Nabeel Mahomed

As a standalone film, Superman is a triumph in casting. David Corenswet embodies (an albeit whiny) Superman in every way: his sincerity, naivety, hope, and belief in humanity shine through every scene. Rachel Brosnahan gives us a Lois Lane who’s no damsel—she’s a fierce, intelligent reporter who actively shapes the story, not just reacts to it. Nicholas Hoult’s Lex Luthor is truly chilling: calculated, bitter, and dangerously intelligent. There are a lot of superheroes in this movie, but it makes sense—Clark is around 30 here and has been Superman for three years, so a wider world already exists. The question is whether these characters are given enough space, and I think, mostly, the answer is yes. The Daily Planet characters are well done, especially Lois and Clark. Jimmy Olsen’s portrayal is different, but interesting. The so-called “Justice Gang” (a name from Guy Gardner—thankfully not likely to stick) is handled well for their screentime. Green Lantern and Mr. Terrific were excellent additions. Hawkgirl left me wanting more, which is a good thing—she’s being set up well for future development. I’m hoping we get a solo project that does justice to her rich lore. Metamorpho could’ve used more development—he plays his role, but feels a bit undercooked. Since he’s a more niche character, I doubt we’ll see a solo project, which makes this missed opportunity more noticeable. The Engineer, however, is where the movie slips into “tell, don’t show.” Only two lines explain her origin and motives, which isn’t enough. On the other hand, Ultraman could be seen as Gunn's way of telling us that the Multiverse does exist, but he's avoiding it (probably in response to Marvel’s multiverse fatigue). I don’t think the multiverse ruined the MCU—it was how they handled it. So I’d welcome DC’s version done right, and it is a huge part of the lore, but the DCU can work without a Foerever Evil movie at the very least. Lex’s motivations: perfectly portrayed if you catch one particular conversation. Otherwise, they might not be clear to everyone. His hatred for Superman—rooted in jealousy, fear of alien superiority, and pure ego—is present in his words and actions. But many viewers I spoke to didn’t pick up on it. Gunn does well to keep it subtle, but I’d argue slightly more overt storytelling wouldn’t hurt for broader clarity. My biggest issue? The science. As someone who studies physics, it pulled me out. Yes, it’s science fiction, but Lex is using Earth tech. What he creates goes far beyond any justified leap. Had he studied Kryptonian tech or the Phantom Zone projector, maybe, but there's no setup and unfortunately a terrible explanation I'd have been better off without. It just goes too far. Still, Marvel's done worse thus far. Overall, this was a decent, experimental start to the new DCU with Gunn's promise of no origins and younger, more inexperienced characters.

I've platted this game and I hate it. The positive: I LOVE the counter mechanics that were added...OFFLINE. It really adds a whole new level of skill and awareness required to become an expert, and it was an unexpected but more than welcome addition to the Budokai Tenkaichi series. The supermoves are visually appealing. The negatives. Forgive me, I may misquote numbers and moves. The story. Every. Single. DBZ game. Is meant to have you play through the EXACT same story mode, done differently, just to let you relive the anime without watching Goku hold a spirit bomb while laughing for 3 whole episodes. Xenoverse tried something new and I was sort of into it, but not all the way since I didn't get to play through everything. This game, however, gives you not only the Microsoft Office Presentation slides that nobody asked for, but also manages to show just how terrible the graphics really are. In comparison to Budokai Tenkaichi 3, it falls so short it's laughable. There are hardly any proper cinematics and most are the length of a GIF. I'd easily compare it to a Sonic 06 cinematic. It took what, 17 years for us to finally get a sequel and it somehow looks WORSE than its predecessor. The one thing I can give the story credit for is the ability to observe the "cinematic" through the character's eyes. That was enough for a laugh. No matter how well you land the counter timing offline, the input delay alone makes online mode the most insufferable thing to deal with. And one of the trophies/achievements requires you to play 100 online battles. The entire online mode in and of itself is a mistake. It's so unbelievably unbalanced. There is no point in playing your favourite character unless you've got an ethernet connection and don't suffer from said input delay, in which case, someone like Ultra Instinct Goku, with about 5 bars of health would pose no problem to someone with 3 or 4 bars of health. The health scaling is also terrible for an online mode and story-wise in general. Goku Black has got about 4 bars, so do Buu and Golden Frieza. But Vegito, the more useless fusion who's never actually accomplished much, has the same amount of health as Gogeta, which is about 5 bars. However, Vegito couldn't even beat Goku Black. In addition, there is also damage scaling. Ultra Instinct Goku's ultimate can take about just over 2 health bars. Other characters will take a little less than one and a half. There's no point in being any other character unless you've got the hardware to deal with the disadvantage. Insert Sparking mode. Charge your max ki, then use a skill point to double charge and enter sparking mode, where your basic attacks become a never-ending combo. Add to that dragon rush, which immediately zaps you to the other side of the enemy from what you were facing, and you can get behind them, where the only way for you to escape is to perform a counter that requires proper timing. The worst part is, once you're downed by this combo, they get an almost guaranteed hit with their ultimate because your character refuses to get up in time. Which makes sense, there should definitely be a few moves that stop recovery until one hits the ground. But some of them keep you there for the most unreasonable amount of time. For brevity, recovery frames, custom battles, and the removal of local tournaments and fights all add to this nonsense.

Spoilers alert. Deal with them. I tried to love it. I really did. The fight scenes were awesome. The chemistry was there. The cameos were great in the middle. And not so much everywhere else. Reynolds really got whoever he could from the first 2 movies, put them in a room together and said they were the people he loved most, as if I should care about half of them. His motivation throughout the movie is very difficult to empathise with because its beginning is unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe that he went back in time to save Vanessa, get dumped by her for not doing Deadpool things and didn't go back and unsave her? What absolute nonsense. Wolverine on the other hand? Very easy to empathise with. Hugh played the screw-up like a pro. And helping us see through that was all Cassandra was good for in the movie. Why change her comic origins and make her less of a Villain but even more ambitious? Ambitious for what, exactly, I'm not sure myself. First she likes her freedom, then she's upset her brother, who had no way of finding her and could very likely have been pruned, didn't come for her, then she's hopeful that her brother loved her, then she's upset that the TVA wanted her dead and her end game is to destroy all of the multiverse save for the void so she can be free again? Again, this movie was rated R. The only kids watching it pirated it. So why try to entertain them??? Don't get me started on the Deadpool army and Dogpool that were just added to have a fight scene and a joke that ran for way too long. Even better: Disney still hates smart thinking. Not that of their writers, no, that much has been painstakingly obvious from Doctor Strange 2 at the very least. But they hate it when characters show ingenuity to solve a complex and often seemingly unsolvable problem. But of course, what they did in the end to stop the villain miraculously stopped the thing Deadpool had been hopelessly worried about fixing the entire time. It isn't like the higher ups in the TVA became aware of everything and would now do their best to try and help him since he stopped Cassandra, no. He did it himself by accident. The same thing happened in Captain Marvel 2, and Ms Marvel, obviously She-Hulk wasn't dealing with her problems so she complained to management. What's the point of a superhero movie without stakes? WHAT IS THE POINT? I wish I didn't hold out hope for this one because clearly, Boss Baby is real and their HQ is at Disney. They've infiltrated Marvel's screenwriting teams and that's why we have the last 5 years of nonsense with the odd diamond in the rough.

I started reading Percy Jackson in the second grade. Didn't know what was going on for a few years and starting with the Titan's Curse didn't help that, but I've read EVERHTHING. Something that really ticked me off was how Grover spoiled everything, like the Medusa scene, and the Lotus Hotel. ESPECIALLY the Lotus Hotel. Name one scene more iconic from the movies than that. And that was the depressing thing... the movie was way off script but still made those scenes really memorable. For that series, that Rick Riordan himself disliked, to have done a better job than the show he had a hand in making felt so off-putting... Some parts were unnecessarily rushed, like the scene with Procrustes, or Charon. Riordan wrote this stuff with the perfect mix of wit, action and humour, and sadly, the show doesn't always live up to that. I must applaud a few things, though. I seriously enjoyed the first two episodes, meeting Hades, the finale, and the development of relationships when Grover wasn't helping them avoid the whole point of the next monster. As for the middle of the show, it's not bad but it's far from great... I just hope Sea of Monsters pulls through.