(film review) - The New Mutants

20th Century Fox had purchased the X-Men off of Marvel when Marvel was heading into bankruptcy and in a desperate attempt, to gain some money to stay afloat, Marvel sold a lot of their characters.  It meant that everything to do with X-Men and Mutants belonged to Fox.  They sold Spider-Man and his universe, Ghost Rider, Blade, Hulk, Namor, Daredevil and only kept a handful of heroes.  Fox also purchased The Fantastic 4, so Fox had both the world of the X-Men and Fantastic 4 to do what they will with.  The only stipulation like the others, keep making films and if there is a period of possibly 5 years (I could be wrong, might be 10 years - as it's from memory) where there is no production on a movie, then the rights will go back to Marvel.  We have seen this play out twice between movie studios.  One with The Fantastic 4 and another with The Spider-Man movies (Hence why we are on our 3rd Spidey).  Where Fantastic 4, seems to have NOW gone back to Marvel (although there has been no talk on it) and will likely be an announcement of a upcoming film by Marvel in the next few years, the X-Men franchise and their weird success over the years stayed with Fox until Disney bought Fox whilst they were making this movie.

Disney's purchase of Fox Studios meant that not only would Disney automatically acquire The fantastic 4 (if they didn't already have it by then), they would also acquire all the rights to the X-Men and the word Mutants.  What it meant for the movie though, was that the film had finished initial production and then went into a limbo state.  No reshoots, no release date, just nothing.  The film was meant to come out 2 years ago and it kept getting pushed and pushed and pushed back.  The end product is this and personally, while I don't think the film is terrible, reshoots or a more in-depth storyline would have been more beneficial and would have went a long way.  I'll explain.

Five teenagers coming into Mutant-hood have been sent to a facility where a doctor named Dr. Reyes (Alice Braga) is assigned to help them harness and control their powers when they first discover them, however when newcomer Danielle Moonstar (Blu Hunt) arrives, everyones greatest fears come to life and an entity called the Demon Bear arrives to feast off of their fear and kill them.  The New Mutants, Wolfsbane (Maisie Williams), Magik (Anya Taylor-Joy), Cannonball (Charlie Heaton) and Sunspot (Henry Zaga) along with Dani Moonstar must band together, confront their fears and defeat the Demon Bear.

So, as I've previously stated, the film isn't terrible.  However, where I think they tripped up, was trying to do a horror movie for kids.  Josh Boone was not ideal or he didn't push the boat out far enough.  Drag Me to Hell by Sam Rami is a PG-13 and successfully bridges that gap between horror and child-friendly (PG-13), where this movie, although has some scary-ish imagery, I didn't find it creepy, atmospheric, spooky or frightening at all.  That could well be due to my fresh-hold and Drag Me to Hell is a completely different movie, but this movie tries, but not successfully.  You are not allowed enough time with the characters or to get inside their heads to understand their personal problems, journey or their powers.  When I think of this movie, I think of Leonardo DiCaprio's Shutter Island, mixed with some kind of home invasion movie like Home Alone, but with a bunch of kids, The Goonies, but this movie only scratches the surface.  The story was decent but could have been more compelling and gripping.  The film was fairly choppy at the beginning and felt slightly rushed.  The connection between the Demon Bear and Danielle, although obvious, could have played out better.  It would have been nice if the movie was slower paced and more character driven with insane things happening in spats only to become a big deal later.  The film does that, but it just wasn't long enough, you are simply not engaged with the characters or feel for them other than the fact that they are a bunch of kids.  Even the final fight could have been longer and mo cohesive.

Not to bash the film, but I loved the acting between the characters although the LGBTQ+ moment felt forced.  The special effects were great especially something as ridiculous as a Demon Bear, looked amazing with smokey red eyes.  Magik and Sunspot looked great.  I loved the effects on the eyes.  The Magik scenes were also great.  The Wolfsbane design was ok and I loved the Cannonball look as well as Sunspot, but I wish I got more from the.  Even those things which were meant to be scary looked ok, but could have been a touch scarier but I liked the design of them.  

Since the acquisition, I know a lot of people were wondering if there was any reshoots or anything that could tie into the MCU.  Could this be a standalone movie they can incorporate into the MCU?  The answer is no.  This is likely a one and done and although established connections to the X-Men universe of years that have passed, this movie doesn't carry near enough the same weight as those films.  Possibly without the merger or at least with the reshoots, we may have had something better, but this film is more or less on the same scale as Apocalypse and the Phoenix one... Average at best, but had a lot of potential.

(trailer review) - James Bond: No Time To Die

(Trailer 2)

(Big Game Spot Trailer)

(Original Trailer)

Whoa whoa whoa!!!  It seems like they are back on the promoting of this movie and they have certainly AMPED up the trailer to slap us in the face with some James Bond Double Zero goodness and I can assure you, that not only am I ready for it, I. AM. HERE. FOR. IT. *throws non-existent money in the air*.

I grew up on Roger Moore.  Pierce was decent but I believe i only saw one movie of his. Daniel on the other hand is my guy and this just looks amazing.  The last oe wasn't as good as Skyfall but this one looks sooo much more great, I just feel they will handle this differently and very well.
Lashana Lynch, whether she will be the next Bond or codename 007 remains to be seen, but damn doesn't she move with grace and elegance in these shots.  I'm soo loving it!
I'm loving that Rami's face isn't completely disfigured and i'm glad we see more of him.  I kept thinking, he doesn't want to play a terrorist but if he is trying to kill everyone, doesn't that make him one or are they pulling a bait and switch? Whatever it is, he is a credible actor and I have nothing but a good feel for this movie.
I just hope hey keep in that bridge jumping scene where you see him scoop up the cable with his foot! Also, it reminded me of 'Because the lady loves Milk Tray', he just needed a dark suit.

Directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga and starring Daniel Craig, Ralph Fiennes, Naomie Harris, Rami Malek, Léa Seydoux, Lashana Lynch, Ana de Armas, Ben Whishaw & Jeffrey Wright

(series review) [STREAMING] - DC's Stargirl

Greg Berlanti is the one guy who I can imagine in the most recent of years to be the living and breathing depiction of Scrooge McDuck jumping off of a diving board into a pool of money.  You see, he is solely responsible (to my knowledge anyway) for every single DC show you are seeing now, hearing of or have seen in recent years.
In 2012, the show Arrow starring Stephen Amell played the DC character Green Arrow.  Fans and critics alike deemed the show to be a Batman "Rip-off", not rip-off per-say but, his enemies were Batman's enemies.  That didn't stop the show as the show was great and improved by each season.  I believe it was season 2 where they introduced Barry Allen whom would later become The Flash, to then have his own series a year later, introducing crossovers from each show and then expanding the now aptly titled 'Arrowverse (Arrow universe) wider to include lot of other heroes and different teams throughout DC history.  Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, Black Lightning, Batwoman and the up and coming Superman & Lois, not to mention other DC shows he helps to produce, Titans, Doom Patrol and Stargirl.  Even when you watch the Chillin Adventures of Sabrina, Greg's name is there! But without him and his input and efforts, Stargirl may not have been made and be as good as it is.

I'm not sure which year Stargirl takes place, whether before the Arrowverse characters as I'm assuming, techinically, it is meant to be as Stargirl is part of the Justice Society of America which comes before the Justice League of America, but the JSA have been wiped out by the villains.  The villains win and the sole survivor, Stripesy meets and marrys a lady named Barbara, Courtney's mother and they move to a town called Blue Valley and he leaves his past behind him.  Unfortunately, Courtney stumbles across the Cosmic Staff, previously held by Starman and would ONLY work for Starman, Courtney, now Stargirl wants to pick up where Starman left off and try to uncover a plot of villainy.

This show is decent and well worth the watch.  Having watched ALL of The Arrow episodes season after season, fairly caught up with The Flash, up-to-date with Supergirl, Black Lightning and Titans (although Titans is a separate thing, kinda), I'd like to say that Stargirl has the tone of the Arrowverse, especially shows like Supergirl and The Flash as it is fairly lighthearted, but it does have some slightly darker elements, not enough to be Arrow dark or Black Lightning dark in some cases, but we are talking about a bunch of teens taking on supervillians and these supervillains are no joke.

With that said, the choreography, like all the aforementioned shows have been amazing.  This show, blatantly wirework, but the use of movement with these characters are excellent.  As stiffly fluid as they possibly can as most of if not all of the fight scenes are practical.  There are some fights that are blatantly special effects but most of the special effects are for other elements of the show, so i found that the fighting scenes were very entertaining.  Yes you can tell it is wirework, but the fights are just great.  These teens get slapped up soo much, it made me laugh out loud on numerous occasions.  They do give as hard as they get in some cases and the work with the cosmic staff is excellent.

The cosmic staff is essentially its own character.  If you are into Marvel movies and know about Thor's trusty hammer, the cosmic staff is similar to that in the sense that only the user can use it, but the staff is sentient.  The staff moves by itself, helps the user to fly, flashes a bright light and can be used as a formidable weapon in combat.  The way the staff moves with and around Stargirl helping her whilst she is wielding the staff is nothing like i've ever seen before.  The staff does however come across as very convenient to plot and story though.  When they want to have the staff work for the story or move/act in a particular way, it would. If they don't want it to work in a particular way and they want to show Courtney get hurt or whatever, then it won't.  There were times I felt like the Staff could have assisted Courtney in moments and it did nothing.

Onto doing nothing, some of these villains were just in the show for the numbers.  Some were pointless and others didn't really show face until the end and still didn't do anything.  I liked that some of the villains were selfish, had their own goals and ideas which caused conflict between some of them, that was good, but for the most part, you only had possibly 3-4 villains which were great and entertaining.  The music was decent and just overall, the story was intriguing enough to have you engaged.  A little fluffy and bubblegum in places but I liked how they managed to balance teenage angst and heroism.  If you can watch the show. It would be interesting how a second season would go especially how it ended.