#53: Uncle Drew

"I just came from hell after beating the devil's ass." may be the greatest line in a movie in 2018.

A loser man who cons people and leeches off of his girlfriend (who the film tries to paint as in the wrong for being enthusiastic about shopping when she supports this guy) enlists the help of an old man and his friends to play a basketball tournament and win 100$k.

This has the same issue that Proud Mary does for me. It exists, I don't have a problem with it, but that's all it does.

Most of the actors are actual NBA stars...and they do a fairly good job, bringing an aspect of realism and genuineness against the outlandishness of the only three actors in the movie (Howrey, Haddish, Kroll).

It's cliche at points - Heart attack, dance battle, 'You get old when you stop playing' - and there's a surprising amount of last minute forced drama (that intercuts between the action and, frankly, stops the film dead).

For those reasons, the screenplay is slapdash and wild, and while the intention were, more than likely, intended to keep the movie upbeat and light, we also are immediately introduced to a montage on how the main character is an orphan who failed at basketball one time against our main bad guy. The movie shouldn't be this heavy.

If you can Moviepass it, and have time to kill, why not.

#52: Paprika (2006)

 Dreamworld Destitution.

A device that enables one to go inside of dreams is stolen by a research psychologist to help people.

Meanwhile, the other scientists who manufactured it are having troubles, as it seems their colleagues are going insane.

It's not as trippy as one would think, perhaps Satoshi Kon thought someone wouldn't make it out alive if it was an hour and a half acid trip.

But when it trips, it trips. It's surprisingly not completely wild and abstract - in fact, it's kind of low on that, using our perceptions of real objects or insinuated fears re: real objects to add to the tense factor.

This movie has a kickass soundtrack. I dig Parade.

Also, the captions for this file are quite nice;

Book 3: The Beach / The Avatar and the Firelord

You're thinking "Wait, how did she get not one, but two of these up in a week when it takes at least two weeks for one set of episodes?"

Because I finally realized that I can have my notes and VLC player opened side by side. Anyway -

Gonna go down to the beach!~

With......

The bad guys?

Book 3: The Painted Lady / Sokka's Master

Water Tribe.

Also, polluted waterways from Fire Nation factories.

Not caring about the wellbeing of your poor citizens - The American Fire Nation Way!

#51: Ready Player One

Vast improvement.


There are only a handful of movies I would consider improved from their books. Ready Player One is one of those, considering it could be nothing else.

Seriously, the book is an incel nightmare, a nerdbro hodgepodge, a weirdo wonderland. The movie keeps Wade's (Tye Sheridan) awkwardness without making him a creep, and Art3mis (Olivia Cooke) is more than a Maniac Pixie Dream Girl.

I wish there was more Aech (Lena Waithe) though.

This movie looks stunning. Seeing it in A) The Theater, B) in 3D, and C) in DBOX must have been a real treat, one that would leave you slightly exhausted at the end.

The story is this; People live in a crapsack world where people can't afford to live and plug into an online MMORPG to live a semblance of a decent life.

Here is where it divulges from present-day America - the creator of this playground has instigated a hunt for clues that will give the winner a lot of money and rights to the game - The OASIS.

And Amazon - I mean, IOI - wants it.

#50: Fahrenheit 451 (2018)

Disclaimer; I have never read this book. So, clearly, this review is a little different.

I suppose this is where a lot of modern YA novels got their initial ideas and since this film doesn't really dig deep onto it's philosophies, it just feels like a bad YA film adaptation.

Complete with different names for common things. So many. Even context clues weren't enough at some points to grasp it.

Out of our three leads, it's kind of same shit different day for Boutella and Shannon, but at least this is somewhat outside of Jordan's wheelhouse.

I hesitate to say that Fahrenheit 451 2018 is bad, but it is really shallow.


So, uh, here's some observations.

#49: Incredibles 2

Fourteen years in the making.

First of all - I went to a 6 PM Thursday showing.

"I can avoid the crowds, I don't think people these days can afford to pay 11$ for a child this late.", I thought, though I can hardly afford it myself.

Per the norm, I get there about 45 minutes ahead of time...and see a family of about 5 kids, older, milling about at the concession stand.

They certainly weren't there to see Hereditary.

"Oh. Hopefully they will be quiet."

There are seats near the front - There are more families already seated near the back - and hope that the crowd stays this size.

T-Minutes 30 minutes...some people sit directly behind me. Why? I think to myself. The theater is maybe 35% full. More than I expected, but still open enough so that you don't sit directly behind someone.

Putting in my earbuds, I listen to a podcast and scroll through social media, head down, and look up to check the crowd size.

Which has swelled to around 70%. The crowd is mixed now, I see college age people, lone adults, more families, some with very small children, and old people.

By the time Bao, the short, plays, the stadium is at around 90% capacity.

But other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play? 

Spoilers, obviously.

Book 3: The Awakening / The Headband

Welcome to Book 3!

It's been a long time coming.

Yep, Aang has been knocked out so long that there was time for him to grow hair - and someone made sure it didn't creep over his arrow. Nice to get a touchup when you're asleep.

#48: The Hunger Games Mockingjay Part 2

Grey and grey morality and color grading.

Now I read these books and was very excited for said movie until they fucked up the casting.

Seriously, I know Americans are dumb as donkey shit when it comes to context clues but Katniss Everdeen isn't 100% white and yet here we are.

I don't think Jennifer Lawrence does a bad job but this casting will never be right to me. At least they didn't bronze her for the rest of the movies like in that initial image from the first movie.

Take your wins where you can get them.

The books were enjoyable - yes, even Mockingjay, which was apparently .... not liked.

 It's been years since I've read them...or saw Mockingjay Part 1, so I only vaguely remember where this should be. I wasn't chomping at the bit to watch these, though I think Catching Fire is the best film.

I did not know Gwendoline Christie was in this movie, but I did know about Mahershala Ali and Julianne Moore.

#47: Hotel Artemis

This is like Atomic Blonde + Fury Road + John Wick, but if those movies were not as great as they are.

 I'm only assuming John Wick is great. Haven't seen it.

This will be a more spoilery review that you're used to here - mainly because you can predict every damn thing that happens - and you don't feel clever for doing so. Just kind of indifferent. 

The year is 2028 - It's pretty much identical to the present day.

• Corporations own basic needs and let Americans perish.
• There are explosions in the sky above Los Angeles.
• Jeff Goldblum is here.

However! There's a bunch of cool sci-fi shit, like AI that basically makes nurses obsolete - except one.

Welcome to Hotel Artemis - Staffed by two people with fake names and occupying several more people with fake names, it's a hospital for assassins, thieves, and criminals.

It's not Universal Health Care, though, you have to pay a subscription to get cared for. Some things never change.

The characters are all reasonably entertaining with colorful pasts that are only hinted at - except two one of them. And unfortunately, that is the most boring backstory ever.

The problem with Hotel Artemis is that the conflicts are extremely contrived;

Big City Greens: Space Chicken / Steak Night

Alongside The Owl House and another new show I cannot recall, Disney is slowly killing it's XD channel and moving things over to the main one, and the first new show (Not counting the Big Hero 6 series premiere last November), is Big City Greens;

Follow the offbeat adventures of 10-year-old Cricket Green, a mischievous and optimistic country boy who moves to the big city with his wildly out of place family – older sister Tilly, father Bill and Gramma Alice. Cricket’s natural curiosity and enthusiasm lead him and his family on epic journeys and into the hearts of his new neighbors.

#46: Wasted! The Story of Food Waste

Respect those who tend to the earth.

If you read nothing else in this review, know that "best by" codes on food are bullshit. Sell-by does not equal "It goes bad on THIS DAY". The food does not know what day it is! Smell it! Learn what a food 'gone wrong' looks like.

Also RESTARAUNTS CAN DONATE FOOD TO CHARITY, THE GOOD SAMARITAN ACT SAYS PEOPLE CAN'T SUE THEM IF THEY GET SICK.

From our job force, to our health care, we're a broken country filled with people who do not know better, or put too much faith into rich people to make it better.

Today's problem is food waste - Americans waste a startling amount of food, nearly 40% of what we grow and produce.

The filmmakers break down what we can do to alleviate food waste with an inverted pyramid. In Japan, a company is importing scraps to feed their livestock.

An interesting idea is presented - using food in some of its pre-what you know of them stages, using all parts of a crop - cauliflower, for instance, is 60% big bushy leaves that no one eats and 40% the white stuff.

They hit upon a lot of topics, some more in depth than others;

#45: Love, Simon

Special and not special all at once.


Happy Pride Month!

This took me forever to watch because I was torn between worry and laughing every thirty seconds because this is a really funny movie.

I hear and understand the criticisms of "We could use more stories about non-white gay men coming out.", but this was a positive, happy-ending, widely released movie.

It means a lot to people, even to my black, bisexual-closeted self.

I appreciate the little asides, especially the one where Simon has an Imagine Spot where he goes to college and there is a mass dance number to "I Wanna Dance With Somebody" and everyone has multi-colored shirts. Totally unexpected, and had me laughing for a while.

Realization struck me that Nick Robinson is the annoying older boy from Jurassic World. Glad he's not doing that shit anymore!