#18: Shazam! (2019)

You know me, for the most part, I like the DCEU. I don't think it's perfect, I understand the criticisms, but I like how they immediately started by breaking the mold instead of waiting 20-some odd movies to do so.

This is really the tone they've been trying so hard to strike, and they nailed it.

 This opens with parental abuse and car accidents - I didn't expect something described as a "Fun adventure for the entire family" to do that.

Some of the imagery is what I call 'dark with purpose' - it's not dark for the sake of being the DCEU, instead it shows Sivana anger/lack of morals.

The enemy isn't a big CGI world destroying villain, it's one angry dude.

The hero's moral struggle isn't "We have to do this bc we're metahumans." It's "Where does my value as a person come from?"

Is there a humongous disconnect between how Asher Angel and Zachary Levi play the same character? Yeah, it's still tolerable and funny.

Spoilers beneath the cut;

Avatar the Last Airbender: The Tragic Beauty of the Final Agni Kai

Disney's Amphibia

After stealing a mysterious music box, 13-year-old, Anne Boonchuy (Brenda Song) is magically transported to the world of Amphibia, a wild marshland full of talking frog-people. With the help of an excitable young frog named Sprig, Anne will transform from monster to hero and discover the first true friendship of her life!

Wow, it's good to see Brenda Song again!

It visually looks nice, though I fear that in time, like "Star", the story will outgrow the style, but for now it's really pretty.

LBGTQ+ Representation & the Chinese Box Office

#17: Nine (2009)

Not to be confused with 9 (2009).

The first hour is really just a string of music videos from various women.

• A wife
• A Mistress
• A costume designer
• An actress
• A lady from the past
• An editor from Vogue
• His mother

Pretty ones, sensual ones, ones that make you wonder "This is only PG-13?".

"Be Italian" and "My Husband Makes Movies" are the songs I particularly like.

The real surprise is this is by Rob Marshall. "Chicago" Rob Marshall, "Into the Woods" Rob Marshall.

How did this feel so choppy when those are great? Even though the latter was 5 years later and had the Hand of The Mouse steering it, "Chicago" is a masterpiece.

The second hour is improved in a "All the shit hits the fan" kind of way, but a few women (The actress, the editor, the mother) seem hamfisted in.

#16: Aladdin (2019)

Fun fact: My mother has never seen the original Aladdin.

Mind, she was also 8 months pregnant with me when it came out.

I can't think of one casting choice here that wasn't hotly contested online, mainly Will Smith and Naomi Scott. I also cast criticism on Guy Ritchie because...really, why?

There's something to be said for Disney casting a half-Indian woman to be their first brown princesses, but it's also not for us to say if she's 'dark' or 'ethnic' enough.

Anyway I enjoyed this immensely?

The '?' is because while I thought "Sherlock Holmes" was perfectly adequate, I abhor "The Man From Uncle" (It has an uneven, patchy second half and frankly, it doesn't deserve a sequel), and "Rocknrolla" is really badly edited and shot but insanely entertaining (and deserves a sequel), I didn't think Ritchie had it in him to make another movie that didn't give me motion sickness or had more than two colors. Kudos!

So, Sonic The Hedgehog Moved.....

.... To a very crowded February, 2020.

Specifically, February 14th, 2020.

Valentine's Day.

I like to think it's a call back to this but probably not.

Why? Because the director wanted to redo Sonic after the internet clowned on him en mass, as if they really couldn't just take one of the models from the newer games, spruce it up, and put it in.

Not that simply, engines and whatnot differing between games and movies, but....it's not as if they didn't have a model to go on besides making him look like a child in a Sonic costume.


But I'm not here to talk about Sonic going fast into a new release date; I'm here to talk about how crowded of a month it will be.