Reviews

It's best to not think of this as having anything at all to do with the Harry Potter movies/books. Which is easy to do since it isn't even remotely similar. It's watchable owing to the performances of several great actors but my oh my the story and production are embarrassingly bad. I'm not sure why they felt they needed to have all the fights occur in a mirrorverse like Dr. Strange, which ruined the scenes, or whether they hoped we'd fill in the plot for them if they made it convoluted enough. It's exactly like every other regurgitated movie Hollywood puts out these days: no creative vision or even respect for the source material, ugly cgi, and high school level writing.

This movie is so bad it feels like a joke. I really can't believe how this turned out. It feels like a low budget production with a script written from fan-fiction. The writing is just next level trash you'd expect from a poorly made video game adaptation. Everything seems completely amateur here, but what really ruins things for me is how they've ended things for one of the few good characters they have left; seriously that's how we're wrapping things up?? That's her conclusion? I can't believe all the wasted potential and years of world development this movie ruins. Also surprisingly bad CGI. Awful. Just awful.

Let me be straight with you: this is the most boring Star Wars story there is. I'm getting sleepy just thinking about it. The sand is the most exciting character until they bring Mando in to fix it. Boba Fett was better off dead for sure. I don't blame the actors, but the production is beyond dull. Read the synopsis if you want (still boring) but I'd only watch the episodes with Mando in them if I had it to do over again. Unless you need something to put you to sleep, in which case this is the perfect series for you.

So far (up to part iv) the show has been "good". But considering that they have both stars of the prequels and the unlimited resources of Disney, this show should have been an easy home-run. How do you make a series with both Vader and Obiwan that doesn't induce a conniption fit from watching it? Obiwan is a fantastic character so it's a shame to see him treated so dismissively.

It really boggles the mind to think that after 5 movies and 2 series Disney is still botching things up this bad. I disagree with the sentiment towards Reva, I think she's a fine character (probably even shows the most emotion out of anyone) and the rest of the cast does just a great job. But once again the writing is just unimaginative and dull. The action scenes have some really cool moments, but not enough. Particularly unforgivable is the part iii duel between Obiwan and Vader. If you're going to include a new lightsaber duel between Obiwan Kenobi and Darth Vader before the Death Star then you dang well better do it right! I also really disagree with the brokenness of Obiwan. It was fine for an episode or two, but it shouldn't have gone on so long. The world is depressing enough without seeing your once cheerful heroes reduced to somber shells of who they once were.

This should have been so easy to get totally right. There's just no energy or soul to this show. It is good though! Definitely worth watching. Which is more than I can say about Boba Fett. No one should watch Boba Fett but an insomniac. I'm sleepy just thinking about it.

There's a running joke about having to not think too deeply about the existential issues raised by Pixar movies (e.g. "where are all the people in Cars?", "Do my toys suffer when I grow up and stop playing with them?"), but that's especially applicable to this movie. I get that Pixar was trying to teach kids that feeling sad is okay, but if you really look at what's happening in this movie it's clear that this little girl is having a full mental collapse and entering full blown depression-with all her "core memories" being turned blue. Not feeling okay sometimes is okay, but this isn't exactly the message they were going for. Tye way Sadness is portrayed is that her being sad is somehow funny. Like "oh isn't it funny that this character embodies depression and has to be dragged around by her foot because she's too overwhelmed with sadness to function?" Also, what does it say about the parents when mom's driving emotion *is* sadness and dad's is anger? That's a scary suggestion that mom's depressed and dad has anger issues.

But honestly, all of that I could ignore because most of it will fly over kids' heads anyway. The real issue is that this movie is just boring. It has a great cast, but it's not funny and the plot just kind of bumbles along uninterestingly. Ironically, for a film about literal emotions with themes about developing emotional depth, this movie is pretty artificial: the animation is pretty to look at, but there really aren't any new ideas on display. The whole little people inside your head schtick is nothing new. It's just a forgettable movie. Not terrible or painful to watch, but nothing awesome either.

The first half of the series is excellent! Really love what they had going on. Tom Hiddleston is obviously great, as well as the rest of the cast. It kept me super intrigued with the sense of mystery and wonder right up until they pulled back the curtain on this new mystery Loki. Nothing against the actress, I think she does a great job! But from that point on I was no longer hooked and just got more and more turned off by it. The mystery gradually lost all gravitas for me, and the big bad guy at the end was a huge disappointment (again nothing against the actor, just felt like a weak ending)

I hated that they trivialized the infinity stones (may have happened earlier in the show). We spent about 2 dozen fantastic blockbusters building these mcguffins up to be like the ultimate power in the universe, only to throw them out without a satisfying explanation. The Ancient One says in Endgame that these things sustain existence, but now-for whatever reason-this new realm renders them entirely ineffective. Obviously the MCU needs to move past the stones but doing it this way just broke continuity for me. If there aren't any hard rules to this universe then there aren't any real, lasting consequences either. It's like "oh here's a new big bad guy and oop he just killed Thor but it doesn't matter because they'll just write him back to life somehow." The series just seemed to shred everything the MCU has built up to this point, and suddenly since anything can happen because all the established rules are gone, nothing matters anymore.

I was not a fan of the incestuous romance angle. They're genetically twins so spin that however you want. But I could have let that go if the series had maintained the thrill of how it began.

Overall, it's probably a good idea to watch this to stay up to date on the MCU as a whole, but I was looking forward to it being over.

The cast does a nice job, but the show just kind of middles on after a great first act. It was interesting to watch once for the mysterious aspects, but I wouldn't revisit it. For me, it comes down to poor writing. They take the infinity stones, which the MCU built up to be the very fundamental forces of the universe, and reduces them to inconsequential trickets, without providing a compelling explanation for why. It felt like a cheap attempt to raise the stakes of the current story to compensate for the inability to create something original. The production only slightly deviates from a single tone, and while it works on certain levels, I never felt connected to the characters or engaged with their situations. I believe the cast was held back by the writing and production, which had some fanciful effects and dazzling set pieces, but failed to capture the emotions/intensity of each moment. It's the old adage about "show me; don't tell me." Finally, while I appreciate both the actors, the whole romantic angle they were pushing was just gross and felt forced. They're genetic siblings/twins. I don't care if they were separated across different timelines, if a real person found out they were dating their long lost sister they didn't know existed, it would still be incest. Nasty. Tom Hiddleston does a great job, obviously. And the plot is interesting, and I enjoyed the development of the mystery, but I was hoping they'd close the story out with this one season.

This film is heralded as some sort of triumph of feminism or reawakening of classic Disney magic. It is neither of those things. There are very few positive messages at all, and quite a number of concerning issues that arise. None of these characters have any trait that is particularly worthy of emulation, and don't acquire adequate character development to attain such a trait. The younger sister (a shut in who probably has never seen a boy her own age before) decides over the course of one night that this rando that came to her sister's party is who she wants to marry-he is a prince after all! Then friend zones the blonde peasant until-surprise!-prince guy turns out not to love me! I better go find blonde bro because apparently he does! And so naturally only this burly man can save me from my sister's tantrum witch curse. Elsa is the awful role model that no little child should look up to. Take a minute to try to think of her positive traits. I'll wait... other than that she loves her sister enough to come save her (though not enough to have talked to her much in the last decade or so). Then there's their proportions. Just like barbie before them, if any human had proportions like these two they would need immediate medical care. No one is shaped like that. From their bug eyes that take up all their triangularly pointed faces, to their tiny waists. It's unnatural. If you want a positive role model, look to Mulan or Hermione or Emilia Earhart or Marie Curie. Cleopatra even! But not some deformed, emotionally unstable damsels in distress. This movie is awful.

I was forced to watch this when it first came out because my best friend liked it somehow. Almost couldn't forgive this. None of the characters are particularly likable or even stand out. It's just dull. And the movie is built around you feeling for this dude, but you can't empathize for him because he's a freaking loon. Zooey (whose character's name I had forgotten until I remembered the name of the movie) tells that guy (who cares what his name is) exactly what her expectations are and he just can't handle it. But the movie acts like we're supposed to side with that guy as if Summer keeps playing games with him-even though she repeatedly tells him exactly what she's looking for to make sure he doesn't get the wrong idea. And that is the plot. Which is less exciting than watching this guy break plates with a frown. Which is the highlight of this movie. And what's with the parentheses on (500)? Hipster garbage. I hate it so much. Zooey is always a cute person but I can't even like her in this. World, listen to me. Let's all agree not to include this movie in any time capsules or culture pods sent into space so that if some apocalypse does occur we can at least have the silver lining of knowing this movie ended with the rest of the world. 2 stars for Zooey. But don't see this movie whatever you do. Probably used in Guantanamo.

Spent the whole movie waiting for something to happen to movie the plot along. It was less fun to watch these people in a bunker than it would be to actually be stuck in such a bunker. Got so excited when she finally did escape and there were monsters outside. But then it ended.