5 Best Films Dealing With Dark Subjects (A.K.A: How Films Help Us Cope)

On June 17, 2016August 16, 2021 By troubledproductionsIn ListLeave a comment

So when the world seems to be turning to shit, who you’re going to call?

ghostbusters2016 — No, not them. Never them.

On an individual level people turn towards music, most people have that one album they turn to in times of need (for me it’s I’m Wide Awake It’s Morning) but on a wide scale it’s films. It’s films that give us hope, that force us to stare into the abyss and envelop us. Films can effect us in a way other media can, music you can take in bitesized chunks whereas films you usually take it all at once. And unlike books everybody experiences it at the same pace, everyone is going through the same journey at the same time. So which films are the best at dealing with these kind of subjects? Well, these.

1. The Middle East – Persepolis

Yeah, I know I mention this a lot. But it is very good. A bleak, yet still hilarious account of growing up in Iran during the most turbulent time in their recent history, made all the more depressing when you realize it’s all true. It’s one of those films that really makes you realize how awful it is over there, you realize exactly why hordes of people are attempting to escape, and how it was all kickstarted by British and US governments attempting to install a puppet dictator during the Second World War. That’s the great thing about being British, you look over the world, at Israel/Palestine, at Iran, at Ireland, and you can just sit their thinking “See that chaos? We did that”.

persepolis — Just one moment of many which is made better when you realize it happened.

2. The Holocaust – Life Is Beautiful

I was torn between this and Schindler’s List. What won this one over is the fact that it doesn’t start awful, the holocaust elements don’t happen until about half way through the film. Before that it’s a somewhat silly Italian romcom, and I think that is kind of essential. The characters characterization is as a jokester, a clownish figure surrounded by horrific things. That’s what drives his character, it influences his relationship with his son, with the other inmates, and (spoilers) even his death. That’s why the first part is needed, we need to see the character in his natural environment, we need to establish his character. As such this film is, without a doubt, the best holocaust-based comedy of all time. Although the only competition is apparently awful and hasn’t been released.

3. World War 2 – Grave Of The Fireflies

There are two types of people in this world, those who cry at this film, and those without a soul. Animated, and done by a company generally known for doing the kind of heartwarming fantasy tales that used to be the forte of Disney, only with more violence and raccoon testicles. The typical US attitude to nuclear power is it causes superpowers, Japan see’s it as either unleashing monsters or causing horrific events, it’s almost as though they have completely different views on nuclear warfare for some reason.

atomic-bombing-hiroshima-nagasaki-70-years — Can’t imagine why.

This, alongside Barefoot Gen create a horrific narrative. One which focuses on the impact that war has on people. How much someone’s life can change and be impacted by somebody with no idea of what he’s done, somebody who never has to look into the eyes of the people he’s killed. This films is generally seen as an anti-war film in the US. Which is a bit weird, all this is doing is showing the effects, this is not anti-war, it’s just honest about what it entails. It could just as easily be seen as pro-war, you could argue that “we need this war to stop things like this happening”.

4. Heart Transplants – Bogowie

Or, as it’s often called by me: “Fucking Bogowie! Holy shit!” Without a doubt the best film ever made about a ragtag group of misfit heart surgeons in 1980’s Russian-occupied Poland. This film is not just about surgery, it’s also about just living in that area at the time, how you could not get anything done without some form of bribery. You can really feel the frustration going through everyone involved. I knew this was based on a true story, but I didn’t realize how big the story was until the final moments, where it showed a picture from the aftermath.

This-is-Zbigniew-Religa_-Former-Minister-of-Health-of-Poland-who-died-in-2009-due-to-lung-cancer_-The-photo-taken-by-James-Stanfield

The above image (taken by photographer James Stanfield) was chosen as one of the best 100 photos ever published by National Geographic. The picture shocked the world, a doctor, carefully watching out for the patient, whilst another doctor sleeps in the corner. The patient, laying there, his life in the hands of equipment which is (let’s be honest) not fit for purpose. People were wondering if the patient will survive the week, yet he’s still alive today (sadly, unlike the doctor, the cigarette smoking former Minister Of Health Zbigniew Religa, who passed away from lung cancer in 2007). Look again at that picture, see the exhaustion on the doctors face, that’s there for good reason; the surgery itself took 23 hours, the doctor in the corner isn’t being lazy, he couldn’t physically stand anymore. It was physically and mentally demanding, as can be seen in this video (it’s in Polish, but worth watching purely for the footage of the surgery). Today, heart transplants save lives all over the world, and it’s thanks to doctors like Religa that that happened, but importantly, it’s also down to photographers like James Stanfield that we can truly get a glimpse at their dedication.

5. Terrorism – Four Lions

A somewhat different one from all the others. This is the only one on the list which isn’t based on a true event, but it’s still important and relevant. This a film that managed to annoy everybody, the tabloids were annoyed because “it’s mocking dead terrorist victims” whereas terrorists were offended because they were made to look like idiots. The thing is, when you watch it, it’s actually not that offensive. The subject matter itself is the only offensive thing about it, there’s nothing in the film really that makes you thin “ok they’ve gone too far now”. Basically, he made an inoffensive film about the most offensive subject matter, for some reason I really connect with that. This film does have one thing in common with the rest of these films though: they’re all films which I would consider to be among the best I’ve ever seen. This is one of only two films I’ve seen applauded mid-film (the other was the sublime In The Loop)

So that’s our favourites. I think the lesson from this is this; it’s okay to talk about dark themes. You need something to shine a pinprick of light into the darkness. So bring on the darkness! Let me dive headfirst into oblivion so that I can burst out the other side with a new viewpoint on the world, so I can be permanently scarred and changed by what I’ve seen. Don’t get me wrong, being needlessly shocking or offensive is just lazy (seriously, fuck A Serbian Film, a film I’m lucky enough to have never seen) and pointless. But films that will shock you, and keep you entertained? That’s just the perfect mix. So I’ll end it there, if anybody needs me I’ll be swimming in a pool of nothingness.

The 5 Best Football Stories (With No Major Films About Them)

On June 10, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn ListLeave a comment

So, Euro 2016 kicks off today, and what better way to ~~take advantage of~~ celebrate than by an in-depth look at every team in the tournament? Yeah, we’re not doing that. I was going to do a blog looking at the movies from each country and try to work out which one would win if football tournaments were decided based on which country made the best movies (like they should be), but then realised that would require watching Russian cinema, and I already spent far too long with a knife to my wrists so watching “Life Is Awful And You’re Going To Get Killed By A Bear Whilst Drinking Vodka, Unless You’re Gay Then You’ll Just Be Killed By Police 2: The Sequel” won’t help. So I decided to showcase the hidden side of sport, the side I find fascinating, the stories told within. People love a good sports movie (maybe not as much as they did in the 90’s but still), even more so if they’re based on a true story. So here’s my favourite football stories which are yet to be (major) films.

1. Leicester 2016

Let’s start with the obvious. Hands up everybody who saw this coming. Liars! Sit down. Leicester barely escaped relegation last year so the odds of them not being relegated, let alone winning were astronomical. This isn’t hyperbole, the odds of it happening were 5000-1. With a squad which cost less to put together than some teams spent on one player, those odds were well placed. To put those odds in perspective: it was more likely that Q-Unit herself, Queen Elizabeth II would not only release a song, but also get to Christmas Number 1, five times more likely in fact. And it was over two times more likely that Kim Kardashian would be president.

8635f8036484fbea9ec50e4c64f42248 — Still better than Trump.

So what else is 5000-1? William Hill have Nick Grimshaw winning olympic gold at Rio this year at the same odds. Think how preposterous that idea is, that someone with no sports training at all would win gold, THAT’S the level of surprise we’re dealing with.

2) Football War.

“Football” and “war” are two words which are normally only associated together in the following circumstances:

When the English national team plays Germany.
When the English national team plays Argentina.
When the English national team plays France.
When the English national team plays Scotland.
When the English national team plays anybody we’ve invaded (which is all but 22 countries)

But there was once a Football War, it was a conflict between El Salvador and Honduras that lasted for four days in 1969. Although it is called the Football War the reasons for it go far deeper, mainly about land reform and immigration (thank god those things are no longer problems). Honduras enforced a law which meant taking and from Salvadoran immigrants (no matter what their legal status is) to give to Hondurans (something which UKIP would probably do too, because they never learn from mistakes). This caused tensions between the two countries, tensions which came to a head when the two teams played each other on 8 June in the Honduran capital, which was marred by violence from both sets of supporters. Violence was repeated in the return fixture 7 days later. Then after another game later on in the month took place in Mexico City, with again more violence (it’s almost as if getting two countries who are on the brink of war to play three high pressure games against each other in the space of one month is a bad idea). The violence at this final game was so bad that the Salvadoran government severed all diplomatic ties with Honduras. The Salvadoran government responded by attaching explosives to the sides of passenger planes and using them to bomb Honduras, which of course led to the inevitable:

Oh, wait. No, not group hug. The other thing. War, that’s the thing. I’m always getting those two mixed up. Luckily the war ended shortly after, yet an official peace treaty wasn’t signed until 1980, and the effects of the war resonated through El Salvador which was plunged into civil war in 1979. All in all, perfect for a story starring Zac Efron, or whichever young person hollywood loves right now.

3. Hillsborough.

In case the last one wasn’t depressing enough. The Hillsborough disaster was a defining moment in English football, a tale which is still unfolding almost 30 years later. For those unaware: On 15th April 1989 Liverpool and Nottingham Forest met in the FA Cup Semi Final, an inexperienced police superintendent who had no idea how to handle an occasion like this was put in charge of police presence there. Inept handling by the police (including directing fans into an already overcrowded pen instead of empty side pens) led to overcrowding, which led to the deaths of many fans through compressive asphyxia. 96 people died due to the sheer stupidity of David Duckenfield who was in charge of the event. But if that was all that happened it would be sad, no doubt about it, but it wouldn’t be as notable as it is today. What gave this event the notoriety was the reaction. Margaret Thatcher’s press secretary Bernard Ingham, blamed “tanked up mob of Liverpool supporters” and this viewpoint continued, with rumours that everybody involved was drunk, even the children, the dead, innocent children. The Sun handled it with the sensitivity they’re known for, publishing false allegations on the front page of their 19th April edition, claiming Liverpool fans urinated and beat up the police as they were trying to help the victims. This was, like most accusations levelled at the fans, complete bullshit. The response to this from Liverpool is still felt today, with a lot of newsagents still refusing to stock the paper. It got the point where when Alexei Sayle did a documentary about Liverpool, he couldn’t even give it away. People in the area just wouldn’t accept it, he had to put them in a pile and burn them. In 2016 the truth emerged, it was a mixture of bad luck and inept organising, finally the fans were found innocent. It’s this which makes it a good story for me. It’s about a group of people taking on a national newspaper, taking on government officials and the police force, and winning. It’s the ultimate underdog story, albeit one I hope we never have to see again.

4. Mobutu-Zaire.

Mobutu Sese Seko was the “president” of what is now Democratic Republic Of Congo, and was, to put it politely, a bit of a dick. Renaming the country Zaire in 1971 he ruled the land with an iron fist, and guns, mostly guns. Zaire qualified for the 1974 World Cup in some style, with many tipping them to be the surprise package of the tournament. As such, Mobutu decided to use this to showcase his country and how great it was, the team were referred to as his lions, but this didn’t keep them from danger. Defender Boba Lobilo’s brother was a highly regarded newsreader (on a news show which started with an image of Mobutu descending through the clouds, because dickholes don’t do subtlety) when he was arrested. What crime did he commit? He said the name of former finance minister Emmanuel Bamba. That arrest may have been a slight overreaction, but was par for the course for Mobutu, who also threatened to arrest two players for daring to not change their names from Christian ones to more Africanised ones. Of course, in typical dictator fashion he had a lavish palace whilst his people starved. He promised the team riches beyond their wildest dreams if they played well at the world cup. They didn’t, losing their first game to Scotland, and being absolutely humiliated in their second game, losing 9-0 to Yugoslavia. Mobutu sent his people to have a “meeting” with the team. A meeting which consisted of Mobutu’s people telling the team:

“You have all brought shame on to the country of Zaire. You are scum, and sons of whores. The great leader says that if you concede more than three goals against Brazil, you will never see Zaire or your families again”

With 11 minutes of the game left, Brazil were 3-0 up and had a free kick in a good position. As the Zaire wall lined up, defender Mwepu Ilunga rushed out and kicked the ball away before Brazil could take the kick. The commentators used it as an example of African football’s naivety and indiscipline, but in reality he just panicked in the heat of the moment. Brazil retook the kick, and it came to nothing. The final result was 3-0 and the players were sent home, disgraced but still alive and allowed back. Once they got back home the players had their club contracts cut and found it very hard to get work again. A heartbreaking story for the players involved, made worse by fact that Mobutu seemed to escape any form of karmic justice, staying in power until 1997, the first African leader invited to the White House by George H W Bush, and got his country to host Ali/Foreman, to the cost $10million dollars which his country could have used.

5. Christmas Truce

Probably the most well known story in this list. Christmas Day 1914 saw a series of unofficial ceasefires along the Western front, some taking part in football matches. This is simply beautiful, soldiers putting their differences aside to fraternise, seeing each other as equals, not caricatured enemies. This film wouldn’t even need dialogue, the entire thing could just be shown with music, the frantic firing in November, the slowing down in December, the first person going over the trench, the game itself, then the slow realisation that this will never happen again and some of these people will end up dead, killed by the people they played with, then an old man, reliving the war, visiting the grave of an enemy soldier, carefully placing a football down on the grave.

The 5 Best HBO Shows

On May 27, 2016May 27, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn List, Why we loveLeave a comment

The American television industry had shockwaves running through it this week as president Michael Lombardo left after 33 years at the network, 9 of them as network head. Lombardo has spearheaded some of the networks most loved programming, notably he was responsible for guiding Game Of Thrones into development. The future for the network is now somewhat uncertain, not in a “they’re going out of business” way, but in a “wonder what’s happening next” way. Longtime collaborator Terence Winter quit halfway through development of the second series of Vinyl, Westworld had production halted when it was decided it needed retooling, and Game Of Thrones is suffering from rumours that it will end after another two seasons (or in other words; the time it takes George R.R. Martin to decide on a verb). So let’s celebrate the network with this, a look at the best work they’ve produced. This isn’t ranked by order of popularity, or critical success, just personal preference, so statistically nobody will agree with this, if that’s the case, comment and tell us where I went wrong.

5. Sopranos

One of THE shows of the 2000’s. It was almost like they saw Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and said “Awww, Britain thinks they can make gangster related media, how adorable” and reclaimed America as the centrepiece for gangster films and television shows. I said “almost like”, the pilot was actually ordered in 1997, so it’s just a coincidence. But meh, still an awesome show. The effect it had on television cannot be understated, it could easily be argued that it was this, not Breaking Bad that legitimised television as an artform, not as a stepping stone on the way to film. If it wasn’t for this there wouldn’t be Six Feet Under, there wouldn’t be The Shield. It was this, more than anything, that legitimised HBO as a network that provides high concept dramas, a network that will produce content you wouldn’t get anywhere else. This was a show that could only really be done on this network, it was too brutal, too uncommercial to be made by anyone else.

4. Game Of Thrones

A show so good it deserves its place here despite me having never seen an episode. A show once described (not by a critic, or anybody important, but by a woman behind me on the bus) as like “Merlin with muff”. Everyone knows roughly when Harry Potter was published, and it’s the same with a lot of book adaptations, but I think a lot of people would be surprised to discover the first book was published in 1996, yet most people weren’t aware of it until the TV series (the series didn’t really pick up until A Feast Of Crows in 2005). Without the show the book series would be highly regarded, but with it? It’s become a cultural phenomenon, and shown that you can do not just high concept, but high budget adaptations too. If the show was made sooner then the chances of Harry Potter being a TV series instead of film would be much higher, and we might have got Rik Mayall as Peeves, AS WE DESERVE!

3. Veep

A show so good that it’s replaced The Office as evidence that American adaptations of British sitcoms can occasionally work out. Is this better than The Thick Of It? Not quite, but is it worthy enough to be discussed on its own? Definitely. It wasn’t really the easiest show to adapt, ABC attempted it in 2007 with Michael McKean (of Spinal Tap and Better Call Saul fame) and Oliver Platt in the leads. They made the pilot, and by all accounts it was pretty awful, they turned it into a conventionally shot sitcom, removed all improvisation and swearing, and then were surprised when it didn’t work. It would be like if you remade Transformers and took out all references to any robots, removed baking from Great British Bake Off, or added jokes to Joey. So when a second adaptation was announced, people were kind of worried. Then it was announced that Armando Iannucci would be directly involved and people were excited again. Then it was announced that Julia Louis-Dreyfus was the lead and I became very excited as I was a massive Seinfeld fan. I was slightly concerned how an American version of this would be, but it’s just as sweary and brilliant as the original. The original was good, but it didn’t have the line “That’s like trying to use a croissant as a fucking dildo, it doesn’t do the job, and it makes a fucking mess”. It’s probably helped not just by Iannucci as showrunner (at least until the 5th season when David Mandel took over almost seamlessly), there’s other talent behind the camera too. The list of director’s is like a who’s who of British television comedy: Chris Morris, Chris Addison, Tristam Shapeero etc. This show is a mesh of British and American talent, and is all the better for it. Long may it continue (still needs Peter Capaldi though)

2. Curb Your Enthusiasm

Seinfeld is undoubtedly one of the biggest American sitcoms of all time (sadly, one which has never really got the love it deserves over here) so it was always going to difficult for the creator, Larry David to pull off that greatness again. Yet he managed it, this show not just matches his previous show, at many times it beats it. Seinfeld had a weak period, the last two seasons in particular are nowhere near as good as the earlier seasons, but Curb hasn’t suffered that problem. The first season is a little off as the show is still finding its feet, but the second one is just all kinds of brilliant and details the character attempting to make a show after the success of Seinfeld, so lots of meta-comments and the media, lots of in-jokes, and a season long story arc. Basically, all the pretentious stuff that film students love. Oh yeah, the cameos. Because Larry David plays himself, and he konws famous people, there’s a lot of celebrity cameos; Ricky Gervais, John McEnroe, Mel Brooks all send themselves up beautifully. The Ricky Gervais one is important because he also made a cameo-heavy sitcom: Extras. There’s one major difference between the way the cameos are handled thought: Extras is defined by the cameos, episodes can almost be titled after them. People think “oh, that’s the Samuel L Jackson episode”, or “that’s the Orlando Bloom episode” and that’s how they’re defined, in Curb, the story comes first, and it’s all the better for it. The best one is probably Michael J. Fox, where he uses his Parkinsons as an excuse to be a bit of a dick in one of the best “I shouldn’t be laughing at this” moments, of which the show has plenty (a highlight is the episode where a holocaust survivor has dinner with someone from the TV series Survivor, and they argue over which one is the true survivor).

1. Last Week Tonight

An odd choice for number one, I know. Not the funniest, not the best made, but definitely the most important. Like a surprisingly high amount of American political comedy, this owes its existence to The Daily Show. When Jon Stewart took a break from the show in 2013 to make Rosewater, he handed the show over to John Oliver, who filled the role admirably. That’s not an easy role to fill, as anybody who has been on the comments section of the facebook page of the show since Trevor Noah took over can attest (for the record, I think he’s doing an excellent job). John Oliver’s stint was so successful HBO offered him a series. Unlike the Daily Show this only has one episode a week, so isn’t really suited for extremely topical stuff. But what this does mean is the areas they do focus on, they REALLY focus on, aiming for them like US Military planes aim for terrorist training camps, only unlike the military, this show usually hits what it’s aiming for. Whether he’s creating Jeff The Diseased Lung in a segment on tobacco companies, or starting Our Lady Of Perpetual Exemption to show how televangelists should by all rights be told to go f*ck themselves with that knife-penis from Seven, this show constantly creates amazing segments which are perfect for sharing on social media. His reaction to the terrorist attacks in Paris last year was particularly fantastic, basically telling ISIS “if you gigantic arseholes are hoping to win a war of culture with France, good fucking luck”. To me, a personal highlight will alway be his war of words with former FIFA vice president Jack Warner, which led to the corrupt former executive to respond, calling him a “comedian fool” in a really badly made video. It’s weird, you’d think a guy who (allegedly) diverted relief funds from a Haiti earthquake appeal, and illegally sold black market tickets (not allegedly, this definitely happened, and he was punished for this million dollar making fraud by being made to pay back $250,000) would have enough money to make sure his videos were of a better production quality.

The 5 Best Film-Based Video Games

On May 13, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn ListLeave a comment

Happy Friday The 13th everyone! Now like all of you I’ll be celebrating this most holy of days by killing horny teenagers near a lake somewhere (lake, puddle, it’s all the same). But other people celebrate it differently. Since the days of Jesus fighting a Pterodactyl in the Roman Colosseum, some people have watched some of the Friday The 13th films on this day. So it makes logical sense that I should ~~take advantage~~, celebrate this by blogging about it. But I’ve never seen any of the films so instead I’m going to talk about video game adaptations of films, because there was once a video game adaptation of the film, and do I need another reason?

5. Goldeneye

GoldenEye007box

Let’s get the obvious one out of the way. This is the first game everybody talks about when they talk of truly great video games. There’s not a word missing there, that should be “video games based on films”, that’s how good this game is. At the time I’d never watched a James Bond film, and even now I’ve seen one I still think he’s a prick, he’s a sociopathic monster who probably has so many STD’s that he should pretty much change his name to Mydia, Chlamydia. But despite that, I still love this game. It has not aged well however, but that’s mainly because of the lot of the things we found innovative in the game are now standard. Before this game it was normal for weapons and ammo etc just to be laying around, this made ammo collecting logical: you could only pick up what had been dropped by people you killed. Yes, there were a few bits of ammo laying around, but your main source of it was the people you killed. Then there’s the multiplayer. There are two types of people who played video games in the 90’s. Those who spent hours shooting their friends in the head in multiplayer and obeying the “no oddjobs” rule, and liars! Dirty stinking liars!

4. Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy

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This game comes from a different time, whereas modern games help the player, sometimes with tutorials, sometimes with guidance during the game, and sometimes with just skipping parts of it if you find it too difficult. Gaming is now focused on enjoyment, making the player have fun (with a few notable exceptions). It wasn’t always the case, however. Some video games used to make you wonder what you had done to piss off the creators. The biggest genre for this were text adventure games. Games which by their nature were quite annoying: you could spend hours trying to talk to a character before you work out the exact phrasing needed (for example: “Talk to person” wouldn’t be accepted, but “converse with person” would). This game is fiendishly difficult, but also very funny. It will make you laugh, scream in anguish, and then hate yourself, a bit like having sex with a clown. I’m not exaggerating by the way, the game is available here if you don’t believe me.

3. Aladdin

aladdin

Oh, should have mentioned, I am not doing these in any particular order, otherwise there’s no way this would be higher than Goldeneye. But it is very very good. A 2D side scrolling platformer that stands out on a console which it seemed like almost every other game was a platform game. I don’t think people can appreciate how hard it must have been for a platform game to stand out in the early 90’s. You were competing against Mario and Sonic at their peaks. The Mario games had some of the best level design in video game history, easing you into an unforgiving game with innovative gameplay that filled you with wonder, whilst Sonic went “vroom” and moved quickly. So for a game to stand out it must be truly great, and this is. I would talk about why, but I already did it here so anything I’d say would just be repeating myself. So because anything I say would be repeating myself, and I don’t like repeating myself I won’t say anything more, because I don’t like repeating myself.

2. Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World

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Because rarely has a video game of a film been so faithful in tone to the film. Anybody who has played video game versions of films and television shows know that the games can play fast and loose with the themes of the film. For example: there’s a Doctor Who game where you play as the famous pacifist, and go around shooting and killing everyone. In Scarface, crime totally pays, and the Fight Club game has Fred Durst. This game doesn’t suffer from that. It’s a throwback game based on a film which loves 80’s video games. It’s not just the film it uses for inspiration, the graphic novel has a scene where two characters get beaten at the same time and an achievement pops up, if you recreate this in the game, the same achievement pops up. It’s little touches like that which are missing from a lot of games.

1. Alien Isolation.

alien

This game is terrifying, it makes the Alien scary again, which it should be. It should be a fearful beast, it shouldn’t be something you can handle with a few shots from a pistol. This game makes you fear it, and that’s wonderful. You know how highly regarded this game is? It put faith back into the franchise after Colonial Marines, a game so bad someone attempted to sue the makers, and won. Whereas that game had you running around shooting aliens by the hundreds (and just made them into another enemy), this game only has the one alien, and you can’t kill it, all you can do is hide and survive. This is the survival horror game the latest generation has been waiting for. I am in no way saying that the genre is not good anymore, just that it’s mainly indie developers doing it now, you don’t have many major releases anymore (I mean, P.T got cancelled for f*cks sake), most of the franchises people used to turn to for the genre have now changed into more action games, so it’s good to see a game where you’re completely helpless, a game where (contrary to video game logic) exploration and discovery will probably kill you.

So yeah, that’s it. Hope you enjoyed it, and Fuck You Konami

Why We (Already) Love Captain America: Civil War

On May 6, 2016May 7, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn Why we loveLeave a comment

Erm, because it’s good? That’s it, blog’s over everyone, go home and play with your food, eat your wives and make love to your xbox (side note: Ex-Box is a truly vile nickname for someone’s vagina, don’t use it, you’re better than that).

But yeah, this film. It’s……amazing. Pre-hype for this was pretty intense, until Batman Vs. Superman: Dawn’t You (Forget About Me), then people started to get concerned. Was easy to see why, it seemed like Civil War was following a lot of of BvS mistakes: they released a trailer that seemed to give away the plot, then another one which introduced a character people weren’t certain if was going to be in it, and they seemed to be introducing a lot of new characters in one film. I’ll admit, I was really disappointed that they put Spider-Man in the trailer. I thought “but it would have worked better if it was a shock, stupid idiots. I hate them all! Burn them!” But here’s the thing: I was wrong. Spider-Man came in waaaaaay too early in this film for him to be a surprise character. Besides, if that happened then people would walk out talking about “Oh my God, I can’t believe Spider-Man was in that!” as opposed to how good the film is. Plus that information would have leaked in the first screenings, even if you tried to avoid it you’d see it everywhere on facebook when you woke up on release day. So in the end it made sense, so so much sense. God damn I loved this movie, probably my favourite Marvel film so far, had everything: sensible plotting, good characterisation, good action sequences, just, everything you want. Anyway, enough pointless random conversation: let’s get started on purposeful random conversation.

1. Spider-Man

He’s one of the characters I’ve never really liked in films, he’s always supposed to be a teenager but is never played as one. At least, not an actual teenager, he’s played like the leading man in a teen drama where “anxiety” and “shy geek” just means “is friends with the most popular girl in school but hasn’t dated her yet” and the only sign of their geekdom is that people with letters on their jacket shove them into lockers. This Spider-Man however is a teenager, he geeks out over superheroes, he messes up, he gets overexcited (which then leads to more mistakes). More importantly: he’s fun. He’s a funny, engaging character whom is inherently likeable.

2. Black Panther

This film is not just Spider-mans, it’s not even fully Captain America, this film belongs partly to Black Panther. This film is his origin story. Which is fantastic news, A LOT of people have seen Civil War, which means a lot of them are now familiar with the character, so now when he has his solo movie (which thanks to this serving as his origin, should be able to avoid the whole “boring first movie” syndrome that plagues so many films) a large number of people who ordinarily wouldn’t go to see the film now will. They’re invested in the character, they’re invested in the story, and they want to see what happens next.

3. The Villain

I’ve seen one or two people annoyed that the villain in this movie is just a guy. He’s not a very rich guy, he’s not a powerful or influential guy, he’s got no powers at all. He is, just, a guy. But to me that’s perfect. Who better to show the Avengers the damage they’re doing to the man on the street than a man on the street? A man who has suffered personal loss due to the actions of a few self-appointed übermensch’s. Superhero movies needed to find their humanity again, they needed a human touch (not the human torch, nobody needs that guy). The characters needed to be shown the consequences of their actions, they needed to create their own villain, not through a mistake, not through an accident in a lab somewhere, but by their very actions which make them heroic. This guy realises that he can’t beat the Avengers, he needs them to defeat themselves, and he sets it up beautifully (which is another thing I like about this film, it doesn’t really have a happy ending, everything’s not fixed, this film truly changes the dynamic of the group).

4. The Airport Scene

Possibly the best action sequence in a Marvel film so far. Every character is given a chance to shine and showcase their abilities. We see why Tony Stark wanted Spider-Man so much, we see Ant-Man do…..well, trust me it’s amazing. So much better than the action sequence which opens the film (which to me was a little too jerky and didn’t really flow properly. Why do so many directors move the camera during action sequences now? It very makes us feel like we’re really there, instead it just makes it dicking difficult to focus on the scenes they’ve spent months working on). One of my biggest problems with Age Of Ultron was that the fight scenes felt pointless, there were too many moments which felt like someone high up said “ok, we need an action scene here otherwise people will get bored” instead of “we need an action scene here to develop the story”. This doesn’t really have that, there are quite a few action scenes, but they’re well placed within the story and they all make sense. Plus there’s a certain uniqueness to them; the character’s are all slightly holding back. They’re going more for showmanship and intimidation than “I am going to kill you” (with the exception of one rather notable three way fight) which brings a different dynamic to the scenes.

5. Next time.

I’m already excited for the next one. There’s so many questions I want to ask (but not in a “this movie didn’t answer these questions and I’m unsatisfied way) and so many things I’m looking forward to seeing. I’m already excited for films that won’t be out for years to come. THAT’S how good this movie is. Basically: here’s the things I’m looking forward to seeing/finding out:

How will Captain America cope now he doesn’t have his shield?
What will happen with Martin Freemans character? He’s too big an actor for such a small part so I assume they’re doing something big.
How will people react to Iron Patriot? One of America’s soldiers is now paralysed due to superheroes, American’s are perfectly okay with foreign civilians dying, but when a soldier is shot at? Shit goes down.
What’s the villains next step? Does he even have one?
How will Hulk and Thor react?
What will the next stage of the MCU films be like? This film changed the dynamic of them completely: the heroes can no longer operate in the open, they are now forced underground. We won’t get the good guys teaming up with the military from now on, we’ll have the military shooting at the good guys.
Will other countries use the superheroes as an excuse to declare war? All, say, North Korea would need to do is stage a scene of massive devastation and frame someone from South Korea for it and claim they’re a superhero and it would be a pretence for war (with international approval as well as South Korea has disobeyed international law).

Oh, and spoilers btw. I, probably should have mentioned that earlier. Whoops.

Musings On Marvel: Day 12 (Ant-Man)

On April 28, 2016April 28, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn Musings On MarvelLeave a comment

Director: Peyton Reed (Bring It On, Yes Man)

Budget: $130million

Box Office: $519million

“If only you protected Janet with the same ferocity” That line only exists to get along plot details.
“I’m not going back, I’ve got a daughter to take care off” the same daughter you had BEFORE you went to prison? Or is it “well, she needed changing then, now she can look after herself”
Is he being shamed for working at a Baskin Robbins? Yeah, how dare he have a job to support his family. Shame! Shame! This is a big issue actually, certain jobs are seen as demeaning but people need to do them. People make fun of the server at McDonalds yet go in at 1am demanding that same person provide them with a burger.Jobs need doing, and these jobs need to be done by people. Don’t act all high and mighty like certain jobs aren’t “good enough” for people. You don’t want to do a job because you see it as demeaning? Then starve to f*cking death. Now, tis is different obviously from “this job makes me work 12 hours a day with no breaks and they pay me in stinging nettles”. That’s management being dicks, in which case, yeah, gain superpowers, sneak into manager’s house, pick them up and drop them in an active volcano.
Things I’ve spotted in the Baskin Robbins bosses office: an employee of the month sign above the sink, a microwave that isn’t plugged in, a rubber chicken, a wicker ball, a metal bucket.
“An Ant-Man” Hey! That’s the title of the movie.
Did nobody think to title them “small soldiers”?
“the ultimate combat advantage” wouldn’t it be more advantageous to be 10 times larger? There’s no good hitting people if nobody knows what’s hitting them as they won’t quit. You make them larger and entire armies will see it and give up.
That bunny is terrifying.
“He’s so ugly, I love him” My girlfriend says the exact same thing.
“you’re her hero”, how? She’s 5, he’s been in prison 3 years. Even if she could remember him she wouldn’t have enough to build him up to hero status.
This guy peed without shutting the bathroom door. He deserves to die.
This is a perfectly viable weapon that again is never used. I mean, he has a handheld weapon that can kill someone with no mess. No blood or anything, so no evidence. You literally flush the evidence down the toilet. That alone is a great weapon.
I have a feeling this montage of finding out about the “job” seems like one of the parts written by Edgar Wright.
This reference to Titanic also seems like Edgar Wright, it also seems exactly like the kind of thing I do: random pop culture references in middle of scenes which have no need for them. I would argue that point but I once put a critique of Love Actually in a scene which was basically a massive argument.
That door falling down still created a hell of a lot of noise.
If he is the size of an ant, surely that guy would still notice him in the bath? Would you not notice an ant in the bath?
This guy who’s entire dialogue is “what the hell” is comedian Garrett Morris who had the first appearance of Ant-Man in Saturday Night Live.
“set up a five block perimeter” for a petty theft? Are you kidding? He’s not exactly caused harm to people so that’s not a good use of resources.
This escape thing is fine, but you know what else would have made sense? Michael Douglas parking his car nearby with the window open so he could just go in there.
I know someone who saw this film and thought “just step on the Bullet Ants, how painful can they be?” Well, to answer that, bullshit. Bullet Ants are terrifying. It’s called a Bullet Ant because its sting feels like being shot. The Schmidt Pain Index is a real thing, and this is really high on it. Also, they shriek at you before attacking, because that’s not scary. Certain tribes use them as an initiation into manhood. They weave sleeves with hundreds of this things in, the stings facing inwards. They then wear them and get stung to holy hell. That’s not an exaggeration, this causes the arms to become useless for a few days, and cause spasms through the entire body. So THAT’S why you don’t just f*cking step on them.
So you control ants and make them put sugar in your tea? That’s just lazy.
The bald guy from House Of Cards is a dick to tiny sheep
“I think we should call the Avengers” So do I! In fact, I’d call them for everything. Changing my light bulbs, fixing my internet, getting the person in the queue in front of me to just MOVE FORWARD ALREADY!
“this is not some cute technology like the Iron Man Suit” Unnecessary shot!
“Plus they’re too busy dropping cities out of the sky” That was Ultron and you know it, dick.
Why ants? I’m serious, it’s never explained why he specifically can converse only with ants? Surely there’s other small things he could talk to, grasshoppers, lice, aphids, spiders. You’ve had this research for decades and figured out how to talk to ants, yet you have no incentive to push it forward to other species? Is it because it was called Ant-Man and you really hate not going with themes?
Where are the rest of the Avengers? Have they all gone home for the holidays and left one guy as the security?
Ant-Man punches Falcon too much. Literally all he needs to do is get his visual apparatus off, then he won’t be able to see him so he can just sneak in easier.
Next time you might want to start with “I got the thing” instead of leaving it until it’s suitably dramatic.
“I fought an Avenger and didn’t die”. Well, technically you fought an Avenger. But Falcon’s only an Avenger in the same way as Barcardi Breezers are alcoholic beverages. Technically right, but nobody counts it.
“this is the work of gypsies” That’s racist!
There is never a good reason to whistle “It’s A Small World”. Ever.
Can you even hit an ant with a bullet? Wouldn’t physics push the ant of the way?
Are those guys being attacked by Bullet Ants? If so it would be a lot more than “ow, slight pain”, they’d cry.
Hank Pym dies whilst I was writing that last one, I think.
Oh wait, he’s standing up.
Ok this is one of the best uses of music in Marvel movies, plus it’s The Cure.
Why is this guy so focused on killing Paul Rudd? Couldn’t he just move on with his life and sell the weapon and still get shit loads of money? This just seems like a distraction.
Where did those ants come from?
Ah, the old “throwing trains at the enemy trick”. So cliche, you know that’s exactly how the Roundheads beat the Cavaliers in 1651.
Can ants survive getting that big? Wouldn’t their exoskeleton collapse or something? It’s like how King Kong wouldn’t be able to run, or barely move.
“that’s a messed up looking dog”. Surely you can tell it’s an ant? I mean, it would be weird for us to see an ant that size, but we don’t have superheroes in this world. They do. Everybody could wake up and find their feet have been replaced by Big Macs and it still wouldn’t be the most surprising thing in the universe.
Imagine watching this whilst really stoned or under heavy medication. That would make a brilliant blog series actually: Medicated Musings. Exactly like these blogs, but recorded whilst either high or drunk.
She’s feeding that thing under the table. Does she want ants? Because that’s how you get ants.
And the post credits scene is a teaser for Avengers 3. I mean, Captain America: Civil War.

Musings On Marvel: Day 11 (Avengers: Age Of Ultron)

On April 27, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn Musings On MarvelLeave a comment

Director: Joss Whedon (writer of Toy Story and uncredited co-writer on Twister)

Budget: $250million

Box Office: $1.4billion

Why did you need to find the Loki Pokey stick? Wasn’t it at the top of the Avengers tower at the end of the Avengers movie? Was it stolen at some point in the Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D series? And if so, f*ck that noise. Don’t make me hours of a TV show necessary viewing for a movie that’s already way too long.
“lasting a little long, boys” Yeah I’ve had that problem before.
“Fire on the weak ones” See, this is why you don’t have weak ones.
“send in the Iron Legion” Why not start with that? That way you don’t have to even be there.
Wait, didn’t he promise to destroy all the suits at the end of Iron Man 3?
Do the people here understand English? Surely that’s a logical flaw Tony Stark would have fixed?
“I want to poke it with something”. That’s exactly how I deal with almost every problem.
“yay” Is Tony Stark now a fifteen year old girl? I mean, what kind of self respecting person says “yay”? Note: I don’t count, I don’t respect myself.
See, this annoys the hell out of me. That shot of the broken shield was used in the trailer. It created intrigue. I was waiting, wondering how that happened, wondering what force could create that. And then I found out: dream sequence, didn’t happen, doesn’t matter. F*ck you film industry. It’s one of the most annoying things about film trailers and I’d love to see it stopped, that, and ruining cameos. There was no reason to showcase that Spider-Man is in Civil War. Close to that: people in the trailer who are only in a handful of scenes. Such as Hugh Grant in Man From U.N.C.L.E.
“no pepper? no jane?” Yeah, we couldn’t afford for them to come to this party.
“Jane’s better” normally I would really disagree with you, but the other person is Gwyneth Paltrow so it’s more like “please, please, they’re both terrible people”
Wait, you’re a celebrity funded by a multi million dollar agency. How do you not have enough money?
“this was not meant for mortal men” But you are mortal! Your mother died just a few movies ago, and you think your brother died. You should be aware of mortality by now.
“he’s also a huge dork, chicks dig that”. As someone who is almost the court jester of dorks I can confirm this is most definitely not true.
“on the world’s leading authority on waiting too long”, no. You slept for most of that, does not count.
If I was Thor I’d totally leave the hammer on the toilet seat so people couldn’t pee.
Tony Stark makes a joke about raping the women of Asgard. Comedy!
So Captain is “slightly” worthy?
Ultron waited until all the other party guests left before attacking.
An evil robot in a Marvel movie? Wow, never seen that before.
The film isn’t perfect, but James Spaders performance is pretty close.
So Ultron went on the internet and now hates the world? I see he’s seen the Daily Mail comments section then.
“he’s taken the Loki Pokey stick and now we have to find it, again”. Even the movie knows it’s repeating itself.
“it was built in the centre of the city so everyone could be equally close”. That’s not true, as in, that wouldn’t work. Unless there’s only one line of houses in a perfect circle then there’s going to be people living closer. I mean, draw a perfect circle on the floor, mark the centre, now stand two meters away, now have someone else stand one meter away from the centre. Are you both the same distance from the middle? No, you’re not. Lee: making fun of movies via math. Usually I only comfort people with mathematics, and that’s only during certain circumstances.
“our parents go in”, wait, your dad is Magneto. So does Magneto die really early on in this universe? Harsh.
“Cuttlefish: deep sea fish, they make lights” no they don’t. You’re describing an anglerfish.
Just realised they’re in Wakanda, shouldn’t Black Panther be there?
Movie spend the time providing a backstory to Black Widow when surely she should have had her own movie do that for her?
Wait, was that Clara Oswald? For one shot.
So Black Widow fantasises in cinematic low angle shots?
Why isn’t the hulkbuster suit the default suit?
I assume there was a deleted scene here which explains why Thor is just f’ing off. How do these films manage to be both too long, and have so many things missing?
“they have a graduation ceremony where they sterilise you” Apparently Greenwich Uni has the same procedure.
Wait, did they take the only strong female character in this thing and make her tragic backstory tie into childbirth? Damnit. And if you don’t see why this is problematic: imagine if Captain America’s main backstory was that the serum turned him sterile, and that was his biggest issue. See how weird that would be? But they had to make the only female character the only one who has a backstory that involves childbirth.
“everytime someone tries to win a war before it starts, innocent people die”. As opposed to normal wars where absolutely no innocent people die.
“guy’s multiplying faster than a Catholic rabbit”. I never noticed that line before.
Why did Ultron shoot the road, not the person?
“how do you want me to take it”. Obvious sex joke is obvious.
“without the homicidal glitch that he thinks are his winning personality” oh but without that I have nothing.
Why is he keeping Black Widow alive? It’s not to lure the Avengers there, as they kind of already have reason to find him and attack him.
Hey it’s a naked Paul Bettany, that’s never been done before.
Wait, where did he get the cape from?
Paul Bettany delivers what is essentially a shakespeare monologue in a film that doesn’t really deserve it.
Ok, that bit where Vision picked up the hammer was pretty awesome.
Quicksilver uses Adidas.
It’s a shame Quicksilver was done better in X-Men Days Of Future past otherwise that bit would have been awesome.
It’s a shame we’ve seen Magneto lift a stadium up in X-Men Days Of Past otherwise that bi….god damnit.
This plan doesn’t really work, that mass dropping wouldn’t have same impact as a meteor of the same size. The reason meteors cause so much damage is because they have high levels of speed because they’ve dropped such a great height. This land mass isn’t being raised high enough to gather enough speed.
Other point: if this city is being raised to 18,000 feet, shouldn’t that change the temperature? Should be below zero surely.
“you get killed” he says, as the camera focuses on the only main character to die.
Wait, can Captain now call his shield to him with telepathy?
Yeah, good job Captain America and Thor, saving those two people when you could be saving a lot more.
“Thor, you’re bothering me”. He bothers me too.
Hadouken!
Hawkeye wastes valuable time making stupid jokes. Funny stupid jokes that were adlibbed on set but still.
“Where else am I going to get a view like this?” A mountain, a plane, riding Iron Man?
“You kiss your mother with that mouth?” His mother’s probably been dead for like a century, not cool!
“show em what we’ve got” Yeah, that’s right, show that army you’ve got one guy in a suit. They’ll be shitting themselves.
“if you get through this, I’ll hold your own”. Well, they both survived, so I assume that scene will be in Civil War.
Villain tries to say a funny line and gets hit by Hulk. Just like in the first movie.
Finally a major hero dies.
Well, I say “major”, he had like 20 minutes of screen time, if that.
So things that aren’t worthy can’t keep the hammer aloft? There was a moment in the last Thor movie where the hammer was put on a coat hook, was the coat hook worthy?
Holy crap that film felt long.
Oh wait, it was long.
Thanos decides to retrieve the stones himself. You know if he did this earlier, these films would’ve been other before Thor. Ah, we live in hope.

Musings On Marvel: Day 10 (Guardians Of The Galaxy)

On April 26, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn Musings On MarvelLeave a comment

Director: James Gunn (Slither, Super)

Budget: $232million

Box Office: $773million

Did kids listen to this music back then? I mean, I did, but I was weird.
Hah, “was”
Plus, is a song which includes the repeated refrain “big boys don’t cry” a good song to listen to in the circumstances?
Can’t anyone become a superhero without their parents dying nowdays? That’s the rouble with the world today, kids lack motivation.
I’m curious as to what happened in those 26 years. Ok, it’s not as big an issue as it was in Fantastic 4 (or to give it it’s proper, stupid title: Fant4stic)
How have the batteries lasted that long?
Or the walkman?
Or the tape itself?
I mean, I went through about 5 cd players in my youth, and I very rarely went to space.
The main hero kicks a tiny animal in the face. But it’s okay because they’re not earth-based. Which is a bit weird as when he was a kid he started fights with people purely because they hurt frogs. And now here’s him, as an adult, gleefully punting animals like rugby balls.
“bereet”, is that because she looks like a beet?
“your culture is a disease” that’s racist.
Groot lost his arms. That’s an arm chopped off in every one of the stage 2 films. Seriously, why do Marvel hate limbs?
“I live for the simple things, like how much this is going to hurt” That’s exactly what I was told last time I had sex.
“I’m going to slather you in jelly” that sounds sexual.
“this one here is our booty” still sounds sexual.
So he wants to protect her despite her causing massive physical harm to him and being responsible for him getting arrested. Why? I theorise it’s entirely because he wants the booty.
“Your words mean nothing to me” oooooooo, vienna.
“I could care less whether you live or die”. Ok, let’s get one thing straight America, that phrase makes zero sense. “I could care less” literally means “there is a situation in which I could care less, therefore I do care a little bit”. The phrase should be (and is, in every other country in the world) “couldn’t care less”. Because it implies you don’t care at all so there is no way you could care even less. The way you say it implies that despite the fact you don’t care much, you still care a little bit. “I could care less” basically says “I care a little bit”, which defeats your purpose.
I bet he never uses that “snap a neck from a distance” on any of the heroes.
“your demeanour is that of a child” yeah, and you’re wearing make-up like a teenage emo kid. You shouldn’t be killing people, you should be writing poetry on your blog about how girls ignore you.
“all fire on my command” why not start with that?
Those headphones blocked out a prison riot? My headphones get drowned out by cars driving past me.
Not even that, but surely he should have seen something on the video screens?
Okay his face is covered, but his hands aren’t, flying through space with uncovered hands would surely cause problems.
He got abducted as a kid, how many kids know of Jackson Pollock?
Surely he’s been threatened before? He collects artefacts so must have people attempt to rob him all the time, you’d think he’d have a defence set up.
Bowie song! And now I’m sad. Seriously, what is going on this year? I found a facebook status a few years old about how bad it was that three celebrities had died that year already. That seems like a blessing compared to this year. Prince, Lemmy, Bowie, Rickman, Wood, the PG tips monkey.
“I will not succumb to your pelvic sorcery” That’s pretty much exactly what my girlfriend said to me the first time we met.
Holy shit Bradley Cooper gives a REALLY good vocal performance here.
And with that he tells an entire bar full of outlaws how much money you’re about to come into.
Hey it’s a tesseract.
“it’s not a purse, it’s a knapsack” no, it’s a satchel. Indiana Jones has one.
I haven’t seen Star Wars but I imagine it’s basically this.
“normal people don’t even think about eating people” Oh, I guess I’m not normal then.
Where did they get those matching red suits from? Did they stop at Matalan before continuing with their quest?
“I think of them as paper people” Now, he doesn’t understand metaphors, so does that mean he literally thinks they’re people made of paper?
“I don’t think anyone is 100 percent a dick” you’ve never met Katie Hopkins then.
“We’re just like Kevin Bacon” doing awful adverts for EE?
Wait, wasn’t the city evacuated? Where are all these people coming from?
The two sisters are attacking each other with swords. I HATE these kind of fights. The ones where it cuts away before each impact. One on one fight scenes should cut as little as possible so the fight flows in one continuous motion. That way it looks like an actual fight, instead of a movie scene.
She chops off her own hand. Seriously, marvel hates limbs.
So he’s still using that stone just to throw people backwards instead of killing them?
“your guardians of the galaxy” Hey, that’s the title of the movie!
“what are you doing?” does it matter? Just kill him. Are people really distracted by singing and dancing? They’re not, trust me I tried.
“it’s probably good we didn’t deliver him to his dad like we were hired to do” The worst dialogue in this entire movie. It’s like the script writer didn’t know how to deliver that information so just turned one of the final scenes into an exposition heavy nothing piece.
“Ronan was only a puppet” No! That’s a metaphor! And that’s not what he’s meta-for. By which I mean, that line doesn’t make sense in the universe that they’ve created.
Howard the f*cking duck.

Musings On Marvel: Day 9 (Captain America: The Winter Soldier)

On April 25, 2016 By troubledproductionsIn Musings On MarvelLeave a comment

Directors: Russo Brothers (Captain America: Civil War, Arrested Development pilot, Community pilot)

Budget: $170million

Box Office: $714million

Why does Captain America need to jog? Isn’t his strength and fitness derived from the serum so he doesn’t need to exercise at all. Unless he’s just bored, in which case, go fight bad guys or something.
Wait, he’s got “Thai food” on the list of things to research? Dude, just go eat Thai Food. Done.
And Sean Connery? Not a list of films he’s in, or anything like that. Just Sean Connery in general?
The Captain America plan to getting into a building:
1. Stealthy stealthy stealthy
2. Flippy flippy flippy
3. Loud noise! Throw shield into room so everyone knows you’re there.
Isn’t Captain super strong etc? I mean, he went toe to toe with Iron Man in Avengers, now a regular bearded dude troubles him?
“last time I trusted someone I lost an eye”, I know, people always say “I’ll tap your head a second before” but they never do.
“agent Romanov is comfortable with everything”, so that’s why you make her wear that skintight costume.
Fury gives a detailed nostalgic history of himself, he’s going to get shot.
“greatest generation, you guys did some nasty stuff” “for freedom!”. Random fact: the Nazi party got their influence for their eugenics programme from a programme in California. U S A! U S A! U S A!
Why does his friend have his own exhibit at the museum? There’s nothing about Churchill’s bff at the war museum.
How did he find out where she lived?
“I thought I could throw myself back in, serve in the army again”. You barely served in the Army. You spent most of your time doing theatre.
“you saved the world”. I mean, yeah, it’s a shame that Captain America doesn’t exist in real life so Germany won the war and the world has been destroyed. That sucked when the world was destroyed. I hadn’t even finished paying off my sofa.
Why holograms? Why not just skype? This is literally just technological dick measuring. And just as messy.
This film continues the MCU tradition of hoping that merely mentioning the other Marvel characters will stop us wondering why they never turn up to help each other.
“he has to socialise”. You want Iron Man to socialise at a kids birthday party? He’ll probably try to fuck the mother and get the kid drunk.
Holograms on the car window now? That’s not just pointless, that’s also highly distracting and possibly illegal.
I would question how they think they could stage a police attack then remembered that Nick Fury is black so they’d just need to say he littered so they had to shoot him.
“to build a better world we need to destroy the old one”. Wow, I wonder if this guy’s evil.
This fight would be over in about 5 seconds if they used the paralysing technology from Iron Man 1.
F*ck off can he fall that far and be okay. Super soldier or not, he still has to obey the laws of physics.
“he refused to share information” so you kill him? Surely one of the people working there realises that’s unfair justice.
“two dozen assassinations in over 50 years” That’s really not many at all. That’s like one every two years. That’s nowhere near enough to have that big a file. I mean, if I get a few more I’ve beaten that record.
Oh please. As if Captain America knows about function overrides on computers.
“if you guys need anything. I’ve been Aaron” so who are you now?
He didn’t eject it properly! That flash drive is going to crash.
That just says which buttons are pressed. Not in which order.
Wait, he’s seen War Games but not Star Wars or any of the Rocky albums?
Wait, so THIS is the guy they decide to save his brain? He’s quite useless.
“if you try to take freedom, they resist”. Really? No shit.
How did they get such high-quality footage on a green and black monitor? This would be like watching TV on an old Game Boy. Which you can’t do.
So the lesson is, don’t trust Swiss people?
So they blew that building up, and all that data, just to kill two people?
“seem pretty chipper for a guy who died for nothing”. Well, you know, except Nazi’s.
Oh, so we can’t get Iron Man or anything, but don’t worry, we’ve got the senator from Iron Man 2 in here.
So Falcon has never been seen in any of these films? He wasn’t called to save the president in Iron Man 3, or to save New York in Avengers?
Rolling out of a car at that speed would cut your skin up so you looked like a kebab.
For two super cool assassins, their aim sure is terrible.
Winter soldier destroys a strangers car. More like Winter So-D’ya Have To Be So Rude?
Superhero landing!
They keep shooting at his shield instead of his legs.
Surprise! Except it’s totally not a surprise. It’s really obvious so why did they leave it so long?
By the way, this scene should totally have an 80’s power ballad playing over it.
How did they decide to use this a hiding space? “We need to think of a hiding space, any idea where?” “damn” “perfect!”
“about damn time”. Yeah, you should have got shot earlier, damn you ScarJo.
Wait, I’m fairly certain Zola was on the same train that Bucky fell off, and was captured almost immediately after. So he could not have been there when he woke up. No, no, no, nothing about this makes sense at all, and horses can’t talk!.
Wait, first Aldrich loses his arm in a battle in Iron Man 3, then Loki chops off Thors arm in The Dark World, now Bucky last an arm too? Marvel hates arms.
Awesome, a scene to show a friendship we already knew existed. Great.
People think that Chris Evans transformation to Captain America was well done, but Sebastian Stans transformation from Bucky to the Winter Soldier is a lot better. He’s almost unrecognisable.
Hey it’s Abed. Hey Abed.
That actually makes sense, the directors for this were hired due to their work on the paintball episodes of Community. That’s the good thing about the MCU, they’ve taken risks with new directors from different genres. Doctor Strange is being directed by Scott Derrickson, who’s known mainly for horror. They’re not sticking with established directors, in fact, the most well known one they had was Kenneth Branagh. And even that was a risk.
“what if Pakistan invaded Mumbai and you knew they were going to drag your daughters into a soccer stadium”. Football! Not soccer. That’s probably the most evil thing he’s done.
They never use this disguise technology again.
“are you sure you’re ready for the world to see you as you really are?” with how tight her clothes are, we already know.
They fired like 8 missiles at one person. No wonder the US military spend so much with that kind of wastage.
Even Michael Bay thinks these explosions are “a bit much”
“it’s trending”. Wait, I pretty much used that exact line the year before in a film. Bastards!
“unless you want a hole in your sternum”. 1) that’s not where the sternum is. 2) couldn’t you have done that earlier when she was hitting people?
“order only comes through pain” kinky.
Does Captain America really need to attempt to sacrifice himself? HYDRA has been exposed, and the missiles aren’t aimed at cities anymore so everyone’s safe. And we’ve already seen he can jump from great heights and be completely okay for some reason.
Captain drops his one of a kind shield out of the flying vehicle, yet somehow you know he’ll find it again.
“there’s nothing more horrifying than a miracle” I dunno, genocide?
Are supposed to be surprised Bucky is alive? I mean, we saw him walk away, this scene literally serves no purpose.

Musings On Marvel: Day Eight (Thor: The Dark World)

On April 24, 2016October 24, 2019 By troubledproductionsIn Musings On MarvelLeave a comment

Director: Alan Taylor (Terminator: Genisys)

Budget: $170million

Box Office: $644millions

This is the third movie to feature Thor, and the eighth in this universe, do we still need to open with narration?
“before there was light there was darkness” narrated over a black screen. First year film students everywhere go “woah, that’s so deep” and use it in their next shitty films about how hard it was to grow up on the mean streets of Henley On Thames.
Dr. Who is that?
“through the power of the Aether”, is that anything like the disembodied voices in the ether as featured in our award winning short film Three Words?
I appreciate that was the cheapest of cheap plugs, but meh.
This movie really wants to be Lord Of The Rings.
Second movie in a row where “turning your insides into fire” counts a superpower”
“and the aether was no more” oh great, this film’s over then? Woohoo.
“bury it deep, so deep that nobody can ever find it”. That’s what she said.
Odin is annoyed that wherever Loki goes there’s war and death, yet the introduction to both of these films have included Odin fighting wars on different planets.
“next time we start with the big one”, but he didn’t run up until halfway through the fight.
“human lives are fleeting, they’re worth nothing” wait, but weren’t you bitching at Loki for not treating humans well. In fact, the entire reason you’re imprisoning him is for attempting to rule the earth. So if humans are worth nothing, then why are you punishing him so harshly? I’m beginning to think that maybe Loki is right, and you’re kind of a dick to him.
If I had a choice between a badass warrior woman, and Natalie Portman, I’d go with the warrior.
Hey it’s Chris O’Dowd.
You know he’s probably seen the news about the Avengers thing in New York so he knows abut the existence of Gods and aliens etc. None of that “he went away” cryptic bullshit.
“Maybe you should stop saying Sea Bass”, why? It’s still better than some of her dialogue.
Now you’re thinking with Portals.
Did the pointy eared evil dude just say “Rush al dente a fanta”?
“the Universe hasn’t seen this marvel” well I hope it’s better than this Marvel.
How much time do you think he wastes watching people as they shower?
“they are mortal” so are you. That was the entire point of your argument with Loki earlier, that you’re not gods, you are mortal too. Damnit Odin get yo shit together.
“humans do not belong here any more than a goat belongs at the banquet table” That’s racist.
“Protector of the nine realms”. Well aren’t you doing a great job with that?
How on earth does the infection know what will harm her? More importantly, why does it care? Even if she comes to harm it can just go to someone else. A parasite doesn’t care if the hosts dies if there’s hundreds of other hosts nearby.
Wait, did she accidentally fall into something that was supposed to be well hidden and never to be found again?
“the Bifrost was destroyed” you still could have called, or at least visited instead of eating Shawarma
Couldn’t this and the opening narration be condensed into one section? Do we really need two history lessons in this movie?
“every five thousand years the worlds align perfectly, during this time the borders become blurred, it’s possible you found one of these points”. No it’s not, as it’s been talked about as a future event even after she “fell”.
“don’t let him hear you say that” how on earth did she hear that from all the way over there? He was doing his low-volume sexy voice too.
So they don’t check these people for explosives? Have they not seen The Dark Knight?
Everybody swings axes yet nobody gets decapitated.
“I need you to do everything I ask, no questions”, yet when I tell women that I get called a pervert and to get off the bus.
That ship is invisible right up until the point where somebody touches it? Well that’s pointless.
Why are all these ships now visible? Is it just so we can see them get shot down?
Why didn’t he raise this shield in the first place?
That ship actually dropped it’s trajectory just so it could crash into the forcefield. Whoever is piloting it doesn’t deserve to live.
Ship crashes through a shitload of columns, building remains standing. Magic!
So the colour of all weapons in the first phase was blue, this seems to be red.
It’s amazing the amount of aliens who look just like humans but with prosthetics.
Was there something cut out there? Her being captured etc didn’t really work visually.
“where is the aether?” I thought you could sense it.
Even if it was invisible the ships can still be attacked, we saw this earlier.
“we are all but defenceless” you could probably try giving Hulk, Iron Man etc a call. Have you even tried that?
Didn’t they already see this in the news earlier?
Thor is told not to go somewhere and fight someone by Odin who orders the Bifrost closed. Thor does it anyway. Isn’t this exactly what led to him being banished in the first movie?
Loki gets slapped by Jane and his response is “I like her”. Well, whatever turns you on.
Movie just rubs it in our face that the rest of the avengers aren’t in this movie.
Loki is definitely the best part of these movies.
Turns out to fix anything you just need to hit it hard. Reminds me, I must get my cats fixed.
Why was that guy laughing at being attacked and buried under strange men?
“I wish I could trust you”, movie gets closer to Brokeback Mountain than it probably intends to.
Ian would be a lot better if played by guy who played Rory in Doctor Who. He’s practically the same character anyway.
A woman is levitated and put into a christ-like pose in mid-air. Holy Harry Potter Batman.
Pfft, like they’d really kill Loki.
A giant spaceship with a glowing red light appears and destroys a small part of Greenwich University. Still less destructive than the Conservative party.
“your universe and your family will be extinguished” You couldn’t say “exterminated” could you? Just for the giggles.
“I thought you’d hit harder”. Me too. Supposed to be an all-powerful being yet all he can do is knock someone over slightly.
Thor is sexually harassed by a woman on the tube. This is apparently funny. Plus, no trains go straight from Charring Cross to Greenwich,
Wait, so Loki killed Odin? So the film killed Anthony Hopkins off-screen? Isn’t that illegal? And I know what people will say when I say this “oh, but you have to wait until the next movie”. Bullshit, if you include the MCU as all containing one narrative as the studio wants you to, then there’s been four (hah, Thor) movies since this one, and none of them have mentioned it. There’s another four (hah, Thor) movies until the next Thor one. So that’s eight movies you have to wait to find something out. Now if you include only the Thor ones, then that’s from 2013 to 2017, which is a four year wait for one plot point. I mean, yeah it’s a kind of ok plot twist, but it makes no sense once you think about it for more than thirty seconds.

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