Tag: Avengers

Black Widow (2021)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick Synopsis: It’s a marvel action film. Do you need to know anything else?

So, this is it, the first Marvel film in two years. Perhaps more importantly, the first one since cinemas reopened. So in summary, there’s a lot riding on this. I actually saw this the day of release, first screening possible. I did this because I felt if I didn’t, that people on twitter would ruin it for me, much like I’m going to ruin it for you, so there’s your warning about that, as this will have spoilers.

In retrospect, I don’t think I needed to do that. There’s nothing in this film which you would really consider ruined if you were warned about it. There’s no moment where your jaw drops and you think “I can’t believe that happened! This changes everything!”. The closest you get to that is the post-credits scene where a character played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus asks Yelena to kill Hawkeye. I saw “character played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus” because I don’t know who she is. Apparently she’s in The Falcon And The Winter Soldier, but that was set for original release after this, so are we supposed to know who she is or not? That moment is the closest we really get to a seismic shift. Otherwise it’s just standard stuff really, Florence Pugh’s character looks likely to be a newer version of Black Widow (albeit more morally ambiguous), and her “parents” are free to do whatever.

A note about her “parents”, and about Pugh’s character too, really. Although they weren’t introduced until now, they existed in this timeline for years, having been operational since just after Civil War. Would Natasha not have thought to get them involved in Endgame or Infinity War? You can argue “she didn’t want them involved” or “they didn’t know it was happening”, but that’s only really true for Infinity War. For Endgame there’s not many people left, and most people she was close to got snapped, so you would have thought she would have got all the help she needed. Or at the very least, they would have tried to find her.

I’m so used to Marvel setting things up, that it’s kind of disappointing there’s nothing here that you can really look back at post Civil War films and go “ohhhhhh, okay”. Basically, this film doesn’t need to exist. It’s a two hour way of introducing a few new characters, and to say goodbye to an older one.

Maybe it’s the timing, if you release a prequel it’s for a reason, and this doesn’t really have one. If this got released just after Civil War I’d have looked upon it more favourably. As it is, it just feels, I dunno, needless? It never feels anything other than a footnote. The cinematic equivalent of money you find in the pocket of a coat you haven’t worn in a while.

Now, the performances? Mostly good. Florence Pugh slots in beautifully like she’s been there all along. David Harbour is a lot of fun and I wish we saw more of him in previous films. He’s probably the best written character in the film. Rachel Weisz does fine, she never really wows but she does what she needs to. The worst performer is probably Ray Winstone. You’d think having him as the leader of a villainous group would be perfect for him. Having him in charge of an underground group of assassins would be great for him. There’s just two issues: 1) he’s not really in it enough. 2) His accent. It’s supposed to be Russian (I think), but really it’s just Russian’ around between a multitude of accents.

It’s not just his performance, the way he’s written is kind of weak too. He never feels like a presence over the rest of the film, when he’s not on screen you don’t get the feeling he’s going to attack or anything, you forget him as soon as he’s not there. Doesn’t help that despite being a big deal, he’s never really been mention to much before this. I’m not saying you needed to introduce him earlier in the franchise, but it would have helped to have the opening scene based on HIM doing something, rather than putting so much thought into some of the needless padding. Trust me, there’s some padding here. There was more than one fight scene where I was thinking “okay, so why are they actually fighting? What is this scene adding?”. Our main introduction to Taskmaster (the other “villain”) was one that wasn’t really needed. It took about 5-10 minutes to advance something that could have been done in a single line of dialogue.

Now onto the good side: there’s some great dialogue in it. The new characters work and provide a good future for the MCU if used properly. We finally find out what the turning point was in Black Widow turning into a hero. It has the potential to kick off some very exciting things for the future (all of the trained Widows are freed, so there’s a group of pissed off trained assassins walking the world, if the MCU doesn’t make use of that, it’s a missed opportunity). I like the idea of more prequels, mainly because I still think we need a film set during the period where half the population was missing. Some of the action set-pieces are tremendous fun (although one does seem a bit too Saints Row 3 for me). Very excited to see what kind of things Cate Shortland can do as a director in the future. Has a great cover of Smells Like Teen Spirit during the opening credits (which may possibly be my favourite opening credits in an MCU film). It’s an apt send off for Johansson, and a lot of fun. It’s just, so very popcorn. It is very very good, it just doesn’t seem important enough, and doesn’t really add anything to the franchise as a whole, it just seems to exist solely as a send-off to the character. Which is nice, but still…

Also I bingewatched Taskmaster (the British show with Greg Davies) so it was hard to unhear Taskmaster quotes throughout. No matter how good a film is, you can’t take it seriously when all that’s in your head is British comedians trying to guess how wide a caravan is in baked beans.

Avengers: Endgame (2019)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

So, that’s it, as close to a season finale the MCU has had yet, this film genuinely feels like closure for a lot of the characters. A fitting closure too, it completes a lot of story arcs which have been running since 2008. Whilst there’s been a few missteps along the way it’s generally accepted that the films have been of high quality and with interacting storylines to keep you invested (even if they weren’t as carefully crafted as they needed to be at times, with major plot holes and continuity errors between separate films). I did love this film, I really enjoyed it, and didn’t feel it outstayed its welcome (which considering it is 3 hours long, really says something). It deserves the praise it’s getting, but I still can’t help but feel slightly disappointed, not with what happened, but with now can’t happen. Like I wish they pushed the Civil War storyline further, as it is it never really felt like a proper division between two sets, it always felt temporary and outside of Civil War itself, kind of small. It never had that urge of paranoia, you never felt like the heroes against registration were under any threat (with the possible exception of Ant-Man in Ant-Man And The Wasp). If you look at the movies after Civil War:

  1. Doctor Strange (completely unaffected by Civil War as not recognised by the government)
  2. Guardians Of The Galaxy 2 (In space so unaffected)
  3. Spider-Man (pro-registration but didn’t affect the movie much. This is annoying as a big part of the Civil War comics was Spider-Man unmasking and revealing his identity, nothing similar to that has happened in this universe since the first Iron Man movie, and that was clearly Tony Starks decision, there’s no “forced to reveal identity” moments yet.)
  4. Thor: Ragnarok. (Again, in space)
  5. Black Panther (not as affected by the Registration Act as it could have been)
  6. Ant-Man And The Wasp (The most affected, but not essential)
  7. Infinity War (just causes a slight “we need to find this person” moment)
  8. Captain Marvel (Set in the past)

To be honest, I can’t even remember if the Act passed at the end of Civil War. That’s how little it’s affected the movies, and that can not be fixed now, it’s too late for it to start coming into effect now, and that’s disappointing. The other thing I’m disappointed in is that there were no post-snap movies. Ok, yeah, technically all movies now are post-snap, but they’re also going to be set after the resolution. There should have been a film between them, so many villain origin stories start with them losing their families, and yet the perfect opportunity for one now won’t happen (oh, spoilers, the people killed by the snap come back, but 5 years have passed in this world so they will be 5 years younger than they should be when they come back, I REALLY hope they make a big point of this in future films). We mostly saw how the snap affected heroes, we didn’t get much of it affecting the world, the opening scenes were done to show that, but the audience isn’t as invested in that as they should be as they’re sitting there waiting for everyone to get revenge on Thanos. Can you imagine how much more effective it would have been if there was an entire movie set in that world? The chaos, the frustration, the paranoia, the fear, the bastards using it to make money, the conspiracy theories! Do ordinary people know it was Thanos? As far as most of them saw, half the world just disappeared with no explanation. The only way they’d know it was Thanos is if someone put out a press release, which I can’t really see happening somehow. So can you imagine the conspiracy theories that would arise from that? It would be INSANE, and yet we will never find out (although I am thinking of writing a short Marvel story set in that universe, just to express that idea).

I know I haven’t spoken much about this film, but I feel if you wanted to see it, you would have seen it already, there’s nothing I can say in this review that will change that. Also, the entire internet has opinions on it and has expressed them better than I could. They’ve been right; it’s emotional as hell, full to the brim with references and fan-service, things are paid off which you didn’t even realise they were setting up, and most characters get their time to shine. It’s not perfect though; Captain Marvel seems misused, only seeming to exist as a Deus Ex Machina, and she’s involved in one of the most cringy moments of the franchise so far which is clearly designed to get a reaction in the cinema but is so false it seems like pandering. Despite how many characters are included, some rather important ones are missing with not even a mention. Also if you think about some aspects of the plot for too long it does seem to fall apart slightly.

But despite that, I highly recommend it, so far it’s been the best example of spectacle so far this year, and I doubt even the Godzilla movie could top it

2018 In Film Part 4: The Good

On By troubledproductionsIn Year round upLeave a comment

The penultimate round-up blog. In here I’m putting, get this, films, which, are, good. I know, shocking, right? I bet you never guessed that from the title. My definition of good but not great for purposes of these is this: would I consider buying if they were on sale?

Ant-Man And The Wasp

I did like this film, loved it in fact. But I don’t think it stands out on its own enough to really be called great. Rudd was fantastic, and it seems as though Marvel might have finally started to solve its villain problem. The action set pieces are insane, they do have obvious product placement but it’s product placement that doesn’t really detract from the film as it’s so well done.

Original review here

+The inventive set pieces. That ending.

-Can’t shake the feeling that it’s DLC to the main game of Infinity War

Avengers: Infinity War

I know, I know. Look, this film was great, I’ll admit that. But I can’t but it in the amazeballs blog for two reasons:

  1. The ending. Until Endgame comes out, this will remain here. We know the ending won’t last, we KNOW that. We know the characters will come back, we just don’t know how. If they fuck up how they comeback, it will taint the ending of this one HORRIFICALLY. Think about when Sherlock faked his death at the end of one season, and there was a great mystery about how he did it, a mystery which they failed to explain in the next episode. The lack of resolution really tainted what was before that, a great episode. And it’s possible it could be the same here.
  2. I rewatched it on a plane and found myself skipping the Captain America parts, they just didn’t hold my attention at all.

So yeah, that’s that. Original reviews here and here

+Peter Parker’s death was emotional AF, even though you do know it’s going to be negated.

-Some of the side villains didn’t get enough time.

Bohemian Rhapsody

Okay I can feel the hate for this one. This is being nominated for more awards than I count (so at least 3) and is about one of the greatest singers of all time. It’s also REALLY well made and the performances are superb. So why is it in this blog and not the final one? Because as much as I try, I just cannot get over them lying about the timing of his diagnosis. They changed it for dramatic purposes and it just feels weird to me. They lied about the death of their friend for a movie. It taints the whole thing for me.

Original review here

+The live aid scene.

-Not entirely sure it will work on a small screen.

Creed II

Treads the same water as the first movie. But does so so skilfully that you don’t really care. If you didn’t like the first one, this won’t change your mind, but if you did like the first one, you definitely won’t dislike this. Michael J. Jordan continues to prove his performance in the first one wasn’t a one off, and shows genuine oscar-winning potential here.

Original review here

+Contains more emotion than you think it would, particularly in regards to the villains.

-The fight scenes aren’t as good as in the previous one, nowhere near.

Darkest Hour

This film wanted to be emotional, but it didn’t really work for me. I think part of that is for similar reasons to the Bohemian Rhapsody one. I knew some of it was bullshit, and that distracted me from the story they were trying to tell. I mean, it is very well made, and you can’t fault the acting. It just left me feeling nothing. Like I completely forgot I saw it until I checked the list. If the acting wasn’t as good as it was, and if it didn’t look as good as it did, this would have been in yesterday’s blog. It just made it into this one. Just.

Original review here

+Superbly acted.

-Kind of hollow.

Game Night

Nowhere near the greatest film. But I really really enjoyed it. In a just world enough people would have loved this to warrant a sequel. I mean, I hope it doesn’t as that could ruin it, but still. Actually had REALLY tight plotting as well, I’ve seen it twice and still can’t remember all the twists and turns it took. And it did it in a non-annoying way, you weren’t sitting there thinking “FFS, stop M.Nighting”. You were laughing and going along for the ride.

Original review here

+The way it was shot made some of the houses look like game pieces during establishing shots. If they did normal shots nobody would have criticised them, but the fact they went the extra mile is something I really dig.

-Little too lightweight.

Gringo

Not many of you would have seen this. And that’s a real shame as it’s a proper hidden gem of the year. Full of great performances and plotting that Red Sparrow SHOULD have had. If you pulled one thread in this plot all of it would fall apart. The characters are really well defined, and it looks great too. It just didn’t leave too lasting an impression. Like, it was great whilst I was watching it, but I could immediately discount it once I’d finished it. Rest assured though, this is probably the closest film in this blog to the “amazeballs” blog, it was just on the cusp of greatness.

Original review here

+The plotting. Seriously, it was that good.

-Missing that something that would make it great.

Hereditary

I still don’t think I’m fully over this film, it fucked me up slightly in the best possible way. It’s really weird, and it doesn’t allow you to sit back at any point, you’re always an active viewer (mainly because you have to be to work out what the fuck is going on). Superbly acted (Toni Collette now officially has to change her name to “Toni Fucking Collette” based on this film). Although I’m not sure whether pointing out how creepy one of the child actors looks counts as a compliment or bullying.

Original review here

+The way they killed off somebody who you assumed would be a main character.

-Doesn’t explain itself very well.

Hotel Artemis

Enjoyed this film a lot. The performances were great and the set design was superb. Actually the whole world-building of this film was spectacular. This film could legit kick off an extended universe. There are so many untold stories told within this film, and I love it. The downside is it doesn’t really excel in a lot of places, almost content to just skate by with mediocrity.

Original review here

+Jodie Foster. She is magnificent.

-Satire could hit harder

Ideal Home

A great film about relationships and parenting. It just veers into 90’s sitcom with the portrayal of homosexual characters. Coogan and Rudd do have surprisingly good chemistry though and I would love to see them do more things together. Considering the plaudits Coogan is getting for Stan And Ollie it wouldn’t surprise me if he ended up in a Marvel film, I mean, every other actor is.

Original review here

+Incredibly sweet at times.

-Little bit too predictable in terms of plotting occasionally.

Isle Of Dogs

Probably one of the bleakest animated films you’ll see this year. Don’t really think it’s suitable for kids, but it is very charming and worth a watch. The kind of film you’ll watch, buy it, be proud to have in your collection, but never watch. I loved it when I first saw it, but since the my opinion on it has cooled, and I’m not sure why. I think it’s because whilst it is incredibly cosy, when you’ve escaped the cocoon of the movie, it leaves no impact on you.

Original review here

+Stop motion animation will always get a pass from me.

-Wes Anderson’s style is not for everybody.

Journeyman

Paddy Considine is a national treasure. he makes the darkest most brilliant films. Not dark in a “everybody dies in the face” way, but in a “relentless horror about the human condition and humanity” way, like a social horror movie where the only death is hope. This is a great character exploration, as such it’s not for everybody who is into big blockbuster movies. But it does have an audience, and those people will love it.

Original review here

+Considine OWNS his character with every inch of his body.

-The directing of the fight scenes could be a bit more impactful.

Ready Player One

This film did something not many films manage to do, it won over my cynicism. That’s not easy to do because I’m a cynical bastard. Yet this was so warm and magical that I loved it, I really did love it. So why is it in this one and not the next one? It has a few glaring flaws, the plot is not important, the leads are only “okay”, and the world-building isn’t as good as it could be. Definitely worth a watch though, this isn’t just a movie, this is cinema.

Original review here

+Full of references and shout outs that you’ll love.

-Better world building really would have improved it. And if you think about certain moments too long the whole film falls apart.

Tag

This film is a hell of a lot of fun. And you won’t regret seeing it. But it won’t become one of your favourite movies. Oddly enough, usually I criticise films like this for lacking emotion, this has the opposite problem; it should be more fun. This would have been great as an ensemble comedy, by focusing the real life game down to just a select few it takes away the chaos and the fun.

Original review here

+Incredibly fun and Jeremy Renner is great in it.

-Should be bigger.

 

 

 

Tag (2018)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Summary:

A group of friends play tag for the month of May, every year.

This was a lot of fun. I’ll get that out of the way now. It’s just joyful, incredibly dumb entertainment. Mostly, and it’s that “mostly” which is a problem. For 90% of the time it’s brainless fun, but one that’s heartwarming in just the right places. But then at the end, it tries to get emotional, and it doesn’t really work. It just seems like an excuse for the film to try to “do” emotional, and it does not do it well. Speaking of things it doesn’t do well; the “miscarriage” joke just seems out of place. The film itself isn’t dark enough for that joke to really work. If it had moments of darkness throughout the film then that joke/sub-plot would have worked. It doesn’t really help that the character who does it isn’t really given much of a character really. She’s just seen as an extension of her partner. Kind of an issue with a lot of the female characters, to be honest, a lot of them feel really underdeveloped. There’s one character who’s introduced really early on, a reporter who is writing a story about the guys and their game. I won’t lie, there were entire scenes where I forgot/didn’t realise she was there. It was clever having her there as an audience surrogate but she didn’t really do anything. I mean, there was one scene which was played out as a series of interviews, just the one. They never do that again. Other things they don’t do: make the most of the premise. This film is fun, but it could be a LOT more fun. I feel it could have been more creative with its concept. It could have been an incredibly wacky caper of a group of people trying to outsmart each other. As it is it’s a group of people all trying to tag one person and getting violently hurt in the process, which makes the game seem less fun and fulfilling than the film says it is.

This review may make it sound like I hated it, I didn’t. It was very very funny. And the cast was great. People have said this is like a Hawkeye movie. But Jeremy Renner isn’t Hawkeye in this, he’s Rorsarch from Watchmen (a casting which would totally work btw). He knows what kind of film this is, and plays his part brilliantly. As do the others, Jon Hamm is great too, hamm-ing it up throughout (see what I did there?). Isla Fisher continues to be just, just great. But the real star is Hannibal Buress, who doesn’t necessarily have the best lines in the script but makes them the best lines with his delivery. The biggest complaint with the cast is it should have been bigger. This is based on a real-life story, but that involves about 10 people, this was cut down so the story would be easier to follow. I wish they didn’t do that. If they made it a larger cast it would have been a lot more fun, and the film would focus on the game, as opposed to the characters. I miss ensemble cast comedies. You know, things like It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and their ilk. We have ensemble action films (The oceans series, even the Avengers to some extent), but lack those old-style madcap ensemble cast comedies. The wacky ones where it’s just non-stop comedy throughout. It’s a shame as it would have been perfect for this, it would have made it something that stood out, would have been less……I guess, “disposable” is the right word. There’s not enough about this film to make it stand out. To be honest, throughout this I was thinking “okay, so it’s a film about adults playing games?” and for some reason, it kept bringing to mind the far superior Game Night. At least if it was an ensemble cast then it would have a reason for the number of unresolved plotlines it has and it would have stood out on its own. I know by the end of the year I will completely forget that this film exists, let alone that I saw it.

But should you see it? I’d say yes. It’s a fun way to pass the time, and it has a superbly diverse soundtrack. It’s just……it should be better

Avengers: Infinity War (2018) (Spoilers Version)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Well I said I was going to put spoilers in this, so here goes:

Bruce Willis was dead all the time

Kevin Spacey is Keyser Soze

Clark Kent is Superman.

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Oh, I suppose I should talk about the spoilers in this film. I have quite a bit to discuss about this, the ending in particular, so I had to do a different blog for it. It would be unfair to spoil the film for those who hadn’t seen it, but there were certain things I couldn’t discuss without spoiling the ending. I think that’s kind of cool though, spoilers mean something again. Because the studio put a lot of importance on not letting the ending go, it meant that people who watched it put that importance on too, plots matter again. I like that.

But this specific ending? Holy f*ck. In case you haven’t seen it here it is: pretty much everyone dies. Spiderman, Black Panther, Star Lord, Drax, Groot, Samuel L Jackson, all dead. Which is kind of odd considering that pretty much all of them have been announced for sequels. This brings up my first point; as emotional as the ending was, it won’t last. It won’t be a film that in years to come you’ll think of as emotionally devastating films. The reason for this; the ending won’t stick. It can’t stick, they’ve announced a Spider-man sequel for one. So as emotionally crushing as the deaths were, everybody knows they’ll be back. Look at articles about it, they’re not discussing “oh no, how will the surviving heroes cope with such horror?”, they’re saying “which of these will stay dead?”, which sucks. The default setting in films should be when a character dies, they stay dead, coming back from the dead should be the exception, not the expected norm. So it’s hard to feel too emotional about this, as there’s a part of you that thinks “meh, they’ll be back” or “I’ll save my emotion for when I get to the next movie and see what happens”. I mean, yeah, I am intrigued as hell as to how they’re going to do it. Personally, I think it will have something to do with Thanos using the time stone to rewind time and kill Vision. Have a feeling that once someone can get hold of that they can use it to rewind back to the rewind (if that makes sense). This means the ones who died before that ((Gamora, Loki (seriously for the love of all that is good kill Loki and keep him dead. He’s a good character but is emblematic of the “no deaths count” thing MCU has)) will stay dead, whereas those that died after the snap (Spider-man, Bucky, Brooklyn 99) will come back.

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It is coming back, right?

No idea who’s gonna do that though, I’m guessing Captain Marvel will have something to do with it but can’t say for certain as I don’t know what her powers are as I’m not too familiar with the character. Maybe it won’t be the heroes, maybe it will be the scientists, we have no idea if Selvig is still alive, if he is given the technology seen in both Ant-Man and Black Panther he could create something great. That’s if he’s still alive though. That’s something I have a problem with in this, outside of Nick Fury (and not-Robin from HIMYM), all the deaths were major characters from this film. Marvel has had A LOT of side characters in their films, did any of them die? Will we ever find out? How was this received by people who had ABSOLUTELY no idea what happened? Random people just going about their day etc when their friend suddenly disappears? I guarantee people thought it was the rapture or something. But we don’t know, because we didn’t see it from a civilian standpoint, we got a small insight with the post-credits thing where cars and planes crashed, but nothing that shows their pure visceral terror. How much more impactful would it have been if we had a character hadn’t seen in years come back for a random scene, only to die? I have a slight feeling that we’ll see that next time we see Hawkeye, that his family all disappear and he goes on a vengeful warpath. I guess what I’m basically asking in all of this is this; is Ned okay? That’s all I want to know.

 

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We love Ned

 

Avengers: Infinity War (2018) (Spoiler-Free Version)

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

A few years ago I saw a film called Men, Women & Children. A film that had moments of okayness but failed to maintain even that. The main reason for this was it had too many characters and it couldn’t focus on all of them, as such some felt underdeveloped and the time spent with them felt utterly pointless. There was concern that the same would happen with this. This had a lot of characters, and all of them were somebody’s favourite (yes, even Thor), so if you didn’t do them properly then you’re going to annoy a lot of people, and in the age of social media, especially with such a highly anticipated film, the slightest inkling of dissatisfaction and they’d be nerd-rage akin to if you said “maybe not everybody has to be white”. As it is, this balances the characters pretty well. Whilst the characters are split into separate groups, there’s no real “core” group. None of them seem more plot-focused than the others. That being said it’s not entirely equal. It seems like the Guardians characters have a lot more to do within their groups than the others. Surprised there’s not really any new characters in it, I mean, there’s an allusion to one at the end but the only new people are the villains. This is slightly odd as it means that these are the only ones in the entire universe. Where was Stallone etc from Guardians Of The Galaxy 2? You’d think they’d have heard of Thanos’s plan and tried to stop it. Or anybody from Agents Of Shield (is that still going? I got incredibly bored by it quite quickly so stopped watching). It’s going to be incredibly difficult to introduce new characters after this, as the first question anybody will ask is “where the fuck were you when this happened?” Before it’s been mostly localised destruction, but maybe with the potential of worse things happening later. This was half of existence being threatened with extinction. There should have been a lot more people.

I mean, yeah that would have meant the film would be like seventy hundred hours long. But even if you just mentioned “earth has been closed off to visitors” to explain others not being there it would be better. Don’t get me wrong, I did love this film. The character interactions were fantastic (although still disappointed nobody said “no shit, Sherlock” when Doctor Strange and Iron Man shared a scene). It was great that the established groups got split up and we got characters sharing scenes who had never interacted before. On the downside, this causes a problem for any future films. The same problem that hit the MCU post-Avengers. From now on whenever a character has a solo film you’ll be wondering why nobody else is helping. If any other Iron Man films happen in the future then he has space-travelling assistance to come help him.

Has to be said that the fact that this film works, and works brilliantly is a true testament to the skill involved. The script is incredibly tight and focused, barely any fluff at all, which considering how long it is is quite impressive. It looks great, the scenes on Titan, in particular, look stunning, The setpiece in Wakanda, whilst not exactly disappointing, isn’t as stunning to look at as you feel it could be. And the music is still a bit of a letdown. Marvel doesn’t really have a great track record when it comes to original music (Black Panther being the obvious exception), they have that one piece of Avengers music they use, but every time I try to think of that I get the Harry Potter music in my head. Even the Saw franchise had a recognisable theme they used as shorthand for “shit’s about to go down”.The power of good music (and not just in a “using established songs) way) is underappreciated in modern cinema but could work wonders. If MCU had character themes then the introductions would be a lot better, imagine if you see a character in the darkness, you have no idea who they are but then a familiar theme plays, exciting you before you even see them.

So yeah, if you’ve liked these films, you really need to see this, but I can’t imagine you enjoying this if you haven’t seen the others. This is not the film you watch to introduce you to the MCU, you’ll be completely lost. So, see this, but see the others first. Will be posting a second review of this later on in the week, specifically focusing on the ending. So look out for that over the weekend.

How We Got Through…March 2017

On By troubledproductionsIn How We Got ThroughLeave a comment

Film

A Cure For Wellness

As you can read here I liked it, but it made me want to self harm. It’s basically this years Nocturnal Creatures, but not quite as great. I do wish Celia Imrie was in it more, she was in the trailer but her role in the film was really nothing more than an extended cameo. Mia Goth was superb however, as was Dane DeHaan (which reminds me, I really need to see Chronicle)

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“Why don’t we do the poster for Slither, but sexy?” “Genius! More cocaine”

Deadpool

Still very very funny, still lacking a compelling story though, but it’s so funny that that makes up for it. One of my favourite soundtracks from last year, although there were a lot of REALLY strong soundtracks last year; Deadpool, Edge Of Seventeen etc all showed that art of the mixtape method of soundtrack making isn’t dead whilst Moana and Kubo showed how you can use a soundtrack as an extensive mood piece for the film.

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Get Out

As you read here, really really good and I can’t wait to see it again to catch things I missed the first time. Got an almost perfect Rotten Tomatoes score, and it fully deserves that.

Hidden Figures

It was good, I wouldn’t call it “Oscar Worthy”. The main trouble with these sorts of stories is it’s impossible to have a good villain. The key to a good villain comes in two separate flavours:

  1. The “nobody knows anything about him” (usually used in horror films)
  2. The “I can see his point, but he’s very very wrong”.

Because these films are character pieces you can’t have the villains be the first one, so you need the second one. But they never work in these films for one simple reason; there’s no logical defence of racism. There’s no way of seeing their point. I had similar problems with Selma too, the villains are so clearly wrong that they don’t make compelling characters. Now I know this is what it was actually like at the time, and it is a truly fascinating story, but it does mean as a cinema experience it never really stays with you. So really my problem isn’t with the film, it’s with reality not conforming to my expectations, so maybe the problem is me.

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Definitely not with the performances which were strong all round

John Wick 2

If you enjoyed the first one, you’ll enjoy this. It’s basically the first film, but more so and in a way that never feels like it’s walking in the same footsteps. One of the first times in a while I remember leaving the cinema and being incredibly excited for the sequel.

Kong: Skull Island

I went into this with low expectations. I was thinking “but I’ve already seen everything, how can spectacle cinema work in this day and age? And you showed too much Kong in the trailer, you idiots, you ruined everything I hate you”. Looking back at it, that may have been an overreaction. The film was, well it was solid. It showed that spectacle can still work in a post Avatar world. It’s not a “I must buy this film immediately”, kind of film, but if it’s on on TV at some point, grab a couple of mates, get some beers in, and leave your brain at the door.

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Logan

One of the best films I’ve seen this year, without a shadow of a doubt. Fully deserves all the plaudits praising it, and more so.

The Great Muppet Caper

I always assumed The Muppets weren’t self referential until the new films came out, like all generations I assumed it was my generation that invented meta-comedy as we’re all so much smarter than all the previous generations. Yeah, I was wrong, and I’m an idiot. Some people say a good film is one that makes you ask questions, the major question of this film is “how the hell did they do that bicycle scene? That’s superb”

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Books

We Need To Talk About Kevin

A very very good book, but not a very nice one. Has a unique way of telling the story and very rarely comes off as exploitative. I’ve yet to see the film but I’m very excited to get round to it.

TV Shows

I should point out; a LOT of these are going to be BBC based. I went on a website I frequent to see what will be taken off netflix soon. There was A LOT of BBC based stuff coming off at the end of the month. As such I had to watch a lot before it got taken off. I got halfway through Doctor Who (which I was watching whilst I was reading Hitchhiker’s Guide, never do that as it creates a weird mash up in your head) and whatever legal issues there were with contracts ending etc was resolved, and a lot of the stuff stayed on. I went off list for no reason.

Extras/The Office

First season of The Office; very very good. Second series; still good. Christmas special; he tried so damn hard to make the main character likeable it’s like he forgot the point of his own story. Extras however is the point where Ricky Gervais just started angrily complaining about the state of comedy in a smug “I’m better than you all, only my comedy is true comedy” way. Which would be admirable if one of the points he was making wasn’t about people releasing comedy singles in-character, which he has since done.

Fawlty Towers

Surprisingly, I had never seen this show before, not all of it anyway. I’d seen an episode or two here and there, but never the whole thing. I get why people love this, very very funny. Does more in 14 episodes than most comedies could hope to do in 14 series.

That Mitchell And Webb Look

Like all sketch shows it’s a bit repetitive but not as obviously as most shows of the genre. I think the reason for this is the history behind it. A lot of sketch show characters have the catchphrase as the joke; so every line in the script is building up to a new way to say that catchphrase. This show tends to put the catchphrases at the start, due (it would seem) to the shows history on radio, which necessitated you put the catchphrase first so that the audience would know which sketch you were in. Has some sketches which are just brilliantly funny (I will never not find a way to use “our caps have got skulls on them, are we the bad guys?” in political discourse). But is also one of the few sketch shows which made me hate life and cry, the “Dementia Sherlock Holmes“. Completely heartbreaking.

The Trip

Yes, it is very up itself, but it is also very very funny, and features two actors self-evaluating every criticism they have of themselves, and they have a lot. New series starts next month, but not on the trusty BBC, instead on Sky Atlantic.

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The Wrong Mans

I’m a sucker for long-form storytelling, particularly in sitcoms (it’s one of many many reasons why I love Crazy Ex Girlfriend and Bojack Horseman), and this has a fantastic story thread running through it. It’s hard to explain just how tightly and intricately plotted this is without it seeming like hyperbole. Hopefully now that James Cordon is huge in America this will start to get strong DVD sales.

Twenty Twelve

Very very BBC. Not going to change your life, but a pleasant enough way to wile away the hours. Funny and enjoyable, just not very memorable.

Music

Shenanigans

Weird to think this is now halfway through Green Days career in terms of albums released, six albums either side of the releases of this and International Superhits. But let’s forget about how this makes me aware of my own mortality and focus on how good this album is; B-sides which are better than most bands release as singles. “Ha Ha You’re Dead” is still one of my favourite songs by the band but you can’t say that without sounding like a hipster douche who’s all like “oh, you probably won’t know my favourite song by them”, and nobody likes those kind of people.

Best songs: Ha Ha You’re Dead

Do Da Da

Suffocate.

Also check out; they have this album called Dookie that you might not know about, pretty good. Also, check out this other super rare album that nobody knows about called American Idiot

All That She Wants – Wizo

I love pop punk covers of songs, and this is no exception. The original is a simply wonderful slice of summer pop (and yes, to me that is a genre) and a pop punk version of it suits it so well.

Podcasts

Toku Podcast

A podcast about video games, biscuits, films, biscuits, tea, biscuits, tv shows, and biscuits. The two hosts are extremely likeable, funny, smart, and kind of strange in the most wonderful way. They spent a long time discussing which avengers would be which biscuits that was hilarious ((in case you were wondering what my choices would be: Iron Man; Jammie Dodger. Captain America; Hob Nob. Hulk: Those oat biscuits that crumble all the time. Spider-Man: Jaffa Cake (is it an avenger, is it a cake? Nobody knows)).

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They also have the best episode titles

So that’s that for this month; I’ll see you in April unless I get hit by a bus and die, then I might have to delay until May.

Why We (Already) Love Captain America: Civil War

On 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 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 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.