A Green Mushroom

I checked out The Grand Budapest Hotel after seeing it on an episode of Movies of Mikey .  I knew almost nothing  about it going in except what I learned from that video. I liked it.  It's a little more... artsy... I think that's the word I want... than movies I typically watch but it was good anyway.  I really liked the framing devices they used for the different levels of story.  It has a story in a story in a story thing going on that's broken up by using different aspect ratios for different levels of the story.  There's also some unreliable narrator thrown in there too for good measure. I honestly didn't know if I would even make it five minutes into this movie but I was engrossed the whole time I was watching it.  With my typical kind of movies I would know who to recommend it to and who not too but this one throws me for a loop. I would say if you get a chance to try this one on the cheap you should give it a shot.  In the end, I ...

This the the movie that finally solidified the fact that I just don't like Westerns.  I've always been ambivalent with Westerns but Magnificent 7 had enough actors that I like that it convinced me to give it a shot. It is a very mediocre movie.  It's completely predictable.  The pacing is sooooo slow.  I think it's a stereotypical Western but made in 2016 instead of the golden age of Westerns.  It just completely and utterly failed to click with me. I even held out for the end hoping something would redeem it.  Maybe the fight scenes would get better.  Maybe there would be a cool twist.  Maybe a character would actually have character development!  No on all counts. At least now I've learned that while I don't mind a Western setting (see my love of Westworld) I do hate the genre of Westerns.  The genre styles and conventions just aren't for me.

The latest Star Wars Expanded Universe novel, Catalyst, is a direct prequel to the upcoming Rogue One out later this week.  It wasn't great. I mean, it was ok.  It wasn't horrible or anything.  But, it also wasn't a good book on it's own. Mostly, Catalyst is just an introduction to two of the characters that will be in Rogue One.  It follows Krennic (that guy in white from the trailers) and Galen (Jyn's father).  They both have an engineering background.  Krennic is a military man and in charge of overseeing the Death Star building.  Galen is a super intelligent scientist doing energy research with kyber crystals.  Galen is a pacifist who wants to use his research to provide power to everyone.  Krennic slowly ropes him into helping with the Death Star main weapon without Galen ever figuring it out. And that's most of the book right there.  Not a lot else happens.  There are parts with other characters but they don't r...

I finally got around to watching Suicide Squad!  It was... alright. It definitely wasn't good.  But it wasn't horrible either. I'm glad I've watched it at the very least. In the end I the only characters I liked were Deadshot and Harley Quinn.  Everyone else felt like they were needlessly cluttering up the movie and wasting my time. Not to mention the plot was boring, predictable, and pretty dumb.  I mean, I know it's a comic movie and I'm supposed to suspend my disbelief but I had so much trouble doing that for this movie. If you're into comic book movies you should probably rent or borrow Suicide Squad once just to see it but chances are you'll never need to own it.  If you're not into comic books movies in general then you should definitely skip this one.

I finally got around to watching X-Men Apocalypse and it was... alright.  I liked it more than First Class or Days of Future past.  But as for the movie itself it was just ok. The plot was entirely predictable from start to finish.  The bad guy was lame and never once interested me.  But the action was fine and the character development was good to see. Overall, I think it's a great movie for a different reason.  It has finally gotten away from the shackles of the original movie trilogy and it's cast.  By the end of X-Men Apocalypse we finally have our entire new cast of characters with new actors all assembled and they seem really good. I feel like the stage is finally set for the next X-Men movie to potentially be great.  I think this cast can do amazing things if given the right script now that they're finally free from all the baggage of the first three X-Men movies. So, while I don't think I'll be re-watching X-Men Apocalypse anytime s...

Horror! In this episode: It’s October! And you know what that means? That’s right, geeks...HORROR! You see,Void thinks horror is dumb and boring. Beej thinks it’s awesome. Is the Beejmeister going to be able to convince the Voidenator that horror is worth his time? Beej taught a horror literature class for English majors a few years back, and he had a wonderful experience with horror in college because all of his friends loved it. So where he’s coming is different from where some fans are coming from. A lot of horror hits on cultural and societal fears, far more than personal. We can trace the entire 20th century’s outlook based on what horror media was being produced. Rarely does horror exist on its i.e. because of its nature. If the intent is to bring people a primal realization of a cultural or societal fear so they can deal with it, that’s not a genre. What you probably think of as “horror” is technically “gothic romance” Emotional connection to events. To situations. ...

Kingsglaive is the tie in movie for FFXV.  I gave it a shot and found it to actually be the best Final Fantasy movie so far. But, with that said, it's not actually a high bar to clear.  Advent Children and Spirits Within were both very meh. This ties in directly with Final Fantasy XV and it gave some really good context for what is happening offscreen during the early events of the game.  It is kind of weird that it's out so much earlier than the game itself but I suppose they're just trying to generate as much hype as possible before the launch of the main product. It's definitely not required watching to play the game but I was super happy with the added context I got from it.  I'm now much more interested in the magic system and political happenings in the world of Final Fantasy XV. I don't want to spoil the story for anyone but if you're a Final Fantasy fan or plan on playing Final Fantasy XV I would recommend watching this movie at least onc...

I must have been in a Simon Pegg mood because after finishing Shaun of the Dead I jumped over and checked out Man Up.  It's a Rom Com from last year starring Simon Pegg. I didn't know what to expect from him as an actor when it came to Rom Com acting but it actually ended up being one of my favorite Rom Coms that I've seen in awhile.  Nothing in it is too outlandish or crazy.  There's no big failure of communication that feels forced and stupid.  I feel like it holds together better than most Rom Com plots. So... I liked it, a lot.  It reminded me how good the genre can be.  I don't know why I like this genre so much but I really do.  It might mean it's time for me to go through a Rom Com phase and check out some more of my favorites.

A friend recently reminded me that Shaun of the Dead was a movie that existed and that I should probably watch it again because I couldn't remember it. They were correct. Shaun of the Dead is a weird Rom Zom Com.  A Rom Com with Zombies in it.  It's not really a horror movie, which is good since I don't really like horror movies, but it's not a straight up Rom Com either. It's definitely in the vein of the Hot Fuzz and The World's End which are part of this (very) loose trilogy of movies. I liked it a lot more than I remembered from my first watch.  I think going into knowing what it was helped a lot.  The first time I basically watched the movie knowing nothing about it.  This time I could just appreciate it for what it is instead of what I thought it might be.

After really liking Zootopia the other day I thought I'd play catch up on Pixar animated movies and not just Disney animated movies.  The Good Dinosaur is the latest Pixar movie that I had never gotten around to. And it turns out... it's not really for me.  It had some gorgeous vistas in CGI but the story itself got really boring really fast.  This isn't a review because I didn't actually finish the movie.  I wasn't enjoying it so I just decided to stop watching. Maybe I'll give the next Pixar movie a shot instead, but until then it truly seems like the Disney animated CG movies are where all the good stuff is now.  I can't wait to see what they do next!

I've never watched a boxing movie before but I heard a lot of good things about Creed so I thought I'd give it a try.  People said I didn't actually need prior knowledge of the Rocky movies to see it which went a long way toward me giving it a chance. I ended up actually liking it.  Not liking it enough to own it and rewatch it a bunch, but enough that if they made a sequel I would probably watch it. I still don't like boxing or MMA in real life but I can appreciate a well shot and well choreographed fight scene in a movie.  Luckily for me all the fight scenes in Creed were very well done.  I thought they were interesting. I'm still not going to run out and start hunting for more boxing movies but I'll keep my eyes out in case Creed has a follow-up.

I finally got around to watching this movie now that it's out of theaters and wow, I'm super glad I didn't spend the money and time on a theater trip for it. I can't believe this is the movie they came up with from the Batman v Superman source material.  I see why everyone railed against it while it was in theaters. I actually spent a solid two days after watching it sending texts to my friend as I deconstructed it in my mind and found more and more things wrong with the movie. At this point I could either dive into all those points or just warn you away from this one.  I think I'll do the later since this movie doesn't deserve any more of my time than it's already gotten.  Be warned, Batman v Superman is bad.

I'm still catching up on movies that are on my list to be watched.  Bridge of Spies made it's way to the top so I gave it a shot. It's a cold war drama that actually turned out to be pretty good.  It's a Spielberg movie starring Tom Hanks, so you basically know what you're getting in for before you even start.  But it's a cool period piece that looks at the early days of the Cold War. It starts as a courtroom drama but turns into a movie about negotiation between world powers during the Cold War.  I feel like I learned more about the time and place thanks to this movie.  It was entertaining enough and held my attention throughout. I can recommend it as a movie you should probably see once if the premise sounds interesting to you.  But it's not going to be one I come back to over and over again.

I saw Pacific Rim once in theaters and I remembered liking it the first time but it didn't leave a huge impact on me. Ever since then I've heard so many rave reviews from people about the movie like it was one of the best things ever.  So, I decided to give it a re-watch since that's what I've been working through in my movie list anyway. And this time I actually liked it a lot more.  Knowing what to expect from it as a movie before watching it meant I could just enjoy it for the pure giant robot vs monster action it provided.  The story, plot, and characters don't need to be much when the story is actually about excuses to have cool battles between these goliaths. I find myself much more interested in Pacific Rim 2 now and also much more likely to watch Pacific Rim again on a whim in the future.  It set out to be a certain type of movie and it achieved it perfectly.

Apparently I've been on a movie kick lately.  My movie list of things to watch had built up so I'm swatting them down one by one. Anyway, Zootopia is a fantastic movie.  I sat down to watch it by myself and by the 15 minute mark both my wife and my son had wandered by and got sucked in.  We all loved it! The premise is that animals have evolved to live together peacefully and basically all act like humans do in real life.  It deals with themes of stereotyping in interesting ways but mostly it's a good movie because the main characters are really interesting and the world is a marvel to find out about. I think Disney is just killing it lately with their movies.  It seems like Disney CG animated movies are actually a lot better than Pixar these days.  And I'm actually super happy with the way they're handling their big franchises like Star Wars and Marvel as well. So... yeah.  I would basically recommend Zootopia to anyone.  It's a great...

I was talking to some friends about the newest X-Men movie that came out and in having the discussion I realized that there was an X-Men movie I never watched.  So, I thought I'd fix that. The Wolverine is actually more of a character piece than an X-Men movie.  I think there were only 2 mutants in the whole thing.  But, I actually liked it more than the last few X-Men movies. By focusing on Wolverine it gets to actually dive into his character and give him real decisions and growth.  It's great to see Hugh Jackman get a full movie playing this character as the main protagonist. Basically, Wolverine goes to Japan and then things quickly get more interesting.  If you like X-Men or Wolverine you should definitely see it. For me, it's just made me more excited for the Old Man Logan movie they have in development.  It could turn out really good.

I never wrote up my thoughts about the Warcraft movie!  Although I did talk about it on the Geek to Geek podcast. I really liked the Warcraft movie.  I went in with super low expectations and walked away pleasantly surprised. I think that anyone who likes fantasy could go see the movie and enjoy it, even though fans of Warcraft will feel more familiar with the world and setting.  Think of it like Lord of the Rings, if you were a book reader and went to see the movies when they came out you would get more out of them.  Same idea here if you've ever been a Warcraft player. It seems like it's broken records in China for ticket sales so I'm hoping we'll actually get to see a sequel or two.  I bet this could be better as a series than as a stand alone movie.

Incredible Hulk is the MCU movie I've seen the least, as I've only seen it once.  I actually didn't realize it was part of the MCU since it was a different actor and feels different from the rest of the MCU movies. This is the first time I've watched it since seeing it in theaters when it originally came out. It doesn't really hold up compared to everything that has come since.  It's slow with a very predictable plot. Honestly, huge portions of the movie consist of shots of Edward Norton's face reacting to things.  It got old fast. I guess I learned that I really like Mark Ruffalo as the Hulk instead.  I've loved him in the two Avengers movie and I'm really excited to see how he'll tie into Thor Ragnarok.

I've never actually been able to get through Iron Man 3 before, but as part of my re-watch of my least watched parts of the MCU I thought I should power through it. It wasn't as horrible as Thor Dark World but it was pretty bad.  It's definitely in the bottom half of quality in the MCU and it really seems like Iron Man as a solo character has reached the limits of interesting. I'm glad I got a little more context for the character but I can't see myself watching this one again for a really long time. All that being said, I still think Iron Man is a great character in the multi-character movies and I love seeing him interact with other super heroes.  I'm excited for more of that!

I really liked Bloodline.  If you follow me you know that I read almost every Star Wars book that hits the market.  This one is right up there with the best ones I've read. And it didn't really surprise me that it was.   Bloodline is by Claudia Gray, the same author who wrote Lost Stars which is my favorite Star Wars book to date. Bloodline follows Leia sometime about half way between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens.  It fills in so much information about the politics of the New Republic, hints at the formation and structure of the first order, and let's us see a key point in Leia's political career.  It's a fantastic book to start bridging the gap between Episode VI and Episode VII. While I'd love to learn more about what Luke and Ben are doing during this time period I never felt like this book had to go there.  There are enough interesting events going on with Leia that I was captivated throughout. If you're a Star Wars fan I recomm...