Invader Zim: Enter the Florpus

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This is actually a movie I didn't even know was going to be a thing until I saw it was on Netflix not too long ago. Zim had vanished for some time, leaving his arch nemesis Dib to become a shell of his former self, merely waiting for Zim's return. I should start this by saying that I'm really only a casual Invader Zim fan. I've seen some episodes of the show here and there, but I know the gist. I don't think you need to be the biggest Invader Zim fan to get something out of this movie, nor would I say you necessarily need to have seen the show. There are points in the film where they reference the show's backstory. However, I do think that even the most basic knowledge genuinely helps. I really dug this movie. It's pretty well-animated. The humor works really well. Most of the jokes really do land. The movie also keeps up a pretty good pace. Sometimes, I wonder if the pace might be a touch too fast. However, this never feels like a detriment to the film, so much as my own personal observation and nitpick in regards to this film. I don't really think there's too much more for me to say. Invader Zim: Enter the Florpus is a lean 70 minutes. It's short and sweet, but never overstays it's welcome. I recommend this film to fans of the Invader Zim series, hardcore and casual fans alike.

7 / 10 

Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw

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Hattie Shaw (played by Vanessa Kirby) is framed as a traitor by an enhanced supervillain called Brixton (played Idris Elba) after her team is massacred, forcing her to flee with a virus that poses a threat to the entire world. As a result, Luke Hobbs and Deckard Shaw (Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham reprising their roles from the main Fast and the Furious franchise) are brought in and forced to work together to bring Brixton down. OK, this movie clearly doesn’t much of an actual plot. It feels more like it’s an excuse to have a bunch of action sequences as well as have Dwayne Johnson and Jason Statham say a bunch of one-liners. I didn’t go into this movie expecting high art. The bigger and dumber the movies in this franchise get, the more I honestly tend to enjoy them. Some of the writing is incredibly cheesy. But, I can’t really be that hard on the writing. After all, this is coming from someone who loves movies like Commando, Con Air, Face/Off, and Independence Day. I mean, this is a movie where Idris Elba gets to say the line “I’m black Superman.”It’s hard for me to say much more. This feels like it’s a movie in the loosest sense. It’s kind of good in all of the right ways, and it’s kind of bad in all of the right ways. If you are a fan of this franchise, then I really do recommend this film. If you’re not a fan, then this might just be the one I actually recommend seeing the most. I don’t want to guarantee anything, but it feels more like a buddy cop spy movie than anything else.   

7 / 10 

Girls with Balls

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So, not too long ago, I came across a movie on Netflix called Girls with Balls. The film is about a volleyball team that finds themselves being hunted for sport by a bunch of rednecks when their van breaks down. Based on that title and premise, I was legitimately intrigued. Let’s just say that the movie was something of an underwhelming experience for me. For a horror comedy, the horror didn’t work that well, and the comedy never really landed for me. I didn’t really find any of the characters all that interesting. It felt like the development was paper-thin. This is something of a catch-22 for me. There have been a lot of movies like this where I have been fairly lenient on characters not having much to them. I feel like part of my issue is that there really isn’t anyone here that I particularly like. This film is technically a foreign film. It’s dubbed into English. At first, this was something that really distracted me, mostly because I could just tell. Some of the character motivations feel like they just come out of nowhere, or that they could have been handled better. In the end, it feels like Girls with Balls was just a movie that didn’t seem like it really knew what it wanted to be. I would still say give it a chance, if only because your experience with a film like this may legitimately differ from my own. Even if I personally wasn’t a fan, I could actually see how someone else could be. 

3 / 10 

Godzilla: King of the Monsters

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Godzilla: King of the Monsters is the sequel to 2014’s Godzilla. This time around, Godzilla has fight King Ghidora for dominance over all monsters. Now, when the movie is about Godzilla fighting it out with other monsters, it is genuinely entertaining. The human cast is composed of solid actors. The cast includes the likes of Millie Bobby Brown, Kyle Chandler, Vera Farmiga, Ken Watanabe, Bradley Whitford, and Charles Dance. But, everything else about the movie doesn’t quite work that well for me. The pacing just feels off. It isn’t really easy for me to explain why. A lot of it just doesn’t quite come together. But, the movie’s biggest problem is the characters. They are played by good actors giving good performances. The problem is: most of these characters just aren’t written very well. There isn’t really anything about any of them that honestly stands out. Their motivations don’t feel that well defined, almost as though the motivations for most of these characters is designed to fit a given scene, so they are incredibly difficult to define. If it seems as though I’m being particularly harsh, it’s because this is one of the movies I was the most excited for this year. The final product is easily in the running for my biggest disappointment of the year. It has good elements (namely the actors, effects, and action). But, the characters, writing, and pacing really let the movie down for me in the end. 

4 / 10   

Spider-Man: Far From Home

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Following the events of Avengers: Endgame, Peter Parker (played by Tom Holland) is trying to find what his place is in a world without Tony Stark, and determine whether or not he is the next Iron Man. While he is on a school trip, he is recruited by Nick Fury (played by Samuel L. Jackson) to help Quentin Beck a.k.a. Mysterio (played by Jake Gyllenhaal) stop a potential global threat. I think it is important that I start with the negatives, because there really aren’t that many. The biggest one is the movie’s twist. It’s not awful. It’s just kind of easy to see coming, especially if you’re a Spider-Man fan. Here’s a hint. It involves Mysterio. That said, Jake Gyllenhaal owns this movie, and pretty much every scene he’s in. Once again, Tom Holland proves to me that he is the one actor I feel truly embodies both Peter Parker and Spider-Man. Holland has really solid chemistry with Zendaya, playing MJ. The humor works for the most part, even if some of it doesn’t land as hard as it did in Homecoming. The action is genuinely creative, and may be one of this movie’s biggest strengths. Overall, Spider-Man: Far From Home isn’t as good as Spider-Man: Homecoming, but it’s still a pretty solid film that actually deals with the effects of previous Marvel movies.      

8 / 10 

Crawl

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A woman named Haley Keller (played by Kaya Scodelario) goes to her family home during a category 5 hurricane in order to find her father (played by Barry Pepper). The two have to survive both the hurricane and alligators lurking in the depths. I think Crawl can be best described as popcorn entertainment. The movie’s about an hour and a half. It seems like it just wants to show up and do its thing. Now, it helps that I didn’t go into this film expecting it to be a masterpiece. I mean this movie does fall into a lot of horror movie traps. Characters are introduced that are just there to die. There are some plot holes that I have to question. With the exceptions of our main leads, a lot of the actors aren’t very good. The visual effects are solid. They aren’t anything I can call amazing, but they actually work well enough. But, if I’m being completely honest, this is a movie that clearly knows what it is. It doesn’t show any interest in transcending the genre. It succeeds at being a simple creature feature. It also takes itself just seriously enough. It doesn’t go for tongue-in-cheek laughs, but still knows exactly what it is. I don’t always need a movie that elevates the horror genre, or pushes the boundaries of what the genre can be. Sometimes I just need a movie that’s purely fun.     

7 / 10     

John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum

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Picking up not too long after the events of John Wick: Chapter 2, John finds himself in a dangerous situation as he must navigate Manhattan, and will also travel across the world in spots as well. This is one of those movies I was really excited for. For the most part, it really didn’t disappoint me. The acting is pretty solid all around. I was really happy to see them bring Laurence Fishburne back for another small but memorable role. I also really liked Halle Berry as the character Sofia. She’s a woman with ties to John’s past. However, I wish she had a bigger role, even if I really liked what I saw of her. I also loved Mark Dacascos as the villainous Zero. Zero is this character who feels like he’s fanboying over John Wick one second, and legitimately willing to kill him the next second. In less capable hands, I might actually hate this character, but I really think he works in this movie. Once again, the action feels like the true star of the show, and I mean this as the highest compliment. The action feels brutal in the best way possible. The way Chad Stahelski films it is exceptional too. I can’t express just how glad I am that it feels like we’re beginning to move away from shaky cam. I love that you can actually make out every aspect of the action in this film. On the more negative side of things, there’s a subplot introduced in this film I think should have been reworked a little bit. As it stands, it doesn’t really go anywhere. It’s hard to talk about, because a lot of the specifics deal with spoilers. It’s also the part of the movie that kind of seems to drag on the most for me, and is the one part of the movie that kind of disrupts the flow a little bit. Don’t get me wrong, John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum is still a damn entertaining movie, and pretty solid overall. But, I also feel like it’s probably my least favorite of the three films as well. 

8 / 10