I Am Not Conflicted About The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part
This trailer is amazing, this movie looks amazing and I can’t wait for The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part!
And you should be just as excited. The first The LEGO Movie was possibly the greatest film of the past 20 years, as far as I’m concerned. So I’m super excited for this super sequel!
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I’m Still Not Sure How I Feel About Aquaman
Looks like I’m just going to have to watch Aquaman in theaters and form my opinion that way. There’s one final trailer for Aquaman, and I just don’t know how to feel about this movie. The trailer seems cool…
…but then it goes and does things I don’t like. For example, it establishes the trident as a McGuffin in the trailer! There’s nothing inherently wrong with McGuffins, but I feel they’re kind of weak. And to establish it in the trailer seems tacky. For another example, the trailer also hits the viewer with a ton of awkward exposition. Like describing the antagonist in full as “your half-brother King Orm” or whatever they said. That name doesn’t mean anything to anybody, not even Aquaman fans. There’s no need to spell it out so much in the trailer. They don’t name Black Manta. There’s no need to name Orm.
Finally, the new trailer, especially, showcases a ton of CGI battle footage. It looks cool, and being filled with undersea monsters is unique, but movies that rely on nothing but overwhelming CGI battle footage don’t fair too well.
Still, I like the idea of a badass Aquaman movie. And I still like Jason Momoa in the lead role. And I’ve heard great things about director James Wan. And Black Manta looks cool. So I’m perched precariously over the prospect of this Aquaman films…
It doesn’t help that it’s coming out the same weekend as Mary Poppins Returns and Bumblebee. This is probably why Marvel doesn’t release movies the week of Christmas.
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The One Thing That Bugs Me The Most About Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindewald
I didn’t like Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindewald. I love the Wizarding World of Harry Potter as much as the next person, and I relatively enjoyed the first Fantastic Beasts movie. But the new sequel is baloney. It’s a hodgepodge of conflicting and confusing subplots, all attempting to pad out a movie that’s really only concerned with setting up the rest of the franchise.
But there’s one thing that really, really bugged me about the new film: the casual use of the killing curse.
Spoilers: Bellatrix kills Sirius
I’m not going to spoil anything in the movie, at least nothing important. It shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that the acolytes of the criminal Grindewald, among others, use the killing curse. It’s just how they use it that really annoys me, and how I feel it contradicts established Harry Potter canon.
Honestly, a lot of things in The Crimes of Grindelwald contradict Harry Potter canon. And as someone who enjoys the pedantry of Harry Potter canon, the detail that JK Rowling put into the Wizarding World, a lot of this really bugged me.
But what really sticks in my craw about the new movie is how casually the wizards flick their wands and administer Avada Kedavra, the killing curse.
Spoilers: Lucius kills nobody
In the books and the original films, we’re taught that Avada Kedavra is one of the three Unforgivable Curses. It’s a big freaking deal. We’re also taught that casting spells without shouting the incantation is a powerful magic that takes years of study. And I feel that it was heavily implied that you couldn’t just cast off Avada Kedavra without using the incantation.
You’ve got to really mean it when you cast Avada Kedavra. You’ve got to put your whole damn soul behind it. Even powerful wizards like Lucius Malfoy, Severus Snape and Vodlemort himself have to speak or shout the incantation out loud to cast it.
Spoilers: Voldemort kills Grindelwald
But in the film, wizards can casually stroll into a room, flick their wrists and people die.
The most egregious example, the one that really grinds my gears, involved an Auror, ostensibly one of the good guys. This Auror is standing there, wand down, when he’s startled by someone at his side. He quickly turns half around, barely raises his wand, says nothing, and a little plume of green magic comes out and the person at his side is dead. It goes that quickly and that simply.
Are Aurors just flinging around the killing curse all willy nilly? Does it really not take that much effort?
Granted, the film takes place in 1927, and the Harry Potter movies don’t happen until the 1990s. Maybe stuff like this is why the Unforgivable Curses were so established in the first place. But it always felt like those were old magical rules.
Perhaps all this casual killing, by good guys and bad guys alike, led to some new magical rules. Still bugs me though.
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Hench-Sized Comic Book Reviews – 11/17/18
Oh boy, this must be some kind of record! I’ve got 10 — count ’em, 10! — reviews for you henchies this week! The combination of a day off from work on Wednesday, and plenty of time to write these up, allowed me to really enjoy comics this week. I even skipped some titles to spare my sanity, so there could have been even more!
We’ve got G. Willow Wilson’s debut on Wonder Woman, which I enjoyed. We’ve got the much-hyped Uncanny X-Men #1, which was meh. We’ve got the long-delayed new issue of Fantastic Four, which was good. And a ton of others!
Comic Book of the Week goes to the final issue of Mister Miracle for a pretty momentous epilogue issue. It remains as mind-boggling as the rest of the series.
R.I.P. Funky Flashman
I skipped a bunch of comics this week. Ms. Marvel was nice, but was a pretty weird tangent. I think I’m going to stop reviewing Rainbow Brite after only that first issue. The second one lost me. I skipped the new Domino purely because there were so many comics this week. And I’m still not caught up on Thor! Why do all my favorite comics come out in a single week?!
Comic Reviews: Amazing Spider-Man #9, Captain America #5, Catwoman #5, Fantastic Four #3, Go Go Power Rangers #14, Mister Miracle #12, Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #38, Uncanny X-Men #1, Unstoppable Wasp #2 and Wonder Woman #58.
How Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them Should Have Ended
Once upon a time, I was going to write a post about how Newt Scamander doesn’t actually do anything in Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them. Rewatch the film and you’ll see. He doesn’t impact the main plot until maybe at the very end.
Either way, the new sequel is out today! So let’s enjoy the video.
Solid How It Should Have Ended. Thankfully, when they don’t do superheroes, they don’t go to their Batman/Superman cafe scenes. I like that.
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Henchman-4-Hire 