One Good Point (Movie) - Anaconda

 Oh man.

So as most of you know, I enjoy a good monster movie. Jurassic Park is probably my all-time favorite movie, and Jaws is right there with it. I was pretty sure Anaconda wasn't going to hit those highs, but even cheesy monster movies can be pretty fun if you've got a good cast, and theoretically, this movie had a good cast. Jennifer Lopez has had some good roles, Jon Voight as well, plus Owen Wilson and Ice Cube. And I'll watch pretty much anything with Kari Wurher (if you're a big time perv and haven't seen Kate's Addiction, phew, go do that. But don't tell me about it, perv).

But very early in the movie, you realize that no, no this isn't that. Somehow both the practical and CGI versions of the giant snake are unimpressive. I'm sure the visuals reflect the in-world descriptions, a 40-foot long snake, but it just doesn't measure up to the bigger, scarier monsters in the better monster movies. The dialogue is often ridiculous; shortly after a scene where multiple people are killed, two of the characters are joking about creature comforts like wine and cell phones. It's completely disjointed, and takes away from the tension of the movie. If this guy is only worried about getting his next pinot noir, why should I be worried about the giant killer snake?

By far the most incredible aspect of the movie is Jon Voight though. I can't fathom how this even happened, unless someone owed Voight some money or people just deferred to Voight out of respect, but this is an absolute debacle. Like, to the point that it can only have been done in jest. No one could have seriously watched his performance in this movie and said, "This is a thing I want to be associated with." There's other bad acting and terrible dialogue in the movie too, but Voight is a tour de force of catastrophe.

Overall, I'm perfectly glad to have finally seen the movie. It's wildly bad, but now I know that it's wildly bad, and I can be conversant about how bad it is. And it sets the stage for (hopefully) a near future monster movie that rises to the occasion.

If you'd (for some reason) like to watch Anaconda right now, click here to use JustWatch to find out where you can stream it!

One Good Point (Show) - The Acolyte, Season 1

I'm a massive fan of pretty much anything Star Wars. I love the original trilogy, I enjoyed the prequel trilogy more than most, and... well, we won't talk about the sequel trilogy, but that didn't stop me from continuing to watch The Mandalorian, Andor, The Book of Boba Fett, or Ahsoka. And it would never stop me from playing a number of Star-Wars-based video games, as well as turning off the standard music for Starfield and putting on a curated collection of Star Wars music instead. I love me some Star Wars.

Even so, I did my best to avoid any sort of spoilers or trailers coming into The Acolyte, and I did such a good job that I had no idea who any of the cast was when I finally arrived. I think ultimately that's a good thing, though I did spend a few minutes here and there during/between episodes looking up various actors to figure out where I saw them before. Which, by the way, was Squid Game (for Lee Jung-jae) and The Good Place (for Manny Jacinto).

Okay, let's get to this actual show!

(Spoiler alert: I'll try to avoid anything momentous, but there will be some details you can't get around)

The Acolyte is a Disney+ series in the Star Wars universe that takes place about a century before the events of The Phantom Menace. It was originally billed as a mystery show, but like Ahsoka before it, it kind of abandons the whole mystery premise a couple episodes in. But unlike Ahsoka, this show probably benefits from the gearshift (I absolutely loooooved the first two episodes of Ahsoka, but found the back half less appealing as the show effectively became a sequel to the Clone Wars animated series).

The first couple episodes of The Acolyte are a bit over-acted at times, and there were a lot of situations that felt like kind of forced drama, where you knew the moment was supposed to be tense, but the dialogue or performances didn't carry that tension. Two of the main characters are a pair of twins, which is one of those classic television tropes that I have trouble getting behind, similar to time travel. Also, the characters are supposed to be about 20 years old, but they carry themselves like teenagers, and are largely treated like adolescents as well. This makes it difficult to really respect the decisions they make as adult decisions. By comparison, Cassian Andor is supposed to be 21 in Andor.

One thing the show does well though is embrace its essence: it is a Star Wars show. There are dangerous creatures, countless aliens, various space vessels, good and evil, lightsaber battles, and an ongoing question in your mind about who might be secretly a Sith lord. While it starts a bit slow and doesn't elevate to Andor levels of quality (a largely unfair comparison, because Andor is so freaking good), The Acolyte ends up telling a pretty good story, and leaves you with enough questions to make you want to see more.

One last comment I'll offer: this show was edited terribly when it comes to episode splits. I'm not sure if there was some last-minute corporate demand to extend/shorten the show, but the ending moments of some of the episodes in the back half of the show are jarring. For this reason, I strongly recommend a binge-watch. Plan on watching the whole thing over a weekend and I think you'll have a pretty good time.

Click here to check out JustWatch and see where you can watch The Acolyte today!

One Good Point - Public Enemies

On paper, I should love this movie. I enjoy a good crime/heist/gangster movie as much as anybody. Goodfellas, The Untouchables, Ocean's Eleven, the whole spectrum of criminality has always been fertile ground for entertainment in my book. I also usually like Johnny Depp; he's charismatic, and does a good job of portraying morally grey/bankrupt characters. And Michael Mann directed it, a guy with Heat and Collateral under his belt.

But it was just not very good.

The pacing of the movie was jarring, with frantic moments that weren't set up properly or allowed to breathe, and then lingering scenes that felt like they didn't add anything to the story. Depp's portrayal of John Dillinger was fine I guess, but I don't think the movie did a good job of explaining why this literal mass murderer would've been celebrated at all. Through some additional reading, I found that people seemed to like that Dillinger was robbing banks, as the public trust in banks and the federal government was very low. You know what wasn't captured in the movie though? ANY OF THAT.

One last note: I did not like the video quality of this film at all. During many of the darker scenes in the film, the picture became incredibly grainy, to the point that I was wondering if there was something wrong with my television. But it wasn't that; it looks like was just a directorial/production decision, presumably as a way to make the movie feel more "old-timey." If that was the case, there's got to be a better way.

Anyways, I don't recommend the movie, but here's the traditional link!

Click here to see where Public Enemies is streaming right now!

One Good Point - Barbenheimer

Ahh, the movie event of 2023!

What? What do you mean? Of course I participated in it... just not until 2024. What's the rush, right?

Barbie

First things first, full disclosure, any movie with a heavy dose of Margot Robbie is going to innately be more entertaining than movies without Margot Robbie. That doesn't mean I can't be objective, but there's a baseline value we're working from here.

Going into the movie, I was expecting a couple things:

• Margot Robbie will look perfect. Check.
• Ryan Gosling will be entertaining, but I won't like him as much as everybody else did. Check.
• There will be a couple of jokes that are subtle and not laugh-out-loud funny, but I will laugh out loud at them. Kind of check (there was one).
• There'll be 2-3 moments where the feminism of the movie feels like it overrides the story. Kind of check (there was, again, one).

Overall I enjoyed the movie. I thought that despite effectively portraying Barbie as a kind of clueless, blank slate, Robbie did a good job of making the character relatable. Setting big business against her did a lot of that legwork too. Gosling did well too, Ken just became the sort of antagonist that I have no patience for. Those of you who know me in the real world would be able to draw pretty simple comparisons to other folks who irritate me.

Hint: It's the same people who reduced the movie to that one heavy feminism scene and dismissed it out of hand.

Click here to see where you can watch Barbie today!

Oppenheimer

Christopher Nolan is a serious filmmaker. I've only seen a couple of his films so far (including watching Interstellar literally hours before I wrote this!), but he's a very gifted storyteller. The Dark Knight is one of my absolute favorite movies of all time, and you have to wonder if The Dark Knight Rises might've been even stronger if not for Heath Ledger's tragic death; rumors abound that the Joker might've played an integral role in that last film of the trilogy.

But we're not here to talk about The Dark Knight (this time). Oppenheimer was alright, but it was... something less than the other Nolan films I've seen. Not length-wise; it was very long, and you felt every minute, something that sets the movie apart from Nolan's best work. I think that impression wasn't helped by jumping around the timeline unnecessarily, and this might seem sacrilege, but I think Robert Downey, Jr.'s role could've been eliminated from the movie almost entirely and it would've benefited the story.

And somehow, in a movie about a literal nuclear bomb, the scope of the effort somehow felt not large enough? I'm not sure what it was missing exactly, but even after the movie ended, I felt like I was still waiting for *something* else to happen. It's entirely possible that it was a movie you gotta see in a theater, for the (spoiler alert) nuclear explosion; maybe that puts a bow on the story better than when you're in a living room.

I will say that the acting was tremendous, particularly Cillian Murphy and Emily Blunt. I would've been happy to spend another half hour with Blunt's character. She seemed to perfectly capture a quiet  internal torment while absolutely eviscerating people who cross her. Florence Pugh was good, depressing, but that was the point. And Downey did well, too; I just think his part in the story wasn't necessary.

Tune in over the next couple weeks to read what I thought of Interstellar!

Click here to see where you can watch Oppenheimer today!

One Good Point - Battlestar Galactica (2004-2009)

Every time I told people that I was watching Battlestar Galactica for the first time, they were shocked that I hadn't already seen it. My Star Wars and Star Trek credentials would suggest that I would've definitely watched it long ago, perhaps even as the show was originally airing, but alas. Back in 2004 I was very busy... well, I'm not sure what I was busy doing. Playing a lot of Diablo II and Civilization II mostly, I think. But for whatever reason, I didn't watch a lick of BSG when it first came out.

But in 2023, after watching Katee Sackhoff kick ass in another season of the Mandalorian (which, screw you guys, I enjoyed season 3 despite its flaws), I finally saddled up and started watching BSG. I caught the first 1.5 seasons on Peacock in full binge mode, as right after I started, they added a note that the show would be leaving Peacock at the end of the month. It was June 27th.

I investigated some other ways to watch the show after it left Peacock, but ultimately my motivation petered out until earlier this year when I noticed it was available to stream on Amazon Prime Video. I started up again and discovered that I had apparently managed to stop watching right at a massive lull in the action; once I picked the series back up, the excitement ramped back up and I zipped through the rest of the four-season show.

There are a lot of things to like about Battlestar Galactica. The aforementioned Sackhoff is one of the biggest bright spots towards the back half of the show, but there are strong performances across the cast. And the premise of the show is fantastic. How would a small group of humans try to survive as a caravan of space-bound refugees, after a massive, near-complete genocide of their species? The idea is compelling, albeit bleak.

Unfortunately, I think this is a show whose whole comes up a little short of the sum of its parts. The individual characters are interesting, the twists are mostly cool, and there are some awesome concepts for the sorts of scenarios that would develop in such an environment. But the execution of these ideas ends up being a little bit of a disappointment. The characters are interesting, but the ways they interact sometimes feel wooden; a lot of the dialogue in the show had an unnatural sort of tone to it.

This is also a weird thing to complain about, but this show had some of the least believable portrayals of drunkenness that I've seen in shows or movies. I've seen drunk people, like, a lot of drunk people. The drunk people on Galactica seemed like sober people trying to act drunk.

HEAVY SPOILERS BELOW!

My biggest complaint, though, is with the culmination of the show. Any sort of science fiction property has the tall task of trying to explain how something impossible is possible. It doesn't have to be elaborate though; Jurassic Park found one idea that seems feasible enough to a layman (ancient mosquitos with dinosaur blood in dried amber), and they handwaved the rest with "cloning" and "computers." Done. Perfect.

From the very beginning of Battlestar Galactica, we had the question of how is Gaius Baltar seeing this image of his seemingly deceased Cylon lover when no one else is seeing her, and what's her purpose? We dance around the idea of Baltar having some kind of microchip in his brain, of him being a Cylon himself, or simply a fabrication of a traumatized mind. And in the end... angels? Angels is your explanation? And that's essentially the explanation for Starbuck too? But even with all of that, we don't get any actual meaningful vision or interaction with this "higher power," just a quick zinger at the very end of the show about how "he doesn't like" being called God. The whole thing felt cheap and lazy, and took so much of the air out of the show for me.

In the end, it was a fantastic premise that had some amazing moments and stretches, but in the end didn't live up to its full potential. I'd be absolutely game for a modern team giving it another try though.

Click here to check JustWatch and find out where you can watch this show right now!

One Good Point - Resident Evil HD REMASTER

 So far I've talked about a few movies that haven't really lived up to my hopes (or for which I didn't have much in the way of hopes, and matched that lack of excitement). Well, it's high time to talk about something that lived up to my hopes and then some: Resident Evil.

I've never been much for scary games, scary movies, scary anything really. I can appreciate some compelling horror/thriller content, and I do very much like monster movies, but spooky creepy stuff doesn't usually do much for me. But I have to say, after getting past my initial jumpiness at turning corners and finding zombies, the core gameplay of Resident Evil was a ton of fun. I enjoyed entering this mansion and slowly peeling back layer after layer, finding out new pieces of the story with each unlocked door and solved puzzle. As I played through it, I found myself already thinking about whether I might enjoy playing it again.

One particularly unexpected turn was that I actually enjoyed combat in the game. I've watched streams of Resident Evil playthroughs, and I had briefly played Resident Evil 5 at a friend's house, and I remember being frustrated with the controls. Having to stand still while shooting is not what I'm used to at all. But after just a handful of encounters in my first playthrough of this game, I felt the game provided a harrowing and enjoyable twist on combat, a stark contrast to most of the other modern adventure games I've played (Dead Rising, Grand Theft Auto, etc). The "clunkiness" of the controls are one of the prime examples of something being "a feature, not a bug." You're supposed to find the combat uncomfortable and frightening. That's the point.

I'm sure it's far too late to be able to offer much in the way of meaningful recommendations for this game; it's been out forever, and if you were thinking about playing it, chances are you already have. But on the off chance you haven't, I strongly endorse this game, and I'm looking forward to giving future games in the series a shot.

Click here to view this game on Steam!

Click here to view this game on Fanatical!

One Good Point - Ready Player One

This is one movie in particular that I'd been especially looking forward to finally watching. It didn't rise to Marvel or Star Wars levels of urgency, and I definitely had access to the movie a couple times via streaming services before I finally got around to it, but a movie about futuristic immersive video games and the evils of mega-corporations? Yeah, that's about my wheelhouse.

And it was... pretty good? In hearing about the premise, and in reading/watching the Hunger Games series, I was expecting/hoping for another story about young adults being thrust into the greater world, and that's sort of what this is, but there are a few too many cheesy moments that sort of break the seriousness of things. The massive final battle is the perfect example, where it's a climactic clash between good and evil, but the tension gets slightly dampened with the insertion of random pop culture cameos. That said, as a sort of popcorn action-adventure movie, it was enjoyable.

I also was kind of surprised at how uninteresting I found Ben Mendelsohn's villainous character. He's a great actor and I had high hopes, but he's sort of another symptom of the same disconnect I felt with the movie between gimmick and seriousness. Interestingly, I would've expected T.J. Miller's voicing of i-R0k to be too silly, but he did a good job of balancing the two aspects of the film. And Olivia Cooke's Art3mis felt like a character who exactly captured the essence of the movie's world.

My sister bought me the book like a decade ago, still haven't gotten around to that. But hey, maybe 2025 will be my year to catch up with reading. For now, it's full steam ahead with movies!

Oh, one more thing. This movie definitely made me want to finally follow through and watch The Shining, so that's on my 'high priority' list for the year. I watched the first five minutes sometime last year, at like 3:30 AM, and I decided that watching a scary movie right before bed probably wasn't the best call. My dreams are scary enough as it is.

Click here to check JustWatch and find out where you can watch this movie today!

One Good Point - John Wick: Chapter 2

Alright, time to make some enemies.

The original John Wick was a fine movie. I watched it many years after it came out (of course), after I already knew there were a couple more John Wick movies, so his survival wasn't ever in doubt for me, but even still, I thought it was just good, not great.

John Wick: Chapter 2 wasn't good.

I get that Keanu Reeves isn't known for his soaring soliloquies or his rapier wit, but his performance in this movie felt utterly flat. The plot had no rising action; you got dropped onto the track at full speed, stayed at full speed, and ended at... you guessed it, full speed. The action scenes were good, but there's a ceiling to how entertaining an action scene can be if it doesn't feel meaningful in the context of a story.

Maybe worst of all is that they try to give you little teases about some larger over-arching story, a High Table organization that promises to be even more riveting next chapter! Maybe someday when I'm feeling forgiving, I'll give Chapter 3 a try. But with my vast list of unwatched movies that I actually am hoping will be good, I'm in no hurry.

Click here to check JustWatch and find out where you can watch this movie right now!

One Good Point - Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore

 As was the case with my movie-watching experience, I'm immediately following up the second Fantastic Beasts movie with the third one. All of my information was fresh going into the third one, though it did take a moment to get used to Mads Mikkelsen as Grindelwald. He does a great job though, and while his portrayal is a bit different from Johnny Depp's, that's not where this movie falters.

Where this movie falters is in kind of basic storytelling lol. It's more complete than Crimes of Grindelwald, as it does have a definitive ending, and answers most of the questions you have lingering from the first two movies. But there are frankly too many instances where some problem gets overcome by "magic" or "beasts." And look, I get that that's the whole point of the series, right? It's a fantasy story, there's going to be some fantasy to it. It just feels like this movie comes up short when it comes to incorporating that human element that the original series was able to deploy so effectively.

I'm not mad at the effort, though. I think the world of Harry Potter has some room to tell interesting stories, and I'm always open to renewing compelling IP; I'll watch every live action Star Wars thing they come out with until the day I die. I wish this movie series was better, but chances are I'll tune in again when the next one comes out...eventually.

I thought about finishing this post with a ranking of every Harry Potter movie, as I do love lists. But I haven't watched a lot of those movies in a while, and we're in a "look forward" mode here. Eventually someday though, sure, I'll rewatch them all and put together a list.

I fucking love ranked lists.

Click here to check JustWatch and find out where you can watch this movie right now!

One Good Point - Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald

So to set the stage here, I enjoyed the full first run of Harry Potter movies. I'm good with magic, and I felt like the Harry Potter stories did a good job of balancing fantastical whimsy and human emotions and experiences. They were a little more angsty than they needed to be at times, but that's the deal with movies about kids/teenagers, right?

Fantastic Beasts is a series *not* about kids or teenagers, but rather about (unsurprisingly) fantastic beasts, as well as a couple of, you know, humans. This second installment, The Crimes of Grindelwald, was okay, but it felt very much like an interlude movie. It advances a few relationships, and gives you more time with the titular villain, but was ultimately not very satisfying, adding questions and offering few answers.

One other note I have, and it's something that comes up oftentimes for me, and I've noticed bothers me in many, many stories these days. Without spoiling specifics, there are a couple of scenes in this movie in which swaths of folks are killed, and these deaths seem only to serve the purpose of convincing the viewer (and/or the protagonists) that their enemy is dangerous. This can be useful if done elegantly, but for the most part I find wanton murder to be a frustratingly heavy-handed device for storytelling. I know for certain that's the reason it took me a while to come around to Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and it's still not my favorite aspect of the movie.

Anyways, Crimes of Grindelwald was fine. I don't think I would recommend unless you're a real Potter-head, but if that's the case you've already seen it anyways.

Click here to check JustWatch and find out where you can watch this movie right now!

One Good Point

So far this year I've been watching a lot more movies than I normally do. I have this massive list of movies I've been aiming to see for years, and with assorted inspiration, I've finally started to tackle that list.

In the spirit of getting myself to write more, I'm going to write tiny little "articles" about these movies that I watch. The premise I'm working under is "One Good Point," as in, my goal is to just try to say one meaningful thing in my mini-review, and then post it. I have a habit of agonizing over articles, watching them grow and grow until I've written six pages on Brett Saberhagen. And I mean, I like doing that too, but this can be a small thing. That's how we build skills, right? We practice.

So! Coming up soon (hopefully), a flurry of small articles about the many movies (and a few shows) I've watched this year.

I'll still do my end-of-year rankings; I'm a man love who loves a Top 5 list, and you couldn't stop me from doing that. See you soon!

2023 In Review - Movies

Along with TV shows, this year was a pretty good year for me with movies. I have a lifetime of all-time classics that I've never seen, and I managed to cross a few of those movies off my list this year. Here's every movie that I (can remember that I) watched in 2023, ranked!

#1 - Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

I waited a while to watch this movie, making sure I found just the right time and place, and the payoff was tremendous. Chris Pine was exactly the right stereotypical snarky party leader that you find in all the best D&D groups, and each other character fit their role to a T. The villains were dastardly, the side characters were fun, the action was tense, and the story made sense. My one note would be that in the Dungeons & Dragons movie, I would've liked the dragon to be a little more terrifying, but that's a small note. I loved, loved, loved this movie.

#2 - The Fifth Element

What the hell took me so long to watch this movie? It's sci-fi and Bruce Willis, what more could you want. The themes are great, the action is great, and the comedy is top-tier. But Mila Jovovich as Leeloo was easily the highlight of the film. So many memorable quotes, large and small, and with an insane combination of cuteness and sexiness. This was definitely one of the highlights of my classic catch-up efforts. "Moooolti-pass."

#3 - Dune

The first half of this movie was absolutely mesmerizing. The grand scale, the machinations of different great houses as they vie for power in this distant corner of space. Politics, intrigue, violence, Oscar Isaac, I loved it so much. The last hour or so was a little more focused on characters I was less interested in, and a story that was a little more spiritual, and didn't really resonate the same. But overall, still a tremendous movie.

#4 - The Nice Guys

I saw a clip from this movie a dozen times on Netflix before I finally watched it, and I loved the clip every single time. I don't know why it takes me so long to decide to watch movies. Just a time commitment thing I guess. Anyways, this movie was a lot of fun! Russell Crowe is fantastic, and Ryan Gosling complements him perfectly (although he gets added to the long list of actors who can't really portray a drunk person). The end of the movie got freaking insane, and lost me a bit, but the characters were great, and I would definitely recommend this film to anyone.

#5 - Blade Runner 2049

I imagine I had a pretty rare experience with these two movies, watching 2049 just a few months after watching the original Blade Runner for the first time. You can really see the differences in picture quality, but they do a good job of recapturing the essence of the original film. I hemmed and hawed between these two films; I liked them both, but I think the supporting cast and story are stronger in 2049, so this one gets the nod above the original."

#6 - Blade Runner

Seriously, this was the first time I ever saw Blade Runner. There are a few all-time classics that I still haven't seen, but we can chalk this one off the list. I liked it a lot, but I think even more than the actual movie, I absolutely loved the idea of the movie. The setting, the concepts, the moral questions, it was all just awesome to think about. The actual journey of Decker as he tracks down replicants was great as well, though I thought the antagonist was a little more murdery than he needed to be; I like when a villain pushes you to question, are they really a villain?

#7 - Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse

SPOILER ALERT. I can't really talk about my feelings about this movie without giving some mild spoilers. I loved the time they spent on Spider-Gwen, though Miles' story didn't really grab me the same way. Far too much of the movie was spent on an extended chase scene that led into the final scene. That final scene was fantastic, and I was super excited by the cliffhanger...right up until I realized it was a cliffhanger. It's disappointing to watch a fun movie and find out you were only watching half of a fun movie.

#8 - Violent Night

This movie was sold to me as ""Die Hard with Santa."" That is a fully correct description of the movie. It's got a full complement of over-the-top action lines and ridiculous holiday-themed fights, and David Harbour does a fantastic job portraying jolly old Saint Nicholas. John Leguizamo as a villain was a little too silly for me, which says something when it's a movie with Santa literally fighting kidnappers. But it was fun, entertaining, and self-aware.

#9 - Bullet Train

Bullet Train was an odd little movie. I enjoyed the brother assassins, and their creative use of Thomas the Tank Engine as a way to classify people. And Brad Pitt's semi-hapless character was a fun protagonist. The final 'bad guy' was a little too over the top (which is saying a lot, coming from me), but the many confrontations on the train itself were interesting, and the action was good. Overall a fun time.

#10 - Guardians of the Galaxy: Volume 3

It was a perfectly fine movie. It had a lot of solid jokes, good action, and decent music (though a cut below the previous two iterations in all of those regards). But the biggest problem I had with this movie was that it felt soooo heavy-handed with the emotional beats. After the fifth fake-out almost death, you begin to feel kind of manipulated. And Adam Warlock was a wholly unnecessary character, despite it being a fine performance.

#11 - Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania

Jonathan Majors absolutely owned this movie, and it's a shame (but completely understandable) that his off-screen behavior is going to prevent him from being in any future Marvel properties. I liked the zany quantum realm characters, though I feel like the movie suffered a bit from spreading its story too thin. The Wasp could've been completely removed from this movie and you wouldn't notice a difference. Hopefully future Ant-Man stories zoom back in on the fun characters and smaller scale stories that made the first movie one of my favorite superhero films.

#12 - John Wick

I finally caught John Wick on a random Thursday night this year (it might not have been a Thursday, it was you know, a metaphor or whatever, a 'royal' Thursday). The movie was about what I expected: big time violent, tons of guns, a whole mess of bad guys getting their just desserts. I don't know that it hit me the way that it seemed to hit a lot of other people, though. Taken was much more of a revelation for me when it comes to hyper-violent action movies. But hey, maybe the John Wick sequels will be less of a disaster than the Taken sequels were.

#13 - Starship Troopers

This felt like two different movies. Half of it was a cheesy, over-the-top action movie, with appropriate surprise deaths and swarming monsters. The other half was a scathing indictment of blind patriotism and government/military overreach. I did really enjoy having to wrestle with the uncomfortable dynamic of fighting a ruthless enemy, and how the protagonists used unspeakable tactics to fight them. It really leans on that idea that there's no such thing as an honorable war. It's just war.

#14 - Terminal

This is a tough movie to rank. Margot Robbie does a phenomenal job portraying her character, an ambitious femme fatale assassin, and Simon Pegg is brilliant as well, playing a man with a mysterious terminal illness. The other characters are decent; Mike Myers as a weirdo janitor is kind of charming. I really enjoyed so so much of the movie, but the ending was just all over the place. It was going for something dramatic and shocking, and I guess it was both of those things, but personally it just kind of landed with a thud. But damn, can Margot Robbie act.

#15 - The Thing

Nick has been pestering me to watch this movie for decades (he hasn't been pestering me, he just mentioned it a few times), so this year I finally gave it a go. The special effects are...well, you don't have to worry about being freaked out about a realistic looking monster. But the story itself was good, the acting was good, and the tension is very real. I wouldn't put it on the same level as Alien, Jaws, or Jurassic Park, but it's a solid thriller.

#16 - Jurassic World: Dominion

Look, nobody is going to confuse Dominion for the original Jurassic Park. Honestly, none of the sequels come close to the original, and that's okay. This one continued to stretch the bounds of incredulity, but it did so with a full embrace of nostalgia, bringing back a bunch of the original cast. And the movie knew what it was. It only took itself as seriously as was reasonable, and embraced its role as a kooky adventure movie for longtime Jurassic Park fans. It wasn't anything special or amazing, but it was a good little capstone to the Jurassic Park experience.

#17 - Nobody

I wasn't sure that Bob Odenkirk was leading man material until I saw Better Call Saul, but he was fucking tremendous in that show, which to me was even better than Breaking Bad. I know that's sacreligious to say, but a guy gets to have opinions. This movie was no Better Call Saul, though it had some fun action, good gags, and the guys you wanted to die for the most part did die. In a year where I watched John Wick for the first time, this one falls a few slots behind that, but it was still good.

#18 - The Marvels

I went into this movie hoping for the best but preparing for the worst. It had some problems, and I still don't know if they know how to write for Captain Marvel, but there were a lot of fun moments, the action was pretty good, and I left the theater feeling pleased at the experience overall. That's not a sure thing these days with Marvel, so I'll take it.

#19 - Dragonslayer

I was expecting the movie to be a lot cheesier than it was, but it was actually fairly mature and thoughtful. It's got some great dramatic dialogue, which is always a plus in my book, and while a lot of the dragon effects were very dated, the movie didn't rely so much on the actual dragon; much more of it was focused on the *threat* of the dragon, the anticipation, the expectation. The protagonist was kind of a whiny little shit, so that docks it a few points, but it was a fun watch, a nice classic adventure movie.

#20 - Venom: Let There Be Carnage

From the first time I ever saw Venom as a kid, on TV or in a comic book or most likely as an action figure, he was just the coolest-looking character around. The first Tom Hardy Venom movie was a lot of fun; the symbiote looked cool, the internal monologue was a funny device, the fights were exciting, and the bad guy made sense. This one was a little bit more of a mess, both visually and narratively. I'll tell you what though: Michelle Williams in a Venom suit was an absolute win.

#21 - Super Mario Brothers: The Movie

This movie was...fine. It wasn't offensive, it wasn't poorly made, it wasn't poorly voiced. But I just could not bring myself to care about any character. The best moment in the whole movie was the opening battle between the penguin kingdom and Bowser's army.

#22 - Black Panther 2

This movie had maybe an impossible job. It was charged with saying goodbye to both T'Challa and Chadwick Boseman. It also had to follow up on one of the most lauded superhero movies of all time and elevate a new Black Panther, and do all of this in an environment that's becoming less and less patient for superhero movies. I think the movie sort of collapsed under the weight of itself, between all those responsibilities, and the various characters it tried to give space for. It was too long, too wide, and not deep enough.

#23 - The Host

One of the previews for this movie cited Jaws as an inspiration or comparison, and for those of you who know me, you know Jaws is one of my favorite all-time movies. This movie...is not Jaws. It's a fine enough monster movie, with some surprises and thrills. Nothing special, though, not worth a recommendation.

#24 - 21

I started this movie sometime in like 2015, back when I liked gambling and had illusions of figuring out ways to 'beat the system.' It didn't grab me at all back then, but eventually I saw it on Netflix and gave it another go. And...well, it didn't really grab me this time either, but I did finally watch it. I found I didn't really sympathize with the protagonist, which made me not really invested in his plight. And Kevin Spacey's character is just kind of a butt. Cross it off the list though.

2023 In Review - TV Shows

This past year was also a big-time year when it comes to finally watching some of those long-recommended TV shows and movies you've all been incredulous to find out I haven't watched (stay tuned for the movies post later this week). I finally watched a bunch of shows I've been "meaning to get around to," in addition to my inevitable rewatches of longtime favorites like Justified and The Office. I've got a bunch more shows still to watch, and if I were smart, I'd start a draft of a post like this now, so I don't have to scramble at the end of the year and try to remember what I watched.

If I were smart, that's exactly what I'd do. Anyways, here we go!

#1 - The Sandman - Season 1

This show was one I've meant to watch forever, but I finally got the motivation to get into it because of a co-watcher. And I owe that person my deepest gratitude; what was I waiting for? The show has the proper balance between macabre, playful, and absurd. Season 2 is expected sometime in 2024, and when it drops, I can promise you I won't be waiting a full year to watch it this time.

#2 - Bonding - Season 1

Funny, quirky, and heartfelt. The episodes are very short, so if you're not careful, you'll watch the whole thing in one sitting. Which is great, it's fun, but you'll be sad it's over.

#3 - The Mandalorian - Season 3

I actually loved this season of the Mandalorian. There were some kinks (not those kind, pervert), specifically with some of the dialogue, but overall I found it really entertaining. And I gotta say, I'm a Bo-Katan stan. Am I using that word correctly? Stan? I'm not as into Grogu as the rest of...well, everyone, but the Star Wars bounty hunting and Mandalorian aspect of things check all the boxes for me. The finale was a lot of fun, big action, and without spoiling details, I was delighted to see two big name story pieces get put away once and for all.

#4 - Cowboy Bebop (live action)

I remember when this show came out, and I remember how the internet reacted with such vitriol and judgment, about how the show was different from the original anime in one way or another. I watched the first few episodes of the original series, and while I enjoyed it well enough, I wasn't drawn in. But for me, the live action version has just the right balance of hilarious ridiculousness and more mature themes. And the character of Faye Valentine in the live action version is just absolutely perfect. It's a shame that all those internet people got the show cut down in its prime.

#5 - Brooklyn 99 - Seasons 1-5

This is another show that falls into that category of, "I really should've known that I would love this show." I enjoy workplace comedies, I like law enforcement as a framework, and I absolutely love the cast of this show (RIP Andre Braugher). Unsurprisingly, I've really enjoyed what I've watched so far, and I'm looking forward to closing out the show in the near future.

#6 - The Bear - Seasons 1-2

I love a cooking show, and this is that, a little bit. But it's more so a show about work, about anxiety, about grief, about relationships, about struggle. It's a heavy, deep show, and also a cooking show here and there. It struck a great balance between humor and stress, it felt very real in that regard. Even when life is awful, it's funny sometimes.

#7 - Invincible - Season 2, Part 1

This was a really solid four episodes of television. It's been a while since the first season of Invincible, and it was great to see the show return, and pick up right where things left off at the end of season 1. I found Rex Splode a little more tedious this time around, but hopefully that was just a fleeting thing; the rest of the returning characters still have me engaged. I'm not wild about the split season deal, but these days you take what you get, I guess.

#8 - Rick & Morty Season 1

I've been told for years that I would like Rick & Morty, that it's got a particular sort of humor that fits my own. And one season in, I heartily agree. There are a few heavy-handed jokes here and there, but for the most part it's a lot of conversational, situational humor, and that's my wheelhouse.

#9 - Loki - Season 2

Through five episodes, this would've been towards the bottom of the list of shows I watched in 2023. It felt directionless and tedious, and it felt like they really wasted the character of Sylvie after making her relationship with Loki such a beautiful part of the first season. But that finale, holy shit. It's as if they took all the good stuff from the season and jammed it into one episode. That one episode alone brings the whole show up several notches.

#10 - Battlestar Galactica - Season 1-2

A show I've meant to watch for years, decades even, I finally started it this year. Of course, I started it just two weeks before it got removed from Peacock, but what I watched during that time was quite good. I don't find the characters as endearing as those on most Star Trek shows, but I believe that's partly intentional; this gritty environment fosters people with sour attitudes and adaptive morals. There's no Captain America in this crew.

#11 - Jury Duty - Season 1

This was a really fun show. The premise was really funny, a faux reality show with a totally fabricated court case, and only one person who wasn't in on it. And they executed it well, created a bunch of really fun scenarios, and the guinea pig ended up being a really sweet guy who unwittingly played his role perfectly.

#12 - Ahsoka - Season 1

Ahsoka was an interesting television-watching experience for me. I came into the show very worried that, having not watched Clone Wars or Rebels, I was going to be in the dark about important story beats. Then I watched the first two episodes, and I was literally blown away. It was a Jedi detective show, with space ships and lightsaber battles, and holy mother of Luke, I was sold. And thennn, the story moved towards Sabine's efforts to find Ezra, a Rebels character who meant literally nothing to me, and the threat of Grand Admiral Thrawn, another character I had almost no prior knowledge about. The references to Clone Wars and Rebels continued, and I did my best to follow along using context clues, but by the end of the show, I was a little disillusioned. I did like Thrawn a lot though; I'm looking forward to seeing more of him.

#13 - Bodies

There are a lot of pieces to like in this show. The acting is top notch, and there's one storyline that really sings. The rest are okay, but the show incorporates time travel, and even in shows and movies I like, I get twisted up about time travel shenanigans. Because of course, it never truly makes sense. Still, there's enough I enjoyed about the show that I would still recommend it.

#14 - Secret Invasion

I don't think I'm alone in having had high hopes for this show. I've come around to Winter Soldier over the years, so the idea of Marvel doing a spy show had some real exciting potential. The current characters were great, and the incoming cast was super strong, several fresh faces with some serious acting chops. And then the show was...blah. It was boring, heavy-handed, sloppy, and just not that much fun, which is almost unthinkable for a Marvel property. The few good Olivia Coleman moments were overshadowed by a frustratingly simple antagonist, clunky dialogue, and some inexplicable narrative choices.

#15 - Justified: City Primeval

What a colossal disappointment. Justified is one of my favorite shows of all time, but this spinoff was a total letdown. You get a few Raylan moments, but overall it just does not capture any of the magic of the original, owing in large part to a poorly constructed main villain. It's crazy that Boyd Holbrook is the primary antagonist in the bookends of my list; his character was fantastic in the Sandman, and an absolute drag in City Primeval.

2023 In Review - Video Games

So as many of you know, I play games at my own pace. That usually means that A) I acquire games and don't play them, and B) I neither acquire nor play big time releases until they've been out for a while. This year was an exception in both regards, to an extent. I didn't acquire nearly as many games as I have in the past, and those I did acquire, I was more likely to play. And, I ended up picking up three different games right around their full release date: Diablo IV, Baldur's Gate 3, and Starfield.

I also spent more time on my Steam Deck this year, trying out some of the many random games I've accumulated through my love of a gaming bundle. In the end, my best guess is that I played 20 new games in 2023. What did I think of these games?

Well, let's rank them and find out!

#1 - Baldur's Gate 3

I've played a ton of role-playing games over the years. I've played hundreds of hours of D&D over the years as well. Baldur's Gate 3 arguably does both of those experiences as well as anybody could hope. Decades after playing games like Curse of the Azure Bonds and Dark Sun: Shattered Lands (both legends in their own rights), BG3 captures that same beautiful combination of exploration, adventure, growth, and challenge. This was deservedly my most played game in 2023, and I expect it'll be right up there in 2024 as well. Now, who wants to play coop?

#2 - Raft

Raft is an interesting game. I really enjoy a lot of the experience; there's a certain satisfaction from collecting goods, putting them to work, researching new technology to do a more effective job at collecting goods, and so on and so on with that cycle. But I'm not totally sure that the gaming experience is like, meaningful. Still, it's a low-stress way to hang out with friends, and that's worth something on its own, even if I'm being tricked into chasing dopamine bursts every time I kill a pufferfish.

#3 - Risk of Rain 2

I'm only like 90% sure that I started playing this game in 2023, but I've decided to include it regardless. I was a huge fan of the first Risk of Rain game, played the hell out of it, never got amazing but still enjoyed it from start to finish. It was always good for a quick cooperative multiplayer game too, the sort of thing you could jump in and out of on a whim. RoR 2 goes from 2D to 3D, but actually does a good job of keeping the same essence of the original game, which is no small task. The last fight is a little more chaotic, and a bit less forgiving, but it's still very fun. And I dare say the different characters feel more unique and interesting for the most part. An excellent follow-up to an excellent original.

#4 - Diablo IV

The story in Diablo IV was absolutely tremendous. I haven't finished it yet, but everything about Lilith is compelling, much more so than the primary villains in previous games. And Diablo IV felt truly fresh, whereas Diablo III felt awfully similar to Diablo II. And bonus points to Blizzard for avoiding a disastrous repeat of Diablo III's launch.

#5 - Starfield

I was so hyped for this game that I blogged for the first time in like, years. I wanted so desperately to have a whole Mandalorian/Firefly type experience, and I convinced myself with the pre-release materials that that was what I was going to get. But it wasn't that at all. We got the same mild-mannered NPCs that previous Bethesda games have offered, space travel is essentially just fast travel, and space combat feels incredibly clunky. Plus I can't even figure out how to become a megacorporation. I enjoy the non-ship combat, and I'm open to finding expansions and mods that improve the experience, but so far it's been a big disappointment.

#6 - Alien: Isolation

Still early in my gameplay, but so far the game has a lot of potential. I'm not usually one for horror-style games, but I'm a sucker for established IP, and famous monsters draw me in even more. I can only rate this on what I've played so far though, which has been pretty simple and straightforward.

#7 - 80s Overdrive

There are a lot of pixel-graphic games out there that lean on old tropes and established nostalgia, but this one hit me just the right way at just the right time. The gameplay is fun, the music is great, and progression feels earned. One of the most pleasant surprises among my many "I'll try this random game on the Steam Deck" choices from 2023.

#8 - Moonlighter

I grew up on Recettear. I've played and replayed Recettear (and am currently doing so again). You, Moonlighter, are no Recettear. It's actually still pretty fun, but adding meticulous inventory management to the hybrid adventurer/shopkeeper base is not an improvement.

#9 - Red Dead Redemption

I bought the original RDR something like 10 years ago. I got a whole Game of the Year edition, including something called Undead Nightmare, which I have yet to play. But I played the base game a bit, and it definitely has the feel of GTA in the wild west, which is what they were going for, no doubt. The game didn't feel particularly dated, which was a plus for a ten year old AAA game. But I didn't feel drawn in by the story, and the few sandbox opportunities I came across didn't suck me in either. I may go back to it at some point, but I got RDR 2 for Christmas; I'm much more interested in the broader, newer, fancier option.

#10 - Suriving the Aftermath

I played this game exactly one time in 2023, for 2-3 hours. Chip and I both acquired the game for free from Epic, and we were both feeling kind of low energy, so we decided to play solo games independently. It was pretty relaxing, mildly interesting. I could see playing it some more, but the fact that I haven't played it since that night might be telling.

#11 - Out There Somewhere

This is a quirky little game, and it was very hard to rank. At its core, it's got the guts of something cool: limited but interesting mechanics, with the potential for a lot of different ways to deploy them. But the game was so short that it was a bit of a letdown to finish it. If a sequel comes out, one that promises to expand on the premise and have a more robust and extensive experience, I'd be interested.

#12 - Dead Island 2

I can't tell if the game is kind of boring, or if I'm just supremely bad at it. There is, of course, the potential that both are true. I'm hopeful to get a chance to try out the cooperative mode this year, maybe that'll add some fun to the experience.

#13 - Splendor

This is simply the video game version of a board game I enjoy. It's an effective representation of the board game, and it translates pretty well to the digital medium.

#14 - Little Racers STREET

Little Racers STREET is essentially a modern twist on RC Pro-Am, the old Nintendo game, but it's got none of the charm. It's perfectly fine, but I found it very forgettable.

#15 - Turbo Golf Racing

I only played the tutorial and a couple of single-player levels. It seems like it could be a fun game to play with other people, but that opportunity hasn't presented itself as of yet. So for now, it's just kind of a weird little driving game that I'm pretty bad at.

#16 - Marvel's Avengers

I've been interested in this game since it came out, so when it dipped to $5 this year, it was an easy pickup. But a long tutorial and ungodly load times kept me from spending much time actually playing the game. I might play it again sometime, but the motivation isn't there.

#17 - The Political Machine 2016

I played a couple games of this, and I feel like I got everything I was going to get out of it. It was fun enough for a quick dip, but I was hoping for a little more of a simulation experience, and not quite so much of a board game experience.

#18 - I, Zombie

It's an interesting little puzzle game, but as the difficulty increases, it becomes less rewarding and just more frustrating. I'd compare it to herding cats professionally.

#19 - Hero of the Kingdom

I can't say for sure that it's a game. So far, it seems to be basically just follow the directions and click where you're instructed to click. I didn't get terribly far in the game, and I don't expect to.

#20 - Ultionus: A Tale of Petty Revenge

You remember how there were some old NES games where you walked pretty slowly, and jumped pretty slowly, and just everything went really slowly? This game is kind of like that. I'm sure that people who've gotten good at the game find it more compelling, but the gameplay was just a non-starter for me.