DAJK

This does make me worried that the 2.5 hour cut will be chopped to pieces.

This might sound bad, but I kind of hope National Cinema Day ticket sales drop a little bit from last year (say, 6.5M vs 8M). If it matches or surpasses, theaters will no doubt raise the prices again next year to $6, and then to $8 the following year, until eventually it just becomes a “PLFs cost the same as regular tickets and there’s no discount for regular admissions.” There needs to be a cap for what people are willing to pay, or else the financial incentive will disappear and NCD will die in 4-5 years.

Gran Turismo is… fine. I pretty much agree with what I’ve heard from a few critics. Performances are generally good (minus a few really bad lines that remind me of the SW prequels in a “no actor could have made that sound good so I don’t blame the actors” way). Blomkamp gives it just enough visual flair and style to keep the racing scenes engaging. But man, the writing and pacing really let this down. It feels SO long, and part of that might be because the movie repeats the same dramatic beats over and over. I like long movies. I like movies that FEEL along, as long as they are dynamic in either the action/setting, or the character arcs/drama. GT feels long, and all of the action scenes are largely interchangeable. Most of the character arcs and relationships feel half-baked or incomplete. But it’s just about entertaining enough for a pass. If Ford v Ferrari is like the “home cooked meal” of racing movies, this is like.. McDonalds. It’s nothing good for you, but it looks pretty tasty, and it’ll get the job done if you’re hungry.

That sounds really, really low for true Friday. Wouldn’t be surprised to see that go up by a million or so.

I would just really like to see Blomkamp have a hit under his belt; it’ll encourage the studios to allow him to make something like District 9 or Elysium again. While I didn’t love Elysium, I love to see sci-fi auteurs get chances with original projects. Gran Turismo, if it catches on, could be a gateway to that.

Not sure why Gran Turismo seems to be over performing here (tracking 5 different theaters and they all seem to be showing the same thing) but if it weren’t for everyone else’s data in this chat, I’d be confidently predicting 2M+ Thursday, if not 2.5.

Strays was actually decent. Surprisingly well-written messaging about toxic relationships, especially for a shock-value raunch com. Not amazing or anything I’ll remember in a few years’ time, but I enjoyed myself for what it’s worth.

Since we’ve moved on from talking about Spider-Man to Superman, let me just say that while MoS has it’s flaws, I still think it’s a great Superman film, and a great movie in and of itself. Humanizes Superman in a way that no other adaptation had been able to do. Love it.

Not sure why so many people suddenly dislike No Way Home. It’s genuinely really fun.

Blue beetle looking like 3M from my comps across a handful of Canadian theaters (in BC). Not sure if Canada is expected to under index compared to the US due to Latino/Hispanic audiences but it’s encouraging that this could manage 3-3.5+ tonight.

This was actually a hell of a lot of fun on rewatch. Bumping my score either half a star or a full star. Not sure if I’m just in a really good mood tonight or what, but this movie really worked. Also I saw it for the second time in Vancouver (I’m not a huge DC guy who would watch a movie twice on opening day it was just happenstance that a buddy of mine ran a staff screening at the theater he manages, and then my dad wanted to go tonight). But my second time it was actually really cool, the audience was primarily Hispanic/Latino and they were all really really into the movie. Lots of reactions (laughs, tears, cheers, etc.) and being a part of that experience might have actually made the movie better for me.

This movie was perfectly fine. It’s got elements of Spider-Man ‘02, Iron Man, Black Panther etc. and in many ways feels like a Phase 1 MCU movie which is refreshing. What it’s missing from those aforementioned comparisons is deeper layers to the script and characterization that really helped those movies connect. I imagine this will be a crowdpleaser and will have pretty solid audience reception/legs, but it’s not going to be remembered like many of those “classic” CBMs are. 6 or 7 out of 10 feels perfectly right.

Yea they do

Not that this is ever a healthy thing to spend a ton of time thinking about, but I often like to predict what I think a lot of the movies that actually did release in 2020 WOULD have grossed had they not dealt with the pandemic (either COVID never happened or they delayed a few years). WW84 - the movie isn't good, but I don't think the reception was utterly toxic right out the gate (like something like Morbius). There was a decent amount of hype, and I don't think a lot of the toxic WOM would have settled in until the movie had been out for a little bit. Would have been received with a shrug, and grossed something like 130/350. Probably around 400 OS as well. Tenet - the fact that this did as well as it did during the pandemic makes me think it would have been a pretty sizeable hit in a regular year (especially OS). Yes, I know that the fact that it was "the only blockbuster for months" helped increase the attention that it got, but a nearly 60M domestic gross and especially 300M OS is impressive. Summer 2020 was relatively "normal" compared to Spring/Fall 2020 so it likely grossed a bit higher than it would have had it released in those months. But I'd argue that it could have done Inception numbers domestic, around 500-600 OS as well. New Mutants - I 100% think this would have grossed Morbius numbers had it released in 2018.

Thought this was pretty good, not great though. Really does feel like what would happen if A24 produced Smile lol. Really effective, although the last 10-15 minutes gets away from itself, and there are so many elements that feel half-baked or abandoned once you reach the end.

I think there's a little bit of revisionist history going on with Shazam after Shazam 2 came out and was an outright flop. Because Shazam 1 was pretty universally acclaimed when it first came out. Say what you will about how generic the sequel was, but the first had heart, humor, and a solid story that you don't often see handled as effectively as many CBMs today. Honestly, I think Sandberg really has the directing chops for big-budget fare. Just get him away from DC for a bit.

I think the last 5-10 years has kind of skewed box office tracking, in terms of people’s perception of what a “bomb” is. Nowadays, if you’re not a billion dollar grosser, someone’s calling you a bomb. I remember last year when people were calling Multiverse of Madness a bomb because it didn’t make a billion… just stop.

So as far as catching up in time for this series, ive watched all of Clone Wars, I’ve watched the first 3 seasons of Rebels and I’m currently reading the second Canon Thrawn book (Alliances?). I’m going to watch Rebels S4 after finishing Alliances, and I hope to read Thrawn: Treason before Ahsoka (might have to put the show off for a few days to make sure I’m caught up). Is there anything else I would need to be caught up? For example, I haven’t yet read Thrawn Ascendency trilogy, is that necessary for Ahsoka?

I’ve followed Zegler on social media for ages and honestly the 1937 comment, whether you like her tone or not, is definitely not the general vibe she gives off. She often comes across as a very sweet actress, and I think the people taking this one comment and applying it to her whole personality are just jumping on the bandwagon.

Screw it I’ll take the other side of this thread. I think Rami Malek, Garett Edwards, Rogue One, and JDW are all fantastic and y’all are just too cynical

Yea this was fine. I enjoyed watching it, but to be fair it hasn’t really stuck with me. Great production values, it’s definitely an expensive-looking movie. And I think it could have been a great one with another draft of the script refining some of the characters and relationships to make some of the pivotal moments storytelling-wise work better. Also they showed the monster way too often/early.

The Toopy and Binoo movie has presold more than Blue Beetle at 3 of the major locations I track. And it's not even close.

Dang, that’s surprising! Hoping this is really fun!

Not a SINGLE Oppenheimer nom? Lol