Hatebox

I think you're right but I also think the degree to which Marvel really dips its toes into different genres is often overstated. No, Winter Solider is not a 70s-esque spy thriller - it's an action-heavy superhero movie with an unambiguous good guy, the usual 3 act structure, and it happens to have fewer jokes than most MCU entries. (And that's not a bad thing! It might be Marvel's best movie).

I personally wouldn't count those because filming a single trilogy from the get-go is so different to a first movie exploding and the studio doubling down on that success after the fact. But I suppose they would be a good example of a single filming schedule at least not compromising coherent storytelling.

Yeah, they're fair shouts. Not without their issues but they're at least different enough from each other that they don't feel like one movie cut in half.

MCU notwithstanding, have any sequels filmed back to back ever been good? I think the John Wick films have only ever been ok so there's no great height to fall from, but it strikes me that these back to back filming schedules rarely result in good movies.

Sounds decent enough. MCU reviews are either polite or gushing. These definitely lean more towards the polite end which I suppose doesn't really matter after the year we've had. Shame it's not the lean spy-thriller some hoped for and instead the increasingly frenetic CGI action we're used to. EDIT - Just read that there's a sequence in the movie set to a somber cover of Smells Like Teen Spirit. If it's done unironically then fucking lol.

TIL that Christopher Nolan's favourite F&F movies are the first and Tokyo Drift. https://theplaylist.net/christopher-nolan-bond-fast-furious-alien-3-20201210/

Hopefully this film has more than one act, unlike its predecessor which felt like a two-hour beginning then abruptly ended.

It's sad that I now see Idis Elba's presence in something as a bad omen.

It really baffles me that some people lose their shit over 'elitist' critics in the context of the MCU when in reality critics are massively kind to these movies. Captain Marvel has a 79% RT for gods sake. Critics are your unwavering allies here!

Sorry, to be clear - I absolutely don't care how the movie performs. Its HBO Max status means there's a limited ceiling for its box office anyway. It's just that having come of age during the first movie's monumental zeitgeist and given it's remained fairly lodged in popular discourse since then I'm struck by the almost universal apathy. I'm not saying it's good or bad, just notable.

Again, a new Matrix movie has actually screened and the world barely notices. I know, I know, there's no trailer yet, covid, etc but I feel like I'm alone at finding that really surreal.

In lieu of actual ratings my only gauge for a streaming show's impact is how much I hear it talked about outside of expected dedicated online spaces. I feel like Wandavision was talked about a shit-load, with Winter Soldier and Loki not nearly as much. Which isn't a slight on them, but does suggest D+ Marvel shows have already settled into a non-novelty groove.

Comedy sequels are usually trash. I really don't think critics have some nefarious agenda here.

I just hope Jake Johnson's meta-character whose love for the first park that made no sense whatsoever comes back...

"Makes the first one look like a masterpiece" is quite the statement.

Just keep the macguffin simple, don't surround Indy with 17 useless hangers-on and let him murder a few people in cold blood and it'll already be miles ahead of crystal skull.

TV reviews on RT are broken - virtually everything gets a high score. Metacritic is a lot more revealing. I'm not saying the show sounds bad, just nothing special... at least the first two eps. But hey, it's not like anyone was expecting a masterpiece.

Going by the reviews it sounds like this is moderately enjoyable fluff. A decent enough summer watch.

They were awful. Textbook examples of 'if you can't think of anything for a character to do, don't have them hanging around in the first place.'

I know covid has been a distraction and a trailer hasn't even dropped yet but I find the seeming lack of general interest in this odd. If you told me a few years ago this was being released I'd have thought curiosity would be through the roof. I guess superheroes really are the only game in town now.

There was a picture of Hemsworth doing the rounds on reddit recently, and I was shocked to see that his legs were no bigger than mine. It's like he'd ignored them completely.

I can take or leave O'Russell, but he does manage to put together insane casts.

This totally feels like it's been made as a vehicle for Holland. Who the hell wants to see an adaptation of a young Nathan Drake, rather than the older one who's in 95% of the games?

Well, I've always loved the Skeeter Davis song that plays at the beginning so props to the marketing team for actually using it and not some 'haunting' minimalist piano cover. Otherwise... more washed-out MCU color grading and lore I'm incapable of caring about. We're in a pretty sorry state when "at least it's not a green-screen nightmare!" is now worthy of praise. (It should go without saying this will be a success. I know predicting that the MCU bubble will finally burst is fun but I doubt anyone really believes it right now.)

Does this film look good? No. But do I still really, really want to see it? No.