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rukaio101

Ruk's Top 88 Movies of 2018

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22 hours ago, cookie said:

Is that a real poster? That's lol-material right there.

I've no idea. I just picked it because it was hilarious.

 

Anyway, continuing on with the list...

 

72. Ravenous (Les affames)

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This movie feels like it was released several years too late. Seriously, 8 or 9 years ago, this might have been an interesting take on the zombie genre with a few genuinely tense and well-directed sequences and some interesting ideas. But as it is now, with the zombie craze already having looong hit peak saturation, this just feels like another generic zombie movie with not enough new to really set it apart from the pack.

 

I will say though, it’s not like it’s badly made. The characters were decent, the direction was solid and, like I said, there were some genuinely tense sequences here and there. But the whole thing is just so permeated with this feeling of ‘Been there, done that’ in regards to the zombie genre that it loses most of its impact. Asshole survivor humans? Been there done that. Slow collapse of civilisation? Been there done that. Innocent kid caught up in the middle that the survivors have to protect. Definitely been there done that.  It doesn’t have all that much new and what little it does have (like the zombies building creepy structures) doesn’t have enough plot relevance to make all that much difference.

 

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that I think it’s impossible to make a good zombie movie these days, just look at 2016’s Train to Busan (seriously, go look at Train to Busan, it’s great.) Heck, including this film, I 'technically' saw 4 zombie movies this year and genuinely really enjoyed two of them (the third was just kinda eh and will probably turn up soonish on this list). But all of those films placed higher than this because they all felt like they had at least some new twist for the genre to make it fresh. If you want your zombie movie to stand out nowadays, then you’re going to have to do a lot more interesting things with it. And this film doesn't feel like it does that, for all the decent direction it has.

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71. Green Book

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(Side note: this is basically just a cross-posting of my thoughts from the Review thread. But hey, I originally wrote that rant for this list anyway and I'll be damned if I'm going to a write a second overly long rant about my dislike for this movie.)

 

Okay, I'm aware I'm probably going to get a little bit ranty in regards to this film, but I feel it's at least somewhat justified because fuuuuuck this movie!

 

Seriously, in my opinion it’s an enormous indictment on the state of the Academy that, in a year filled with so many amazing movies that intelligently explore complex themes of race with nuance and purpose, that this is one of the ones currently ahead in the Oscar race. This safe Oscar-baity drivel that ignores real history and modern day race-relations in favour of making up crap and presenting racism in a safe marketable way so the nice white audience doesn’t feel too uncomfortable.

 

Now, I will confess that a lot of my anger towards this movie does come from its subtext and from outside context. Taken completely on its own at face value, it’s actually a fairly entertaining and well-made film, so I can understand why some people like it. Viggo Mortenson and Mahershala Ali both do great jobs with the material given and the movie never feels like it’s boring or dragging. It’s a lot like last year’s Three Billboards in that, if you remove it from all outside context and ignore the problematic themes and messaging, it’s honestly a fairly enjoyable movie, so I’m not too surprised to see a lot of positive reception towards it and don't particularly judge other people for enjoying it.

 

But take that context into account and this movie just comes off looking irresponsible at best and, at worst, outright disgusting. The film was made without permission from Doc Shirley’s family and, judging from their interviews, it’s fairly easy to see why. Ignoring the rather major fact that Doc Shirley was really never that close a friend with Tony Lip and their relationship was strictly professional, Shirley was close friends with numerous civil rights heroes and important black figures and all but raised his three brothers. Yet in this movie, Doc Shirley is suddenly a cold figure out of touch with regular black folk and popular black music and is distant to everyone including his family, a sole brother he lost contact with years ago. And why all this sudden change, you might ask? So the filmmakers can justify a subplot in which Tony Lip (the white guy in this scenario) can teach Doc Shirley to be black.

 

To say again, this movie, directed by a white guy and written by three white guys, has a subplot where Viggo Mortensen, the white guy in this partnership teaches Mahershala Ali’s uptight black character how to be black. Including a scene where they eat fried chicken together.

 

Jesus. Fucking. Christ.

 

Seriously, there’s being unintentionally ignorant and then there’s just… this. It’s especially galling because the movie tries to have it both ways with Tony Lip. Apparently he’s somehow more in touch with the black community than Doc Shirley, but the movie has a subplot of him getting over his own prejudices (albeit without that much in the way of actual self-reflection or realisation, he just kinda does) and somehow the movie still has him shocked, surprised and appalled by the racist ways Doc is treated in the Deep South.

 

Bitch, if you seemingly ‘know common black people and culture better’ than Doc Shirley then why the fuck are you so surprised about this shit?!

 

Especially irritating to me is that they did include some ways in which the movie genuinely could’ve worked or been interesting or nuanced in terms of exploring race. There’s a scene in which Tony and Doc are stopped by a racist policeman (and I’ll get back to that more later), Tony tries to talk to the guy and admits that he’s Italian, to which the cop states that makes him ‘practically half n—r’. Now that’s a genuinely interesting topic to potentially explore. Look at the ways in which various white subcultures like the Italians or the Irish also received prejudice during that time and contrast Tony Lip’s various experiences to Doc Shirley’s. But nope, Tony just punches the cop for the insult (like I said, I’ll get back to it) and it’s never brought up again.

 

Now, I will confess, part of me does wonder whether I’m simply being so harsh on this movie because I’ve already seen so many significantly better movies this year dealing with race from the perspective of black writers and filmmakers. Widows, The Hate U Give, BlacKkKlansman, Black Panther, Sorry to Bother You and ones I haven't even seen yet like Blindspotting and If Beale Street Could Talk, that I've heard raves about. But I feel like this tame sanitized portrayal of racism in the Deep South simply does not hold up any more. I mean, I mentioned in the last paragraph that there’s a scene involving the main characters being pulled over by a policeman and that’s been a recurring theme in a lot of race-based movies these last couple of years. Widows, Blackkklansman, The Hate U Give and last year’s Get Out all have similar scenes, obvious as a reflection of a lot of tragic real life events involving police shootings.

 

But you know what the big difference is between those four black-directed films and this white-directed one? Tension. Suspense. Genuine fear for their lives. The Hate U Give opens with the main character receiving ‘the Talk’ on how to act around police officers so they don’t fucking shoot you, something that is apparently based pretty heavily in real things that some black families do to protect themselves. Meanwhile, in Green Book, the characters get stopped by an openly racist policeman in the Deep South and you know what the worst thing he does is? Gosh gollee gee, he makes Doc Shirley stand out in the rain unnecessarily! What a scoundrel, am I right fellas? There's no genuine fear or tension as there probably should be in such a situation, just annoyance at this comparatively minor injustice. Fuck, Tony Lip punches the same cop in the face and the worst thing that happens is that they get locked up for a few hours. All this in spite of the fact that the Deep South in 60’s was a million times worse than modern day race relations between black people and the police and that Doc Shirley would have far more reason to fear for his life there than the movie lets on. But obviously we can't draw parallels to real modern day racial struggles or the nice white audience might feel uncomfortable and question whether we or not we actually solved racism forever. [/sarcasm mode]

 

In fact, that level of underplaying the sheer amount of danger black people were in in the Deep South back then is active through the entire movie. The film is named after the Green Book, a book specifically written so that black people would know where/how they could travel and stay in the Deep South without getting fucking murdered, yet the movie never really seems willing to grapple with the true consequences of that. There are scenes of Doc facing racism and a beating once or twice, sure, but the movie often treats it more like a mild nuisance and injustice rather than the systematic, potentially life-threatening thing it really was. Like Tony Lip, the movie doesn’t seem to get how bad it was for black people back then and is unwilling to engage with anything beyond its safe dollar store portrayal of racism and message of 'thank god that doesn't happen any more, right?'.

 

Honestly, I feel like I could talk about how badly this movie bungled its subtext all day. There are hundreds of small ridiculous, painfully bad moments that I barely even touched on (Tony even makes a fucking 'Not All White People' argument successfully). But, to sum up, when people ask me ‘why do we need more diversity in the filmmaking world?’ I’m going to point to the dozens of excellent nuanced black-written/directed movies that explore racial problems and strife in an intelligent and meaningful way that came out this year…... and then I’m going to point to this movie. A film that, while technically solid and with a pair of excellent performances to enjoy, is almost embarrassing with its clearly white-centric sanitized view of a genuinely horrible period of history.

To sum up my thoughts, seriously, fuck this movie. If you enjoyed it, fine, more power to you, it's honestly not a badly made flick, but I just can't get over how fucking willfully blind it is to the very subject it's claiming to explore.

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70. Early Man

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Siiiiiiigh. Is it just me or have Aardman kind of been losing their edge with their last few films? I mean, I loved Chicken Run, Wallace and Gromit and Arthur Christmas (and even consider Flushed Away a bit of a guilty pleasure) but their last couple of films have been somewhat… underwhelming. I didn’t care all that much for Pirates and I honestly forgot that the Shaun the Sheep movie was a thing a few times. And considering how slow a schedule Aardman usually works to, that means it’s been a long long time since I really loved an Aardman film.

 

Needless to say, Early Man didn’t do much to change that.

 

I will say though, at least part of that blame feels like it ought to go to the advertising. Specifically that the trailers did their utmost to avoid mentioning that this was a fucking sports movie of all things! So going into what I thought would be a fun Aardman caveman comedy-adventure and learning that it’s all about football of all things wasn’t exactly a pleasant surprise. Especially since, as far as sports movies go, it’s fairly generic and by-the-book. 'Protagonist's Team need to win game to save their valley, problem is they suck. They train to get better, it doesn’t look like it’s going to be enough in time, protagonist gets his darkest hour moment, then they fight anyway and barely win by the power of plucky wit.' And all played almost completely straight.

 

Honestly, it’s disappointing because there’s really a lot I feel like Aardman could’ve done with this premise. They have a great quirky sort of humour and an inventive way of recreating modern idioms in different environments (see the underground city in Flushed Away). But this just felt like it lacked a lot of their usual spark and wit. Don’t get me wrong, there was still some of it there in bits and pieces and there were more than a few things that I did enjoy about the movie. It did feel like it had actual effort and passion put into it, some of the gags were fun and Tom Hiddlestone and his outraaageous francais accent was particularly fantastic. But overall, it just wasn't enough to make it a good movie.

 

Ah well, maybe the next Aardman will be better. When it comes out. Eventually.

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69. Hunter Killer

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You know, from all the terrible reviews I heard about it, I was honestly expecting this movie to be absolute trash on the same level as A Good Day to Die Hard. It looked fairly shite from the trailers and the whole general premise was quite hilariously tone deaf to the actual current relations between the US and Russia.

 

Yet when I put it on… honestly, it was alright. It wasn’t particular good either but, as far as generic action movies/simple background noise went, I didn’t have any complaints. Like Skyscraper, I expect to have fully forgotten it by week’s end, but as far as generic action timewasters go, you could do worse.

 

…You could also probably do better, but I digress.

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68. Isle of Dogs

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You know, sometimes there are filmmakers or styles of filmmaking that everyone else seems to outright adore, but never quite seems to click with me. And I'm not talking about just 'any critically acclaimed movie that I don't like', mind. Films like The Old Man and the Gun or last year's Dunkirk are films that I don't enjoy as much as others, but I also understand why I don't enjoy them and can articulate my problems with them. No, in this case I'm talking more in regards to filmmakers like Green Room's Jeremy Saulnier or arthouse films like You Were Never Really Here. The sorts of films where I can see what they were going for, feel like they succeeded at what they trying to be but, for whatever reason, their style just doesn't seem to work for me. And in that regard, I’m just going to have to say it.

 

I don’t think Wes Anderson’s animation style is for me.

 

And it's not like this movie is the sole instigator of that feeling. In 2009 everyone was gushing over his Fantastic Mr Fox but, even being a big fan of the original book, I just thought it was eh. And it’s a similar result this time around. Everyone is gushing massively over this movie, but I thought it was just okay. And it's not like I have a complete aversion to Wes Anderson's style, I loved Moonrise Kingdom and The Grand Budapest Hotel, but his animated movies never really quite seem to do it for me.

 

Honestly, I’m really not entirely sure what it is about this movie that left me so uninterested. I mean, okay, sure there’s obvious flaws and criticisms to be made, like Greta Gerwig’s character in her entirety, but something about how flat and empty the animation constantly feels just turns me off the wrong way. It’s not like it doesn’t fit the tone or anything, but it just didn’t really work for me. Plus I could barely tell half the dog characters apart, in spite of their big name voices.

 

Still, as much as I may have personally felt underwhelmed, it's not like I don't get why a lot of other people have really liked this film. There's a lot to enjoy, there are a lot of neat ideas and little touches here and there and it does have a lot of Wes Anderson's unique style to it. But it's not for me. Unfortunately.

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67. My Hero Academia: A Tale of Two Heroes

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Boy, this sure was an anime filler movie, wasn’t it? Yup. Veeery anime filler-y.

 

Okay, so for those who aren’t aware, My Hero Academia is a Japanese manga/anime series set in a scenario where more-or-less everyone has superpowers called 'Quirks'. The protagonist, Izuku Midoriya, is one of the unlucky few who doesn’t, but ends up inheriting one from the mightiest and most celebrated hero of the time, All Might. Then he goes to high school, because Japan. I’ve actually been following the original manga since literally the first chapter (if I want to go full hipster, I'd bring up that I actually read the author's previous series as well when it ran) and it's nice to see how phenomenally popular it seems to have gotten. Especially since it’s honestly probably one of the better shonen jump titles running right. But, as with all popular long-running anime series, it was probably only natural that it would eventually get a generic anime filler movie to go with it, so here here we are.

 

Still though, as far as generic anime filler movies go, it’s fine. It does the job well enough. There’s a basic story, some neat flashy fight scenes and plenty of moments and cameos for fans of the series to lap up. It doesn’t really do much more beyond that and doesn’t really live up to the writing standard of the series but, like I said, as far as generic anime filler movies go, it’s fine. Something for the fans to enjoy and then probably forget about in a month’s time.

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66. Tomb Raider

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Okay, I’m aware I’m starting this review off on a somewhat personal tangent, but I just talk about how much I fucking hated Lara Croft’s dad in this movie? Like legitimately really fucking hate him.

 

Ignoring for a second the insult of having one of the most iconic female video game icons of all time having her entire character/motivation revolve around daddy issues, the guy is just the fucking worst. Seriously, his wife dies and, rather than help their grieving daughter, he instead dumps her in a boarding school for years and goes gallavanting around the world in a quest to commune with the dead or some shit, before going missing and being presumed dead and causing even more emotional trauma to said daughter and then being an asshole and, in the few messages he leaves behind, insists she never ever look for him and just abandon him for dead, completely ignoring the impact that that might have on her. And let's not even go into the fact that the quest almost ends with him unleashing a fucking doom plague on the world. He's kind of a terrible father all round, to be honest.

 

And, most frustratingly of all, nobody ever calls him out on this shit! The movie treats him like he’s a great dad and a good person when the entire plot is caused by him all-but-abandoning his daughter and almost dooming the world because of his own inability to just let things go! There’s one point where he actively berates Lara for coming after him and potentially dooming the world and I just wanted her to turn around and call him out on all of his bullshit!

 

Ugh. Sorry, really really hated that character. A lot.

 

Honestly though, it’s kind of a shame this movie underperformed because, Richard Croft aside, there is genuinely a lot to like about it. Alicia Vikander does a great job in the title role. is instantly likeable and charismatic and genuinely makes you want to see more of her. Plus there’s a few fun action setpieces to the film as well and some real heart-in-mouth moments, even if ultimately it's a bit forgettable. Even the villain was surprisingly sympathetic (probably moreso than Lara’s father.)

 

Admittedly, it's not anything particularly outstanding as far as blockbusters go and certainly doesn't come close to truly breaking the video game movie curse, but it's still a somewhat fun (if a bit flawed and forgettable) ride.

 

But seriously, fuck Richard Croft.

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65. Pacific Rim Uprising

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You know, it’s funny. Five years ago, I would’ve given my left kidney for a Pacific Rim sequel, considering how much I genuinely enjoyed the first one. For years it was a touch and go as to whether it would ever actually happen, before finally getting the green light to cash in on that sweet sweet China movie. And now that we’ve actually finally got it, my thoughts are just… eh, it’s okay I guess.

 

Honestly though, there are quite a few things to genuinely like about this film, despite its fairly averageness as a sequel. I feel like Charlie Hunnam gets a unfairly bad rap for the first Pacific Rim movie, but John Boyega far outpaces him in terms of charisma and likability and I enjoyed his relationship with other characters, even Scott Eastwood who is usually flat as cardboard in most of his roles. Plus concepts like the rogues Jaegers were great and turning Charlie Day’s character into a villain was a legitimately inspired twist. But overall, it's a fairly underwhelming sequel and honestly, while it feels weird to say, I think the biggest problem with Pacific Rim Uprising is what made the first Pacific Rim so fun.

 

The giant robot fights.

 

See, the thing about the original Pacific Rim’s robot fights is that they had a real sense of weight and scale to them. Everything from how they were shot to how they moved made them feel real and heavy and powerful. Each blow, each impact, each punch and crash, felt precise and felt heavy. The fights in Pacific Rim Uprising are… well… just CGI robot fights. It lacks that same feeling of scale, destruction and weight that the first one did and thus just come off more like weightless CG Michael Bay robots smashing against each other without thought or meaning. It never feels real in the same sort of way that the original Pacific Rim did. And without that sense of scale and wonder, the writing alone is far from enough to save the movie.

 

So yeah, it feels like switching out Guillermo Del Toro ultimately was kind of a mistake. I mean, it's not like he was doing anything important at the time. Just working on some freaky fish movie that no-one ever heard of. Who cares about all that? Ah well, maybe we’ll get him back for Pacific Rim 3. Which I'm sure is deeeefinitely going to happen. I mean, they put a sequel hook at the end of this film and everything, so obviously it's going happen, right guys? Right?!

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2 hours ago, rukaio101 said:

71. Green Book

 

Now, I will confess, part of me does wonder whether I’m simply being so harsh on this movie because I’ve already seen so many significantly better movies this year dealing with race from the perspective of black writers and filmmakers. Widows, The Hate U Give, BlacKkKlansman, Black Panther, Sorry to Bother You and ones I haven't even seen yet like Blindspotting and If Beale Street Could Talk, that I've heard raves about.

You really need to see Blindspotting, hopefully before the BOT top 25 deadline. It's my favourite film so far this year (and it certainly isn't a feel good racism is over kind of film).

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63. The Meg

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You know, I’d like to take the executive who came up with the idea of making this PG-13 and stuff them in a sack with the same guy who did the same for Venom and Once Upon a Deadpool and then feed them to sharks. I mean seriously, you’ve got Jason Statham fighting a giant killer shark and you want to keep it family friendly? What part of any of that sounded like it should be family friendly to you?!

 

It’s annoying too because there’s honestly quite a lot to like about this film when it leans fully into the whole shark killing thing. The Meg gets a few great kills and a fantastic introduction and the plot is fairly solid to boot. But the movie leans way too heavily into an uninteresting romance between Jason Statham and the female lead and desperate attempts to appeal to the Chinese market and not nearly enough to bloody gory giant shark attacks. I mean, does anyone even really get munched in that big scene on the packed beach? What a let down.

 

Still, the movie made enough to make The Meg 2 a pretty likely probability so maybe in the next film we’ll finally have a chance to get to see what we actually came for and make room for some actual hardcore R-Rated material to- Oh who am I kidding, that one’s going to be PG-13 as well, isn’t it? God damn it.

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62. Rampant

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Okay, I’m not going to lie, the big major reason I chose to watch this movie is because of the premise. And can you blame me? It’s a great premise. It’s a wuxia-style, swashbuckling zombie apocalypse movie set in Medieval Korea. If that doesn’t sound at least slightly interesting then you’re dead inside (pun semi-intended).

 

The actual plot of the story is actually more of a Game of Thrones-esque sort of political period story. After the Crown Prince of the kingdom of Joseon (medieval Korea) commits suicide, his younger brother reluctantly returns home to seek the truth behind his brother’s death and, in the process, ends up getting caught in the middle of the courtly intrigue. Something even more complicated by the fact that there’s a freaking zombie invasion going on in the land. Sounds like a winning movie, right?

 

Well, yes and no.

 

Unfortunately, the movie itself kinda suffers a bit from the same issues as Ravenous, in that, in spite of its setting, a lot of the zombie stuff feels like it’s been done before and done better. Aside from the setting, the movie doesn’t really do anything new or interesting with the zombies other than having them act as waves of mooks for our heroes to cut down. It also doesn’t help that the actual violence is usually relatively tame and it doesn’t have the sheer frenetic style and imagery and tension of the likes of Train to Busan or some of the better wuxia movies out there.

 

However, I actually honestly found myself feeling fairly engaged with the actual political side of the story. Game of Thrones-ian is honestly kind of apt as there’s a lot in the way of betrayals and political plots and the like. The king manages to walk a strange compelling line of both being very sympathetic and unsympathetic at the same time and the main character’s utter irreverence and distaste for the political games makes him a very likeable protagonist. It does end up being a bit swamped by the less interesting zombie apocalypse stuff, admittedly, but there is a fair amount of good stuff there.

 

Overall, this wasn’t quite as good as I was hoping it to be, but It still had enough to it that I don’t regret seeing it. Not the worst zombie movie I saw this year, but not the best either.

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61. Solo: A Star Wars Story

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Okay, I kinda feel I’ve gotta ask up front about this one. Did anybody actually want a Han Solo origin movie? And I mean really want one? I know I didn’t and I’ve yet to run into a single person who really felt like they desperately needed this movie. So, in that regard, this movie’s relative floppage at the box office didn’t actually come as too much of a surprise to me. But as for the actual quality of the movie itself… eh, it’s alright I guess.

 

Honestly, that’s about the best and worst I can say about it. It’s alright. The characters are alright, the story is alright, the action is alright and so on and so forth. Nothing particularly prequel bad but nothing to really inspire the imagination either. I had admittedly mixed feelings on Rogue One, but at least it had its high points and at least it felt like a story in this universe that was actually worth telling. This doesn’t. We don’t get any massive new insights into Han Solo’s character that I felt we really couldn’t have done without. He’s just a naive kid who gets kinda-sorta (?) backstabbed by his love interest and that’s about it.

 

Honestly, while I’m not necessarily convinced that Lord/Miller’s version would’ve been a masterpiece (although they have pretty damn good track record) at least that version feels like it would’ve been interesting, whether it was bad or good. This just… isn’t. It’s not good enough to standout in the series, but it’s not bad enough to stand out either like the prequels. It’s just there. It’s just alright, I guess.

 

 

(Side note: It does kinda say something about how forgettable this movie is that the Star Wars fanbase in the months leading up to it spent all their time arguing about The Last Jedi and, upon Solo's actual release... immediately went back to arguing about The Last Jedi.)

 

 

(Side note 2: Please for the love of God do not start arguing about The Last Jedi here.)

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60. Suicide Squad: Hell to Pay

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The last of the three DC Animated movies I saw this year and pretty easily the one I preferred the most. I didn't love it, mind, and I don't think it was as good as the last animated Suicide Squad movie, Assault on Arkham (which I think is pretty underrated), but it was still okay, rather than terrible.

 

Honestly, I think the thing I liked most about it was the premise. Effectively, the Suicide Squad are sent on the behest of a terminally ill Amanda Waller to retrieve a magical card that allows the holder free passage into heaven upon death, regardless of evil deeds done in live. Now that's really awesome premise and, considering the Squad is obviously already made up of murderers and wrongdoers who could all benefit from said card, holds a lot of room for potentially fun storytelling. And while I wouldn't say this movie does anything overly exciting with said premise, it gets the job done.

 

Honestly, one of the reasons I'm so much more fond of the Suicide Squad animated movies than the live-action one is because they understand what makes the dynamics of the titular team so engaging. Specifically, that they're all backstabbing assholes. The live-action Suicide Squad movie was far too concerned with copying the 'quirky unlikely family dynamic' from Guardians of the Galaxy, rather than leaning into the double-crossing gambit pileup that the animated movies go for. And needless to say the latter is both more convincing for these characters and just plain more fun.

 

Still, I'll admit I'd be hard pressed to give this movie that high a praising. It's entertaining enough, but never really hits any of the fun peaks that I felt Assault on Arkham did. The action is a bit basic and, while there are some fun character beats here and there, the team doesn't feel nearly as well-defined and dynamic as that movie.

 

That said, it's still a lot better than Batman Ninja or Gotham by Gaslight. So, guess it's got that going for it.

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59. Mortal Engines

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This movie feels like it came out 10 years too late to be relevant. Seriously, the original novel this was adapting was actually fairly big at the time of its initial release, at least here in the UK, so seeing the film come out now really feels like a ‘You kinda missed the relevance train’ sort of moment, much like last year’s Captain Underpants. But where last year’s Captain Underpants was actually a legitimately really good movie, surprisingly enough, that reminded me of everything I loved about the original children's books growing up, this movie… wasn’t.

 

Now, it’s been absolutely ages since I actually read the original novel for this and thus I don’t really recall a lot of the plot details all that well. But even without that, a lot about this movie does really feel like the usual substandard blockbuster novel adaptation. It not only tries to include too many subplots from the book (leading to a first third that feels crammed with poorly-paced exposition) but also changes a lot of stuff significantly for the worse towards the final third (in particular the fate of Valentine’s daughter which, as a result of being changed, leaves her with almost nothing to do in the final act). Hence the entire thing ends up very much being a ‘worst of both worlds’ situation.

 

However, I also do think this movie has quite a few things going for it. Specifically, the aesthetic. I really love this sort of steampunk stuff, which I don't think gets enough representation in modern blockbusters, and this movie delivers it in plenty. The designs of everything from the big cities to the aircraft to the tiny scuttling hamlets are all great. Plus, seeing London transformed into a giant moving steampunk city is pretty awesome and it has a lot of sweet little details tucked in here and there.

 

Another thing I really liked about the movie was Shrike, the badass zombie terminator who legitimately feels like he was transplanted in from a significantly better movie than this and single handedly raises the quality of almost every single scene and moment he’s in. Something about his undead-terminator-esque demeanour combined with his sheer unstoppableness and him having one of the more actual emotional moments of the movie really made him stand out in what was otherwise a meh-ish kinda blockbuster.

 

Still, this movie isn’t great. The first third is paced wonkily and stuffed with too much poorly-handled exposition and the final third was clearly created from scratch for the film because it barely seems to fit the rest of the movie. And I severely wasn’t impressed by the scene where the Wall denizens ‘forgive’ the Londoners who moments earlier were attempting to kill them and successfully blew up most of their fleet and wall. But this movie still has some things that make me consider it worth watching.

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58. Bleach

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Speaking of questionably competent adaptations, I have to admit I enjoyed this adaptation of Tite Kubo's long-running shonen action series a lot more than I was expecting. Admittedly in large part because I wasn't expecting to enjoy it at all. Japan doesn't have the greatest reputation when it comes to effects-heavy adaptations of blockbuster action manga. Still, this was a lot more enjoyable than I was expecting, even if it still has a lot of clear problems in adaptation.

 

For those unfamiliar, the original manga follows Ichigo Kurosaki, a Japanese teenager who sees dead people. After an disastrous encounter with Rukia, a soul reaper who helps ghosts move on the afterlife and destroys corrupted spirits named Hollows, Ichigo accidentally ends up inheriting her powers and taking her job as a soul reaper. Shonen action stuff ensues, including epic sword battles, superpowers and dozens and dozens of story arcs of increasingly poor quality and ridiculously drawn-out fights with zero background and bullshit powers, until the series was more or less forced to end by its publishers and Kubo had to wrap up his entire final arc in about two chapters. Also, for some reason, one of the main villains in said final arc was a giant disembodied arm.

 

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(Seriously, did this shit ever get explained?)

 

Fortunately, this movie only adapts a handful of the earliest arcs, when the series was arguably at its best. And honestly, it does them fairly well? Admittedly, it does lose a lot of the quirkiness and fun of the series in translation, since the manga format compliments both the weirder stuff and the comedic overreactions a lot better, but as far as adapting difficult material went, I honestly thought this did a decent job. It focused on the most compelling and interesting story arc it could feasibly adapt, wasn't afraid to cut out a lot of the chaff, managed to condense a decent character arc for both Ichigo and Rukia down into the running time and even actually managed to have a conclusion that worked both as a potential sequel hook (should the movie be successful) and a conclusion in its own right (should it not).

 

Admittedly, it's not perfect, hence why it's on the lower end of the list. I'm not sure how necessary some of the side characters were and the connecting story arcs was a little clunky. Plus it suffers the weakness that most foreign blockbusters of this scale do in that the CGI is... not great. And as mentioned, it really does lose a fair bit in translation.

 

Still, considering how little I was really expecting from this, 'enjoyable but flawed' is honestly not a bad conclusion. I don't think I'd rush out in desperation for a sequel, but I'd be at interested to see one. For a while at least. Because seriously, Bleach got reeeeeally bad towards the end.

 

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Never forget.

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56. White Fang

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Okay, so apparently the book that this film is based on is actually supposed to be a big deal? I’ll confess I’d never actually heard of it, so maybe it’s just an American thing, but seemingly it's had a bunch of adaptations through the year, culminating in this recent Netflix animated movie which was... alright, I guess?

 

The story is about a wolf cub, the titular White Fang, and his journey from youth with his mother, to his adoption by humans, to relationship with his various masters, to his brutal experiences in dog fighting, to his eventual nursing back to health by a kindly deputy sheriff. From what I can tell, it's fairly sanitized down from the original novel in a lot places, but it’s honestly not a bad story, even if some things don’t seem to fit together all that well. It also had probably one of the most punchable main villains I saw in a movie all year which, considering the competition, is fairly impressive.

 

However, what really made this movie interesting to me was that it simultaneously had some of the best animation I’ve seen all year… and some of the worst. Specifically, the lighting in this movie is absolutely gorgeous, with a beautiful mix of sunset colours that just look fantastic to behold on the CG background and animals. I was heavily reminded a lot of Long Way North (my favourite movie of 2016), which similarly managed to create a gorgeous-looking effect via its use of light with traditional animation. And the animals and background in this movie also look damn good too, which is fortunate considering the main character is a wolf and all. But the humans… the humans… well… they're not great. It's not the worst human animation I've seen in a movie, but it's still somewhat jarring to go from this-

 

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-to this...

 

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Now, to be fair, this character is supposed to be to some degree deliberately ugly. But there's a difference between 'intentionally ugly' and... wrong. Not horrendously 'what-the-fuck-were-you-thinking' bad, just subtly... wrong. Like a video game sprite that had clear money put behind it, but you still expect to any minute start clipping through the background. Especially when it's in motion.  Honestly, it’s almost jarring how bad the humans look compare to how gorgeous all the other animation is. Like someone sculpting a gorgeous lifelike statue, but it turns out they can’t do feet without turning them into weird little lumps.

 

Still, the movie’s fairly decent. I wouldn’t call it outstanding or anything to really go out of your way to see out, but it’s entertaining enough. If you're an animation fan and are looking for something a bit more obscure than the usual fare, you could do worse than this.

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55. Mary Poppins Returns

 

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Did you know the original Mary Poppins is actually an old favourite of mine? Yeah, it wasn’t actually something I really watched all that much as a youth but when I saw it a few years ago, I was genuinely surprised at just how much it held up. It’s a quality movie with a lot of catchy tunes, an iconic performance from Julie Andrews and Dick van Dyke doing... an accent, I guess? But either way it was charming, memorable and filled with joy and it's easy to understand why it has such a treasure place in pop culture history. So in comparison does Mary Poppins Returns live up to the hype?

 

Well, it’s in the bottom half of the list, if that didn’t tip you off. Barely, I'll admit, but still the bottom half.

 

Honestly, the thing about this movie is that, while it has a lot of fun musical numbers and great choreography/production design and a lot of good acting as well, especially with the always fantastic Emily Blunt bringing her own interpretation to the titular role, rather than attempting to copy Julie Walters, the movie itself… well, it feels kinda lacking in terms of actual heart. The original Mary Poppins had its indulgent musical numbers, yes, but it had a really solid story and pacing beneath the glamour and fun. And while this movie certainly attempts to replicate that… it doesn’t. Not really. Honestly, I'd go so far as to call it shallow beneath the glamour. The characters feels lackluster, much of the plot and messaging feels almost tone-deaf to modern audiences and all the showy musical numbers in the world aren’t going to mean much if I don’t care all that much about the people involved.

 

Still, as far as fun gratuitous musical numbers go, this certainly isn’t bad. And, like I said, Emily Blunt is great in the titular role, adding a uniqueness to her performance of the infamous nanny that leaves her different enough from Julie Andrews while still feeling like the same character. But in terms of recapturing the actual heart and strength of the original movie… it didn’t do quite so well. And all the spoonfuls of sugar in the world won't fix that.

 

(Look, it was either this or trying to fit supercallifragilisticexpealidotious into a pun. Don't @ me.)

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