movies: shang-chi and the legend of the ten rings

I don't think it's any exaggeration to say that Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is my new favourite Marvel movie. And possibly the best Marvel movie.

Which may well be because it's unlike any of the Marvel movies before it. Even with a non-zero number of cameos by previous Marvel characters.

I have been watching a lot of Asian cinema the last two years. Korean movies, Chinese movies, Japanese movies. And a lot of them martial arts movies, with a large dose of historical fiction thrown in.

And this movie has fingerprints from a number of those marital arts movies all over it. In the best possible way.

First up, the story.

Marvel movies have proved in the past that they're just better when the villain is more of an antagonist than a scenery chewing bad guy or a bit of a damp squid. Black Panther knew that. And in a lot of ways, Thanos had a point about over population in Infinity War. And now we have Xu Wenwu, played wonderfully by Tony Chiu-Wai Leung, a man driven by a desire for power and grief, but still a man who cares for his family, even if he shows it in a really screwed up way, and believes he's doing the right thing.

It feels like a much smaller and more intimate story, the story of one man and his relationship with his children, even if the stakes are mostly set at the usual "fate of the world" stakes. Yes, it's full of the usual clichés.. "finding your power", "doing the right thing", but there are also so many small story moments that feel fresh and are wonderfully done.

I feel like a lot of that possibly rests at the feet of the writer/director Destin Daniel Cretton. I mean, yes, there were other writers, but this feels like a voice that goes all the way through the movie.

And they aren't even all that huge as far as moments go. Shang-Chi has a female friend and there is no romance plotline, and she isn't secretly pining away for him without him knowing. There's a moment where Not The Main Character is crucial to the end of the movie, while Shang-Chi isn't having a hero moment. The moment you've been waiting for the whole movie happens almost without words or a lot of fanfare. The female characters have agency, names and talk about things other than the male characters. A low bar, but one many movies fail to clear.

Speaking of the women in this movie. I was pleasantly surprised by Awkwafina in this movie. Yes, the last thing I saw her in way Raya, and super didn't love her character in that, but she was good in the, admittedly, mostly forgettable Oceans 8. Her character could easily have become annoying or used as the comedy relief character, but, no... she's a fully fleshed out character with an arc and doesn't just become the damsel in distress at the end of the movie. Or worse yet, become a shoe-horned in romance plot as mentioned before. I also very much look forward to seeing what they do with her in later movies.

And as an actress without any movie experience, Meng'er Zhang is very good as Sheng's sister. Likewise, it will be interesting to see what they do with her character in later movies, because she will absolutely show up in later movies.

A quick shout out to Fala Chen in her small role as Shang's mother. Her first scene in the movie, which is also part of the opening of the movie, is possibly one of the BEST martial arts/romance scenes in... any movie.

But... Michelle Yeoh... Michelle Yeoh makes ANY movie she's in better. She may only really be in the movie about as much as Fala Chen, but she's great.

I will also say that the henchman, Razor Fist, played by Florian Munteanu, has something about him... I mean, yes, he's very handsome and he has biceps that are ridiculous... and a super cool villain defining feature. I can't put my finger on why (and no, I don't think it's about being thirsty for the bad guy), but he has that kind of screen charisma that just had me drawn to him. The character is fun enough, his first scene is probably the best, but I enjoyed him a lot.

Which brings us to the titular Shang-Chi... Simu Liu. I wasn't sure about him when I saw the poster, but... damn (also, I kind of thing the photo of him on the poster doesn't do him ANY justice). He also has that screen charisma and a sweetness and warmth that makes him feel perfect for the character (admittedly a character I know nothing about beyond what I've seen in this movie).

But he can do comedy, he can definitely do action and martial arts, and he can do drama and emotion. He also looks great both shirtless and in the Shang-Chi final costume.

On that note, all of the costumes, especially in the latter half of the movie, are amazing. Actually, the entire last... third of the movie in general is great.

As a whole, the movie wasn't really what I was expecting, although honestly I wasn't really sure what I was expecting. But it surprised me. And I enjoyed it a hell of a lot.

yani's rating: 5 dijiang out of 5

movies: avengers - endgame

Let's start this off right... this review will have some spoilers for Avengers: Endgame. If you haven't seen it yet, why are you even looking at this?

So, I cried. Not like cried like a baby or the ugly cried, but I think I cried on and off for the last 45 minutes.

Backing up a bit... this movie did not go in any of the directions that I thought it might. Beyond the "everybody who still has a contract with Marvel will be back at the end" expectation from the previous movie.

This was the perfect way to wrap up both the Infinity Gauntlet arc, and the last 22 movies. By tying it into iconic moments from the other movies, it allowed the audience to remember the joy and give it a whole new feel. And it gave all of the original Avengers something to do.

I also appreciate that in some ways this movie is a total troll. Especially when it comes to Thor... it wasn't the Thor we wanted (well, probably most of us, but I'm sure Chris Hemsworth had the best time ever), but it was definitely the Thor we knew and loved from Ragnarok. Likewise, the Hulk reveal wasn't what I was expecting at all.

And of course the finale had to feature both a 5 year time jump AND time travel. I read that Kevin Feige cited the final Star Trek: The Next Generation episode All Good Things as an inspiration for this movie and that absolutely makes complete sense.

It was also amazing that they got to tie in just about every single guest star possible, right down to the kid from Iron Man 3 appearing as a teenager (that one person in a black suit you just couldn't identify in THAT scene). But the point at which I both cried and wanted to punch the air and probably said "YES!" very quietly to myself is during the final fight when the portals start to open and ALL the returned heroes show up (and of course they let the stars of their highest grossing movie walk through first). But Tom Holland was the point I started to really cry.

On top of which the point at which all the badass Marvel ladies step up to give Captain Marvel a hand (not that I'm sure she really needed the help to be honest) was fucking awesome. Give me more of that... fuck it, give me a movie where they all team up and kick some ass, I don't even care what the plot is.

This is why the writers, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, and the directors, Anthony and Joe Russo really get how to write/direct action that's not just Thing A hitting Thing B, they put character moments all through this damn thing... they just know how to make a great superhero movies. From Captain America and Thor's hammer to the kickass women to the fact that they knew that waiting an extra beat before Tom Holland stepped through the portal would have people leaning forward in expectation. And the seemingly endless number of references, both explicit and subtle to the other 22 movies in the series.

They also gave me the thing I didn't know I'd been wanting since 2011, Steve finally making good on his promise to Peggy. Honestly that was the only part of the movie that was "spoiled" for me before going in... otherwise I went in knowing nothing. And I wasn't even annoyed about that one spoil... because of course if they discover how time travel works, he would want to go back and just be a regular guy... or at least as regular as he could be. And who knows, maybe they made little superpowered babies.

I don't even care to be honest. That scene was just perfect.

And yes, it's very easy to forget that the finale is actually taking place on Earth, because the bad guys blow everything up so that it's generic rubble and could be anywhere (or more accurately, is one part practical rubble and 9 parts CGI). And it is a shame that both Captain Marvel and Okoye aren't in the movie more, given the fact that they both appear prominently on the poster, and a number of things from the first movie (like the meaning behind Thanos' visions of the little girl) kind of get glossed over, but they also don't feel super important to be honest.

Plus now we're never going to find out what actually happened in Budapest.

It's not necessarily the best Marvel movie from a critical standpoint, but it did make me love it and love it hard. And it is the end of an era.

yani's rating: 5 timelines out of 5

movies: captain marvel

Captain Marvel is the best MCU movie to date.

It's smart, it's funny, it has an amazing star, it's deliciously 90's retro, it has the best MCU soundtrack, it has the best message.

And it may actually have a worthwhile villain for once. Or at the very least a villain who represents everything wrong with his culture.

Brie Larson was without doubt the perfect choice for this role... she does badass exceptionally well, she does snark exceptionally well and she commands the cameras attention.

Also, she can stand toe to toe with Samuel L. Jackson, Jude Law or Annette Bening and still do all those things.

Co-directors and co-writers Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck have put together a great story and a great movie. Don't get me wrong, it's not perfect, there are still a couple of things I was slightly confused by (which, I will be honest, make more sense after some internet sleuthing where the history of the blue MacGuffin was all laid out), but I still enjoyed the hell out of it.

I also loved the call backs from the first Guardians of the Galaxy movie, and Stan Lee's final (?) cameo (not to mention the all Stan Lee footage Marvel Studios logo they used at the start of the movie), actually as Stan Lee for once.

As I said at the start of the review, the movie is deliciously 90's retro, with a kick-ass 90's soundtrack where most of the artists are either female or bands with a female singer. And I love the fact they didn't hit you over the head with the decade it was supposed to be set, but casual references to both Blockbuster and Radio Shack (along with a wall full of band posters) were enough to clue you in.

And without giving anything away, the pivotal moment towards the end of the movie reminded me very much of Buffy's speech in the episode Chosen... specifically the line "Every girl who could have the power, will have the power. Can stand up, will stand up." It's not perhaps an original thought (hero discovers the power was in them all along), but it is quite beautifully done in this movie.

It was also a nice change of pace that this wasn't an origin story... or at least not in the classic sense... it was more of an origin by way of flashback story... which is unusual, but it suited the story.

Of the very few things in the negative column, the main one was the somewhat crunchy CGI, mostly whenever Goose the cat needed to be not a real cat... but also when Larson had her helmet on, especially at the end, it very clearly became a CGI puppet at that point.

But those are very minor complaints on what was an otherwise excellent movie.

yani's rating: 5 pagers out of 5

movies: avengers - infinity war

It's both impressive and a little frightening that with only a couple of stumbles along the way *cough* theincrediblehulk *cough*, Marvel has been doing this shared movie universe thing for 10 whole years now.

And Avengers: Infinity War really shows that they know what they're doing.

For the record THERE WILL BE SPOILERS IN THIS REVIEW. They won't be until later, and I'll try not to include too many, but I want to get my thoughts down about the end of the movie, and that, my friends, requires some degree of spoilers.

You have been warned.

Given that this movie's cast list is extensive to say the least (there are 24 characters on the poster for goodness sake... at least I think it's 24, I lost count several times), they did handle that many characters in probably the best way possible, splitting characters off into small groups, which leads to some really great pairings... Stark and Strange, Thor and Rocket... anybody who spends any screentime with Starlord. There were a few that I would definitely like to see together more... most notably Black Widow and Okoye, but hopefully that will happen in the second movie.

And they have also finally put together an adversary for the Avengers who has more than a single character trait (with the exception of Loki, but then he hasn't really been a formidable threat since the first Avengers movie)... Thanos is... complex. Don't get me wrong, he's an insane creature with a scrotum for a chin, but he's complicated. And Josh Brolin actually brings a lot to the character.

I will say that there are more than a few moments where I was already way ahead of the story... I'm not sure if that's a shared experience and intentional by the film makers, but especially towards the end there were a couple of times where I already knew what was about to happen (specifically with the soul and mind stones).

Thinking about it, it feels like the real keystones of this movie (pun entirely at your discretion) were Thor, the Guardians of the Galaxy and Dr Strange. Yes, Iron Man was in there too, but a lot of the time he felt secondary to Strange and Spiderman and eventually the Guardians. Also, I was basically over Tony about three movies ago (don't get me wrong, RDJ does a great job, I'm just essentially over the character himself).

And Captain America doesn't necessarily take a back seat, there's just not a whole heap for him to do. Thinking about the way the movie ended though, I think that essentially sidelining the entire original Avengers team in various ways was somewhat intentional, because they're clearly going to have to kick butt and take names in the sequel.

The movie also looks amazing (unsurprisingly)... from New York, to Wakanda, to maybe half a dozen alien planets... it looks great. Yes, there were times when I looked at the screen and thought "well, everything I'm looking at right now was created in a computer somewhere". None of it was bad, though... even though Thanos's whole gang were at least augmented in the computer.

Now, about that ending...

Remember, spoilers.

I'm not going to lie... I teared up a little bit twice during the ending and once before... the before part was Groot helping Thor with his new weapon, the end parts were Tom Holland's performance of his final lines as well as the scene between Groot and Rocket.

But does anyone ACTUALLY believe all of those people are gone for good. I mean, Black Panther... after the metric fuckton of money that movie just made, he's definitely coming back... and Spiderman has a solo movie coming out just after the Avengers sequel, so it all just lacked teeth.

Doubly so when you realise that of the 24 characters (and it is 24, I recounted) on the poster, the half that remain alive at the end of the movie are either side characters, the villain or the six original characters from the first Avengers movie.

Plus, keeping in mind Dr Strange's comment about how many possibly outcomes there are where the Avengers win basically brings us to a "Morpheus Matrix moment".

Yes, there is at least one character who probably won't be coming back... but even that I'm not sure about, because comic books and the things they inspire are weird that way.

But it was good... it was a great ride, they finally fixed the villain problem that has been part of almost every Marvel movie, and it was a hell of a cliffhanger to go out on.

yani's rating: 4 infinity stones out of 5

movies: black panther

While the overall quality of Marvel movies is pretty high, every now and again they absolutely hit something out of the park.

Black Panther is that something.

Writer/director Ryan Coogler and his co-writer Joe Robert Cole have put together a story that both fits the mould of a Marvel movie but at the same time breaks it. It's an origin story without being an origin story since everything you need to know about the origins of the Black Panther is covered in the opening narration.

And for once there's a villain character that actually has a personality and more of a backstory than any of the previous ones.

A lot of this is the story, some of this is the directing, but I think that a lot of it comes down to the fact that Coogler has put together an outstandingly talented cast. There really isn't a single bad performance from anyone in this movie.

Chadwick Boseman showed us what he was capable of in Captain America: Civil War and he continues to do that in this movie but at the risk of having the internet beat me up and steal my lunch money, as good as Boseman is, he's probably one of the least interesting (major) character in Black Panther.

And a lot of that is because of the women of Black Panther... Danai Gurira as Okoye, Letitia Wright as Shuri, Lupita Nyong'o as Nakia... hell, even Angela Bassett as Ramonda... these are strong, capable women with personalities and dimension. For me though, it's all about Gurira, she manages to make the warrior general of the king's guard interesting, funny, graceful, strong and magnetic. And watching her and some of the other Dora Milaje when they're being bodyguards... they never stop looking around, scanning everything and everyone. It was a tiny detail but they got it so spot on and it added so much.

Michael B. Jordan plays, I think it's safe to say, the most interesting Marvel movie villain yet. And the one who looks absolutely amazing with his shirt off too. But the character has actual reasons for what he's doing and while what he wants to do is bad, he's doing it for the right reasons.

That's one of the things that struck me about this story to be honest... there are many conflicting viewpoints and some people clearly want to do or are doing "the wrong thing", but almost everyone is coming at it from the exact same place or as I said before, for either right or understandable reasons... which is fairly unique is superhero movies in general and Marvel movies specifically.

And speaking of beautiful men... Winston Duke sprawled on his throne in his mountain lair is a beautiful man. But again, M'Baku is the kind of character you don't expect to be who he turns out to be. Which just proves how much Coogler understands character and story.

I also think the fact that Coogler brought people he's worked with before over to work on this movie, including cinematographer Rachel Morrison, production designer Hannah Beachler and composer Ludwig Göransson... which was obviously a very good choice. Especially the former two, because this movie looks amazing.

From the aforementioned mountain lair throne room to all of the costumes, weapons, buildings, all of the graphic design, basically everything visual. It's all so, so good.

If I had any quibbles, it would be the very, very, very minor one that I kind of prefer the Black Panther costume from Civil War, mostly because of how much I was in love with the first helmet. But they've changed the Captain America suit, what, like five times now? I'll survive.

Given how much money this took on it's opening weekend, I'm not sure I need to suggest to anyone that they should go and see this movie... but just in case... go and see this movie.

yani's rating: 5 vibranium gadgets out of 5

movies: thor - ragnarok

Thor, God of Thunder is back... and he's bringing with him Ragnarok... the end of things. And damn, but Thor: Ragnarok is one hell of a ride.

We're not stuck on Earth, or Asgard... and there are no dark brooding elves... no... this movie is bright and bold and brash and bubblegum and pulling it's inspirations from the 70's and 80's. And doing a damn good job.

Director Taika Waititi has managed to create the ultimate Marvel movie... it's fun, light, full of action and doesn't take itself too seriously. I feel like part of why it works (if something I read online is to be believed) is that Waititi had the actors improvise about 80% of the dialogue... and it shows, in the best possible way.

Everything seems real and the humour often doesn't feel like it's something that's been workshopped and refined, but genuine moments. And yes, it lacks the heartfelt moment that some of the other Marvel movies have had (I'm thinking mostly of either of the Guardians of the Galaxy movies, since they've mixed pathos and humour the best of all the Marvel movies), but that's not what this movie is... it's a big, bold, fantasy action movie, and it does that exceptionally well.

Returning, naturally, is Chris Hemsworth as the titular thunder god, and even the new haircut (which appears towards the start of the second act I think) makes sense here... this is Thor stripped back to basics and as much of the theme of this movie seems to be, shedding the old in place of the new. Also, Hemsworth looks the best he's ever looked at Thor in this movie... I mean, there's only one shirtless scene, but the man looks impossible... amazing, but clearly impossible for mere mortals to achieve.

Joining him once again is Tom Hiddleston as the trickster Loki... and this is possibly Hiddleston's best turn as Loki. Again, I think it's because the humour is dialled way up, and the best Loki moments are actually those fun, playing, teasing moments.

Also visiting from the wider Marvel universe is Mark Ruffalo as The Hulk... and honestly, mostly Hulk and not Banner. It's fun actually getting to know the big green guy this time around, yes, he's a giant toddler having a temper tantrum, but he's fun (again, I just keep coming back to that word). And the CGI on Hulk are just amazing. Yes, you've kind of, sort of been able to see Ruffalo in there in the two Avenger movies, but this time, he's so clearly 100% there under the green, it's kind of spectacular.

There's no Natalie Portman and Co this time around... apparently she dumped Thor (I'd say spoilers, but they throw it out within about the first 20 minutes), and I'm actually okay with all of that. Like I mentioned before, this movie is about shedding the old and reinventing what comes next.

Taking the villain's chair this time around is Cate Blanchett as Hela (in this incarnation of the mythology, spoilers, Odin's first born... but still the goddess of death)... and Blanchett is just having THE BEST TIME with this. I will reiterate my usual complaint that the Marvel villains often feel somewhat toothless, and Hela suffers from that as well (although given the body count in this movie, she shouldn't... but still manages to), but I don't quite know how you balance an unsettling or creepy villain with the light tone of these movies.

My favourite moment is when Hela is talking to her lackey, Scourge (played incredibly well by Karl Urban) in the throne room of Asgard... everything about her body language and tone and their back and forth dialogue is what makes this an engaging movie. The interaction itself isn't something we've never seen before, but the way the two of them do it makes it worth watching.

Returning from the previous Thor movies is Idris Elba as Heimdall, who, out of everyone is the only one really making the movie that was presented on the page. Which isn't to say he's bad, because he's not... but he's making a much more serious movie, which completely works for the character and his scenes, and never threw me out of the moment while watching, but he's the stakes. He represents what really going on and what Thor ultimately needs to get back to and focus on.

The other new face is Tessa Thompson who seems to have made a career out of playing strong willed, but sometimes not totally likeable, women (I'm looking at you both Veronica Mars and Westworld as the two characters I'm most familiar with). And she does that here as Valkyrie to some degree, but I quite like her character here. And she's no so much unlikable as she is complicated, which is fun to unpack.

Also deserving of a mention is Rachel House who did the voice of the grandmother in Moana as the second in command to Jeff Goldblum's character (yes, Goldblum is also in this, having the time of his life, just doing whatever the hell he wants really)... but back to House... her character, Topaz, is just so dry and funny and bitchy... not to mention looking like she's ready to kick all the butt and take all the names. I loved every scene she was in, I'm not going to lie.

As I think I've mentioned multiple times now, this movie is bright and colourful... I think this even our sparkles either of the Guardians movies to be honest, and it was nice to see an alien/future city where the buildings aren't either a) all the same colour or b) all grey/white/silver/gold/blue.

And for the most part, the effects are amazing. Possibly the only bit that didn't quite look "right" was the giant wolf, Fenrir... I mean it looked pretty damn good... it just didn't look 100% believable... and this is in a movie with a guy made out of rocks, and spaceships. It's a minor nitpick to be honest, but it's still there.

The music is also amazing... with the most brilliant uses of Led Zeppelin's The Immigrant Song (you know, the AH-AH-AHHHHHHHH-AH.... AH-AH-AHHHHHHHH-AH song), and something called In the Face of Evil by Magic Sword... which made me think very strongly of the Stranger Things title song during the movie, there's a synth thing going on certainly which carries over to the score itself (so maybe it was part of that instead).

At the moment I'm going to go out on a limb and say that this is my favourite Marvel movie to date.

And as a final note, and a slightly spoilery one at that... pay particular attention during the "play" being performed when Thor returns to Asgard for the first time... the actors playing Loki, Odin and Thor are Matt Damon, Sam Neill and Luke Hemsworth respectively.

yani's rating: 5 undead warriors out of 5

movies: guardians of the galaxy vol 2

On the surface, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 should not work. I mean, c'mon... the first one shouldn't have worked either.

On paper, the concept of a dude stuck in the 80's, a green warrior chick, a massive guy who is just literal, a bioengineered trash panda and a talking, walking tree just should be a bridge too far.

But goddamn, this movie works and may even exceed the previous one. My hat goes off to writer/director James Gunn for once again putting together an incredibly watchable movie.

This movie had me essentially from the very first moment... or at least from the opening credit sequence. It was both a riff on the first movie as well as being so entertaining (and giving the people what they want... more Baby Groot!)... and the choice to focus on Groot and not the big action scene in the background just sets you up for the style of the rest of the movie. It's clear that once again, this movie will feature a strong soundtrack as well as not take itself too seriously.

And unlike last time, because this movie didn't need to tie itself in any obvious way to the wider Marvel Cinematic Universe, it let the antagonists feel more... fully formed. Don't get me wrong, like the majority of the MCU movies, the antagonists are always the place where the movies tends to fall on it's face. And this is much the case here as well.

The Sovereign are visually stunning, with their gold on gold on gold aesthetic and overwhelming desire for vengeance, however they seem a little toothless at the end of the day. The other antagonist should really be a spoiler, however if you've ever seen a movie or an episode of a TV show in your life, you KNOW as soon as he arrives that he's a rotten apple that is going to be revealed before the end of the movie, and will be the thing that the heroes need to stop.

Which is exactly what happens.

Not that it's not an interesting journey, and the movie never really tries terribly hard to convince the audience that he's actually a good guy, so you just spend the movie wondering when the shoe will drop.

Once again the cast does some great work, although with more character to service this time around and with more of the storyline really revolving around Chris Pratt's character, it does feel at times as though the other characters are given either rudimentary plot elements or slightly overlooked.

The worst of these is Gamora, Zoe Saldana's character, who does some great work with Karen Gillan, but it's mostly confined to one sequence in the latter half of the movie. For the record, I'm on record of not being a fan of Gillan, however I will say that her slightly short character arc here is actually quite moving, and actually had me on her side over Gamora's (possibly because Nebula gets all the development in that storyline and Gamora gets a single scene at the end).

I was slightly annoyed with Bradley Cooper's Rocket Racoon this time around... it makes sense at the end of the movie, but he's pretty much a dick throughout the whole movie, so it's kind of hard to really be in his corner until the very end during his scene with Michael Rooker (who actually gets some interesting character moments this time around). Vin Diesel still gets props for saying three words with different inflections and yet still somehow having his name at the top of the movie poster. It's nice work if you can get it. Baby Groot is too damn adorable throughout the whole movie, but I really think his animation team deserves all the credit for that.

Pom Klementieff does a fantastic bit of acting as empathic Mantis, she manages to pull off a wide eyed and innocent persona, and has some lovely moments with Dave Bautista... although his character feels like it was rewritten to be more for laughs than it was in the previous movie, where the humour came from him saying something blunt and that being shows as funny by one of the other characters, here it feels like they've gone a little too far the other way, making him a little too self aware somehow.

Props also have to go to Kurt Russell for managing to be both believable as a father, a living planet and a man with a plan and an agenda, all without seeming to do a massive amount of shifting between the three emotionally. There really isn't a huge tonal shift in his performance, which I think makes more sense... he's just himself (as in the character) and what other people know about him at any point shouldn't really change that. It was also nice to have that (spoiler alert) shift in his character at the end of the movie avoid all the scenery chewing and moustache twirling that sometimes comes from that situation.

I also really enjoyed Elizabeth Debicki (last seen in that kind of scenery chewing role in The Man from UNCLE) as the High Priestess of The Sovereign... Debicki does "haughty" exceptionally well, and that was brought to bear again here.

I was genuinely moved by the story a couple of times, but mostly it was a fun movie with more than a few laugh out loud moments.

yani's rating: 4 Anulax batteries out of 5

movies: doctor strange

Doctor Strange is the latest outing from Marvel Studios, and while it was a character that I had heard of, he's also one I know next to nothing about beyond a few references on one of the podcasts I listen to.

What it turned out to be is a very visually spectacular movie and a somewhat interesting character.

Let's get my only major nitpick out of the way first though. While I love what Marvel does with their movies, they have yet to create a half decent villain that isn't Loki. The problem as always is that you either need to have the villain escape at the end, or die in such a way that he could return, or use a villain who is good enough to move the plot along but who doesn't need to be there by the end of the movie (or he's some giant galactic heavy who's pulling everyone's strings, but that's another story).

And in this case, Kaecilius played by Mads Mikkelsen, it's the third one. He's also basically a cult leader/religion zealot whose motivations are maybe a little muddy.

There is also the major drama that happened before the movie had even finished filming, where characters who where ethnic minorities in the original stories had been turned into white characters, or, more accurately, whitewashing. And I can see the problem, I understand why it's a problem, it would be much better if it didn't happen to the degree that it does... but I'll be honest, it didn't really bother my enjoyment of it all that much. The movie also doesn't even pass the Bechdel–Wallace test for goodness sake, not really surprising given that there are only two major female characters, and they never meet.

Getting back to the good stuff though. As I said, I was pleasantly surprised by this movie, especially from the amount and quality of special effects on show. It's funny, something like Iron Man or Captain America probably has as many effects shots, but they're not trying to break reality, so they don't call attention to themselves, whereas here they've just thrown the who CGI toybox on the floor and gone to town with it. Think Inception, but ramped up to about 100.

And watching all those effects happen was gorgeous... and I will definitely want to watch that again at some point just to pick up everything I inevitably missed.

Doctor Strange is played by Benedict Cumberbund, who I'll admit I'm not a huge fan of and who definitely suffers from a bad case of "they-want-to-put-him-in-everything-itis" which means he's a little overexposed. But having said that he does a fairly good job with Strange, which is interesting because the character makes it really, really, really easy to dislike him for the first part of the movie, and it's a flaw that could be hard to recover from... and I'm still not completely sure how he managed it to be honest.

I was also impressed by Rachel McAdams who performs some of the weightier emotional moments at the beginning of the movie as Dr Palmer, Strange's ex-girlfriend.

And when you need an ancient, unnamed sorcerer supreme, who else would you go to other than Tilda Swinton (her role of The Ancient One is the one that had accusations of whitewashing, which is a shame, because she's great in the role, and a kick-ass female character to boot.

Like all origin stories, the plot has to find those familiar beats of character's life being changed, character finds their new path, character passes through their on personal trials, character meets adversary, character learns something, character conquers the aforementioned adversary, roll credits. There's no major diversions from that here, and they do make it perhaps a little more on the serious side than some of the other Marvel movies, but it does use levity very well (as Marvel movies always do).

But at it's core, this is more of a visual experience than anything else, and on that front it succeeds beautifully. All in all though, it surprised me a little bit... while there is a certain standard I've come to expect from Marvel movies, this one was better than I was expecting.

yani's rating: 3 sling rings out of 5

movies: captain america - civil war

Before I dive into my review of Captain America: Civil War I need to disclose something first... when it comes to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (or MCU), I am totally and completely #TeamCap.

Everything that they've done with the character since his first movie has brought us to a point where the character is pretty much everything I want from a superhero (and superhero movie to be honest). He's "good" (as opposed to conflicted or tortured or mysterious) without being bland. He has heart and a sense of duty, both of which are a core part of this movie, yet he can still have a sense of lightness to him when needed (not so much this time around maybe).

And yes, I fully remember saying that he was the least interesting part of the first Avengers movie, and to a lesser extent the second one because he was the character with the least going on... but I have to say that whenever the movie has his name in it, damn, the character gets much more interesting.

Part of that is squarely Chris Evans, he just managed to give the man out of time a gravitas and a heart, even when he's not saying anything at all. The other part is definitely the writers, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely who just seem to get this character and write him in a way that appeals to me.

I'm also not really sure how you could get to the end of this movie and not be on the side of Captain America... I mean, yes, he was always going to be the hero of his own movie, but he's just right (at least 80-90% anyway).

Generally I don't mind Robert Downey Jr's portrayal of Iron Man in his own movies... but in any of the ensemble movies he just always seems to come off as a petulant, whiny child who can't deal with his own feelings. It's the same in this movie... without spoiling anything, he's made to feel bad about his actions in one of the earlier movies, and instead of saying "yes, your son died, and I'm very sorry, but we also stopped a crazed AI (which I also happened to build, soz) from attempting to wipe out all life on earth", he seems to decide that since he clearly needs to be held accountable for his long string of unwise, childish and petulant decisions, then so do the rest of the Avengers.

Captain America, naturally, feels differently, and hence Civil War ensues.

The movie also makes sense to be from the perspective of a movie within that cinematic universe. The one thing I end up thinking in any of the stand alone movies is "hey, why don't you just call up your super powered friends and ask them for help"... but they don't, because budget and stuff, but it doesn't make a lot of sense narratively. Granted this movie is a little bit like "Avengers 2.5" given that pretty much everybody except for Thor and Hulk make an appearance, but having them there just makes sense. Captain America exists in this world with all of these other characters (and they keep on introducing new ones, which I'll get to in a minute), and while it was great last time to have Falcon and Black Widow around, you do start to feel the spaces where it would make sense for other characters to be when they're not there.

Speaking of the new guys... both Black Panther and Spider-Man make an appearance here, mostly so that they can introduce them before spinning them off (no Spider-pun intended) into their own movies. And I'm not going to lie, I'm more than a little bit in love with Chadwick Boseman as T'Challa aka Black Panther. Not just because he's gorgeous, but also because he's really interesting in the role (there's an especially sweet exchange between him and his father early in the movie), and I can't wait to see what he does with his own movie in 2018.

As the youngest Spider-Man we've seen so far, I'm not completely sure about Tom Holland yet. He could be really good when he gets his own movie in 2017, but I feel like it will depend on the writers quite a lot. In this instance he comes off a little too much as quippy comic relief, and they either played up the really, really young thing or made him a little bit annoying at times. Holland does feel the right amount of adorkable for the role though, but given that the first Andrew Garfield reboot was my favourite movie from 2012, he has some bit spider-shoes to fill.

Given the sheer number of characters in these movies now, it's hard to mention everyone, but I have to call out Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff aka Black Widow... firstly I love the chemistry that she has with Evans... it's not romantic or sexual, it's camaraderie, they are friends and genuinely care about each other. But also because there's just something about Johansson as Romanoff that works within this series... it may be cause she's the one who always seems to be pointing out to the other characters when they're getting in their own way, she's their Jiminy Cricket if you will... I don't know exactly, I just know that I love what she does in the role and what the writers give her to do and say.

In fact, all the women, although there are only three characters with any degree of screen time... Johansson, Elizabeth Olsen as Wanda Maximoff aka Scarlet Witch and Emily VanCamp as Sharon Carter aka Agent 13 are all great in their respective roles (which is more than I can say for some of the guys).

The action sequences are fairly strong and because these are all mostly established characters you don't need to spend any time setting up what they can do, you can just jump straight in there (although there is one really, really clunky line that's given to Scarlet Witch where she literally says "you guys remember I can move stuff with my mind, right"... and it's a line they really should have cut in favour of just showing it.

But the sequence that works the best, and really the one that everyone paid their money to see is the one where the two groups take each other on. And it's slightly unique within the movie universe where a group of uniquely superpowered individuals take on another group of similarly but differently powered individuals and really let their powers out to play. That kind of thing is fairly common on the comics, where the good guys take on supervillain groups regularly, but we've only seen it in a smaller sense in the movies to this point.

And it works pretty damn well I have to say.

It's the final showdown that's the most impactful though... I won't spoil anything about it, but it's like nothing I've seen in a Marvel movie yet, and I can't help but feel that it's going to ripple through the MCU for a number of future movies.

And while it's got some strong competition, I feel like this is the best of the Marvel movies so far.

yani's rating: 5 Sokovian Accords out of 5

movies: avengers: age of ultron

Goddamnit, that Joss Whedon definitely knows how to put together a superiour superhero movie.

As I believe I said roughly three years ago, almost to the day... MR JOSS MUTHAFUCKIN WHEDON!

I thought that the first movie was the definitive Avengers movie... well, Avengers: Age of Ultron kicks the first movie's butt, takes it's lunch money and sends it home with a bloody nose.

This movie had me... from start to finish and all points in between, this movie just had me. And as always with Mr Whedon it was all the characters (and I do mean ALL the characters, just about everybody shows up in this thing at some point... or is at least name checked... and that's on top of introducing five new characters including the main villain) and their relationships. And if there is one thing that Joss Whedon does exceptionally well is write for a disparate group of characters and given them all a voice and find a way to bring them together believably.

Everybody gets their little beat... and sometimes more than that. Thor actually gets to be humorous this time around... Tony Stark is pretty much always Tony Stark, and it seems like his role in the Avengers movies is to be the self involved kid that nobody else wants to play with... there's a whole new world of Hawkeye... Black Widow and Hulk get to enjoy new and interesting territories... and even Captain America actually has stuff to do this time around, even if that stuff is mostly being in charge (it always feels like he's the least interesting guy in the room, although it does feel more like he's found his groove this time).

Personally all my favourite stuff is the emerging relationship between Scarlett Johansson's Romanoff and Mark Ruffalo's Banner/Hulk. And Johansson gets to take Natasha in all these new directions and open her past up a little. But I still hold to the idea that I don't want a Black Widow solo movie... not because I don't think Johansson would be great, and with the right writer and director it wouldn't be interesting, but I still like being able to just see tiny slivers of her past rather than laying it all out. And given what we've seen so far, I also think it would be hard to make without making it really, really dark and borderline depressing.

Having said that, I'd love to be proven wrong.

Oh, and as always, it's nice to see Chris Hemsworth perform his contractually obligated shirtless and wet Thor scene... not quite as lingering as the shots in the Thor movies, but still very pleasant. Also bless the makers of Under Armour for putting many of the cast in very, very tight fitting, body hugging shirts... particularly Chris Evans with those arms...

But getting back to the actual movie.

While the plot feels more grounded than the last (which is weird to say when you're talking about hordes of robots), or at the very least the threat is internal, rather than external, the movie definitely ramps up the spectacle... instead of just New York getting flattened, this time three different cities get the Battling Avengers treatment. The most spectacular of these, unsurprisingly, is the final battle, which is pretty damn amazing. In a lot of ways it's the best parts of the first movie's final battle sequences, where they all work together, but ratcheted all the way up.

And I think this is maybe the first of the Marvel movies where I wouldn't have minded seeing even more of the villain... there's just something about James Spader's voice performance that's kind of compelling... plus Ultron is clearly bat-crap crazy in a very human way, which is intriguing in a machine.

There also wasn't a single moment where I felt the movie's 141 minute run time... yes, thinking back on it after the fact, they probably could have trimmed down a couple of the earlier fight scenes, but like I said at the head of this post, the movie had me all the way through, so I never even noticed the time.

yani's rating: 5 vibranium androids out of 5

movies: guardians of the galaxy

Like the majority of people, I knew next to nothing about the Guardians of the Galaxy beyond the character's names and the fact that it was a third string comic book.

But the Marvel Cinematic Universe has worked it's magic yet again and it turned out to be a hell of a good movie.

The cast is exceptionally good... current Winner of the Internet, Chris Pratt, is fantastic as Quill, he's charming enough, goofy enough and more than sexy enough to carry off the character without making it cringe-worthy.

And the fact that the character was taken from Earth in the late 80's allows for not only the best soundtrack to any of the Marvel movies thus far (although the music is all 70's rather than 80's), but also gave the writers the change to weave in any number of great 80's references.

Zoe Saldana and wrestler, Dave Bautista are equally brilliant (especially Bautista, how has better comic timing that I would have expected)... but to be honest more than a few scenes are completely stolen by two characters who aren't even there.

Groot, a walking, talking tree voiced by Vin Diesel, and Rocket, a genetically modified raccoon voiced by Bradley Cooper don't feel like computer generated creations, especially Groot... I had to keep reminding myself at certain points that he wasn't a dude in a creature suit but actually CGI. There were a couple of moments in the Uncanny Valley with Rocket, but he's a raccoon, so that's pretty damn understandable.

But Groot quickly became my favourite character, and I did get a little misty eyed at a certain point due to his character... as well as having the best moment of the movie right at the end.

And because the story all happens on other worlds or just in space generally, they had great license to create a world full of candy colours and bigger than life people and places.

I will say that the fact that the villain was tied back into the larger Thanos storyline begun in (the end credits of) The Avengers makes Lee Pace's portrayal of Ronan feel a little "Villain of the Week"... and while I'm am incredibly biased, I can't help but think that Karen Gillan proved once again that she's not that great an actress given that she's a bit shouty and more over the top than absolutely called for as Nebula. I'm fully willing to accept it's more about the fact that I just can't stand her.

Also incredibly high on the "What the ever-living fuck" scale was the post credit sequence... I won't spoil it specifically, however I can imagine that a large number of people may not even get it because it took me a moment to realise... but it also doesn't tease a little bit of the next movie. It's just fucking weird.

Although thinking about it now I can only think that it was another, rather blatent, 80's reference.

Even taking that into account, it's a great movie overall, and a more than fitting member of the Marvel stable.

yani's rating: 4 Infinity Gems out of 5

movies: captain america: the winter soldier

I swear that Marvel just goes from strength to strength with their movies... and Captain America: The Winter Soldier is one of the strongest entries in the catalogue.

I think a couple of the reasons (which I only found out afterwards) is that the directors Anthony Russo and Joe Russo insisted on live action over visual effects wherever possible and the fact that producer Kevin Feige described the film as "a 1970s political thriller masquerading as a big superhero movie".

Which absolutely shows within the movie. It's less about superpowers and gadgets and more about what happens when Steve Rogers' world is turned upside down yet again.

Thanks to the internet I knew about the Hydra related twist in the tale (which I won't repeat here... but thanks internet, this is why we can't have nice things) and about the identity of the titular Winter Soldier (which is one of those things I just knew without really knowing how I knew it)... but even so it didn't spoil my enjoyment of the story.

The story is definitely where the movie is strongest... not that it doesn't have it's issues here and there... I still can't get past the fact in any of the "post Avengers" movies, that the characters don't cross over more. I mean, I find it hard to believe that they wouldn't have called in all possible favours/help for the big battle at the end. But I also understand that that's not going to happen for reasons that have nothing to do with the in-movie universe.

Unsurprisingly, the cast is excellent... I mean a number of them should be since they've been playing the same characters for a number of movies now. Chris Evans is brilliant as always as the World's Biggest Boyscout, and manages to show the fact that while Captain America has adjusted to the modern world, he's still adjusting to how much people have changed, and knowing who he can trust.

I'm pretty sure this is also Scarlett Johansson's best portrayal of Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow so far. Part of me would love her to get her own movie, since I think both the character and Johansson deserve it, but at the same time this version of Romanoff is a really mysterious character (I'm not sure if she's the same in the comic books) and it would be kind of a shame to ruin that with a lot of backstory. Plus Johansson gets most of the dryly comedic lines, usually at Rogers expense, which she delivers perfectly.

Newcomer to the Marvel Universe, Anthony Mackie as Sam Wilson/Falcon is my new favourite character... and not just because, you know, wings. There's just something about Mackie's performance, which I can't quite put my finger on yet... but he makes Wilson seem like he has a lot more going on than I think the character really does on paper.

To be honest I wasn't completely sure that Sebastian Stan was the same actor who played Bucky Barnes in the first Captain America movie since he looked so different. Although weirdly in the earlier part of the movie the Winter Solider has weird black makeup around his eyes, which then completely vanishes later on. I did like the fact that they didn't take the usual route of having the character do a total 180 within the space of a single movie. But since Stan is signed on for nine movies, so this isn't the last we've seen of Bucky.

It was also nice to see Samuel L. Jackson given a chance to do more than just deliver exposition in one of these movies.

It'll be interesting to see how the events of this movie affect the future of the Marvel movies, especially the Avengers sequel.

yani's rating: 4 Helicarriers out of 5

movies: thor: the dark world

The first Thor movie look a lot of it's cues from Shakespearean dramas, unsurprising given it was directed by a Shakespearean actor/director.

Thor: The Dark World, on the other hand is much more of a "space battle pew pew" movie. To be honest that did kind of bug me a little... the movie seemed to trade in a lot of the ancient Viking nature, not so much of the Asgardians, but their enemies and just turn them into random space baddies with big laser guns.

It required a little shuffling around of things in my brain, let me put it that way.

But for all that this movie has a very, very different tone than the first one, they both work equally well in their own way. And the sequel doesn't skimp on  entertainment value. They even manage to work in a little character development between action sequences.

Chris Hemsworth returns as the titular thunder god (although the Asgardians seem to have been demoted from actual gods to "people who just live and really, really, really long time and can do a lot of really cool things"... I'm not sure what that's about though) with Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Anthony Hopkins and a large number of the supporting cast returning to their roles... and they're joined this time around by Christopher Eccleston, essentially unrecognisable under a faceful of prosthetics, as the major villain.

And Asgard has been given a major facelift since the first movie... everything isn't quite so golden this time around, and the sky actually has some colour in it... and all in all, it looks very pretty... plus we get to see more of the city this time around.

There are also a lot of really pretty details, from the Norse knotwork designs that make up the forcefields in the Asgardian dungeons, all the way up to the way that both Thor's red hero cape as well as his dark "just bumming around the palace" poncho hang... so big kudos to both Wendy Partridge as the costume designer and whoever actually sewed those things so they hang just so. I do then need to turn around and slap whoever decided that Natalie Portman should wear her boring, shapeless Earth jacket over the top of the amazing Asgardian costume she gets to wear.

Speaking of Portman, even though a lot of the movie hinges on her and she's on screen a lot of the time she still somehow manages to feel a little underutilised... which is kind of stupid and possibly only exists inside my head. Although during a couple of sequences she does seem to take a backseat not just to Hemsworth (which is understandable, since he's playing the title role) but characters up to and including her comic relief sidekick played by Kat Dennings.

This time around, after the first movie, and The Avengers, Hiddleston's Loki really works for me. I wasn't a huge fan of the character before now, but there's one particular scene when Thor comes to see him in the dungeon that is kinda heartbreaking and the two do have a number of nice moments during the movie.

Also getting a better bite of the cherry this time around is Rene Russo as Frigga (Thor's mother) who gets a couple of really nice scenes, including a fairly impressive, if brief, fight scene.

It also has to be mentions that Hemsworth only takes his shirt off once yet again... although this time he is shirtless and wet, so an added bonus this time around.

And, of course, because this is a Marvel movie, you have to say right until the very end of the credits for an extra scene... there's one after the first part of the credits that seemingly sets up the plot, if the internet can be believed, to next year's Guardians of the Galaxy movie, but the one right at the end is mostly just cute.

yani's rating: 3 dark elves out of 5

movies: iron man 3

Without a doubt, Iron Man 3 is the best of the Iron Man trilogy.

The first movie was the introduction to the character, the second was a bit of a disaster but essentially sets up a lot of the groundwork for The Avengers, so in a lot of ways, this is really the first true Iron Man movie unencumbered by needing to do anything other that tell a really interesting story.

Actually, I'm not even sure this is an Iron Man movie per say... if anything this is a Tony Stark movie.

The majority of the movie concentrates on Stark's own demons (in a way that the second movie tried to do but failed miserably), his flawed humanity without being an obnoxious brat and to a degree explores his relationship with the Iron Man suit... or the idea of Iron Man through the multiple suits that feature in the movie.

Without going into too much detail, it's Tony stripped bare, in fact while there are some great sequences involving the suits, especially the end battle sequence, he spends more time out of the suits than he does in them by far.

And I think partly because of that it very often feels like Stark is in genuine danger... it doesn't feel like "oh look, Bruce Wayne's back is broken, give him an inspirational montage and it'll be all better for the third reel".... this actually feels like the character is in danger from everything that's happening around him. Which I have to say is not something that you really get from superhero movies very much. It's all easily surmountable obstacles, but this doesn't feel like that at all.

Robert Downey Jr does a fantastic job once again as Stark... and as cliché as it sounds, it really does feel like this is the role his life lead him to... he's been at the top of his game, been brought all the way down to the bottom of the barrel and pulled himself up again by his proverbial bootstraps, and it feels very much like that's what Stark goes through to some degree in this movie.

It's also nice to finally see Gwyneth Paltrow get in on the action in her role as Pepper Potts, although overall it feels like she has less to her role this time around.

But Ben Kingsley essentially steals a chunk of the latter part of the movie in a way that I did not see coming. Some of his early scenes as The Mandarin feel maybe a little bit Villain Of The Week... but he really gets a chance to shine towards the end of the movie.

I still feel like Don Cheadle isn't the right choice for Rhodes/War Machine/Iron Patriot compared with Terrence Howard, although there's no denying that there's chemistry between Cheadle and Downey.

And speaking of chemistry, although the superhero befriending by young boy thing has been done any number of times, the dynamic between Downey and young Ty Simpkins is actually pretty great. And doubly so because I think they've written his character of Harley as a little bit of a Tony Stark Jr, so there's some great moments where they spark off each other.

As far as the look of the movie is concerned, it's pretty much flawless... sure, I would have loved to be able to see all the various Iron Man suits much more clearly at the end of the movie but because they're whizzing around all over the screen it's hard to tell sometimes what's an Iron Man suit and what's a henchman.

I assume that most of the time the Iron Man suits are CGI, even when the actors are just walking around in them, although there might be some practical suits... but it's impossible to tell the difference beyond the whole flying suit thing.

Like all of the Marvel movies so far, there's a post credit sequence, which pretty much all of the audience stuck around for. But, I have to be honest, I don't know that it's worth it. It is amusing, but it's not like the pre-Avengers sequences where they all revealed a little teaser about the next movie in the sequence... this is just amusing for the sake of being amusing.

yani's rating: 4 suit pieces out of 5

movies: the avengers

First off... Joss Muthafuckin Whedon!

At the nexus point in the Venn diagram of "character", "comedy" and "action" is the name Joss Whedon! And he brings all three out in equal measure in The Avengers.

He also manages to take characters from three different movies and make them all fit into the same one seamlessly. Yes, a chunk of that is down to the actors, but the writing certainly helps.

And what a group of actors... I really don't think there's a wrong foot anywhere...

Robert Downey Jr, Chris Evans and Chris Hemsworth all bring back their larger than life characters. Technically Evans' Captain America is the least fleshed out of the three... Downey's Iron Man has two movies worth of character under his belt and gets 95% of all the really great lines... Hemsworth's Thor has all the backstory with the villain (although I did spend a good portion of the movie wanting to wash and brush his blonde locks since they just looked all stringy and not especially godlike)... but Evans' character feels less important somehow... he still has some good moments, but he just feels the least developed.

Mark Ruffalo's Hulk is really the best interpretation I've seen of the character... not only is the Hulk CGI the best yet... actually keeping/using Ruffalo's face/performance... but Ruffalo's performance as Banner is actually something interesting as opposed to just filling in time until the green dude turns up.

And the more normal members of the Avengers, Jeremy Renner's Hawkeye and Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow both get their particular moments in the sun.

If fact, all the characters have their own moments... particularly during both the major action piece about halfway through the movie, but also in the latter part of the movie which is essentially one giant action piece. And there's some nice moments of different characters being matched up with characters they really haven't had much time with previously, which works well... makes them feel much more team like.

Plus, Samuel L. Jackson being all Samuel L. Jacksoney.

The only possible weak link amongst the smaller roles was Cobie Smulders... not because she was bad, far from it... I just had trouble getting away from her "How I Met Your Mother" character... and I don't even watch the show.

I'm also not 100% sold on Tom Hiddleston's Loki as the major villain... again, not that he was bad... he still brings the magnetism he brought to his role in Thor, and I know that Loki is instrumental in bringing together the Avengers in the comic books... but he just didn't quite seem like he was enough of a physical villain to actually require the team to unite... he feels like more of a sneaky cerebral villain.

I'm not completely sure that the 3D is a required thing though... it wasn't bad 3D by any stretch of the imagination, in fact the whole movie looks fantastic, but I'm just not sure how much it really added apart from maybe one or two sequences in the final battle.

It's a long movie at 142 minutes, but once it ramps up it never feels that long... although I did feel like it took the movie a little while to find it's feet... it really wasn't until all the characters are together in one place and things start to go crazy that I really started to enjoy myself, and I think I was sitting there with a grin on my face for the remainder of the movie.

And as I mentioned at the beginning, there are a few moments of seriously laugh out loud comedy... and most of them, oddly enough, come from The Hulk once he appears. Although there are other great lines from most of the other characters at one point or another.

It's definitely the best of all of the recent Marvel universe movies, and amongst the best movies in the superhero genre.

yani's rating: 4 armoured space fish out of 5

movies: thor

It wasn't my original intention to see Thor in 3D, but it turned out that the 2D version was only playing very late or very early, so we didn't really have a choice.

Thankfully it didn't turn out to be a bad idea.

Overall Thor isn't a bad movie... it does fall very much into the "setting up the character" mould that superhero movies always seem to do on their first outing, and usually the character spends the majority of the movie not being the person from the poster/the comic book character.

And I know they have to set up what the rules are for the character, but sometimes I just wish they would say "too hell with it" and just dive straight into the fully former character.

The story really isn't anything we haven't seen before in different forms... main character is sent on a quest and learns whatever lesson needs to be learned just in time for the climax of the movie.

But, as they say, there really are only about four stories in the world and everything else is a variation of one of them. It's a journey we've been on many times but it didn't ever feel stale.

The cast was pretty good... I mean you really can't go wrong with getting Anthony Hopkins to do the opening narration for a movie, and getting him to star as a god is usually going to end well.

Chris Hemsworth is suitably blonde and buff to play the titular (no pun intended) role, and doesn't do too bad in the acting stakes, Natalie Portman is great as always and there are a number of supporting roles that are filled with actors I didn't necessarily recognise, but who put in quite strong performances.

But my favourite actor of the piece has to be Tom Hiddleston as Loki... because even with Chris running around momentarily shirtless and bulging incredibly spectacularly, I found Loki a lot more appealing... well, other than the fact that he was the villain. He had a certain magnetism though.

The movie looks beautiful, especially the Asgard sequences (which is only to be expected), and the 3D never felt laboured or obvious... in fact there were a couple of points where I had to check that everything was actually appearing in 3D because the effect was actually quite subtle and realistic.

I did notice a couple of times where there seemed to be too much distanced between one object and another (or specifically a character and a table), but I'm not sure if that's me or the cinema or just an optical illusion.

There were also a couple of nice moments tying this movie into all the other Marvel Universe movies which I enjoyed.

Overall while it wasn't a complete and total knockout, I think Kenneth Branagh handled the material quite well and the 3D made it all look great.

yani's rating: 3 Mjöllnir out of 5

movies: iron man 2

This seems a little weird to say about "a comic book movie", but the first Iron Man movie actually had a lot of heart... it tore down it's main character, took this apathetic playboy, stripped him down to nothing and then essentially built him back up into a hero.

Iron Man 2 takes that hero, and turns him back into the spoiled, bratty playboy.

Sure, the movie gives you "reasons" for his behaviour, but taking him back to this place and not really wearing him down at all before building him back up isn't anywhere near as satisfying.

The movie does tick most of the boxes though... and to mix my metaphor slightly, it delivers what it says on the box. There's things that blow up, there's Iron Man, there's Scarlett Johansson in a skin tight black outfit (personally I don't see the appeal, partly because I think she's a bit of a crap actress), there's the other Iron Man (okay, technically I know it's War Machine), there's Mickey Rourke who fortunately isn't in a skin tight outfit and who does a reasonable Russian accent... but he's a bit m'eh...

There are a few things overall that are m'eh... the whole reason Rourke's character hates Tony Stark is incredibly glossed over... I mean it makes some degree of sense within the confines of the movie, but it's stretching the bounds of the movie's own internal logic a little bit.

However Rouke is just plain sketchy (how much of that is the character and how much is him is open for interpretation)... and honestly, the character never really has much menace.

I also wanted to knock the snot out of Sam Rockwell, who fills in the "clueless rival" portion of the script.

And while I don't have a problem with Don Cheadle's performance, I still don't think he's as appropriate for a military man as Terrence Howard was.

Rounding out my list of character gripes, it really did look like Samuel L. Jackson had wandered in from some other movie. Everything else seemed to be grounded in some kind of reality, but Sam's Nick Fury just stuck out like a sore thumb in just about every scene. I think possibly it was the wardrobe.

But like I said, it ticks all the boxes and delivers what it promises... things go boom, there are some moments of humour, there are a few tips of the hat to the proposed Avengers movie (even before the post credit teaser which did give me a vague ripple of excitement), there's a not particularly subtle Walt Disney reference, Gwyneth Paltrow and Scarlett look suitably sexy in skin tight business attire (if you like that kind of thing) and you have double the amount of Iron Mans... Iron Men... whatever...

Oh but the scene I keep seeing in the trailer, with Gwyneth kissing the Iron Man mask before throwing it out of a plane... it's not actually in the movie... (I'm guessing it should have come right at the beginning).

It's a passable way to spend a couple of hours, but it's nowhere near as good as the first one.

yani's rating: 2 Russian cockatoos out of 5

movies: the incredible hulk

Sometimes when the original movie was so bad (Hulk, I'm looking at you) you kind of wonder why they would bother remaking the movie. Of course I suppose it's better than remaking the good movies and ruining them...

Anyway... The Incredible Hulk is such a remake, and it is fortunately miles ahead of the original.

They have ret-conned pretty much all of the plot from the first movie, and honestly, you need to be paying complete attention during the opening titles, because all the "Last Time on The Incredible Hulk" info is contained in the quick editing in the title montage (even if you know the basic Hulk mythology).... including a couple of references that places Hulk squarely in the same universe as other recent Marvel movie Iron Man (and there is the much talked about cameo by Robert Downey Jr as Tony Stark)... but then Marvel is planning to make movies of both Captain America and then The Avengers (which is the superhero team consisting of Iron Man, Hulk and Captain America, amongst others), so I guess that makes sense.

I will admit that I've never been particularly fond of The Hulk... I mean there isn't really that much to him... he's all "dude gets angry, turns green, smashes things"... so, you know, not exactly riveting stuff. But Edward Norton does do a pretty good job as Bruce Banner, especially since he manages to get across the struggle of keeping calm and not wanting to let the internal beast escape.

And I will give them a huge amount of props, the CGI this time is about a billion times better than last time... Hulk stays a consistent size, and he's more human looking (despite the green musclebound thing obviously), doesn't leap impossible distances like some sort of steroid enhanced frog and the textures are pretty damn good. Yes, he still obviously looks CGI, but it's better CGI.

I'm a little ambivalent about Liv Tyler's performance... it occurred to me on the way home that she always seems to play the girlfriend/female sidekick... and from the handful of things I've seen her in it always seems to be the same performance... but whether that's because she's something of a wooden actress or because she keeps being offered the same kinds of parts, I'm not sure. I did find myself wondering how the role would have been if Michelle Monaghan had been cast instead. That's not to say that Liv didn't do an okay job, but it was a little bland.

There were also a couple of characters that seemed like they should actually have gone somewhere... and kinda did go places, but we weren't necessarily let in on the reference... the Mr Blue character for one... interesting things happen to him the last time we see him... but that's the last time we see him...

There wasn't actually a whole hell of a lot to the plot... not when it really got going. There was a lot of good stuff at the beginning, when Banner is hiding and running around Brazil... basically stuff that involves actual acting... but once that part stops there's a lot of the big green dude smashing things randomly.

Speaking of the Brazil sequences though... I know that the stuff was all filmed in real locations, but I've never seen a real location that looked so much like it should have been created as a model... it's just really hard to believe that it actually exists... there's a slow pan up a mountain side that's covered with what I assume are shanty/slum houses, but it looks AMAZING... it just keeps going and going and going and going and you think it's never going to end.

Getting back to the plot... nothing in it is overly surprising, you pretty much know where it's going to end up (not helped by the fact that they keep showing part of the final confrontation sequence in everything I've seen about the movie)... but the end of the movie is actually somewhat lackluster... there's the big fight scene, and then it just kind of stops... and you find yourself wondering "and then?". They do add a couple of little scenes at the end that sort of wraps things up, but it doesn't really explain what happened. I do wish they'd added the second one at the end of the credits so that it would match up with the similar scene in Iron Man... they could have made a whole thing about having those scenes after the credits, and then people wouldn't necessarily have seen them, and would have to see the movie again or get the DVD to see them... it would have been good.

On the up side, at least this one was a decent movie...

yani's rating: 2 Mr Greens out of 5

movies: iron man

I went into Iron Man pretty much expecting another fluffy superhero movie... but I was very pleasantly surprised... it seems to be so much more than that.

The opening sequence is pretty damn spectacular, and is definitely one of those scenes that just grabs you and throws you around a little before the movie settles in.

It's a really good mix of the marginally fluffy, the very serious and the "realistic" superhero stuff... it doesn't always dwell on the "how" (like "how does this chest mounted power thing actually work"), but instead concentrates on the "why" and the results, which I think was very much the right idea for this movie (and not just because the "how" is pretty much "because he has to make the suit, so we'll just let him make it and skim over some of the how").

There were also a sequence set in Afganistan with a father and his son that started to slide over the line to being a little intense... it could have been lifted out of this movie and dropped pretty much without alteration into a much more serious and dramatic movie without missing a beat. It was something of a relief when Iron Man made his appearance actually.

Robert Downey Jr is just PERFECT as the title character... his dry sense of humour and ability to switch between real drama and dry comedy work really well in the role. Plus he looks really buff in all the scenes where he's "required" to wear a tanktop... and that "power source" thing in the middle of his chest actually kinda adds to the whole look... or it could just be I'm a little strange...

Sadly Gwyneth Paltrow is slightly wooden as the unfortunately named "Pepper Potts"... and the strawberry blonde hair didn't seem to be doing her any favours.

Unlike many similar superhero movies, the CGI didn't jump out and pull me out of the moment. Maybe because Iron Man is a constructed object, which computer graphics always do better than trying to replicate the human form, but while I can guess which bits were Robert in the suit (and I'm guessing there was a suit, and that he was wearing it in a few scenes) and which bits were totally CG. Which coming from me is a pretty big compliment.

Like with almost all of the Marvel and DC properties, I somehow seem to know large chunks of backstory without knowing how I know it... I've never really read any Marvel titles and I'm pretty certain I've never seen the Iron Man cartoon, but yet bits of the mythology has seeped into my brain somehow. So there were a couple of bits and pieces that I picked up as tips of the hat to the fans... which were nice.

And speaking of which, this is TOTALLY one of those movies where you have to stay right until the very, very end of the credits for an extra little scene... now only for the very cool cameo, but also because it kind of sets up the idea of a sequel (woohoo).

It will be nice to see what they do if they do produce a sequel...

yani's rating: 4 Jericho rockets out of 5