Tag Archives: movies

Justice League: Warworld (2023)

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June 4, 2024

The fourth day of the June Swoon 3: A Cinematic Flashback brought me to HBO Max and the first animated film of the month. It is also the first disappointment of the month.

At first, I felt that Justice League: Warworld was an intriguing concept. Seeing Wonder Woman in the old West was a neat concept and watching her square off with Jonas Hex opened a lot of possibilities. I was thinking this was much like Westworld and seeing the Justice League involved in this setting would be cool.

However, it was not just the old West. After her short bit was done, we came across Batman in the world of Warlord. Wonder Woman was there too. I did not understand what was happening and, if this was the case, why was Batman not in the old West. and where was Superman?

Eventually we came to Superman as an agent of the government in a black and white alien invasion film where both Batman and Wonder Woman would appear as would King Faraday. It also borrowed heavily from a Twilight Zone episode I saw last summer during the Daily Zone rewatch.

All of these side bits seemed to be nothing more than time wasters as the real plot started up in this episode as they came across Mongul, with Lobo, who has some weird sci-fi storyline. Apparently, Warworld is a massive weapon against the multiverse and he was in search of a key. Why he brought the Trinity into the story made no sense, but that was not unlike most of the rest of this movie.

J’onn J’onzz was here too and played a role in the end of the film, but the movie made the entire thing feel unnecessary as it was being used simply to introduce the idea of Crisis on Infinite Earths. The movie brought in what I assume was Harbinger at the very end to rescue the Trinity and set up the next animated film. I am only guessing that this is Harbinger since the look of the character is nothing like I remember. She looked more like Marvel’s Frankie Raye aka Nova than she did the Harbinger from Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Jensen Ackles lead the voice cast which included Stana Katic (formerly of Castle fame) as Wonder Woman, and Darren Criss as Superman. Other actors included Ike Amadi, Troy Baker, Matt Bomer, Roger Cross, Brett Dalton, John DiMaggio, Frank Grillo, Teddy Sears, Kari Wahlgren, and Robin AtkinDownes.

The animation was fine, but did not standout in any instance. The characters did not feel right. Even in Elseworld type stories, the characters needed to feel like the characters we know in order for us to relate to them. Much of the story was convoluted and only felt as if it existed simply to put them in these specific settings. Worse yet, was it simply felt like a commercial for the next DC animation film.

Usually, the DC animated movies are very well done. This was quite a step down.

The Garfield Movie

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I have not been looking forward to this movie because the trailers for The Garfield Movie have been truly awful. Still, I went in with the hope that this would be better than I thought it would be.

Sadly, it is not.

I did not like The Garfield Movie at all. There are so many things that I just did not work for a Garfield movie. This was an action movie with a character that had always before spent all his time on the couch eating lasagna. The entire storyline with Garfield’s estranged father, Vic (Samuel L. Jackson), just did not work. It was something that did not work for the character and stood out as a huge problem with the script. Seeing Garfield jumping from drone to drone just should not happen.

The animation was good. I think some kids would like this movie, however, my theater was mostly filled with youngsters, and there was very little responses during the film. Very few laughs. There was no energy in the room. I did not think that was a good sign for the film.

I know there was some controversy with Chris Pratt as the voice of Garfield, but he was fine. I do not think that the voice performance of Chris Pratt was the problem of this movie.

This film did not resemble the classic Jim Davis Garfield character at all. He became an action hero and the relationship story with Vic was both ridiculous and predictable. There was not enough humor and the story was weak. Some youth may find this entertaining.

2.5 stars

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

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I was one of the people who thought Mad Max Fury Road was just okay. I did not love it like most of the people who saw it. I feel much the same way about the prequel film, Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, with Anya Taylor-Joy and Chris Hemsworth.

It was fine. I did not love it. It was passable for me.

According to IMDB, “As the world fell, young Furiosa is snatched from the Green Place of Many Mothers and falls into the hands of a great Biker Horde led by the Warlord Dementus. Sweeping through the Wasteland they come across the Citadel presided over by The Immortan Joe. While the two Tyrants war for dominance, Furiosa must survive many trials as she puts together the means to find her way home.”

There are a lot of good things in Furiosa. To start with, the film looks tremendous. The effects, many of which were practical, were epic. The stunts are wonderful and work very well with the story.

Anya Taylor-Joy does a great job taking the role of Furiosa in this prequel. However I do think the standout performance of the film was from Chris Hemsworth, who just eats every scene away every moment he is on screen as Dementus. He is not just playing Chris Hemsworth nor is he just Thor. He is a fabulous villain in Furiosa.

My biggest problem is the story, which is the same basic problem I had with Mad Max. There is not much to the story, though I did like the background of Furiosa’s life. There is a lot of action, but I would appreciate more story beats to chew on.

So I liked Furiosa. I appreciated the work done by director George Miller and the cast, especially the main two, were top notch. You should see this in the theater. If you loved Mad Max Fury Road, you will love Furiosa too.

3.4 stars

Bates Motel S1 E2

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Spoilers

“Nice Town You Picked, Norma”

Man, Freddie Highmore can give some death stares unlike anyone else. His eyes are amazingly creepy and, at times, simply frightening. You can see the insanity inside them, making him a great Norman Bates.

Norma’s first son and Norman’s half-brother Dylan arrived at the beginning of episode, creating tension within the Bates family. He had so much anger directed toward Norma, who he did not call Mom, but by her actual name, and the tension between him and Norman was obvious. Dylan’s anger toward Norma boiled over as Norman tried to defend his mother’s honor.

Vera Farmiga played Norma with such a depth that elevated this character into one of the most compelling character on the show. She is so mysterious and enigmatic. You are never quite sure what she is thinking behind each stare. When she was questioning Emma about her disease, I could not tell if she was interested because she was being empathic or if she was saying it to let Norman hear about the things about her cystic fibrosis because she was jealous of any other girl who might have a connection to Norman.

Romero continued to be suspicious of Norma after they found the truck of Keith Summers and a witness had said that Keith was seen arguing with Norma and Norman at the Hotel. Norma is cool as can be during the interactions, hiding the real anxiety beneath the surface. Keith was the man who raped Norma and whom she killed and dumped in the lake. Some of the word play between Norma and Romero was well written and jumped off the screen.

The town that they have moved to is shown to be a darker place than Norma had expected, with a deep criminal underground involved.

After episode number two, the storytelling is excellent. They bring up storylines that continue to service these characters while focusing on the unhealthy relationship between mother and son. A relationship that we know will end up in tragedy.

Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes

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The franchise of The Planet of the Apes released its fourth film in the new series of films and its tenth film overall in the franchise. The previous trilogy has been claimed by many pundits as one of the best trilogies of all-time, and some wondered why there was a need for a new film and how it would fit into the story.

Well, the film takes place several generations after the end of the War of the Planet of the Apes and focuses on a new set of protagonists, while still using the legacy of Caesar in the basic plot.

Our new protagonist is named Noa (Owen Teague) and he is trying to find his tribe after the were taken away. He was joined by the elder orangutan Raka (Peter Macon) and a human named Mae (Freya Allen). However, it turns out that Mae has her own motives for tagging along.

Our new antagonist is Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand) who arrived about an hour into the movie. He is trying to get inside this vault built into a cliffside where there were a bunch of human weapons.

I thought this new film was okay. I did like how they built this new group of characters and starting creating the world around them. I think it has set up for the future films well. The first part of this movie felt kind of dull at times. I did like the character work here, but there felt like too much going on.

The apes continue to look tremendous. The special effects are great. I will say that a few of the time when I would see Raka walking, it looked weird. Other than that, everything looked fabulous.

The third act was a lot of fun. I may have a small criticisms of it, but they are not major problems.

Truthfully, there were some ups and down for this film. I liked parts of it. There were parts that I found boring. It looked awesome. I do think it could have shaved off 10-15 minutes for the runtime. This may be better when you look back on this after the whole trilogy is done.

3.5 stars

Boy Kills World

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This was extremely violent and brutally gory. That does not bother me much, but there were more things that did bother me in Boy Kills World.

According to IMDB, “Bill Skarsgård stars as “Boy” who vows revenge after his family is murdered by Hilda Van Der Koy (Famke Janssen), the deranged matriarch of a corrupt post-apocalyptic dynasty that left the boy orphaned, deaf, and voiceless. Driven by his inner voice, one which he co-opted from his favorite childhood video game, Boy trains with a mysterious shaman (Ruhian) to become an instrument of death and is set loose on the eve of the annual culling of dissidents. Bedlam ensues as Boy commits bloody martial arts mayhem, inciting wrath of carnage and blood-letting. As he tries to get his bearings in this delirious realm, Boy soon falls in with a desperate resistance group, all the while bickering with the apparent ghost of his rebellious little sister.”

The positives for me was Bill Skarsgård, who I think was really good as the deaf/mute hero. My only problem with him was my own. When I looked at Skarsgård, all I could see was a combination of professional wrestlers Cody Rhodes and Edge and it distracted me constantly. Again, that is not the fault of the film and I thought Skarsgård was very good as this action character.

The action did not work very well for me. There was a lot of camera movement in the fight choreography that was annoying. The fights and the blood did become a bit dull for me because it was overdone. Too much blood and violence dampened the effect of both of them.

The voice over of Boy’s inner thoughts was hit and miss for me. There were some fun lines with it, and others that just felt like it was out of place. I did like the fact that the internal voice was the voice from Boy’s favorite video game as a youth, but the use of “Finish him” or “Fatality” seemed excessive. Funny at first, then not so much.

I became bored by this movie rather quickly, and by the time the third act came around and there was some movement on the story (predictable as it may have been) I had checked out. Not the worst film I have seen this year by a long stretch, just not very good.

2.6 stars

Abigail

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This movie was awesome, but I just can’t shake the feeling that it could have been so much better, perhaps even the best movie of the year, but it has to settle for awesomeness thanks to the trailers.

I went into the film wondering why the movie would reveal in the trailers that the little girl who had been kidnapped was, in truth, a vampire. I did not understand the idea behind it, but I gave them the benefit of the doubt, thinking that perhaps there was another, more dramatic reveal in the film that made it okay to give away this major plot point.

After seeing the movie, I am even more flummoxed about why the studio would give away what could have been a major twist in the story in the trailer.

The first part of the movie treated this like a kidnapping story and that the crew of hired thugs were to babysit the hostage in this old, spooky house. There were times in the early part of the film that tried to make the little girl, Abigail, into a victim and the film tried to pull on the heartstrings of the audience. The thing is, I knew the whole time that Abigail was a vampire.

It also tried to play a bit of a game of “who can you trust” by making it seem as if Frank, played by the amazing Dan Stevens, was behind the entire thing, and that would have been a cool twist, had I not known that the little girl was a vampire. All this early part of the movie would have worked so much more had they not spoiled that reveal in the trailer.

And the argument would be trying to get people into the theater, but I honestly think there could have been a way to weave together a trailer that painted this into a different picture, while protecting that one major concept. The reveal of Abigail as a vampire would have hit so much harder, been so much more impactful if I did not know it was coming.

After all of that, this movie still rocked really hard.

I was shocked to see at the film’s beginning that Alisha Weir played Abigail. Alisha Weir was the lead of one of my favorite movies of a couple years ago, Matilda the Musical. I absolutely loved her in that role and she is fabulous here too. She is an amazing young actor and she has a bright, bright future. In what could have been a one note role in Abigail, Weir brought so much emotion, vulnerability and power to her character while still being sinister and downright terrifying.

The rest of the ensemble cast was great too. Melissa Barrera was fantastic as the main protagonist, who was the character that the audience was intended to connect with and I certainly did. However, they still imbued her with plenty of mistakes and a back story that was filled with mistakes. She was a bad ass, but also a character with more regrets than happy memories.

Dan Stevens is always amazing, and this is no exception. This is a character that is anything but likable, but you still find yourself rooting for him even though. Dan Stevens does a tremendous job with this character that had surprising depth for this type of movie.

Kathryn Newton, William Catlett, Kevin Durand and the late Angus Cloud formed a ragtag bunch of lowlifes that mixed beautifully with the horror/comedy vibe of the film. Giancarlo Esposito had a small, but meaningful role as well.

As I mentioned, this was a horror/comedy film and I laughed out loud multiple times at some of the situations that these characters wound up in.

I might have legitimately given this movie 5 stars had the vampire twist been kept as a secret. I came out raving about this movie even without the surprise, but I can’t help but think it would have been so much more without the spoilers.

4.75 stars

Civil War

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This was a really well done movie with some dramatic moments.

I do not want to every see it again.

There have been several movies that I have seen that I loved, but that had such an impact on me that I would not want to watch it again.

Despite what you might think, this is not a political movie. The film does not go into specifics on how the film’s civil war started nor does it take sides. I think that was a very smart thing to do, but I do expect that some people from either side may see what they want to see in the movie even though it is not there.

The film focuses on four characters who are photo journalists in their attempt to go from New York to D.C. It is essentially a dystopian road trip movie, with a series of scenes that show the horrible events that a war brings. Innocent bystanders are caught in crossfire, lives are ruined, death surrounds them all.

The four main characters have great chemistry together and bring an energy to the darkness around them. Kirsten Dunst played a battle weary photo journalist named Lee and Wagner Moura played her partner Joel. They are joined by up and coming photo journalist Jesse, played by Cailee Spaeny. Then fourth of the group was the wonderful Stephen McKinley Henderson whose character was a grizzled veteran reporter, Sammy.

These characters interact with each other and the film is truly a character piece involving their road trip toward D.C.

The sound mixing team on this film did an amazing job as it sounded unbelievable. The gun shots would literally resonate in the audience’s gut, creating an uneasiness and an awkwardness that empowered the tone of the film.

Civil War is a violent film that does an admirable job at not taking a side in the conflict, nor does it blame either. It spends time with four characters who have to deal with the consequence of war and trying to exist in a war zone. It is a compelling movie with strong lead performances that anchor the film.

4.25 stars

Monkey Man

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Dev Patel had his debut as a feature length director. He was also a writer on this project as well as the lead actor, so Dev had a huge presence across Monkey Man.

I would say that the best parts of this movie was Dev Patel. His performance was outstanding. He took this character and provided a ton of emotion for him.

According to IMDB, “Kid, an anonymous young man who ekes out a meager living in an underground fight club where, night after night, wearing a gorilla mask, he is beaten bloody by more popular fighters for cash. After years of suppressed rage, Kid discovers a way to infiltrate the enclave of the city’s sinister elite. As his childhood trauma boils over, his mysteriously scarred hands unleash an explosive campaign of retribution to settle the score with the men who took everything from him.“

This was very violent and brutal in many moments, but the biggest problem I had with the movie was the use of shaky cam. So much of the fight scenes were difficult to see because of the shaky cam. There were some scenes where the camera was set and not shaking and they looked great.

There were several moments that the film felt kind of dull. It feels as if it were too long and could have used some editing.

Monkey Man has its flaws, but it is a good movie despite those. It was an impressive debut for Dev Patel behind the camera.

3.4 stars

Immaculate

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Sydney Sweeney has now appeared in two of the worst movies of 2024. First, Madame Web and now this religious themed horror movie, Immaculate.

According to IMDB, “Cecilia (Sydney Sweeney), a woman of devout faith, is warmly welcomed to the picture-perfect Italian countryside where she is offered a new role at an illustrious convent. But it becomes clear to Cecilia that her new home harbors dark and horrifying secrets.“

I should not single out Sydney Sweeney, because there is no doubt that she is the absolutely best part of this fart of a movie. Her performance is savage, and she dominates her screen time.

The problem is that the film is just not very good.

The first hour of the movie was very dull and it spent the entire time throwing jump scares at the audience where the music suddenly spikes loudly, only to see nothing in particular. It was one of the most prolific uses of jump scares I have seen in quite awhile.

While the film’s premise had some promise, the film just goes off the rails in the third act, settling for shocking moments over any sort of storytelling. While I appreciate some of the swings it took in that final act, particularly right at the end, it depends on shock to create emotion in the audience, not anything to do with character or story elements.

Sydney Sweeney was really good in this. She gave it her all. The material was just not up to the quality of her performance.

1.3 stars

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire

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Godzilla and Kong are back together once again with the Monsterverse as a new threat forces the two titans to work together. Yes, the story is a little wonky and lacks any real sense of dread, but there are some epic monster fights, and where else are you going to see Godzilla give King Kong a suplex?

That was a life-affirming moment for me.

The new threat is another giant ape by the name of the Scar King. Scar King has been trying to escape from the bowels of Hollow earth for a long time and, with Godzilla on the surface, Scar King has been having more success. He has marshalled his forces together, including a cold controlling titan that he is using pain to force it to help him (that’s not coming back at the end…sarcasm). Kong realizes that he can not take the new threat on his own and he went back to earth to recruit Godzilla, who has been sensing trouble and has been charging up with some nuclear energy.

The plot of this film is really weak. What this movie had to do to hit its purpose was to have great monster fights, and I already mentioned the suplex, right? The fights were well done and the CGI looked fantastic. Was there some cheesy moments? Sure. Kong gets a bionic arm to help with his injured arm. Luckily this bionic arm was already in Hollow Earth.

However, there was a major problem. I never felt as if Scar King was a danger to any sort of combination of Godzilla and Kong, along with whatever other Titans that might show up (no spoilers). I never believed Scar had any chance of taking them down, even after he did well in his initial fight with Kong.

The humans were kept as a sideshow, as they should have been. The human cast included Rebecca Hall, Dan Stevens, Brian Tyree Henry and Kaylee Hottle. Kaylee Hottle, played the lovely young lady Jia, reprising her role from Godzilla vs. Kong. Hottle had a real presence on screen and she stood out among the human characters. She seemed to fit beautifully in with the grandness of the monsters around her. I was very impressed by this young actress, who apparently is deaf as well.

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire was a fun time if you wanted to see giant monsters fighting. Though it is an unfair comparison, this does not match up to Godzilla Minus One at all. That was a much better movie, but this is still fun and a decent popcorn flick.

3.2 stars

Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey 2

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Last year, in my opinion, the worst movie of 2023 was Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey. By far. Despite the negative word of mouth (and honestly, probably because of it), I saw that movie on streaming and hated it. There were several movies that I saw last year that, in my movie reviews, I said that this ‘new movie’ would be the worst movie I saw that year, except that I had seen Winnie the Pooh: Blood and Honey.

I was very surprised to see a sequel already to this horror schlock. What was even more odd was that I saw that it had 100% on Rotten Tomatoes at the time (6 reviews).

Admittedly, this sequel is better than the first one. Honestly, that bar was REALLY low.

Then, it kicked off with an opening between Rhys Frake-Waterfield, the director, and Scott Chambers, who had assumed the role of Christopher Robin. They spoke about their new Pooh cinematic universe that they are building including movies featuring horror-takes on Pinocchio, Peter Pan and Bambi, and then even a Poohniverse film where all the monsters assemble like the Avengers. I’m not making this up. The most unbelievable part was when they spoke to the director of the upcoming Bambi: The Reckoning, Dan Allen, who said if you liked movies like Jaws, Aliens and Jurassic Park, you will love Bambi: The Reckoning. What?

Then, Pooh 2 started with an animated intro which made me pause. I thought it was very well done, and I was intrigued with the set up coming out of the opening. Could this actually be a good film after the pile of crap that the first one was?

Short answer: No.

The very next scene was a kill scene with Pooh, his new cohort Owl and a reanimated Piglet, attacking and killing three of the worst female characters you will ever see in a movie. There was no rhyme or reason to it. It was just to have some kills, and I realized that my initial possible thoughts (dare I say, hopes) would go unfulfilled.

I am going to say this. I actually thought when the film focused on Christopher Robin in the first act of the film, it was decent. I liked the conflict of Christopher Robin being accused of being involved in the 100 Acre Wood Massacre (which was basically the first film). Chris had become a doctor and he was struggling not only with the events of the last movie, but also a trauma involving his brother when he was a young boy. All this piqued my interest.

Sadly, that entire storyline was interposed with some of the dumbest scenes of Pooh and Owl killing random people in graphic and gory fashion. Some of these kills were laugh out loud funny, and I did that several times. They took away most everything from those initial scenes with Chris.

By the end of the film, I hated the Christopher Robin story too because they had taken it in the most bizarre and stupidest path. Predictable too. I said several points during the film that were so obvious that it was shameful that they tried to pass them off as reveals.

There were several story elements that were brought up, but either never followed though with or tossed aside with a rampant abandon.

The film did look better. Frake-Waterfield and Chambers had said in their intro that the success of the first film allowed them to approach this one with a considerably larger budget and it did show in the look. However, just because something looked better, does not mean that is better.

Case in point, the film introduces Tigger late in the third act and does nothing with him. He is there for basically one slaughter scene and he was a tiger with long claws that killed people. No sign of “the tops are made of the rubber, the bottoms are made of the springs” that you might associate with Tigger. The film did nothing to establish that this was the Tigger we knew. It made him generic.

The relationship between Pooh and Chris took an even more messed up twist that was completely unnecessary and barely acknowledged.

Yes, this is better than last year’s film. I don’t think that this is an automatic, no-doubter for the worst movie of 2024. However, I am not saying that it won’t be the worst movie of 2024. It will be in the conversation.

1 star

Man from Atlantis S1 E4

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Spoilers

“The Disappearances”

This is the fourth and final TV movie of the series, which was actually entitled “Man from Atlantis IV: The Disappearances.”

It is interesting that I remember this being one of my favorite TV shows when it was on back in the 1970s, but after watching the first four TV movies, I do not remember anything about them.

I enjoyed this fourth movie of Man from Atlantis quite a bit. In fact, it might be my favorite of the four.

According to IMDB, “Elizabeth is kidnapped, one of dozens of scientists held prisoner on the island of Felicitos, controlled by special mineral springs that render their victims completely happy and compliant. Dr. Smith is using them to build a rocket to take her away from our troubled planet in search of some better world, and Mark must find a way to counter the brain-washing and free the captives“

I really do like this show. There are problems, of course. The acting is not what I would call great, but for the 1970s TV, it is acceptable. They have the most conveniently placed cameras around the sub and areas where people can watch what is happening on monitors. That is just a weird bit that doesn’t really affect anything. In a show about a man with webbed fingers who can breathe underwater, having cameras in places that make no sense should not be the biggest drawback.

I did like the Dr. Smith villain of this episode. She was quite brutal and cruel, yet I could understand why she was doing what she was doing. It could be an episode that features a debate on climate change, even before it became a real thing.

Mark was a real hero in this episode. He came up with solutions for everything from the torpedo to the mind-control. I thought the look of Mark when he was trapped in the shed without water was great for the special effects of the time. His underwater scenes were excellent as they always are for this show. Those scenes underwater were well done and looked great. I am not a huge fan of the manner in which Mark always swam, but that would be the way a real person would swim. Today, he would be more CGI and could look like he was swimming faster. Still, I liked the realism of the shots.

Moving ahead, the show starts its regular series run of 13 episodes, which was all the show would get. This is actually a pretty decent sci-fi series and, despite some flaws, has been a fun watch so far.

Road House (2024)

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I just watched the original Road House on Hulu this morning. I wanted to have seen it before watching the remake on Amazon Prime tonight. I did not love the original. I did not hate it because I could see the appeal. The 2024 version of Road House I did not love, but I liked it more than the original.

Jake Gyllenhaal steps into the role of Dalton (who gets a first name in this movie, Elwood), this time a former UFC fighter whose career ended after a tragedy. Dalton’s name was enough to intimidate most people so Frankie (Jessica Williams), who owned a bar named Road House in Florida came to find Dalton and offer him a job to help clean up the bar.

Just like the original, Dalton discovered that the backwoods town had problems with certain individuals who want the Road House gone.

These people bring in Conor McGregor to try and kill Dalton.

I was actually more engaged with the character of Dalton immediately in this movie because of a scene with a train. I found him more interesting than the late Patrick Swayze version.

The villains were every bit as one dimensional as the original. Even McGregor was just the violent killer character.

This was just as violent as the original with Gyllenhaal being quicker to fight than it was with Swayze. The fight scenes were very brutal and displayed Dalton’s skills in mixed martial arts.

There were less involvement with the rest of the bar employees in the new film than the original, but they were there in the scenes.

Gyllenhaal is the star of the film and I thought he did a really solid job. The film is not brilliant, but I was entertained and I did find it better than the Road House I watched this morning.

3 stars

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire

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I love the Ghostbusters movie from 1984, and no Ghostbusters movie since has come anywhere close. That does not mean that every film since has been garbage. I had heard that the new film, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire was not very good. It lowered my expectations for the movie. I think that helped.

According to IMBD, “The Spengler family returns to where it all started – the iconic New York City firehouse – to team up with the original Ghostbusters, who’ve developed a top-secret research lab to take busting ghosts to the next level. But when the discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an evil force, Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.”

I did think the story was decent. I liked the idea of the villain and the powers made it very cinematic. There are some great moments with the cast, in particular McKenna Grace, who once again had the biggest arc among the new characters. Paul Rudd was playing Gary in the best Paul Rudd manner. Carrie Coon did not have much to do. Finn Wolfhard was a nice addition for comedic purposes.

However, there was way too many in the cast. There are too many characters who were just here because they were in the last movie, and they added several new characters who are performed by great actors. I do not think that any of the new characters were needed additions. I love both Kumail Nanjiani and Patton Oswalt, but they felt forced into the story.

And I hate to say it, but of the original Ghostbusters, Dan Aykroyd’s Ray Stantz was the most important. Bill Murray and Ernie Hudson were there for no major reason and Annie Potts was just collecting a paycheck. It is nothing against any of these actors, because they are all great, but there was just not enough in the script for this many people to do.

Making William Atherton’s Peck the new Mayor of New York though is a stroke of genius. He is a perfect antagonist for the Ghostbusters and it makes sense why he hates them.

The special effects are great. They use them in the proper times and it does not seem to be overused.

However, the finale of the film was a touch underwhelming for me because of which characters were central in the battle, and I saw it coming a mile away.

I enjoyed the film for the most part, but it did feel as if there were just too much stuffed into the two hour run time, making the movie feel cramped. Very few of the new characters are developed. There were a couple that I did not even mention. Still, as a fan of Ghostbusters, this was a good time at the movies. It could have been considerably better.

3.25 stars