⚠︎ POSSIBLE SPOILERS FOR THE MARVELS ⚠︎

OMG GUYS ?!??! THE MOVIE WAS SO GREAT OMG !!! I'm not gonna give you all a whole movie review like those other cool people do because I can't do that BUT. There was some cinematic scene that were just ✨✨✨ Most of the movie is in space and the fiews are just amazing, like they really put some work in the CGI.

There's something great in the movie. We get to see why Monica was reculant to talk about Carol in WandaVision (just like how some theories thought). And we get to see Kamala fangirling a lot. But at some point we can see that every heros is still human which is great, something that we don't talk about enough. They suffers too but they can't show us the face of them because they are heroes.

There is some scenes where you can truly relate to some of the characters issue. Or atleast I could anyways. And

I personally cried at the end, I don't know for y'all but I definitly cried and honestly, I knew that I would cry at some point.

Btw this is when the big spoiler arrive so if you want to leave, do so.

THERE THAT ONE SCENE AT THE END SCREAMS THE UNIVERSE MIGHTIEST HERO NEVER TRULY LEFT >>>>>>

Y'all. There is these two words in the end credit that I absolutly loved and it usually said by a blond to a brunette. But you know, I'm not gonna spoil everything 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

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WE CAN HEAR BRIE SINGING LIKE A FREAKING DISNEY PRINCESS GUYS LQJJDKQLFJKAKFH 😭😭✨✨✨✨ LIKE SHE IS LITERALLY LIKE A FREAKING PRINCESS AAAAAAH

AND IN THE END CREDIT WE GET TO SEE SOMEONE THAT I THOUGHT WAS LOST BUT WASN'T AND I LOST IT BECAUSE THE MOMENT I CRIED WAS THE MOMENT I THOUGHT WE LOST HER

And also, we don't se Valkyrie for more than 5 minutes to those who wondered :(

ANYGAYS, the end if the big spoilers is here.

Overall, I absolutly loved the movie because I'm a space addict and I also am very gay for Carol Danvers so yeah.

(No like, I swear there is some scenes where the cinematic graphics were so great that my mouth was literally wide open)

Okay I just found out something. So we all know Captain Marvel. (BTW this post is for marvel fans) and her movie. I've watched that movie multiple times. Love it, I think it's written fairly well, great CGI, funny script, good lore and story, love how everything ties in, overall its a really good movie; and captain marvel is one of my favourite superheroes, and one of the most badass.

WHY THE F*CK do people think she's a "bad movie and bad superhero" like it's one of the really good B.E movies! (Before Endgame)

**I'm using B.E as Befoee Endgame because A.E (after endgame) is arguably the worse marvel era. Don't get me wrong, it has some great stuff in A.E, but B.E is just better overall.

Anyways, back to what I was saying. I think k Brie Larson was a great actress and did really well portraying the character Captain Marvel. Not to mention captain marvel was one of the overpowered superheroes in the B.E era, before they started making everyone OP to defeat big CGI villains and to make their movies more action packed to get more views and stuff. She had good plotline, good powers, cool backstory, funny, and genuinely one of my favourite female superheroes.

I would love to see her as the new face of the MCU, A.E. considering they killed off what was generally considered the "face" of the MCU, Iron Man and Captain America, they haven't put much focus on one or two specific people to be aforementioned face.

Captain marvel hasn't been killed off, she has amazing potential, and she's personally one of my favourite 'Big Badass Backup To Fight Big Strong Villain" in those "No hope left" moments.

I don't understand the hate on her. May e its because she was, along with Natasha Romanff, one of the first female superheroes on-screen in the MCU. Sexism is a big thing in movies and stuff, but I have some reasons why I think she and another person- who I will mention later- should be the next 'Face of the MCU'.

1: the previous 'face' duo was Iron man and Captain America. So it sta ds to reason, along with what marvel has been doing to be more racially and gender inclusive, that we should have 2 female superheroes.

Yes I know the whole 'really overexaggerated feminist film superhero plotline new budget annoying superhero to earn more money and get higher ratings' thing is annoying; but hear me out.

Point 2: I have a few options, but to continue off of point 1; I feel like a good combo would be The Scarlet Witch and Captain Marvel. (Wanda Maximoff and Carol Danvers)

They are both powerful, badass, good storyline, great actors behind them heroes/characters. They could make for a good duo to contrast from the B.E duo of men.

Point 3: yes u know that Wanda is 'dead' BUT before the rocks fell on her, you could clearly see a flash of RED MAGIC in the rocks. After the entire Dr Strange MoM (multiverse of madness) plotline was 'Scarlet Witch has grown in power she's following us into DUFFERENT DIMENSIONS and was prophesied since the DAWN OF TIME, and has unlocked much more of her powers, I HIGHLY doubt some normal old rocks would kill her.

It's just unlikely considering how obscure some of marvels foreshadowing has been, we know that they foreshadow films that come out like 3 years later.

Point 4: moving away from Captain Marvel and Wanda, how about a new duo.

Bucky Barnes and Yelena Belova. Its similar to the old duo of Captain America (man out of time, from 1940, soldier) and Iron Man (normal human, with special training/ gear that is one of the only things that makes them super.)

This duo would be interesting, especially as we've seen both bucky AND yelena on an official marvel movie poster together.

I personally love both characters;and it pays homage to the golden age of marvel B.E.

Bucky is homage to Captain America (obviously) and Yelena is homage to both Iron Man AND Natasha Romanoff.

And it could allow for more opportunity of the old age to come shining back through the new age, in the form of two humans, who have a rivalry,

(I think it would be interesting to have bucky and yelena to have a mild rivalry at least, considering we chose them due to there similarities with the old duo, cap and stark)

Who are also enhanced in ways that gives them an advantage in fighting, and it could give a lot of opportunity to save marvel. And bucky is a fan favourite character, so considering marvels reputation going down now their movies are getting worse COMPARED TO B.E, I think this could be a great way to bring the nostalgia of the old movies back.

So my original rant was about captain marvel being hated. Sorry for making you read all this, and if you have read everything here, I thank you immensely for giving me the time and chance.

I really miss the B.E era, and hate how they kill off all the OG great characters for new, sh*ttier superheros like Kamala Khan.

So here is just some ideas in my passionate rant which I would love to see. I love Wanda and Captain marvel, but personally I think I would prefer the Winter Soldier and White Widow duo because it would need less fancy magic CGI, and give the film(s) they appear in a more B.E and better quality feel then just a bunch of CGI that takes away from the quality of the movie and storyline, and the lack of CGI ( I mean the bright magic flashy stuff they constantly use in A.E, not the general cgi they more often use in B.E)

Would give the film(s) a better, more enostalgic, more authentic, emotional, just overall better film quality and plotline.

Star Wars Visions - Review

So I finally finished watching all of Visions, the ambitious anime project set in a Star Wars loose if at all canon, and I truly had a good time with it, as a fan of anime and Star Wars I was curious how they would deliver.

Spoilers for Visions, watch it then come back here to read what I thought about it. Reminder: This is my own personal opinion

So as I said, really enjoyed this experiment Disney decided to take, the 9 episodes weren't all flawless but they weren't awful either, so I'm gonna go through what I liked and disliked about it.

We'll start with the negatives, since they're few, picky and it gets it out of the way.

What Wasn't Great

Runtime A veiled negative has to be many episode's runtimes being too short, some only lasting 10-15 minutes. Before watching I was expecting all to be at least 30 minutes, so it was a shame that none lasted that long.

Episode 2: Glorified Music Video I think Episode 2 was perhaps the weakest episode of the nine for me, because it was all building up to a song. I think it probably leaned a bit too much on existing characters like Jabba and Boba, as well as Tatooine, to carry interest, so it was a bit of a low point.

Episode 3: Studio Trigger keep their balls away from the wall Episode 3's The Twins wasn't bad, it just lingered a bit too much on the less fun things. Studio Trigger had made a name for themselves for striking visuals and absolutely batshit crazy fight scenes that ignore all manner of physics with the likes of Promare, Kill La Kill and Darling of the Franxx (and kinda Gurren Lagann, the company was made as a result of that so it's like a Studio Ghibli thing with Nausicaa) but The Twins didn't have enough of the major fight scene for my liking, given how most of what we saw was in the trailer. Maybe it's the fault of the trailer, but it did feel like you could just watch the trailer rather than the episode, which is a bad thing.

Episode 7 too, but it also lacks bravery The Elder was also a good episode, but it too lacked in the final fight, the ending being very abrupt. The Elder also had a problem in that they wasted their good characters, but also failed in stakes. Had the padawan been killed instead of simply being wounded by a lightsaber slash to the belly it probably would've worked more, since we were shown that the Elder is precise in his cutting and it would've served to increase the urgency of the master fighting him too. The fight was short and out of the characters we lost it was the most important character that bit the dust.

The Episode Order could've been Better My final criticism has to be that the order of the episodes felt like it could've been better. Starting with The Duel was right but following it up with Tatooine Rhapsody brought the mood down, likewise putting The Elder after T0-B1 was perhaps too jarring a theme switch. The bigger sin was probably ending with Akakiri. Akakiri was good, but it was a downer and you don't really finish a Season 1 on a downer because you want people to feel excited for more rather than feeling bleak about it; with the options of Lop & Ocho, The Elder, The Village Bride and The Ninth Jedi (which would've been my pick for episode 9) it was an odd choice to pace the episodes in such a way - even when knowing that people would binge in this order. FYI if you wanted to know how I would've ordered the episodes it would've been The Duel -> The Elder -> The Twins -> Lop & Ocho -> Tatooine Rhapsody -> T0-B1 -> The Village Bride -> Akakiri -> The Ninth Jedi

This way we start strong with Sith-heavy episodes that grip with combat, we have the Duel to set us off, we show off the Elder to sell the Dark Side's strength, which blends into the Twins and that sibling relationship blends into Lop & Ocho, we use Tatooine Rhapsody as an intermission of sorts but then carry the lighter theme with T0-B1, whose artistic elements and worldbuilding leans into the Village Bride. We make Akakiri the penultimate since we show the Jedi succumb to the Dark for love in contrast to the Elder where the Jedi succeeds by steeling emotions, before finishing strong with Ninth Jedi.

What Was Great

Anime is perfect for Star Wars Star Wars has of course delved into animation before; Clone Wars (both), Rebels, Resistance and Bad Batch, but never like Anime. So Visions was allowed to shine by showing off everything anime can offer which more realistic CGI and live action could not. Bright colour grading, physics-defying movement, as well as unique character and lightsaber shapes.

(Mostly) Not Wasting Time While I have criticized some episodes for not making the most of things, and not having enough time, but many episodes would last 12-15 minutes and still feel like they had a coherent storylines with no gaps in getting to know the brand new characters or a lack of important information and investment. It is a testament to the good writing of the episodes that episodes got so much from such little time.

We're Left Wanting More In spite many episodes' brevity, the good writing also provided us stories with great potential to be fleshed out. Who wouldn't want to learn more about these new characters? See most of their adventures? The franchise potential from certain stories' one episode makes the experiment an unequivocal success.

The different styles add to the story Using a different anime studio for each story allowed each episode to stand out in their own way, and lean on different areas of importance. The Duel for instance applied a Kurosawa aesthetic which made the audience anticipate samurai themes. As much as the animation will get props for its visuals, environments and character design we should also give a hat-tip to the amazing music, especially in The Village Bride, and the voice acting from both JP and EN. We had some recognizable faces on both sides with EN having Joseph Gordon-Levitt, David Harbour, George Takei, Neil Patrick Harris, Allison Brie, Simu Liu, Karen Fukuhara, Lucy Liu and Taemura Morrison reprising as Boba, while on the JP side we had names familiar with One Piece (Zoro - why you gotta be a sith Zoro!, Brook, Tama, Kiku), DBZ (Goku), Naruto (Hidan, Tayuya and if you count Boruto; Chocho and Kawaki), Jujitsu Kaisen (Itadori, Megumi, Nobara) and more. The different styles also allowed a greater freedom to lore between studios, I know the lightsaber colour thing was done in High Republic but I did like how in the Ninth Jedi Kara's lightsaber started out translucent (I actually preferred it that way), while not diverting too far away from the canon.

The Samurai style episodes were the strongest While some episodes leaned on other elements of Star Wars, the best of the bunch kept true with the correlation force users had with samurai. The Duel, Village Bride and Ninth Jedi - alongside Akakiri, Elder and kinda T0-B1 - had strong showings by maintaining their force user characters as samurai or samura-esque, which only added to the themes of the episodes too.

Its success will hopefully entice more Studios and Directors A positive for the future is the fact that there is a future. Visions has plenty of mileage as both a series of one-off stories or stories that can be expanded upon, and its success will mean that more will be on the cards. Imagine now what other studios may want to try their hand at their own story in this universe? And what it does not only for the franchise but also the animation studios themselves, because this in itself becomes a bridge for fans on either side to be introduced to the other; new anime fans, new star wars fans, everybody wins.

Conclusion

Visions provides an alternative in Star Wars media outside of live action but also away from the CGI tv shows, but it has started off strongly almost as well as The Mandalorian and in my opinion better than the Bad Batch did. My favourite episode was probably the Ninth Jedi, but Village Bride and the Duel are close runners up, soon followed by Lop & Ocho, I hope very much that the stories these ones started especially can be fleshed out and maybe even greenlit for their own series, while also curious about what more Star Wars can deliver.

All in all, good job for everyone, they took a risk and it paid off.

CAPTAIN MARVEL REVIEW [SPOILER-FREE]...

For some reason, there's been this toxic, volatile mass of incredibly opinionated people that have made their voices heard since this movie was announced in 2014, and their disgust for this film's existence has only snowballed since. And here we are; the movie is out, the internet is pointlessly enraged (because internet), and people are dishing out their reviews. Some people just can't wrap their heads around or accept that a female is the main hero, which is scarce throughout all superhero franchises at the moment. Is it fear hidden behind disgust? I don't know. Whatever it is, it's pretty sad.

Here's the thing, it's okay not being interested in a movie, but the way most negative people are coming across is sheer disapproval, not apprehension or scepticism. This goes for any film or franchise that has done the same, or is planning to do so. Heaven forbid we get an overdue female hero lead, twenty-one movies in, right?! But with all this being said, I'm going to review this movie simply as a movie. I'm not going to give it bonus points because she's a woman, nor am I gonna lower my score because she's a woman. I'm reviewing it as the next installment in the MCU, and as a standalone piece.

Right off the bat, I thoroughly enjoyed Captain Marvel. I'd read a few reviews before going to see it, but after seeing it for myself, I'm genuinely confused as to why the majority of people are giving it a "Yeaah, it's alright", reception. That's fine of course, but I found a lot to love about this nostalgic, sci-fi, buddy-cop movie. It's an above-par film when comparing it to other cinematic releases, but because we only tend to compare these films to other MCU installments at this point, people's standards are incredibly high, and dare I say we're somewhat spoilt because of this? I try to appreciate a movie for what it is, rather than what it isn't... Regardless I enjoyed it.

Think of it this way... Imagine how hard it is to keep finding new/fresh ways of doing an origin story for a new character, whilst making sure it's not the traditional style of origin, this far into a franchise. The lost memory and mystery keeps you guessing, and there were some very satisfying revelations. You have an idea of who she is and what she stands for, but you can't help but think she's being suppressed for some reason. You follow her journey, watching Carol slowly re-find herself to eventually let loose, showing what she's truly made of (literally). The intrigue and mystery elements aren't difficult to follow either so don't worry about the movie unintentionally muddling itself with too much shroudery (yeah, I just made that word up, but you know what I mean).

Brie Larson plays both a convincing Captain Marvel and Carol Danvers. The stubbornness that masks her compassion lets you know that yes, don't get on the wrong side of her, but it's never in an arrogant way. She's very likeable in the sense that she's never unnecessarily rude. Yeah, in her urge to prove herself initially, she's a little reckless, but that goes for every superpowered person that's finding how far they can push it. As the movie goes on, the more she discovers about herself and the world she's a part of. I could see a slow transition from start to finish. The human she truly is eventually works hand-in-hand with her god-like power, so you're not just watching some crazy omnipotent being rip everything a new one, you see Carol at the same time.

It's obvious I'm going to say Fury was awesome in this. I'm glad he had a lot to do in this, because I was worried he was gonna be a glorified cameo overused in the trailers, but he's not. It was cool seeing this pre-avengers Nick not quite on top of the S.H.I.E.L.D foodchain, but you see how he eventually becomes so. Somehow, he has the most sass in the movie. The de-aging technology is literally unnoticeable too, it was like genuinely looking at a younger Sam Jackson. The same goes for Clark Gregg as Coulson. I was trying hard to spot any rubbery CGI on their faces, but I couldn't. It was great.

Okay, I've been dying to talk about the Skrulls. I love, love, love them. I desperately want more of them in the future of the MCU. I don't care what direction they take with them, I just wanna see them again. I appreciated the use of practical make-up for them, and I really dug Talos' aussie accent. If I had to come up with an accent for a Skrull leader, I wouldn't have thought of giving him such a voice, but I'm glad they did because it's great. I have no issues with the supporting cast either, other than perhaps I'd have liked to have seen more, but there's only so much you can fit into a debut film, when the hero is the focal point. What I will say is that it was nice revisiting the Kree and fleshing out their portion of the MCU.

Finishing up, I can't wait to watch Captain Marvel again. The score, the aesthetics, the characters, and the references to the wider franchise (subtle and on the nose) were contributing factors to my enjoyment, but Captain Marvel as a hero is a why this movie succeeds. Well done Brie! Another fine addition to the MCU, and I can't wait to see what she brings to the table for Endgame! If you're not scared about a female being the lead role in a superhero movie, then you should enjoy it also.

I Hate You, I Love You, Chapter 89

Chapter Summary -  Danielle stays in Ireland to deal with the house situation as Tom heads back for the Kong Skull Island premiere.

Previous Chapter

Rating - Mature (some chapters contain smut)

Triggers - references to Tom Hiddleston’s work with the #MeToo Movement. That chapter will be tagged accordingly.

authors Note - I have been working on this for the last 3 years, it is currently 180+ chapters long.  This will be updated daily, so long as I can get time to do so, obviously.

tags: @sweetkingdomstarlight-blog​​ @jessibelle-nerdy-mum​​ @nonsensicalobsessions​​ @damalseer​​ @hiddlesbitch1​​ @winterisakiller​​ @fairlightswiftly​​ @salempoe​​​ @wolfsmom1​​​

If you wish to be tagged, please let me know.

Danielle sat waiting in the solicitor's office, a cup of tea on the table next to her, a small but significant piece of paper under her hand. She thought of how she had dropped Tom to the airport that morning, telling him she would be home in less than a week hopefully, that she would see him before he went on the international part of the Kong Tour.

Again she looked at the small piece of paper in her hand, it had taken Tom another two minutes to convince her it was the right thing to do, and a small call to NatWest to confirm that yes, given her credit history and the fact she had her house as collateral, she very much was guaranteed the loan. So with a small transfer and a trip to her Credit Union, she and Tom were able to hold the piece of paper that meant that she would get to pay for her aunt's part of the house. Tom smiled as she looked at it, clearly ecstatic as to what it meant for her. When he had asked her what was her plans, she simply shrugged and stated the other half, when she could.

She was brought back to the present by the sound of people walking down the hallway towards her. She knew by the irked voice of one that it was her aunt, she inhaled deeply and waited for the door to open. When Bernadette entered the room, she looked angrily at Danielle. "What do you want? I suppose you are going to try and stop me from forcing the sale?"

"Just sit down, Bernie," Danielle growled.

"You have no respect," The woman commented, but she did what was required. "Where is the solicitor gone?"

"To get the last of the paperwork."

"What paperwork and what would you know, you dropped out of college, Mattie was too soft on you, you went on to do nothing."

"I would disagree, I have a great paying job, I have a nice home and a good hard-working boyfriend, things are very much going well for me Bernie, not that I am overly bothered by your opinion, though I do use it to gauge things. What you find to be terrible and anger, I know my father would have approved of, so thank you for setting my concerns to rest." Danielle smiled sweetly just as the solicitor re-entered the room.

"Right, so it is a fair swap really, nothing of great note, you Danielle Hughes, are offering the whole twenty-five thousand euro share of the house at Droichead Beag, Connemara, Galway to Bernadette Whelan, your aunt and on her accepting, she is signing over her share of the building and her legal rights to it. That is the general gist of this." The solicitor explained.

Bernadette frowned then looked at Danielle, who looked at her for her reaction before pushing the draft forward. "How?"

"I told you already, I have more than enough money." Danielle grinned. "Oh and I still want my mother's things back. I mean it, Bernie, I am going home tomorrow, I want them back before I head to the airport. I have spoken with Michael and Lourda, I have a guy coming to change the locks today and you will not be given a key, you are no longer responsible for anything in the house and you will not have to concern yourself with its maintenance or bills."

"Fine." Bernadette went for the bank draft, which Danielle pulled back.

"I will give this to Mr Roberts, you will sign that legal document, he will give us a copy each and you will get your money then."

"Are you trying to imply I would try to rob it?" Bernadette snapped, her face showing how appalled she was by the idea.

"No, but that is the legal process." Danielle scoffed, "So sign the damn paper so I can get on with my day. I need to go shopping for a dress."

"What would you want a dress for, you never wore dresses when your father was alive?" "I have something to go to as soon as I return to London, so chop-chop, I'm a busy woman."

* Danielle smiled as she drove to the airport. She had slept well enough as Tom's smell was still on the side of the bed that he had been on and knowing that they would return there soon, her holding the largest part of the home she always wanted making her excited and happy. She had gotten a dress the day before after the solicitors and with her hair and make-up booked, she looked forward to going home, to being home with Tom again, arranging for them to go public and finally be able to do things together. The idea of them and Mac going for a walk in Hampstead Heath was enticing in ways she could not vocalise, she knew at first there would be people annoying them, but she knew too that they would be old news again in the near future.

She handed back the car and went to the check-in desk, she knew Tom would be busy all day, he had to prep and get ready for the premier. He had texted earlier in the day to ask her how she was getting on, she gave him a story about getting the legal work signed and said little else before the car to ready him for the day arrived, so with 'I love you's' and goodbyes, they said they would talk later.

As it stood, she arrived in London on time and was able to get a taxi back to the house, it felt almost odd to be back and for Tom not to be there, but with too little time to worry about things, she rushed around, getting her bag and everything brought back upstairs and into the room, she looked around, Tom had it as it always was, but she realised that the bed was unkempt in the centre and not to the side, causing her to laugh slight, Tom clearly taking advantage of the greater space. She took out the dress and went into the wardrobe to get the shoes she knew would work with it. Just then, her phone rang. "Hey, Nacelle."

"So, I spoke to Henry, he said that he can fit you in, he is brilliant, I trained with him, I would not allow some half-wit at you."

"You're the best Nacelle."

"You know it darling, listen, how does lunch at ours sound next week?"

"Brilliant, day and time and I'll be there."

"Woohoo, we will wait until lover boy is on the road so you'll have something to do other than pine for him."

"I will not pine, I will mope quietly in a corner and pretend not to eat my own weight in Ben and Jerry's." Nacelle laughed. "I'll be fine, it's only two to three weeks."

"How was Ireland?"

"Wet, wetter than usual."

"So submerged then?"

"Effectively, here faired no better I can see."

"Apparently not if you listen to Becky. Anyway, I will talk to you later, Henry is lovely, he'll look after you."

"Thanks again Nacelle."

"Anytime girl, I'll look after you." Nacelle sang before hanging up the phone.

With her dress and shoes in hand, Danielle rushed outside and into the waiting taxi, texting the address as she went.

* Tom smiled brightly as the rain fell, there had been one question about Taylor, but he dismissed it, focusing on the movie instead, he smiled, posed and spoke with his fellow cast members for what seemed like an hour on the carpet. He loved that the tour was starting at home, he would be able to get another few days at home. More importantly, if Danielle could get everything sorted in Ireland, she could come home, he could spend a few more days with her before he left again, that caused him to smile more.

He joked and smiled as he, Brie Larson and Samuel Jackson stood together, being photographed and Jackson complained jokingly of the British weather. He began to walk into the cinema finally and sighed. Overall the evening was a success thus far. He took out his phone and looked at it, a few texts had come in, all of well wishes, but none from Danielle, which caused him to frown. She knew what time he was due to be in the cinema, she was usually one of the first to text, so it felt a slight bit disheartening. He looked at the celebrities that had come to the premiere also, the cameras flashing as they posed, he found himself hoping they enjoyed it. He also watched the others that had secured tickets, Emma said she was coming, so at least his little sister would be in the crowd, one of the first to give her opinion on it. He had not seen her enter, but the simple text 'we're here' had made its way to his phone, making him smile.

The movie was well edited, the CGI made all the imaginary running for his life look good, and from those who were present, it seemed to be well received, not Oscar-worthy, but good nonetheless. Again, he checked his phone a few times through the movie, but there was no word from Danielle. He was tempted to text, but as the first to clench his jaw when others did such things, he resisted, he would ring her when he was done. He watched as one woman rose from her seat in a manner that suggested she was trying to make as little of a nuisance of herself as possible and rushed up the aisle of the theatre. She was well dressed, her choice elegant, but Tom had to admit alluring also, he had not seen her outside posing for photos yet he felt as though he knew her, but he shook his head, she was of similar build to Danielle and he had not seen her face properly because she had not looked toward him in the darkened room.

There was a round of applause when the film ended and slowly the lights began to rise again. The room was a flurry of activity once more. Tom felt his phone vibrate in his pocket and when he saw Danielle's name, he grinned widely.

Danielle - I hope you had a great night and that the screening went well, I know it will do great with people. Why do I get the feeling you have made a new clatter of 'Hiddlestoners' with this one xx

Tom smiled as his brow furrowed, unsure what Danielle was referring to, but to see a text from her caused him to feel elated. With people congratulating him he shook hands and began to talk to people regarding the film.

The after-party was being held in a small club not far from the cinema, the list was shorter than the premiere one and in truth, as much as Tom enjoyed getting people's positive reactions, he wanted to go home.

He forced the smile onto his face as he stood with the same small flute of champagne in his hand after half an hour, counting down the minutes until he could leave.  "Well done." the first genuine smile came onto his face as he heard his sister's voice behind him. She embraced him tightly in a hug. "I actually really enjoyed that."

Tom chuckled, "you sound somewhat shocked by that statement."

"Well, remakes can go either way," Emma stated defensively.

"Where is Jack?" Tom looked around before looking to Emma again.

"At work, I told you this the other day."

"But you said 'we're here'."

"Yes," Emma grinned. "But I never mentioned Jack."

"Then…" Tom turned slightly and stared open-mouthed as he realised who was beside them. Feeling incredibly sheepish for noting the woman that had gone to the restroom during the movie was similar to his girlfriend, not realising it was actually her. Danielle's hair was tied back from her face, which had her make-up done to have a natural look and she donned a dress he knew for a fact she had not had in the closet before going to Ireland. "How…the house…?"

"Done and dusted yesterday, I flew home at lunchtime. Hello, by the way." Danielle smiled.

Tom immediately leant in and forced himself to only kiss her cheek. "Hello, I…I didn't think…"

"When Luke rang about that confirmation for the show, he asked if I planned on coming as a normal patron, I told him to see if I could keep a ticket aside, and when Bernadette all but snapped the bank draft from my hand, I knew I could make it."

"So it's done, you have the house?"

"I have half the house, but don't worry, I will get the other half soon." Danielle winked. She watched as Tom fought to prevent himself from declaring to the room about them, his eyes darting over her elegant dress which shaped her breasts perfectly. "Behave," she warned.

"This will be the longest two hours of my life." He groaned.

"What was it you called it before," Danielle teased as she leant in to whisper in Tom's ear so Emma would not hear. "Delayed Gratification." She grinned.

Danielle's dress

My take on modern Star Trek compared to the old:

Star Trek very much embodied what liberal American white males of the 1980s and 1990s thought the future would (or should) look like: secular, sexually liberated, humanistic, meritocratic, equitable, and technological – a man’s world, basically. In this world, religion plays practically no role in public life. Problems are solved with diplomacy instead of violence. Money doesn’t exist, so there is no capitalism, greed, or want. People spend their lives bettering humanity and doing other such noble things like negotiating peace with aliens or exploring the universe in one of Starfleet’s advanced starships, each equipped with a plethora of miraculous technologies. In their leisure time, the crews of these starships visit a holographic room, the holodeck, which can conjure any fantasy into a photorealistic facsimile of the real thing.

Probably the only place in the Western world where this mentality can still be found is California’s Silicon Valley. As in the fictional world of Star Trek, men do most of the work; they advance through meritocracy; and there is something akin to a fraternal culture, irrespective of the prevailing progressive ideology. Silicon Valley is also still largely free of the odious diversity requirements imposed on the rest of society.

…

The high point of the franchise, The Next Generation, featured a mostly white liberal cast and various things white liberals liked at the time – sex appeal, food, pseudointellectualism (although handled capably by talented male writers), cutting edge tech, meritocracy, optimism, exploration, and the white man’s moralism.

Starfleet, the Federation’s military and scientific branch, was a rigorous meritocracy, just as Silicon Valley is today. Members were admitted only through a combination of senior officer recommendations, high scholastic achievement, and phenomenally high standardized test scores. Character was also paramount. Crew evaluations feature prominently in several episodes of TNG, and it was made clear to underperforming members that the starship Enterprise cuts a standard above the rest; perform or hit the road.

In the diverse world of Star Trek, the white writers imagined meritocracy would ensure whites like themselves would still have a position at the top of society (just as in Hollywood then and Silicon Valley now) despite soon becoming a minority in real life America. You’ll notice progressive humans are at the center of the Federation in Star Trek despite being a small minority in that fictional universe as well. That’s by design, conscious or not.

…

In the TNG episode The Drumhead, Picard faces down a witch hunting admiral — a woman, no less. The plot revolves around an incident that occurred on the starship Enterprise. Sabotage is suspected, and the situation is tense. The initial evidence points to a low ranking crewman who is later discovered to be of mixed race, one-quarter of the Federation’s most feared enemy. This all but convicts him in the eyes of the admiral’s tribunal. The admiral mercilessly presses her case, threatening to destroy anyone who gets in her way. She’s meant to be a caricature of conservative jingoists of the era – always scared of the Russians, racist against minorities, emotional. In Hollywood’s view of history, those were the people behind the McCarthy hearings, which this episode obviously pulls from.

…

Toward the end of the episode, Captain Picard confronts his antagonist and gives a fine speech about principle, temperament, and morality in the process. The admiral is defeated when a fellow admiral, a black male character, stands up and walks out in disgust at her actions.

This is one of the reasons why fans liked the character of Jean-Luc Picard: he was a decent, honorable man despite not being perfect himself. He had a code he lived by, and he led by example. Men like that sort of thing. Star Trek Picard, in contrast, portrays him as a bumbling moron who is always wrong and continually berated by female underlings. His view of the world is portrayed as naive or just wrong, requiring strong SJW women to take it to the enemy themselves, often employing violence – including rank murder and sadistic violence.

In another episode of TNG, white male commander Riker stands up to his white male superior — an admiral — who wishes to break the terms of a peace treaty to gain a military edge over a mortal enemy. Riker prevents him from doing so and exposes the dastardly plot. Moral of the story: principle trumps Machiavellianism.

Star Trek was very much a pre-Millennial liberal morality play whereby inspired characters (mostly white) would often stand up to authority figures (mostly white) in order to promote a general moral code — a greater authority — among fellow whites.

Consider some of the following things about Star Trek: The Next Generation and ask yourself if any of this would be allowed on television today without controversy.

…

The diverse new cast of Discovery and Picard mostly excludes white males. The only principle white men who did not appear in make-up during Discovery’s first season were either villains or openly gay. The show’s lead is a black woman who’s the best at everything, acts bizarrely hostile towards the crew and later berates the male commanding officer, captain Pike – introduced in season 2. There’s also an assortment of other female archetypes more typically seen in network television crime dramas – the dorky female comic relief, the bestest ever leader, the tech guru.

Star Trek: Picard’s white male actors, aside from TNG cameos, are mostly villains when they appear at all. Picard himself is a senile old man who contributes essentially nothing to the show. He is used as the butt of criticism from the cast. It’s clear the writers are using him as a canvas to paint their grievances with the real world. Picard — white male America — stands in the new boss’s empowered way. He lives in luxury as minority characters live in poverty. The (white) institutions he represents are all corrupt and racist. To rectify this injustice, the diverse cast must defy Star Trek convention – up to and including committing acts of cold-blooded murder (even villains don’t deserve that).

The new shows also – bizarrely — feature a dearth of straight black male actors. TNG had two; Voyager had one; DS9 had several, including a masculine male captain. The feminists who write this newer junk must feel threatened by their masculinity, a common phenomenon in modern Hollywood movies, comic books, and in network television: black men are usually removed (Star Trek), made gay (Marvel’s New Warriors), or turned into female servants (Samuel L. Jackson in Captain Marvel – a pet to Brie Larson). So, they’ve almost entirely been excised as primary leads in the new shows. The mostly unaccomplished female writers of Discovery even reported the more accomplished (read: threatening) black male writer, Walter Mosley, to Human Resources for uttering a racial epithet (in context with writing about racism), causing him to quit the show in disgust.

Author Walter Mosley Quits ‘Star Trek: Discovery’ After Using N-Word in Writers Room

Discovery and Picard are both written by a crowd that obviously hates the demographic they are writing for, so they pepper many of the episodes with things they know that demographic will take as insults – female characters insulting male characters, underhanded jokes about masculinity or mansplaining, obnoxious female leads, incompetent white male characters who need female instruction, excessive melodrama, denigration of lore. It’s patently obvious. They aren’t even being subtle about it.

…

Fundamentally, these new shows struggle because they are written by people wholly unlike the target audience, so they are not able to appeal to them (the same is true of other ruined male franchises like Star Wars – but I’ll save that for another time). These new shows aren’t for the old audience. The new — diverse — show runners have made that clear. Star Trek now serves as a vehicle for airing out racial and gender grievances against the perceived white male audience. It’s akin to planting your tribe’s flag on another tribe’s territory. The aggrieved gets a rush from being able to rub their enemy’s face in their loss. It’s intentional.

…

Regardless, the primary audience for a show like this is heterosexual men, disproportionately white … And when minority male characters appear, they’re not supposed to be losers upstaged by their sassy, disrespectful and arrogant female subordinates. In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the black male captain put his hothead female executive officer in her place more than once. In the new Treks, men are continually insulted, often for no good reason, by female crew members.

What do men like in Star Trek?

Men like technology. So, the writers of Picard introduced a magic wand to the newest iteration.

…

Men like adventure, not melodrama. So, obviously the female writers feature an inordinate number of episodes of characters crying.

…

Most of the adventure element prominent in previous shows is absent or poorly constructed in the newer ones … or ripped off from other properties, including video games. Paramount was being sued a while back for copyright infringement.

…

Men also like ship design, which was a major component of the old shows. They provided countless hours of free fan promotion across message boards and websites, they were cool locations for new episodes, and they inspired fan movies. So, obviously that had to be sidelined in the new shows. The ships, once iconic and profitable selling toy items, are now generic CGI models – totally uninspired trash hastily put together as an afterthought. The new shows can’t sell the merchandise, so the retailers have refused to license much of it.

Another thing men like? Group service – following rules, meritocracy, sacrifice for the tribe, defending territory (even the non-violent philosophical variety), that kind of thing. Well, that’s almost totally absent in Discovery and Picard. The once-honorable and meritocratic military-like Federation is portrayed as corrupt and unequal; the black female lead of Picard berates Jean-Luc in one episode for living “in his fine chateau” while she lived in poverty – again, a totally antithetical concept to the old shows.

…

The whole Federation is a dystopia with criminals and drugs and injustice all about.

Various Federation admirals in the new movies and television shows are belligerent, short-sighted, and rude; one is an outright war criminal. TNG featured at least two episodes with corrupt Federation admirals, but our show’s male heroes put them in their place by the end of the episode. Even the female captain Kathryn Janeway did this once in Voyager. Not true of these newer shows, though. Admirals berate the male characters, then go away – never to be redeemed or brought to justice.

Many of the characters in the new shows act entirely unprofessional towards each other. They are sometimes even cruel or sadistic. The female captain of one Discoveryshort Trek allowed a bumbling white male crewman (whom the female writers mocked the entire episode) to die horribly and then simply shrugged it off when asked about it, “he was an idiot” (implication: he deserved to die because he was annoying her).

…

The biggest supporters of these new incarnations, not surprisingly, are the show’s American writers – along with a few “critics”. These people lack any loyalty to a higher cause (other than themselves), are nihilistic, are sadistic, enjoy berating “the other” (men, whites, themselves even), and have practically no respect for anything they aren’t personally invested with. In other words, they are thoroughly Americanized losers.

There would be a college thesis in that observation if we lived in a better timeline. In this one, the world where the bad guys won, you are stuck reading it in a random internet comment.

I think that observation explains much of what is wrong with modern culture: the past, in many ways, was better than the present and probably will end up being better than the near future. That’s intolerable to a lot of political extremists, the very people who put us in this position in the first place. So, the past has to be destroyed; it serves as a foil to the current reigning madness. “Let the past die, kill it if you have to.” That’s why pop culture had to be denigrated. That’s why Star Trek is trash nowadays.

When conquering armies of the ancient world subdued an enemy, they often defaced the conquered tribe’s symbols – destroyed the statues, burned the temples, desecrated anything sacred; both Muslim and Christian conquerors were famous for this. Same thing here. The new regime is burning the cultural bridges so you can’t go back to the better world left behind, the one not ruled by them.

…

Although, in fairness to the ladies, it’s mostly men like Alex Kurtzman who have ruined the new shows. The guy once stated in an interview that he has a problem writing male characters. Hollywood: let’s hire that guy for Star Trek!

I see you saw Captain Marvel. what's your opinion on the movie? i kinda liked it, but I feel like i haven't got a strong opinion yet :/

since i don’t know how to write reviews, i’ll just… here goes.

ok so, the movie wasn’t as bad as i expected it to be, and it necessarily wasn’t as Great as i wanted it to be. i say it wasn’t as bad because i always go to a theater with the half ‘how bad can it be’ and half ‘i hope it’ll be good’ kind of an attitude. 7/10 for me. i feel like upon rewatching it i’d give it a 7,5/10.

and now hear out my logic before you go after me or something, because i can explain, okay. it’ll be messy, so i’ll just… do it in points

- music - some of it worked, some of it didn’t. i felt like the need to be 90s-like overwhelmed the directors/producers, and some of the songs weren’t put in the moment they should’ve been, or were put in a wrong way (say, Come As You Are). but it worked for the most part, no big complaints on my side.

- editing - it worked for like 90% of the movie. sometimes the editing was so quick that i couldn’t tell what was going on. but even the badly edited moments are light years ahead from the TASM movies.

- the make up was just… amazing. the fact that the skrulls looked so good makes you wonder why fox got lazy on their make up with like one fucking person. mcu literally paints like half of their characters, even wade wilson in fox looks just wonderful, and then you have raven who looks more and more like shit with every movie she appears in.skrulls looked almost breathtaking, i was really amazed by the job the make up artists did, huge kudos to them. the fact that talos expressed his emotions so well under the prosthetic was just… wow. kree looked very good, the glowing on carol look very nice, and the cgi on nick fury was just freaking groundbreaking - at some point you just couldn’t believe this guy is like 70yo in real life. when the cgi is so good you don’t even notice it, then you know that the artist reached their goal.

- i liked the world building. i understood the cosmic stuff for the most part. i knew who, why, when, and what for. the movie had a lot to say in not so much time, yet it still kinda managed to no overwhelm me with the information.

- i adored the interactions. characters were playing off each other really well. the buddy cop relationship between carol and fury was undoubtedly one of the best parts of the movie.

- the pacing was great. some of the marvel movies or movies in general really feel like they want to be 8 hours long, and this movie doesn’t have that problem. you don’t really notice the time passing, the scenes don’t drag, there’s no focusing on such bullshit like obligatory/forced hetero relationships, too long conversations, or too long action scenes, and before you know it the movie ends - that’s how you know the pacing was fine. (compare it to AMATW and how it dragged. seriously, i needed breaks while watching ant-man and the wasp. i couldn’t sit and watch this whole movie. thank god i didn’t go to the cinema for that because i’d probably annoy everyone with pee breaks every 3 minutes. but that’s an opinion, don’t @ me, we can have different opinions about different movies and still live a good life.)

- i really, really enjoyed the way the movie mixed everything. you have the kree, you have skrulls, you have humans, shield, the air force, some flashbacks, and the movie doesn’t feel like a frankenstein kind of a creature. take TASM 2 for example where it feels like you’re watching 9 different movies put in 1 movie despite the action taking place in one freaking city. i felt like it was all tied together very well in captain marvel, and i think it may be because the main character took you on the journey and showed you everything from her perspective, and it worked.

- the humor was so good. you had to get used to carol’s snarky comments or how she brushes off everything with jokes, and then some dry-like kind of humor came in, and then some real humor came in, and even if some jokes didn’t land, it still felt like that person would actually say it.

- i like the twist with mar-vell [*‘everything has to be like in the comics’ people screeching in the background*]. i like how the skrull were done - i really, really felt for the skrulls (that moment when talos rubbed his face against his wife… my eyes watered.)

- goose the cat. that’s it. he won my heart.

- and as i mentioned before - the movie also undercuts these superhero-landing tropes - we’ve seen that before, it’s not so impressive anymore, AND we’re gonna see it dialled to 11 in endgame.

- now hear me out and don’t @ me - brie larson does not have the MCU-like charisma… YET. just yet. she’s on a good ground. you know she likes that role, it shows she likes that role, she wants to play it, she wants to be that character.

mcu charisma is what i like to call the kind of a vibe that the mcu actors give off when playing their roles. you know nobody could replace tony stark, you know nobody could play steve rogers the same way evans does, you watch tom holland and forget it’s tom holland, you see a peter parker, you look at rhodes and forget there’s an actor underneath. i didn’t feel that with brie larson just yet in like 1/3 of the movie. i could see her acting, see her having fun and knowing what she’d like to do.

and i’m NOT saying it’s her fault she doesn’t have that charisma yet. i think the fault’s in the writing and the directing. carol danvers did not have enough ‘me’ screentime. again, don’t @ me, i do not criticize the acting or the actress, or the movie. it’s about how her character was written into the story. because it felt just like that - she was written into the story, instead of the story being written around her, despite her being the main character. and it was a glaring problem that wasn’t really a problem you cared about - and that was because the lines delivery was great, the movie was funny, well-paced, well-acted, the action was good, the music for the most part was good, the cgi aged well. so you didn’t really notice that lack of ‘is she the charcter yet, has she become the character yet?’ thing.

but then again, i didn’t feel for steve rogers up until the end of the movie where he crashed the ship. i didn’t feel for thor in any other movies than the avengers, ragnarok, and then endgame. i still don’t feel for sam wilson EVEN THOUGH i like the character (he certainly has more depth than black widow in one movie than she has in all the movies, and it’s the writers’ fault, not scarlett’s). i have never felt for black widow - she has no character for me. she’s better now than she was in im2, but i still don’t like her as a character, and that is because i have… nothing… to like. she’s snarky and bland for me. and it’s a shame because then you see shuri or pepper potts, or okoye, or even aunt may and you can tell they have a lot of depth despite being given not so much time on the screen. and then natasha shows up and like, ugh. *spider-man noir voice* who are you again?

some of the mcu actors hit off with the character charisma the moment they show up on the screen, some of them take their time, and it’s ok. it’s absolutely ok for brie larson to not BE carol danvers yet.

we’re yet to see her in endgame and in other movies, so i’m more than certain she she’ll become a captain marvel.

i feel like she’ll kind of have this thor complex - boring (yet carol is way way way way better in her movie that thor was in thor 1 and 2, don’t @ me, i really don’t like thor 1 & 2) in the origin movie, but wackier and ultiple times more interesting as it goes on. she also has this stephen strange complex - she needs more characterization the way doctor strange did. strange was a prodigy in almost everything he did job-wise but was disconnected with his emotional side, and i kinda feel the same for carol danvers.

she will be good, i feel it, i believe in it, give her time. even though i liked her in the movie, she still lacks some depth. that’s not to say she has no depth, no, she has a lot of it. she just hasn’t been able to show it yet.

overall, given that it was a first movie with such huge budget for those indie movie directors, i think they managed. yes, the movie is a bit scattered, and it lacks a bit of depth, but it ties into the mcu very well, it’s entertaining, the humor is good, and the action is good.

7/10. lighthearted and entertaining, even if a bit choppy. we can discuss.

Captain Marvel Review: Not Just a Girl (Spoilers).

It’s Here! The final chapter before Avengers: Endgame, the newest hero, and the first female led movie in the MCU Captain Marvel! Carol Danvers is here and she is ready to take on Thanos bare handed, but first she had her own adventure to go on. For a solo/origin hero movie Captain Marvel is fun, heartfelt, and thrilling. Who is Carol Danvers? There was a lot of talk about whether Brie Larson would be able to capture the comic book characters intensity, (a stupid fear, she has a freakin’ Oscar) Would the MCU’s first female lead be strong? Likeable? Maybe she wouldn’t smile, or her voice would be too high. All worries were unfounded because both Brie Larson and Carol do the comics justice. Larson’s portrayal is layered, she is likeable, and she is badass. Carols dry humour, coupled with Larson’s delivery, help her cut down anyone who dares get in her way, Fury, Talos, Yon Rogg, all pale next to her, because she is simply too badass to put up with men who want to make her less than she is. The scene where she comes across a biker who tells her to smile directly mirrors the treatment a lot of male MCU fans gave the character when the first trailers came out. Instead of smiling she steals his bike. Instead of placating her mentor, Jude Law/Yon Rogg/Dumbledore, she owns her own sense of self worth, saying she “Doesn’t need to prove anything to him.” She does more damage in thirty minutes than all the other heroes have done collectively over a ten-year period and it’s exhilarating watching her cut through enemies and spaceships like butter. The scene where she unlocks her potential and kicks ass to No Doubt’s “I’m Just a Girl”? Cinematic poetry. But it isn’t all photon blasts and quick remarks; there is a vulnerability and humanity that is uniquely Brie Larson. To have a gruff, completely cold character, or a too bubbly fun lover would be a disservice. She is at her best when the two sides come together. Her vulnerability, her sensitivity to others are strengths, they don’t take away from how badass she is. Only 90’s kids will remember The movie really wants you to know that when Carol crash lands on earth that she is in fact in the 90’s. From the first shots of her crashing through the roof of a blockbuster video everything screams grunge. The best references were to Carol and Maria playing street fighter 2, using the Alta Vista search engine, and the costume styling. Sooo much plaid. The soundtrack is full of nineties bangers that both fit the time period and the story. Strong female singers like Gwen Stefani in No Doubt and Courtney are used to highlight Carols most badass moments. Nick Fury is young and has an eye and SHIELD isn’t full of Nazis. Sometimes the layers of nostalgia are quite thick, like all the 80’s nods in Guardians, and a lot of random references are shoehorned in. But for the most part these references at a unique flavour to the story that helps further differentiate it from the other MCU movies which is getting harder and harder to do. The Power of Friendship. In the last ten years the MCU has had a lot of good friendships evolve, Bucky and Steve, Tony and Rhodey, Thor and Heimdall. But before now we haven’t seen any female friendships blossom, not even in the team up movies. Carol and Maria, played by the amazing Lashana Lynch is a beautiful thing to see. Described by Brie Larson as the movies true love story, of friendship lost and then found again she couldn’t be more right. The pair have an amazing relationship, two women supporting each other and thriving in an industry dominated by men. Their mantra “higher further faster” a tribute to their ability to rise up together. They join Mar Vels programme together and support each other up until Carols “accident”. Their reunion upon Carol’s return to Earth is emotional and touching, Maria’s tears as she reminds Carol of who she is, is one of the most touching scenes in the film. Maria even helps during the films climax, egged on by Marias daughter, Monica. Monica also adds a sweet innocence to the movie, excited when Auntie Carol returns. Monica Rambeau also has a lot of interesting arcs in the comic universe also and it will be interesting to see if the MCU character follows suit. Carol and Fury: BROTP. Very few heroes have been able to go toe to toe with Fury’s charisma and imposing personality. Some obey (Steve, Natasha, Clint), some rebel (Tony), but few have ever felt like his equal. No one besides Carol has ever been able to create a playful comradery. Whether it’s a symptom of being younger or less jaded doesn’t seem right, because he’s still badass. Carol is probably the first person to ever knock him down a few pegs (“Congratulations agent Fury you just asked a relevant question.) Like Carol he goes against his superiors in favour of what he thinks is right. Brie Larson and Samuel L Jackson have electric chemistry, throwing barbs and having each other’s backs when it counts. The fact that the two actors are close friends helps with the organic evolution of their characters connection. The fact that Fury kept the beeper on his person for twenty or so years is a testament to how much he trusts Carol. SKRULLS: Be careful who you trust. The Skrulls an alien race of green shape shifters who can take on the form of any being that they encounter and seamlessly blend in, essentially taking over planet one person at a time. A huge plotline in Marvel comics, the Kree versus skrull war is the movies central conflict. Carol is told that essentially the Skrulls are baddies and her team of noble warrior Kree are all that stand between the shape shifter and total domination. The fact Marvel has trouble creating memorable or impactful villains, who’s motivations are usually unimportant, never to be heard from again. (Loki and Thanos are exceptions.) The Kree as a concept are pretty terrifying, unseen they could take over family or friends without you knowing, and their original forms are like scary green goblins. Ben Mendelsohn plays their leader Talos, a charismatic leader with a single purpose in mind who will do anything to reach his goals. Mendelsohn comedic timing coupled with a thick Australian accent puts him above a lot of the blander villains. His fear of Goose is particularly hilarious. But it’s once you find out why he’s doing what he’s doing that he and the Skrulls become more. If you follow the news or pay attention to the state of the world right now the plight of the Skrulls will feel really familiar to you. Misplaced and hounded by an army that is far better armed, just looking for a planet of their own. Obviously, their methods are pretty insidious and wrong, which highlights how desperate this group of characters are. This helps in developing Carol as a character, who makes the conscious choice to go against her “team” or the Kree and does what she thinks is truly the right thing. The Goose is Loose. Lastly, the little scene-stealer Goose the cat/flerken! Not everyone is a cat person, but everyone should be a Goose person. Where he came from is a little vague, and why he came to earth is unknown. Fury loves him, Carol loves him. The only person who doesn’t is Talos, which is a hilarious gag. His flerken moments are disturbing and wild; his tesseract strength stomach is a site to behold. He is the only being besides Carol to melt Nick Fury’s heart, and he is the answer to one of the MCU’s last remaining huge questions: What happened to Nick’s eye? How does Captain Marvel fit into the MCU. We know the events of Captain Marvel occur before almost every event in the MCU bar Captain America’s origin. None of the other heroes exist in their current forms, no stones have been collected and no team has been formed. That last part, the idea of forming of the Avengers initiative comes right after Carol and Nick’s adventure, the name a nod to Carols air force days which is a nice touch. Coulson and Nick are young; their cgi faces actually work really well, after about 20 minutes it all starts looking really natural. The MCU tends to use it’s trump card when it wants to make a solid connection between movies and that is the tesseract. The cosmic cube has been owned by Nazis, Loki, Odin, and finally Odin. Another piece of the artefacts origin is put into place. However without remembering where the cube was after world war two you have to wonder how the cube was passed around so much afterwards. It isn’t used in Carol’s comic origin, and it doesn’t make total sense. It’s a very convenient plot device, but any other Kree object could have been put in it’s place. It does make Carol the strongest hero in the MCU however which is fitting, giving her the ability to travel so far from Earth that she has no clue about any of the events that happen in her absence until Fury pages her in the Infinity War post credit scene. Brie Larson’s explanation, that there are a lot of planets and species in the universe that need help besides Earth, is actually a pretty solid explanation. But is she really gone the whole time? Did she pop in occasionally to see Maria and Fury at any point? Did it take twenty years to help the Skrulls? All valid questions that aren’t answered. Where will the MCU go, after Endgame, now that it’s unleashed it’s most powerful force? It’s exciting to think future adventures could happen away from earth, that villains could potentially become stronger, Maybe Galuctus will pop up. Brie Larson and others have mentioned the possible appearance of Miss Marvel, Kamala Khan in the sequel, which would fit nicely with the films message of girl power and a lot of people would love to see. Wherever the MCU goes after Endgame is open ended, but Carol’s strength opens up so many exciting possibilities.

Captain Marvel (2019):  I probably shouldn’t have opinions about this movie because that’s pretty much just shooting off a flare into space that I don’t want to have sex all the time anymore, every day, day after day, and 0.7 times a year with other people, it’s a curse.  Having opinions about this movie’s bad karma-- some real incel shit, probably.  Because its not really a fantasy for boys-- it’s a very particularly fantasy for women, namely the fantasy of war-loving women not really succeeding at anything and messing up their mission, but then having a black lady call them fierce anyways.  It’s a fantasy for Hillary Clinton, who is my abuelita. 

That was the best part of the movie, watching the black lady saving the movie-- I felt, like, proud for that actress, pulling off that scene in a big movie, like that.  But it was also just kind of funny because at that point in the movie, Captain Marvel had gotten beat up by Jude Law (eew)(just to Jude Law, generally-- eeew-- why are we still doing that??), gotten lectured by Space Siri, gotten kidnapped on her big mission, built a space phone but didn’t have enough pocket change to use it (what?), chased someone and then not caught them, then gone to some This Is Your Life library except run away when the people she was chasing the scene before showed up rather than fight them, like I thought was the plan; and also worn a Nine Inch Nail shirt but in ‘95 which means she’s repping Downward Spiral, and not Broken or Pretty Hate Machine, which I consider to be a failure of taste.  Like, Captain Marvel was kinda a fuck-up but then halfway through Brie Larson having to recreate the “I don’t want... yo’ life” monologue from Varsity Blues, they have a black lady go like “you can touch my hair whenever you want” and it’s like, yeah you know what Captain Marvel you alright.  

Hip white ladies and how they feel about black ladies-- I don’t know what that’s all about, but I enjoy whatever weird-ass shit is going on in that relationship...  

The other best part is when the movie turns into a sneaker commercial about how girls can do sports, too.  I liked that part-- I didn’t get teary eyed or anything, but you know, good for the ladies.  And hey, you know what?  I bet they can do sports. Some people will say, "Tumblr’s gone too far,” but now that I can’t show you porno-gifs anymore, that’s just the kinda edgy content this blog needs to stay relevant... 

The other best part of the movie is Annette Bening.  She’s just good.  I just like Annette Bening.  (I like Brie Larson generally too, but they really didn’t give her much to show off being an actress on this one...).  They use technology to make Sam Jackson not look like a 70 year old man but then he has an action scene and it’s like “yep, he’s 70.”  Can’t CGI the 70 out of that guy’s physical movements, I guess...

I never really read those comics (and I don’t really care about the Kree-Skrull War comics) so I don’t have, like, nerd opinions about this one besides I made a little happy noise when Kelly Sue had her cameo.  That’s the nicest part about this movie, is how her and the people she got going, that Carol Corps or whatever, what this all must mean for them.  That’s all pretty swell, by any math, them getting a win this big. 

But that said, boy, that character-- is there anything going on there?  Most of the Marvel characters have to struggle with some shadow-- Hulk’s got anger; Spider-Man’s guilt; Gerry Conway’s description of Iron Man; etc.  Having a shadow was the entire deal to Marvel comics.  But I couldn’t really figure out what Captain Marvel’s interior struggle was-- besides like, amnesia?, which to me, is just a sitcom situation and not really a shadow.  Mostly, Captain Marvel just felt like the human version of that Dreamworks Face, even though she comes from Space Israel or whatever and you’d think would act more space-alien-y at first, or ever, at all during this movie.

(I mean, the biggest problem this movie faced is being the superhero movie after Spiderverse though.  Like, something had to eat that bullet, but... boy, that was 80% of what I was thinking about during.  “Spiderverse managed to do this!” ).

Plus, the movie has that problem of all these sci-fi movies now with a lady being a hero, where I guess they’re so scared of showing a woman getting the shit beat out of her ala True Romance, so they just make the girls’ superpower being “never having to struggle to win a fight”.  It’s always like watching those no-stakes fights in the Matrix 2 when you know Neo’s just fuckin’ around, except with Snow’s Informer playing because remember the 90′s haha.

Anyways, most of the movie was just kind of ... ideas that sound good on paper, but just didn’t seem exciting when I was watching them. I never saw any of these folks’ earlier movies.  (I really wanted to see Half Nelson!  I’ve been, like, guilty about not seeing that movie for a long time because a lot of people thought I’d like that one for some reason??).  But I just found the basic moment-to-moment storytelling just not very involving, for me, mostly.  (The only thing I really actively disliked in the movie was the sound mix, though-- maybe it was my theater, but all the volumes were really strange in that move...)

You know: it’s a Marvel movie-- it was mostly boring but fine, just fine, the suits won, they grow movies in a lab now, the story does’t really make sense but it’s fine, but... all in all, at least i wasn’t watching Benedict Cumberbatch learn that he’s special, so it’s not the worst one of those, either.  It’s fine.  I get why people like it, I think.  It’s nice they have a thing to like.  (The first ten minutes when it’s pure space opera are kinda neat and weird and visual, but then I turned cold at the flashback scene specifically and never rallied from there). I just see these movies to live in the world and as an excuse to be around friends and all, so you know.  Having opinions about them is just dumb.  But one time I was like “hey we should have sex” to a girl and she said nah, and I was like “bummmmmer”, so here I am, having opinions about Captain Marvel online.  Damn.  Damn.  Oh shit, Youtube radicalized me!!!!

WIG REVIEW: CAPTAIN MARVEL

Ok fine I saw this! As I have written before, we are all now obliged to see all Marvel Universe movies...so that we may see upcoming Marvel Universe movies. It’s a never-ending cycle that will continue forever and has made us collectively watch like years of long-ass movies but we will never ever stop.  THE NEXT AVENGERS MOVIE COMES OUT IN A MONTH LET’S JUST DO THIS. But what about the wigs? Let’s discuss.

We begin in outer space, where people/aliens (?) wear kimono tops and train to fight in some intergalactic war that I definitely don’t care about and Jude Law wears terrible contact lenses. Brie Larson is identified as “Vers” and as  contractually obligated by any female Marvel Universe lead, wears a terrible wig. It is kind of dried out, kind of curly, kind of a mess, but in that breezy/sexy way, and for only this opening scene, is rightfully pulled back into a pony so she can train to fight. Jude has some alien name that I don’t care to remember and tells Brie constantly that she’s too much of an emotional woman and I already see what they’re doing here FINE. 

Anyway, before anything is explained about what the hell is going on in this planet, Brie and Jude are suited up and off to do some covert operation that I truly do not understand or care about. However, I cannot emphasize enough how much I disliked Jude’s contacts throughout the entire movie.

For this covert operation, Brie gets suited up in this...lewk? I do not know how or why her hair is forced into a mohawk but much like everything else happening in this movie at this point: NO EXPLANATION EVEN THOUGH VERY NECESSARY. THIS IS NOT THE LEWK.

Anyway, something goes awry and Brie ends up kidnapped by some other aliens (?) and put into some memory extracting device where we catch glimpses of “Vers” actual self back in the good ‘ol USofA. Most of these memories involve a younger version of Brie getting knocked down and told to stick to gender stereotypes and OMG I GET WHAT YOU ARE DOING MOVIE - OY.

And then somehow she escapes from the memory machine and gets catapulted to earth, specifically to Los Angeles in  1995 and GET READY FOR 90s REFERENCES! BLOCKBUSTER! RADIO SHACK! GRUNGE! SONGS YOU HAD HOPED TO NEVER HEAR AGAIN! There is even an elaborate chase scene through the LA subway system that felt very much like a sequel to Speed (except NOT Cruise Control - NO THANK YOU). Through it all, Brie’s beachy waves remained perfectly quaffed without any thought to putting it back. This actually outraged not just me but the entire viewing population who DEMANDED A HAIR TIE FOR CAPTAIN MARVEL AMEN. 

Also, we meet some Shield Agents as “played” by Samuel L. Jackson and Clark Gregg but mainly played by CGI de-aging technology. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: MARVEL JUST PLEASE USE THIS TECHNOLOGY TO GIVE US MORE 80s-90s MOVIES AND NOT MORE AVENGERS MOVIES I’M SO TIRED PLEASE.

Anyway, Brie and Samuel team up to go and try to figure out who the hell she even is (and like hard same on that - please explain yourself, movie!) and in order to go under cover at some airplane hangar, she wears this hat. Definitely can’t see your beachy wig under there now, gurl!

Then finally - FINALLY! - we meet Goose the cat. This cat was a large part of the promotional campaign for this movie and as a crazy cat lady IT ABSOLUTELY WORKED. However, I was already bummed that the friggin name of the cat was changed from Chewie to Goose to reference Top Gun and please movies: never change anything to reference Top Gun. 

Anyway, I was led to believe that this cat would be Brie’s sidekick but it was more like Samuel’s side kick? Or really like no one’s side kick (cats don’t do that - which is fair) but also I honestly could have used about 1000% more cat content in this movie, just saying. 

Regardless, we finally start getting some answers about “Vers” who is actually Carol DanVERS (Jude only saw the last part of her dog tag - get it?!?!?!), an American pilot who got stolen to space once by Jude.  Carol used to work for Annette Bening in her covert operation MAR-VELL (DO YOU GET IT? IT’S MARVEL. DO YOU GET IT THO?????)

OBVIOUSLY, I LOVE ANNETTE BENING. But her talents and green contacts and fabulous grey coif are all wasted here. I WILL REMIND YOU ALL THAT ANNETTE BENING STILL DOESN’T HAVE AN OSCAR SO STOP MAKING HER WASTE HER TIME ON MARVEL MADNESS PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

Anyway, we get some more flashbacks to Carol Danvers piloting days, when she actually used a hair tie like a rational human being. Wait is this whole loose beach hair thing supposed to be a result of alien living? Nah.

Well Brie and her beach waved wig then become Captain Marvel in her new USA-themed suit and kick a lot of Jude Law and intergalactic ass all while remaining completely curled and not in her face while fighting. Wonders never cease! I think that Hollywood needs to realize that having hair look “perfect” all the time is NOT GOOD OR BELIEVABLE. Seriously this hair withstands like a nuclear explosion at one point and still stays easy/breezy/beautiful. Huh?

Oh also in order to fly, she still has to use that mohawk helmet with Bonnie Tyler music video eyes and no - I still don’t know why. TURN AROUND BRIGHT EYES.

In the end, Brie saves the world and keeps her bewigged hair from looking bedraggled by remembering every time a boy told her she couldn’t do something or got knocked off a car or wall or whatever, like some inspirational Nike commercial about getting up and trying again and OMG PLEASE STOP WITH THE FEMINIST PANDERING. I get it - we all get it. 

I truly wanted to love this movie and it’s not all bad but everything is just so heavy handed and clunky, much like the 90s itself. And then they played a Gwen Stefani song and I wished this movie were Wonder Woman again. They do have something in common, though: bad wigs.

VERDICT: DOESN’T WURQ

Review of Captain Marvel:

Under the cut for spoilers and more, 'cept this:

100% Ace safe.

EDIT: Since one of my followers did ask, I will say this now: If you have epilepsy, this movie is not safe, not from the first 10 minutes. About 1/3 of the scenes can trigger an episode and I want y’alll to be safe.

TL;DR - worth watching.

First of all, the rating on Rotten Tomatoes by the self-centered bois who have a case of butthurt because Captain Marvel doesn't have a white male protagnist can go sit on soe cactus. They can protest all they want but they will miss out on a fun movie with an amazing theme, one that is important for anyone, guy, girl, NB, and more.

The movie was enjoyable, trope filled but also subverts some tropes in it. The plot had a couple of holes in it and somet things were a little cliche overall I enoyed it and will go watch it again in the theatre sooner than later.

The plot.... I'll be able to make a better review on the plot once I watch it a second time. There are some plot holes and some of the elements are a bit off chronologically (as someone who lived through the era at that age, too.) but they won't distract from viewing it ('cept us picky as fuck writers but I digress.)

I know I was in stitches in one scene where there is an Anachronistic search engine used for the film and my niece (who is 15) was in stitches by the time to wait factors happening. (What a flashback on how much time was wasted waiting on information or data recovery!)

The storytelling was enjoyable at the start, making it a bit of a mystery but anyone who hasn't watched anyting of Marvel movies can pick up on the story fast enough to understand. As the story unfolds and the pieces of the story start getting filled in, the story turns predictable but nothing that distracts from the overall enjoyment of the movie.

Djimon Hansou was good but I'd have enjoyed seeing him on screen more in a larger role (but that's just me.) and the CGI work on SLJ was good - you couldn't tell unless you'd have done a side-by-side of him now. ('Cause he looked like he did pre-Pulp Fiction but without the Jheri curl.) Clark Gregg had a small part for the movie but it’s an influential part. They CGI’d him some and it’s subtle but not painfully obvious. Jude Law is Jude Law and while he's not on my 5 list anymore he still is pretty to look at. The big surprise is Ben Mendelsohn. I didn't recognize him 'til I saw the name at the end and appreciated the banter and subtlety he brought to his role. But y’all keep your eyes open for Akira Akbar. Lt. Trouble is adorable as all get out - and brings a sass that only she can pull off.

Where I want to brag is the addition of Annette Benning.

She’s over 60 now and the fact that an older woman is featured, with her showing some age and also having her in a pretty important role and second important role is a good if not excellent showing of how older women are making a name and more in films now and not just the pretty faces of younger women. It's an excellent balance in that she's not there because she's someone's wife or Mom or anything so trite. The same goes for Brie Larsen. Shes not there strictly as a focus for some romantic subplot. She gets some of the typical manspaining and gets told to smile more which has a funny reaction from her along with everyone who has heard that from a man and doing what we'd all like to do in response to being told to smile more.

Thing is, she does smile. She laughs. She's cheeky and sassy and sharp as a tack and smart as a whip. Her backstory is told well along with how she earned her place and the glass ceiling she faced in the mid 90s. The explanation for how she became who she is is demonstrated and works well, even if it's been used countless times, especially in the Marvel Universe.

She has her moments of weakness, of questioning things, and wondering what to do. She's not cold, frigid, robotic or any of the other complaints that men make regarding women actresses. She's not a Mary Sue but she is a male power fantasy but with a woman in the role, it's subversive simply because it's a woman in the role. Had the MRA’s bothered to watch it and not blindly disabuse it because it wasn't a white man as the main character, they'd see the elements of the male power fantasy: smart, earned their place, willing to do anything to protect, stands up for what is right, incorruptible, do the right thing even if it's not easy, etc.

Had it been a white man in the role, the reviews would be off the chart, even if the plot had been weaker. Had it been a white man in the role, no one would complain that she has resting bitch face because men are never told to smile more or demonstrate overt emotional labor for anyone who is a man.

The intersectional feminism is wonderful stseeing two women interacting in a heart-felt way was so rewarding. There are some friendly competition moments and banter but it's far removed from any catty antagonism you'd expect. The rewarding part for me was how the Hero gets called out for what happened and why they were gone like they were. You get to see a competent, incredibly emotionally strong black woman in a role that only a few treads (like Dr. Mae Jemison.) The Hero trusts her friend completely and has no worries that she's capable. That demonstration of platonic love and trust warms my heart.

In short, it does pass the Bechtel test. It passes the Sexy Leg Lamp test. It passes the Mako Maori test. I can’t say for certain it passes the Sphynx test. The protagonist has an incomplete backstory but you get snippets and anecdotes explaining enough about her and her attitude towards life and more.

The CGI was excellent and pay attention to Goose and the 4 ginger kitties that play Goose.

And no, the cat doesn't die.

Back to the CGI thought. It's excellent and it's obvious in some places and spots but some of the CGI is very subtle which is nice, too. The movie has a sci-fi feel to it, where the ideas for future technology would be excellent leaps forward.

Colourful language? Only 1 or 2 that I remember, and one is a sexist reference.

The misogyny is present and it comes from many aspects, from institutional to familial to competitive. Part of it is expected in the 90s when institutional sexism was accepted in the early days of the opening of MOS billets in the military and the intentional glass ceiling limited opportunities for women then.

There is one incidence that could be considered questionable for the Ace test but it’s played up as humourous and cheeky rather than a tension charged moment and plays on some caricature stereotypes.

Violence is present in the movie in some abundance and there are some fatalities but mostly casualties and more where the outcome is left to viewer discretion. The two main antagonists don't perish and it fits in the storyline brilliantly but there are some that happen.

There are noticeable trope elements borrowed from some other movies, like Matrix and Men in Black (you'll know them when you see them) as well as Independence Day, Wonder Woman and even Star Wars. The blend is nice but not too overwhelming to be called derivative.

I’d say it’s worth buying a ticket in the theatre.lem

Captain Marvel

Captain Marvel is the latest Marvel film, and the first female lead Marvel film starring Brie Larson as Carol Danvers. This is a prequel to nearly all of the Marvel films before it (It’s come after the first Captain America). Introducing us to the young Nick Fury played a CGI’s smooth face of Samuel L. Jackson – it’s amazing how far CGI technology has come in such a small amount of years.

Carol Danvers is one of the elite Starforce Military. Originally from Earth, Carol ends up with the Kree training to protect Earth from Skrulls. As the attacks continue, Carol learns more about her past and unravels the truth with the help of Nick Fury. It’s a pretty simplistic storyline – as it’s a war between two groups that spread to earth, thus introducing Nick Fury to aliens and special beings allowing him knowledge that explains his Avengers initiative for future movies. It explains how the Tesseract originally ended up on earth, thus connecting to the first Avengers movie.

Everything that occurs in the movie, is connecting to the future movies and why things occurred in the order that they did, so it’s hard to get fully drawn into the storyline when you don’t need to be concerned with anyone’s well being.

The performances are decent, but it comes more across as a buddy cop comedy/action film rather than the typical Marvel film. It’s an enjoyable movie, enough to watch at least once, but considering it’s the first female lead Marvel film finally, I was hoping it would be more memorable.

It’s worth watching leading up to Endgame considering Carol is going to be in Endgame – but otherwise it’s not worth rushing out to go see. Although I did really love Goose, he was an adorable ‘cat’.

Captain Marvel = Marvel’s The Last Jedi?

When seeing previews for The Last Jedi, I never thought how much of a mess that movie would turn out to be. Granted, it was good overall, but really managed to disappoint me and become so... cliched...

Marvel Studios’ Captain Marvel may turn in the same fate. But previews have already given a majority of people the same fleeting feeling that this film is going to just go for an agenda, much like the Star Wars franchise has. For this analysis, I’ve been looking into Wikipedia for information on what this movie has to offer. I may go off on a tangent or two, so please forgive me if I do.

The first issue fans have with this soon-to-be film is its lead actress, Brie Larson. Brie is an Oscar-winning actress, but even with accolades, she’s still prone to faults. Recently, news has come out that she took the role of Carol Danvers as a form of being an activist, which I don’t think sends the right message to fans. I mean, it shouldn’t just be a job, but it also shouldn’t directly influencing viewers. Brie’s also made headlines for wanting more diversity in critics. Okay, that’s fine and all... but basically calling out white men as the majority and saying there’s too much? Is that really what you want to do? 

Brie, I haven’t seen many movies with you, but I think this is the wrong move. You’re demonizing the guys who are going to watch your movie because it’s supposed to be this blockbuster epic. On top of that, it’ll only make things worse by the time the first reviews come around. 

Regardless of the outcome of reviews, I’m still seeing this movie. One, I want to continue seeing how the Marvel Cinematic Universe expands from this. And two, I just love seeing superhero movies in general. So Brie Larson’s activism doesn’t turn me away, but it does for others. And I can totally understand their points.

Right now, the film is tracking for $100+ million on opening weekend. That’s not bad at all, but definitely lower than earlier projections had cited around $160 million. The film’s budget of $159 million will surely be met. Now the problem becomes what will fans take away from this. People are already boycotting this movie because of what agenda it’s bringing. It hasn’t even come out yet. 

Say what you will about The Last Jedi, but I barely saw any form of anger towards pandering and activism when trailers were coming around. So why now? Is it because we can no longer trust Disney to do right by these kinds of films? Well considering that Black Panther, Avengers: Infinity War, and Ant-Man and the Wasp did reasonably well at the box office, I’d say Disney was doing fine with their Marvel properties.

And thus brings us to the problem: Promoting a woman who turns out to be a superhero instead of a superhero who turns out to be a woman. Let’s face it, Carol Danvers is not exactly a beloved Marvel character... at least from what I’ve seen and read. But of course, people can warm to the character if they’re given something inspiring and not something that panders to certain audiences.

What we have here with Captain Marvel is Brie Larson playing the role of an activist, not a superhero. And that’s what seems to be the problem. If Brie took the role with the goal in mind to become Carol Danvers rather than become an activist, I think there would be a different consensus amongst those in the fandom. Tone down the rhetoric, be a hero on screen and inspire people through your movie rather than just telling us that’s what you’re doing. It ruins the fun for people. And... it might ruin the fun for me, too.

Huh... Hopefully, the trailers were just there for show and not in the final product. There were questionable lines, weird CGI issues, and some other nitpicks. But there will be good stuff in this movie. There’s so much more than just Brie Larson. We have Samuel L. Jackson, Clark Gregg, Jude Law, Gemma Chan, and so many more talented actors and actresses.

Plus, I’m already impressed with the makeup and digital de-aging effects. The Skrulls look amazing. Though... something about them seems off without the black parts atop their heads... Eh, another nitpick. Anyways, the movie should be fun enough. Looking forward to March, everyone!

Captain Marvel (2019) Review - A hot mess

OK, I have to admit that I didn’t go in having high expectations for this movie. The trailers gave me a mixed bag of feelings on this one, to be honest.  Overall my impression is that Captain Marvel came out at a bad time. It would have been better by miles if it came out before Avengers: Infinity War. I mean, then the after credits from Avengers would have a bit more sense to everyone, not just comic enthusiasts. 

Aside from that, another issue I see with the film is that it will always be compared with DC’s Wonder Woman which I don’t think it’s a fair comparison because: a) Wonder Woman is a powerhouse name on its own and b) The movies come at different times in their respective universes. 

Comparatively, WW came around after the mess that were BvS, Suicide Squad and Justice League and so brought a fresh new change of perspective for DC films in general (DC still trying to figure itself out and not having Marvel’s 10 year experience). It was, by all accounts, a total departure from the usual DC style and people loved it. Admittedly, its end sucked balls.  On the other hand, Captain Marvel came out nearing the end of Marvel Phase 3 - a period of 10 years of building a cohesive universe. By now we are expecting Marvel to already take a fresh spin on their movies, to bring something new to the table. They did that with some of their movies...this was not one of those movies. Marvel simply brought nothing new with Captain Marvel. I dare say that it was incredibly predictable, though it did have one twist at some point (Still it might have been a twist for me since I’m not that familiar with CM comics).

While it has its entertaining moments, Captain Marvel fails to deliver a solid punch and be memorable. And the reason is that it has no idea what exactly it wants to be. It knows it’s stuck in this awkward, lukewarm, moment between Avengers 1 and 2 and it seems afraid to take risks. It is, all at once, a buddy-buddy comedy, a fish out of water story, an intergalactic war story and an amnesia story, and none of them are done particularly well.  The movie starts with info dump. 

...

Let me rephrase that. The movie starts with A LOT OF INFO DUMP or EXPOSITION. Literally from the first moment we are taught what is what through a series of awkwardly-written conversation between Captain Marvel and another character. And then they do, what CinemaSins already named, fightsposition (in which two characters spew exposition as they fight, see Doctor Strange to witness it in its full glory).  After some more exposition, we get to a mission were we barely get to see stuff. I kept wishing they could just turn the light on. I mean I get it’s supposed to be this different planet, but come on man I can barely see anyone’s face at all. Following more shenanigans Captain Marvel ends on on Earth and that’s where the buddy-buddy part starts. I’ll admit, her banter with Samuel L. Jackson was pretty good and chuckle worthy. It was also nice to see Coulson again. Missed than son of a bitch.  I don’t want to offer any spoilers since it’s still so early since the movie come out. Suffice to say that some fight scenes ensue, some shown in the trailers. Some things happen here and there and then we get to the finale which, while admittedly badass, was kind of a let down.  I didn’t like the writing at al. I feel Brie Larson could be an incredible actress but something happened, aside from the writing. Some scenes with her I liked, especially when she was snarky, but otherwise she was just bland. Mainly because of the writing which, BY GOD, was bad. The only good writing was for her best friend and for the Skrulls, I’d argue. Samuel did his best with the script he got and it’s needless to say he was flawless, because, how can he not be?

*Oh and side note: the exposition returns with a vengeance towards the middle of the movie and slaps you in the face like the bitch it is.

The soundtrack I found to be rather bland. I mean the songs that were picked were ok and went with the mood but I kinda felt they wanted that Guardians of the Galaxy feel to it and it just seemed so out of place. And on top of that it did not make want to go home and listen to the soundtrack some more. Hell, I can’t even remember the songs exactly. Aside from one near the climax of the movie.

The CGI was nice thought it did have its clunky moments. 

The characters were mostly forgettable. I admit I did like Ben Mendelsohn as the Skrull Talos, but I like him in everything and anything he is in because he is awesome, thanks. Samuel L. Jackson was a given because he is entertaining as hell even with basically toilet paper as a script. Clark Gregg as Coulson as little as he was on screen. Lashana Lynch as Maria Rambeau was insanely good and really acted way better than Brie, through no fault of Brie’s though.  Jude Law was ok but it was such a baaaaaad casting choice. I can’t stress enough. He stuck out as a sore thumb. 

The plot was super predictable though I admit, as I’ve mentioned, they made a twist which I quite liked. But I think, by far, my favorite part was, like a 6-7 minute part where we’re shown her memories in a very funny and unique way and I loved that and I wanted more of that creativity woven into the story. *SIGH*

*Side mention: They do explain why in the trailers she seemed so MEH about the whole situation and it does make sense but we never really get to see her explode in a fiery passion. Sure she’s going around destroying things, letting it all loose but she still felt, somehow, restrained.  All in all I’d give the movie an 7 out of 10.  It did its job of being filler till Avengers: Endgame, it gave us a pretty interesting after credits scene, some touching Stan Lee moments and some badass moments as well and it did show why Captain Marvel is one of the strongest characters in-universe, it just showed it badly. They basically took Captain Marvel and made her squish an ant and they called it a day. Yes she is stronger than an ant, but does that mean anything? I’m not saying what she did wasn’t an impressive display of powers I’m just saying that she didn’t have a foe to go toe to toe with to really let herself shine. 

She’s saving herself up for Thanos. Wink-wink. 

Sleeping with Other People (USA, 2015)

Predictions: Kat saw this movie when it came out. Alex, half-remembering maybe having read its summary at some point, predicted that Alison Brie and Jason Sudeikis meet in a sex-addicts support group, hook up with each other, and then are afflicted with feelings.

Plot: Well, clearly Alex did read the summary for this movie, although she also obviously forgot some parts. Alison Brie and Jason Sudeikis first meet in college because Alison Brie is stalking Adam Scott, her TA. Jason Sudeikis lives on Adam Scott’s floor and rescues Alison Brie. They lose their virginities to each other and then don’t see each other again for twelve years. THEN they run into each other at a sex-addicts support group. Jason Sudeikis is a cheater cheater pumpkin eater who can’t stop two-timing...three-timing...four-timing the ladies. Alison Brie is also cheating — but only with Adam Scott. Adam Scott with a tiny unbearable mustache. She and Jason Sudeikis reconnect and decide to become friends.

Jason Sudeikis helps Alison Brie kick her Adam-Scott habit because Adam Scott is now engaged (even though he keeps calling Alison Brie anyway), while Alison Brie...well, encourages Jason Sudeikis to try to connect with women outside of sex. Meanwhile, Alison Brie has also gotten into med school, and Jason Sudeikis is playing the long game in wooing his boss, Amanda Peet. But pretty much everyone in Alison Brie and Jason Sudeikis’s lives — including the two of them — kind of thinks that they are together. But, no, they’re just friends.

Such good friends, you guys. They are just the most platonic of pals, with their snuggling and their pet names and Jason Sudeikis teaching Alison Brie how to touch herself. This is all stuff people do with their friends. Such good friends. May we all be blessed with such friendships. Friendships that we don’t want to ruin or complicate with our obvious non-friend feelings.

Things are going fine until Jason Sudeikis and Alison Brie attend Jason Mantzoukas’s kid’s birthday party. While rolling on molly, Alison Brie manages to unwittingly attract a hot single dad. Much to Jason Sudeikis’s dismay, she goes out with him. Hot Single Dad takes Alison Brie to a fancy mixer, where she runs into — surprise! — Adam Scott and his shitty little mustache wife. Devastated, she tries to call Jason Sudeikis. However, he doesn’t pick up, because he has finally managed to con Amanda Peet into a date. At the end of the night, the two of them meet up again at Jason Sudeikis’s apartment, snuggle up in bed, and admit that they are in love with each other. “But what are two platonic in-love pals to do?” Alison Brie inquires. “Nothing,” Jason Sudeikis says, with his big emo eyes. “Absolutely nothing.” (We may be paraphrasing, but barely.)

With that, Alison Brie moves to Michigan to attend med school, and she and Jason Sudeikis say goodbye forever. Which is weird, because now we all have Facebook, so… But okay, sure. Two months go by. Jason Sudeikis is now like...boyfriend of the year to Amanda Peet?? Like, taking her kid to soccer and surprising her with a birthday trip to France???? But one day, while at brunch with her, he spies A Certain Mustache sitting across the way. How can one miss that mustache? Of course, Jason Sudeikis is filled with the urge to punch said mustache in the face. This effectively terminates both Mustache’s brunch and Jason Sudeikis's relationship with Amanda Peet.

He calls Alison Brie from the police station, partly because no one else will bail him out and partly to yell that he loves her. She yells enthusiastically back. Shortly after, Jason Sudeikis is trying to settle an emotional distress lawsuit with Dr. Mustache (oh yeah, he’s a doctor), but Mustache won’t budge. Alison Brie goes to see Mustache to cut ties and blackmail him into letting Jason Sudeikis off the hook. It works. She and Jason Sudeikis walk off into the sunset to have a quickie before they get hitched.

Best Scene: Jason Mantzoukas’s kid’s birthday party. Alison Brie and Jason Sudeikis dance together while on molly, which is pretty delightful, and then are miserable coming off it, which is also delightful. Then she gets approached by Hot Single Dad, and Jason Sudeikis is real bad at hiding his jealousy. Love it.

Worst Scene: Alison Brie trying to break things off with Adam Scott at the beginning. Oh my god, the first sighting of the MUSTACHE. But also, he is such a pretentious douche. Why is Adam Scott always a douche in movies?? Though we shouldn’t complain. Without "adam scott romantic comedy douche," we would not have this blog.

Best Line: "Yeah, it's like Ted Bundy. You can't get them into a van by just being a jerk. You've got to have a certain way about you." — Jason Sudeikis, talking about Alison Brie being an “approachable psychotic.” There were a lot of very funny lines though. This one just particularly made us laugh.

Worst Line: “Because I’d rather fail with you than win with anyone else.” — Jason Sudeikis, who was pretty much always very amusing and witty...unless he was declaring his feelings, at which point he would immediately become disgusting. Several. Times.

Highlights of the Watching Experience: So many famous people in this movie! Early on, Alison Brie breaks up with Adam Brody in a restaurant, and he has a very funny flip-out. It’s a nice bit role. Also, her best friend before she falls in love with Jason Sudeikis is Natasha Lyonne, playing yet another lesbian. Does she ever play non-lesbians? Has she just been lesbian-typecast? Discuss.

How Many POC in the Film: ...Where to begin. Um. So, we have discussed on this blog in the past the crucial and controversial question: are Greeks POC? (We think yes in old-timey Europe, but probably not in modern-day America.) Anyway, Jason Mantzoukas is Greek. Some people, however, seem to think that because he has curly hair and is the color of Scar from The Lion King that he is...black???? Clearly, the casting directors of this film thought so, because his kids are DEFINITELY THE KIDS ONE WOULD CAST if one parent was white and the other was black. Those are some freaking adorable, Afro-having, mixed-race kids. On the one hand, how...nice?? that they are...celebrating...interracial...families???? On the other hand, while we may not know if Greeks are POC, I think we can all agree that they're not black.

Alternate Scenes: How about, instead of a live-action Lion King starring CGI-ed lions, we just cast humans, AKA Jason Mantzoukas in the role of Scar? (You can't un-see it now, can you? You’re welcome.)

Was the Poster Better or Worse than the Film: ...Worse? The movie is about two people who like each other but aren't having sex, whereas the poster seems to be about two people who hate each other and aren't having sex. The poster is the poster for a movie about Jason Sudeikis and Alison Brie's crumbling marriage. Maybe she just tried to drown him, so they're talking about whether sleeping with other people would improve their relationship.

Score: 8.5 out of 10 platonic-pal smooches. It was so hard to score this one, you guys, because, on the one hand, it's pretty recent, so who knows if it will stand the test of time...? But, on the other hand, is there anything we love more than best friends who are secretly in love???????? (This is a normal thing for two actual best friends to love. Not pathological at all. WHAT? SHUT UP. WE DON’T HAVE A PROBLEM. YOUR FACE HAS A PROBLEM.)

Ranking: 7, out of the 82 movies we’ve seen so far. Kat can't remember why she originally told Alex this movie was only okay???? Maybe she loved it too much and couldn't handle her feelings, much like Jason Sudeikis and Alison Brie.

New Post has been published on https://toldnews.com/world/how-to-make-an-avengers-film-in-11-steps/

How to make an Avengers film in 11 steps

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption The Avengers cast and crew (L-R): Joe and Anthony Russo, Kevin Feige, Robert Downey Jr, Jeremy Renner and Brie Larson

Avengers: Endgame, the fourth instalment in Marvel’s superhero crossover franchise, made an unprecedented $1.2bn at the box office last weekend.

It’s the biggest three-day haul in movie history; and a testament to the strength of Marvel’s serialised approach to story-telling.

Directors Joe and Anthony Russo said they were “definitely surprised” by the film’s “runaway success” – but also announced they were taking a break from the superhero genre, after making two Captain America and two Avengers films in the space of seven years.

“One of the most important things we learned is that when you’re shooting two of the largest movies ever made, and you’re shooting them back to back… is don’t shoot ’em back to back,” Anthony told BBC News, confirming the duo’s departure.

Joss Whedon experienced similar emotions after writing and directing the series’ first two instalments.

“Why on Earth would I make another Avengers movie? They’re really hard,” he mused on the DVD commentary for Age of Ultron. “It was ill advised. I see that now.”

But Marvel’s Cinematic Universe will continue – with new instalments of Spider-Man and Guardians of the Galaxy already confirmed; and a new configuration of The Avengers almost a certainty.

If you somehow end up in the directors’ chair, how should you prepare? Here are 11 key lessons from the people who made the originals.

This article does not contain spoilers for Avengers: Endgame, but will discuss plot details from the preceding films.

1) Start out on a TV show

Image copyright Fox

Image caption The Russos directed the pilot of Arrested Development, and have referenced the show in both Infinity War and Captain America: Civil War

All three directors of The Avengers made their names in TV. Joss Whedon created Buffy The Vampire Slayer and Firefly; while the Russo brothers worked on cult comedies Community and Arrested Development.

Those experiences were invaluable when it came to wrangling a cast of more than 20 characters, “because they are all ensemble shows,” says Joe Russo.

“Those were shows that had to be executed in 21 minutes, they had to be funny, and they had to have a plot. And sometimes, like in an episode of Community, you’d have 30 speaking parts – so that’s an exercise that certainly trained you in trying to contain as many characters as we do in two hours.”

“We’re drawn to multiple points of view and group dynamics, because we grew up in a very large Italian-American family,” adds Anthony, “so we’ve always loved working with ensembles.”

2) Know the characters inside-out

Image copyright Disney

Image caption The first Avengers film brought together six heroes, now there are more than 20

The joy of the Avengers is seeing how these disparate characters, and the actors who play them, interact.

“There is a natural competition when the leads from two different franchises get together and it plays right into the competition of two heroes getting together – so it is delightful,” observed Infinity War script-writer Chris Markus last year.

“A very compelling element of crossovers is who has primacy. They’re all leaders, they’re all used to leading their own worlds, and once you put them into the same room, who gets to call the shots? That is a notion we revisit several times.”

Still, it’s a challenge to give 23 separate characters a distinct voice in the confines of a three-hour film.

Luckily, there’s an old screenwriting tip that comes in handy: If your characters are well-written, you should know how each of then would react if they accidentally fall into a swimming pool.

“Thor from Infinity War would mess that pool up,” says Anthony. “Whereas Rocket – he’s not exceedingly self-deprecating, so I think I could see him gag and spit. He’d be a little irritated.”

3) Take a lot of toilet breaks

Image copyright Shutterstock

Image caption Even superheroes need the bathroom

Scott Derrickson recently tweeted how he “ran into Joe Russo outside the men’s room,” while he was editing the Doctor Strange film in 2015.

“He pitched me the basic story for both Infinity War and Endgame [and] I told him that if he could make the first movie work, the second movie would be incredible.”

Which begs the question: How long did Joe keep his colleague waiting for the loo?

“I think it was like a 10-minute pitch,” he laughs.

“But the funniest thing is that people are like, ‘Do you guys get together at Marvel all the time and have meetings about the storylines?’

“And the answer is, ‘No, it all happens on the way to the bathroom’. That’s where everyone runs into one another and starts exchanging information.”

In other words, don’t hold it in.

4) Keep the story simple

Image copyright Disney

Image caption The search for the Infinity Stones is the key plot device of Avengers: Infinity War

For all of the acclaim heaped on Infinity War, the plot can be boiled down to three words: “Thanos wants stones”.

“We have so many characters in the movie that we knew if the plot was complicated, it would take too [long] to explain and that would take away from the characters and the action,” said screenwriter Chris Markus on the DVD commentary.

Even the number of Infinity Stones caused a headache, said co-writer Steve McFeely.

“Had we invented the idea of Infinity Stones in a vacuum, I’m sure we would not have decided there were six of them. Six MacGuffins is a lot for one movie.”

To keep things moving, the Russos dictated that every scene “had to do more than one thing”.

So the opening sequence – in which Thanos crushes the Hulk, kills Thor’s brother Loki and steals one of the Infinity Stones – conveys three plot points in two minutes.

“It establishes Hulk’s journey – he’s been defeated and doesn’t particularly want to help [Bruce] Banner over the course of the movie,” explained Anthony Russo.

“It establishes a vengeance story for Thor by taking out his brother, and it establishes the plot for stone collection.”

5) The odds should seem insurmountable

Image copyright Disney

Image caption Just another day at the office

“I wanted to make a movie where being a superhero wasn’t a free pass,” said Joss Whedon, about scripting the first Avengers film in 2012.

“Where things were tough enough that you would be as strong as you could possibly be and still not be enough to deal with what was going on.

“The stakes,” he added, “are always the same.

“The stakes are: You could die.”

6) Acknowledge the ridiculous

Image copyright Disney

Image caption He’s behiiiiind you

When your heroes are up against a sentient robot who’s ripped an entire city off the face of the planet, it pays to acknowledge that everything’s a bit far-fetched.

And so, at the climax of Age of Ultron, Hawkeye takes stock of the situation and says: “We’re fighting an army of robots and I have a bow and arrow. None of this makes sense.”

“I refer to that as ‘inoculation,'” Whedon explained. “He says the thing we’re all thinking, and it plays.”

7) Talk to the animators

Image copyright Disney

Image caption Hulk and Thanos are based on motion-captured performances by Mark Ruffalo and Josh Brolin

The Avengers films are some of the most effects-heavy movies in history, with four major characters – Thanos, Hulk, Rocket and Groot – created by computer animation.

Making them believable is a crucial task, so both Whedon and the Russos started working with artists before the scripts were written.

“Thanos was difficult,” says Joe Russo. “We knew we were sunk if Thanos wasn’t photo-real, so we spent two years doing research and development on Thanos and making sure that he would work correctly.”

For his debut as the Hulk, actor Mark Ruffalo even wrote a letter to the effects team, stressing that his motion-captured performances were only the first stage of creating the character.

“We are all playing this part,” he wrote. “I have taken it as far as I can and you guys have to use what you can and then forget about me and become the Hulk.”

“It was incredibly inspiring to the animators,” recalled Whedon, who set aside a day to explain how the movie portrayed two different aspects of the green-skinned monster: “The one Bruce Banner becomes unwittingly and the one he decides to be”.

“What I found out later was that most of them – in fact all of them – had not been able to see the script, so they were just animating things in a vacuum,” he said. “So it was incredibly productive.”

8) Always put the raccoon on a chair*

Image copyright Disney

Image caption Size isn’t everything…

Have you ever noticed that Rocket – the CGI raccoon played by Bradley Cooper – is almost always standing on a chair?

“That’s a great point,” says Anthony. “When you’re dealing with characters of radically different sizes, it presents a lot of framing challenges.

“You start to learn tricks in blocking [staging the scene] to keep everyone in the same relative plane, so you can actually shoot them.”

(* or a table)

9) Ban t-shirts

When we first meet Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow in Avengers Assemble, she’s tied to a chair, barefoot and in a vest top, apparently being interrogated by shadowy Russian forces.

Of course, she breaks free in spectacular fashion… but her outfit made it one of the hardest stunt scenes to choreograph.

“Whenever you say ‘she has no sleeves’ to your stunt co-ordinator he cries man tears,” Joss Whedon noted afterwards.

“It’s very difficult to do a lot of these things if you can’t pad up the knees and elbows.”

10) Embrace the darkness

Image copyright Getty Images

Image caption Joss Whedon clashed with Marvel during the making of Age Of Ultron

Making these films is “incredibly physically demanding,” says Joe Russo, and there will inevitably be dark days.

“When you start out, it’s all perfect in your head,” Whedon told BBC News in 2015, “and when you work with the actors, it gets better.

“Then at some point you’ve been editing for so long you start thinking. ‘Who am I? What’s happening?’ and you forget why you ever showed up, and what you’re trying to say. And you despair. It’s a very bleak experience.

11) Emotion > action

Image copyright Disney

Image caption Thor is sad

Adding character beats to action sequences has been Joss Whedon’s calling card since Buffy – and he pulls it off perfectly in Age Of Ultron’s climactic battle, where Hawkeye stops whaling on the bad guys to discuss home improvements.

“You know what I need to do? The dining room,” he tells Black Widow. “If I knock out that east wall, it’ll make a nice work space… What do you think?”

“That sequence is, for me, the reason I show up,” Whedon said in the commentary. “Where two people in the apocalypse are talking about re-doing the dining room, that says more about their relationship than anything else I could have done.”

The Infinity War team made a similar decision. Their film doesn’t end with a battle but the emotional fallout of Thanos’s “snap” – scenes that left some viewers in tears.

So what will they feel when they walk out of Endgame?

“Catharsis,” says Joe Russo.

“We realise how impactful the Infinity War ending was,” adds his brother.

“We saw how difficult it was for many people and that’s something that we really respect. So we were very committed to paying off that kind of a story.”

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