“Guardians of the Galaxy” on IMDB
Sci-Fi/Adventure, 121 Minutes, 2014
Before I get into the movie I’m going to begin with a totally harmless spoiler about the end-credit tease. It has nothing to do with the main plot of the movie and I won’t give anything meaningful away. Sometimes coincidence can blow your feeble brain.
“Thor: The Dark World” on IMDB
Action/Fantasy, 112 Minutes, 2013
Thor, you crazy asgardian god, what’s going on?! Why are you throwing your hammer around? You look like somebody kicked your puppy. What? Your little friend from down in that other dimension get herself all infected with all-powerful ancient evil? Well, I’m sure she’ll be alright.
Action, 130 Minutes, 2013
[By way of explanation, this review was written on Sept 19. I may have also sent the spellchecker into a neurotic spiral of depression.]
Ahoy, maties! This be the third picture show in the “Iron Man” series. Comin’ in the roiling wake of “The Avengers” [IMDB] it struggles like a drunkin’ tar heaved overboard. Our rum-soaked sea-dog, Tony Stark, is now bedeviled by panic attacks, insomnia and insecurity after saving the whole of the seven seas from an alien boarding party in New York.
“The Amazing Spider-Man” on IMDB
Action, 136 Minutes, 2012
No matter where you fall on the question of a character reboot this soon after the Sam Raimi trilogy or the whole “Mary Jane Watson versus Gwen Stacey” thing or even the “biologic versus mechanical web shooters” decision it’s hard to argue that this isn’t a damn good movie. That said it’s impossible to talk about this without drawing comparisons to Sam Raimi’s masterful effort released a very short 10 years ago – but we’re not bitter!
Action Adventure, 143 Minutes, 2012
Was there really any chance this would be a bad film? All of the prequel films (with the arguable exception of “The Incredible Hulk” [IMDB] which I personally felt was an unneeded remake) were top-notch. The studio enlisted geek God Joss Whedon to write and direct. The marketing machine has been running non-stop for months. Of course the best laid plans always have a chance to explode in one’s face but this was as much of a lock as I’ve ever seen.
Action, 132 Minutes, 2011
We’re definitely approaching the limits of mass appeal for X-Men. The fact that this is basically “Jim Henson’s X-Men Babies” make it more likely to be accessible to fans of the previous films, but pretty much everybody else will be lost.
Action/Adventure, 115 Minutes, 2011
Good movie. Took my son, he enjoyed it as well.
I never personally read Thor (or many Marvel comics, being a DC Universe kind of guy) so I had very little background to go on, but I believe they struck the right tone here. For fans of the other Avenger movies (“The Hulk”, “Iron Man”, etc) there are plenty of inside-jokes and the ever-suffering Agent Coulson of S.H.I.E.L.D. is given his largest role yet.
