review on Tyler Knows Nothing

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 14:39:36 -0700

Watched: Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender 🍿 Utterly gorgeous. Packed with action set-pieces from beginning to end. The story is fascinating, but ultimately is both too rushed and leans too heavily on tropes. Ends up making it fan-service eye candy and little more. #movies #animation

Tue, 07 Apr 2026 18:06:23 -0700

Watched: Return to Silent Hill 🍿Um… not great, all around. It could be because I haven’t played the games, but I’ve watched the earlier films and they were, at the very least, better from a film standpoint. I’d say don’t bother. #movies #silenthill #videogames

Wed, 03 Dec 2025 14:02:21 -0700

Watched: TRON: Ares 🍿30 minutes into the film and I’m bored. Nothing new. Nothing interesting. Crappy dialog with painful delivery. Have a feeling I might not bother watching much more. #movies #reviews #moviereviews

Tinyblocks Minimal iPhone Setup Guide... a review

Fri, 14 Mar 2025 15:27:24 -0700

Had I known that I could connect a Bluetooth mouse to my iPhone and use the pointer to reorganize my Homescreen I would have done that a long time ago. Apparently, this has been a feature since iOS 13, and later added to iPadOS 13.4. I know that using a pointer on my iPad is quite useful, but it never occurred to me to think I could do the same on my iPhone. As luck would have it, a fix found me!

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When I came across Tinyblock’s Minimal iPhone Setup guide in a toot on Mastodon I was intrigued. It’s always taken so much time to organize, group icons into folders, set up the right widgets, and whatnot. Then you have to swipe around or open folders or, even worse, search to find an app. The Minimal iPhone Setup Guide promised an entirely new way to interact with my iPhone.

IMPORTANT: This guide requires certain features available in iOS 18 not earlier versions, so keep that in mind.

After donating a fiver* to the author I was redirected to the guide. I’d never seen anyone deliver an experience using Notion before, and I was pleased with the experience. It works more like a slide deck app than just some hokey web page, and the formatting is nice and clean. The guide walked me through the steps of how to set up their concept of a Minimal iPhone Homescreen and had it set up in a total of about 15 minutes.

*NOTE: The author lets you set the price you’d like to pay for their work. I chose $5 US, and I felt that was perfectly fair. I ask that you consider a similar donation for their effort.

The result is almost indistinguishable from a standard homescreen setup, but the added functionality is transformative. Using a clever combination of Focus modes, Shortcuts, and various iOS standards like the Dock, Lock Screen, and Control Center, you can configure a wide range of easily customizable dashboards that suit your needs in the moment. And, at least for four of these, at a single touch when placed in the Dock (as shown in the image below).

Left to right are my Dashboard, Blogging, Finances, and Multimedia pages, each accessed by a single tap to the icons in the dock. If you look closely, you’ll note that the icon that appears next to the time roughly corresponds to the icon on the dock the page is associated with. The reason they are slightly different has nothing to do with the guide, but iOS. Focus and Shortcuts do not use the same icon sets. It’s as simple as that. It would be nice if Apple were to fix that…

With this setup, I only have two folders (top left on my Blogging Focus) for things I need access to, but don’t open very often. That means everything I use regularly is no more than two taps away or otherwise inside a folder, and often just the one tap to launch. And I can still Swipe Right to get the Today view and Swipe Left to get the App Library in each of the Focus modes.

For the first few days I found myself swiping like my old setup, but I soon got used to that and now I’m fully on-board with this new approach to accessing apps. I highly recommend it to anyone who’s tired of swiping and searching.

For additional details, head over to the Tinyblocks website.

PS: This is an entirely independent review. Tinyblocks has not asked for this review nor have I offered them to review it before posting.

Sun, 09 Mar 2025 11:56:47 -0700

The wife and I spent most of the conveniently placed dialogue-free sections eagerly speculating on what was going on in this film and were pleasantly surprised when we were mostly wrong. Very well written, directed, and acted with excellent visual work. #movies #thegorge #AppleTV #scifi

Fri, 07 Mar 2025 19:52:50 -0700

A review for the movie Bloat (2025). Conclusion: Don’t bother. #film #review #horror

Bloat... a film review

Fri, 07 Mar 2025 19:05:27 -0700

🍿 Bloat (2025)

Tedious. Annoying. Unless you have some unnatural fondness for the very particular sub-sub-genre of horror known as “screen life”, which itself is a derivative of the mostly frustrating found footage sub-genre, then you will not like this film. I could barely get through ten minutes.

Conclusion: Don’t bother.

Editor’s Note: I’ve decided this is not the format for me, so I’m reposting this in my preferred format. It’s the exact same text, so if you’ve read this, you don’t need to see the other. It’s literally just a different format. -TKN

Sun, 02 Feb 2025 19:30:15 -0700

Without question, a well directed and shot film with solid performances by most of the cast, they should have leaned hard on the “psychological horror” instead of just “horror”. I may be jaded, but I didn’t find it frightening. Dafoe is always a pleasure, though. #film #movies #reviews

Watchmen Chapter I, a review

Sun, 01 Sep 2024 18:48:41 -0700

What can I say about Watchmen that hasn’t already been said… is what I would say if DC hadn’t just released the first part of an animated two part adaptation of what is considered one of the finest comic books of all time. But let’s talk about the comic book first.

Released as a 12-issue limited series in 1986 and rendered into a trade paperback combining all twelve issues in 1987, the creation of writer Alan Moore, artist Dave Gibbons, and colored by John Higgins, Watchmen was a critical and commercial success and has remained so since its release. It would win a Hugo Award in 1988 and be added to Time Magazine’s 100 All-Time Best Novels list.

For more details regarding the Watchmen comics, please refer to the Wikipedia entry.

Zack Snyder’s 2009 adaptation was something of a critical success, but in no way a commercial one. On a $150 million dollar budget it only pulled in $187 million at the box office, or in other words a commercial flop. A Director’s Cut would be released later in 2009, but that would only increase the film’s appreciation amongst critics and would not contribute to the studio’s bottom line in any significant way. A decade later, HBO would release Damon Lindelof’s Watchmen TV series which would, like the comics, receive wide critical praise and commercial success and currently has a 96% Fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. However the show would differ significantly from the comics taking place thirty four years after the events in the comic books and focusing on racist violence in modern-day Tulsa, Oklahoma, the location of the tragic Tulsa Race Massacre in 1921.

DC’s struggle with feature films

DC is not known for making good live action adaptations of their comic book characters, aside from the Batman movies. I won’t go into details, but I’ll list a few: Steel, Catwoman, Constantine, Superman Returns, Jonah Hex, Green Lantern, Man of Steel, Suicide Squad, Justice League, Shazam!, Black Adam, The Flash, and Blue Beetle are most of their releases in the DC Extended Universe (DCEU), and none of them performed well when compared to Marvel’s blockbuster run. There is, however, one medium in which DC has excelled and Marvel has not; animation. Their animated films, generally referred to as the DC Animated Universe, or DCAU, are produced by Warner Bros. Animation studio.

For a complete list of all DCAU animated films released, check the Wikipedia entry.

From 1993’s Batman: Mask of the Phantasm to the just released Watchmen Chapter I, DC has floated a literal armada of top-notch animated features. Sure, there have been duds like the unfortunate adaptation of the already unpopular comicbook, Batman: The Killing Joke, the 2nd and 3rd installments of the three part Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths film trilogy, and Superman/Batman: Apocalypse but there have been a lot more highly rated outings like Batman: Under the Red Hood, Justice League: Doom, the sublime Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Parts 1 & 2, and Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox. There are many, many more out of the near 60 films so don’t feel bad if I’m leaving off one of your favorites. I’ve already listed a lot of films, so let’s just move on to Watchmen Chapter I.

Editor’s Note: While DC has had an enormously successful run of animated features, the medium of animation in America has been relegated to the juvenile markets. There are pockets of successful adult animation, like Family Guy and other animated sit-coms and sci-fi like Scavengers Reign, but on the whole, animation isn’t taken seriously in the US.

The breakdown

Now, normally for a review of an animated film, television show, or short I would not go through the history that lead up to that property’s release, but Watchmen is different. Since it hit comic book shop shelves in 1986 and hasn’t been developed into a continuing franchise of any significance. I suspect a lot of our younger folk born since 2000 may not be as familiar with the comics as with older readers and an overview is helpful to understand the significance of Watchmen in relation to our history. So, let’s take a quick look at the spoiler-free Wikipedia synopsis:

Watchmen is set in an alternate reality that closely mirrors the contemporary world of the 1980s. The primary difference is the presence of superheroes. The point of divergence occurs in the year 1938. Their existence in this version of the United States is shown to have dramatically affected and altered the outcomes of real-world events such as the Vietnam War and the presidency of Richard Nixon. In keeping with the realism of the series, although the costumed crimefighters of Watchmen are commonly called “superheroes”, only one, named Doctor Manhattan, possesses any superhuman abilities. The war in Vietnam ends with an American victory in 1971 and Nixon is still president as of October 1985 upon the repeal of term limits and the Watergate scandal not coming to pass. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan occurs approximately six years later than in real life.

When the story begins, the existence of Doctor Manhattan has given the U.S. a strategic advantage over the Soviet Union, which has dramatically increased Cold War tensions. Eventually, by 1977, superheroes grow unpopular among the police and the public, leading them to be outlawed with the passage of the Keene Act. While many of the heroes retired, Doctor Manhattan and another superhero, known as The Comedian, operate as government-sanctioned agents. Another named Rorschach continues to operate outside the law. [SOURCE]

The fundamentals

The film lines up quite neatly with the comics. Chapter I covers the first five books of the twelve book series and the opening scene is almost a shot-for-shot, word-for-word adaptation of the opening pages. In fact, without having had the trade paperback in front of me while watching I could still tell that much of Alan Moore’s gritty dialog and story beats are translated almost directly from the comics to the screen with some streamlining by screenwriter J. Michael Straczynski (Babylon 5, World War Z, The Amazing Spider-Man). Watchmen is very character-driven, so a lot of time is spent with a focus on said characters. However, it is the comic’s more fleshed out dialog in which we get a larger sense of the world of Watchmen that appears to have been trimmed. A simple truth illustrating the differences between the comic and animation mediums is that what we do get in terms of texture and detail is often lost in the flow of the motion picture as we are unable to linger on panels and soak in the additional context that the comics allow.

Documenting all the little changes would take me a lot more time than I am willing to invest. Suffice it to say that the changes do not, as of yet, necessarily detract from the story and help to frame the necessary pacing for the motion-based medium versus the static page while maintaining the overall story arc of the first five issues.

Character design is, due mostly to the 3D CGI, smoother and slightly less textured than the meticulous art of Dave Gibbons (illustration and lettering) and John Higgins (colorist). The positives, however, are that there are no speech bubbles to obfuscate the visuals, the view is wider than in the comic panels, and we can see the body language of characters in motion. One early illustration of the differences is when Dan Dreiberg (Nite Owl II, voice acted by Matthew Rhys) comes home to find Rorschach (Walter Kovacs, voice acted by Titus Welliver) has broken into his front door and is eating cold beans straight from cans in his kitchen. Rorschach’s iconic pattern shifting mask is pulled up above his nose revealing the lower half of his face. In the comics, he clearly hasn’t shaved in days and has baked bean sauce on his chin where in the film he’s clean-shaven, as shown in the comparison below. This is a nitpick, but it’s indicative of some of the visual sanitization of the adaptation, likely for budget reasons and/or time constraints. For now, however, that remains speculation.

The comics are laid out by Gibbons in a perfect grid of three by three rectangular panels, only deviating to group into larger panels or , less often, divide them even further into smaller ones, but always maintaining the pureness of 90º angles. I find that this helps define the pacing of the comics, like driving with a steady beat to the ultimate climax of the tale. For the film, overall shot composition, set design, and world building are moderately strong, but is somewhat lacking in the ticking urgency in comparison to the source material. The Doomsday Clock plays a major role in the comics. The panel layout helps to subtly sell the slowly encroaching time, and I feel that is lost in this first chapter, though I can honestly say I don’t know how they’d fix that. The strategically placed shots of period newspapers, however, help to sell the stakes. If you can are able to see them in time.

There are many things to like about the animation. Color, lighting, and atmospherics are strong. The colors are vibrant and clean while still delivering that dark, foreboding, dismal feeling of experiencing a time on the edge. While the animation technique used is cel-shading it feels very mature, like many strides have been made in technique since 2004’s Appleseed, so it helps to deliver the appearance of the comics coming out of the pages. The one character that really jumped out at me, however, is Dr. Manhattan, and I think that this is mostly due to the fact that his radiation glow eliminates the need for cel-shading.

Character movement does suffer a bit from 3D figure rigging, but it’s clear they attempted to put a lot of care into trying to make characters look organic and their body language look natural. The end result, however, is that despite that effort, it’s not always successful. As has become common with Western 3D animation the characters are animated on the “twos”, which means they are moved every other frame, a technique from traditional animation due to the extreme cost of animation on the “ones”, or every frame. Unfortunately, there are a number of scenes where movement, such as walking, appears stiff. I am glad, however, that they didn’t go with motion capture.

The Ups

One of my favorite parts of Watchmen Chapter I is the flawless handling of the dismally depressing Tales of the Black Freighter that appears as a comic inside both the comic books and the film.
I also very much like the application of textures throughout which work very well with the lighting and color work.
The application of depth of field is also excellent which makes me suspect that a cinematographer was involved in production.
There are also some truly beautiful shots in the film.

The Downs

I’m not sure I’d call it an animation error, per se, but during Dr. Manhattan’s Mars monologue where he reflects on the accident that changed him, there is a scene where two characters meet and walk away and one of their shoes appears to pass through a rock. It just seems to me that they should have put the rock somewhere else, but it really stood out to me.
The 84 minute run-time does not work in the film’s favor, mostly because there is only one more part to be released. Unless Chapter II is significantly longer, they won’t be able to fully adapt all twelve issues of the comics.
Some of the ugly language from the comics is trimmed from the film. While I don’t like the words used, they aren’t applied gratuitously and have a sharp, cutting point that should have been maintained to illustrate the cultural and sociological undercurrents of division and fear that pervaded the US in the 80’s when the Cold War was intense and AIDS put people on edge.

Conclusions

Out of all of DC’s Warner Bros. Animation’s works Watchmen Chapter I sits near the top as one of the best, and not because it’s their first “R” rated film. It is clear that the production team took the adaptation seriously, though were likely saddled with some constraints as illustrated by the short run-time, that there will only be one more part to complete the adaptation, and that quite a lot of contextual dialog was removed in translation.

What I would really like to see from DC, however, is a real commitment to their animation works teams of writers and animators. I would see that as an increase in budgets for their animated features and to use their writers for their live-action films to increase the script quality well over their current efforts that have plodded onto the big screen.

TKN’s Nothing Score™

This is my first go at a rating system, so bear with me. I’m a nerd. I give Watchmen Chapter 1 three and a half Macs, mostly for story and accuracy and detract points for not going all the way with the animation. Being such an important work from the 1980’s, I believe it deserved a lot more attention and care.

Hotel Transylvania: Transformania | Film Review

Mon, 31 Jan 2022 18:10:58 -0700

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Despite the growing recognition in the West that animation is not a medium made expressly for children, there is an expansive industry that revolves around productions that aim specifically for that audience. Ahem… Disney? Heard of ‘em? There are a number of outfits that play in that space these days. Warner, Illumination, Pixar, DreamWorks, Universal, and Sony Pictures Animation, in no particular order, are a smattering. Each studio has their own “voice” but Sony’s Hotel Transylvania franchise is a series of films that speaks in its own voice, and that voice is Genndy Tartakovsky.

And yet, Tartakovsky’s participation in the fourth entry in the tetralogy is limited to writing the story, co-penning the script, and acting as an executive producer. Instead, the helm was handed off to co-directors Derek Drymon and Jennifer Kluska, who are both first timers in the director’s chair (that’s a big chair.) Tartakovsky wasn’t the only one to decline participation in this latest, and reportedly final, installment, either. Most notably, Adam Sandler was replaced by Brian Hull as the voice of Count Dracula and Kevin James’ Frankenstein was replaced by Brad Abrell. Trust me when I say that you won’t miss them. The replacements are almost exact matches, indicating that star power just isn’t necessary to support feature-length animation. All it does it foster bloated production costs.

Sony describes Hotel Transylvania: Transformania as follows:

When Van Helsing’s mysterious invention, the “Monsterfication Ray”, goes haywire, Drac and his monster pals are all transformed into humans, and Johnny becomes a monster. In their new mismatched bodies, Drac, stripped of his powers, and an exuberant Johnny, loving life as a monster, must team up and race across the globe to find a cure before it’s too late, and before they drive each other crazy. With help from Mavis and the hilariously human Drac Pack, the heat is on to find a way to switch themselves back before their transformations become permanent. [SOURCE: IMDB.com]

At its core, Hotel Transylvaniais both an homage to classic luminaries of the Golden Age of animated shorts like Wily Coyote, Tom & Jerry, Popeye the Sailorman, and even more contemporary adherents to classic animated hijinks like Roger Rabbit and Ed, Edd, & Eddy (a meta turducken, if you will) and entirely its own thing, something like Rush is to rock music or Ben Folds Five is to alternative.

Nuts & Bolts

As the fourth entry, HT4 is a solid evolution of the defined art style, but it doesn’t stray from the franchises established parameters. This is no Spider-Verse and yet the color palette is rich and bright, lighting and luminance effects are excellent, and the correct application of bokeh and the lens effects bring believable depth to most scenes. It’s clear, that Sony has been working hard to refine their process. That said, some of the textures don’t look great (the rock slide in the opening musical number looks like crap) which is a big oversight on such a high-visibility production.

Character designs, on the other hand, are peak franchise, hewing closely to the immutable nature of classic cartoon character design that said characters are iconic and must remain recognizable. They only change in service of a gag and always return to their pristine base form when the gag is complete. This is the same basic rule that defines all character designs from all cartoon where these icons always wear the same clothes, et al. Imagine Fred Flintstone wearing actual pants or Jessica Rabbit wearing something other than her signature red, sequined dress… oh. Well, not that, but you get the idea. Thanks, Disney Whitewashing Division…

The story telling is solid, if a bit on the basic side, something I’d expect of Illumination’s work. It’s not bad, but it’s also not sophisticated. The comedy revolves almost entirely around the physical gags which, in turn, defines the entire film. In a film that is more a buddy adventure flick, ala the far superior Emperor’s New Groove, then another entry in the HT canon it works to a degree, but not entirely. There’s little to no meta humor that pleases both adults and kids alike, depending on your depth of knowledge. It comes down to the gag, and that gag is always a physical comedy bit. The approach takes away from the core conceit; two people coming to terms with each other by walking in each others shoes.

Unexpected hair loss syndrome…

If anything jumps out at me it’s that the film feels claustrophobic. We start in Drac’s house, then the hotel, the plane, the provincial town, the bus, the jungle, and the cave, then back to the hotel. While the story is about Johnny and Drac and their journey towards acceptance of their differences, and spending time in each others shoes, it pulls back from the more expansive world-building as exemplified in the Tartakovsky-helmed entries. Since each scene needs to serve the setup for the next visual gag, any potential avenues for additional, foundational scope and scale is ditched in favor of setting up for the next gag.

And that’s where it lies; at the intersection of storytelling and spectacle, with the visuals winning over the written by a long shot. It’s not a terrible movie, to be sure, but you won’t derive much but the most deconstructed joy, the kind that makes a little kid roll around in the dirt with the giggles but generally doesn’t survive the transition to higher modes of cognition that come with age.

It should be a hit for years to come as a go-to for quiet toddler mommy hours worldwide.

iPhone cases & an important charity for Peruvian children

Fri, 31 Dec 2021 11:46:25 -0700

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Phone cases are a dime a dozen.

Well, not literally. They cost real money, but they’re available everywhere for all kinds of mobiles and at every conceivable price point. When it comes down to it, consumers will select the style and price that fits their circumstances and financial wherewithal. Hell, a lot of Chinese phone makers include a (cheap) case in the box that I’m sure a handful of people around the globe actually use.

When I received a press release from Illusion Photograph offering me a review sample of one of their phone cases, I told them up front that they should focus on getting samples to more visible outlets. They insisted, so I did some research and, after learning their story, acquiesced. They sent me a Route 66 case for my iPhone 12 mini, and this, in a way, is a review. So, here it is…

The case comes in a zipper lock sleeve, has a lovely print applied, is glossy, and fits snugly onto my phone. It has cutouts on the top and bottom edges to better facilitate edge swiping, and the button cutouts prevent unintended button mashing while retaining easy access. In other words, it’s a lovely, but otherwise unremarkable case.

Not exactly enough for a full post, but that’s not really the point. Here’s the email I sent Beatrice, the owner of Illusion Photograph and co-founder of the LivingHeart.co charity that illustrates the actual point:

Beatrice,

Tell you what, you can send me a case, but a case is a case. I’d prefer to profile you and your efforts to raise funds for Living Heart. Your words on your website are moving. I fear for the future and my heartache is endless as I worry for our most vulnerable, no matter where they live, how they live, or what they look like. A human is a human. Full stop. And yet we struggle to make any real head-way in human rights around the world.

So, sure. You can send me a case and I’ll give it a nod, but the piece will be about you and your work and your ongoing efforts to find yourself. I fight daily for the same thing, so I feel you.

Sincerely,

Tyler

As I believe I’ve made transparent (see what I did there?), they sent me a case for free and I was planning on posting a piece about their charity. What I would also like to make clear is that I’m doing this for the charity. My only hope is that people either buy cases or donate to the charity.

This seems like a good time to talk about the charity itself. This video, produced in 2012, pretty much covers everything you need to know about how your generous donations are spent.

Most charities focus on much larger targets with narrow goals, but what I believe are the core strengths of Living Heart are its tight focus on a small region of Peru, the education and nutrition of the children of those remote communities, the care to honor and promote local traditions (read: NOT colonialism), and the teaching of sustainable skills instead of just dropping off supplies. By not expanding outward in an attempt to serve more and more communities, the charity can focus its efforts and realize real change in these impoverished regions. Note in the video when they talk about donations of warm clothing they say can be worn underneath the culture’s traditional garb. There’s a level of detail and cultural sensitivity in that you don’t see a lot of.

I urge that you give, or buy a case or five, and/or tell your friends and family to give what they can. I’ll be donating the value of the case I received once I’ve got the spare cash because I think that’s not only fair, but a responsibility I have to my fellow humans on this ever-increasingly miserable rock.

No one has ever asked to be born who they are. We just get the luck of the draw, and these kids aren’t at fault for living in poverty, and by extension their parents. Society has a long, dark history of discrimination and segregation and classism in the extremes, and these Peruvian communities high in the Andes are an example of that.

I think Living Heart is doing something very important here. We should all pitch in.

Happy New Year…

Greenland (2020) | Film Review

Fri, 08 Jan 2021 13:00:00 -0700

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Good GOD, what a pig. Sure, Gerard Butler was a staple in mid-budget action flicks, but this dumpster fire isn’t one of his better ones, and it’s not going to inject any enthusiasm into prospects for his ongoing career.

BUDGET: $35 million BOX OFFICE: $47.5 million (worldwide)

Directed by Ric Roman Waugh and written by Chris Sparling, this schlocky disaster flick wannabe already instills a sense of dread before you cue it up after seeing that the movie poster proudly proclaims the movie is from “the” producer of the John Wick franchise, The Town, and Clash of The Titans (that monster hit… get it.)

When was the last time you were excited to see the latest film from your favorite producer?

Look, I’ve tried to write a simple summary of the plot, but it doesn’t make any sense. Gerard Butler’s insipid delivery as structural engineer John Garrity fares as well as expected when joined by the phoned in crap from Morena Baccarin (wife Allison) and Scott Glenn (Allison’s father Dale) and the obligatory kid, played by Roger Dale Floyd. There’s nobody else of note in the film. I’m rather surprised that these three agreed to sign on, but such is the lack of quality in Hollywood these days.

The basic rundown is as follows: John and Allison are in a bad way, but it’s not made clear why. We also learn that a comet is going to just barely miss Earth, then some of it’s going to hit, then all of it’s going to hit. That’s when John gets a call from the government that tells him he’s been selected to survive if he can get his family to a nearby military base before the end of the day. A lot of stupid shenanigans ensue, they get separated, and they get back together, and they survive. The end.

Big whoop.

Simply put, it’s a waste of time. The pacing is acceptable, but there are a lot of story elements that just feel slapped on, like generic tropes strung together to approximate an actual story. There’s zero recognizable character development, especially for Gerard Butler’s role. He’s not developed as a real, feeling, engaging, desperate human. His life circumstances bring no stakes. He’s not redeemed in the end. He doesn’t learn any harsh lessons. He’s just an unadorned avatar. The same applies to Baccarin and Glenn’s characters.

Multiple planes in the sky are clearly copy-pasted. The fires in the neighborhoods are way too big. The compositing is sloppy. Shots throughout are amateurish. All of it lacks any real energy, something I’m pretty sure is necessary for a disaster film. Hell, I’d bet real money that the Greenland shots are stock.

The Takeaway: Don’t bother.

Wonder Woman? Meh.

Sun, 11 Jun 2017 12:58:52 -0700

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So, I've seen Wonder Woman now. As was common in the Golden Age of comics, there's a lot of cannibalism. WW effectively is DC's Captain America, complete with a cadre of hardened war vets with distinct personalities, even a Scot with a funny hat. That, however, is NOT why I ultimately didn't like WW. It starts simply enough (don't worry, no significant spoilers).

The Black nanny.

Does anyone in Hollywood know what's going on? We're having a lot of issues with all kind of civil rights things, like trying not to marginalize Black people!? The top of the film features a young Diana Prince (she gets the last name later) running, only to find that she's run away from her Black mammy. Oh please. Diana is white. The Queen is white. Most talking parts are white, though there's one "senator" who gets, what, five words? Then there are issues with the special effects.

Amazon flies off galloping horse, shooting an arrow while flipping, and landing on her feet. That would be nothing except she magically need not obey physics and the laws of motion. A horse is traveling at around 20 MPH, you jump off and try to land on your feet, what happens? If you do it like the Amazon, you smash your face into the ground. A bit later, a high leaping Amazon throws a pair of knives down towards the camera. If you look closely you can see that they leave her hand and minutely correct direction.

The racial and social aspects are also a mostly subtle aspect of the film. First, there's the contrivance of sparks between Gadot and Pine. It's more staged then natural, though that's more a side effect of the less-than-elegantly formed dialogue. If that weren't cliche enough, there's the team. First, we get the Native American who talks earnestly about how the white man took their home and how he is better being free waging war in Europe. Seriously? Here's an idea. Don't steal homes from people, not that we can fix that now (though we can make reparations). Then there's the Middle Eastern fellow, Sameer, who chooses to fight as a mercenary since he isn't allowed to be an actor because of his color. These scenes don't have any honesty in them. They feel spliced in with a blunt butter knife. It's demoralizing.

Then there are aspects of WW that don't add up. In the first battle scene, a sniper is suppressing WW and her team in a courtyard. Mr. Scottish sniper seems incapable of actually sniping (why is he there, again?), so Chris Pine hatches a plan. Three mortals run out and grab an enormous sheet of metal. They hoist it over their heads, and Diana uses it as a springboard to smash the bell tower to bits. I mean, it really explodes. The entire top of the building, gone. So, if she can do that, why can't she jump, what, 80 feet? Besides, she jumps higher than that earlier.

Worse yet is the subtle, almost imperceptible misogyny. Simply put, you can't be a good woman, even a super powered woman, unless you have a man to coax it out of you, even if that man complacently supports the repression of women. While Chris Pine's performance is wonderful, his ultimate role is to be a guide to the real world outside of the sheltered world of Themyscira, the hidden island home of the amazons. They dance. They do it. He navigates her around. She, the nubile naif who doesn't understand the world as it truly is.

I know these feel like nitpicks, and some are. The story, overall, is good. Most people who don't read comics likely don't know it, so it feels fresh. Gal Gadot is great as WW, though there need to be fewer SLOMO scenes of determined walking. Chris Pine is also great. Others have said that he is comfortable playing any role, leading or supporting. I think it's more than that. I believe that he's comfortable in his own skin and enjoys pretending, but doesn't need it. It's like any craft, and he is skilled. I don't, however, believe we've seen what he can truly do yet. I look forward to those days.

I'm a little surprised that this is a blockbuster, to be honest. It's more like a Marvel film, if not quite so tight and lacking the easy banter. DC has set a low bar for entry, though, and Hollywood's latest entries have been, well, crap. So much money spent to achieve so little actual value. Sadly, I don't think Wonder Woman represents a turning point for the DC cinematic universe. I have a bad feeling that this is just an anomaly.

Bummer.