Frozen II sees sisters Anna and Elsa venturing to the Enchanted Forest, upstream from their own kingdom. There, they will discover a land in need of saving and learn some shocking secrets about their own family history.

Astonishingly, the pre-title sequence is really, really rough. Like, first draft rough. (More likely, it’s the result of too many rewrites, but you get the idea.) The film soon picks up, but even at its best, the script needed one more dialogue pass. The writing simply doesn’t pop in the way that Frozen and Moana‘s scripts did.

We get a few new characters, none of which stick in the mind after the credits roll, except one, who exists purely for the purposes of further queerbaiting (seriously, the sooner Disney takes the plunge with regards to Elsa, the better.) There’s subtext to be found – something about the environment, something about addressing our colonial past – but there’s nothing bold or thought-provoking about it.

The animation is 2019-standard, nothing mind-blowing like the water or hair animation in Moana.

Acceptable describes just about everything in Frozen II. It feels like it could have been a Disney+ exclusive, rather than a fully-fledged cinema release. This film had the same $150 million budget that the first did six years ago, which surprised me. Surely the highest-grossing animated film of all time deserved a bigger, bolder sequel?

I’m curious to see what the legions of fans thought of this. A significant proportion of them may have actually ‘grown out’ of the property, which is the risk you run when you take such a long time developing a follow-up.

Whilst I was never blown away by Frozen, I could at least see why it captured the hearts and minds of so many. With Frozen II, there is very little to set it apart from the scores of other 3D animated movies of the past ten years.

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I’m not sure I can even go into this film in any depth – I’m too angry.

The Rise of Skywalker feels like it was specifically made to appease the group of fans who hated The Last Jedi. Like someone ran through the half dozen plot points that frustrated them the most, then set out to retcon them, one by one. It’s truly astonishing how many things achieved by the last film are undone by the return of J.J. Abrams.

Chief among The Last Jedi’s accomplishments was the notion that we have to move on from the past. Rey (Daisy Ridley) wanted to learn from it and take the next step; Kylo Ren (Adam Driver) simply wanted to kill it. “We are what they grow beyond”, Yoda said. Clearly he wasn’t talking about Episode IX, which has no interest in taking up the opportunity presented at the end of Episode VIII, instead content to retread old ground – even more than The Force Awakens. So expect to see old faces, endless callbacks and rehashed scenes from the original trilogy.

I won’t list the major plot points that infuriated me – to do so would be to spoil the film – but suffice to say, it feels like an apology. Which, historically speaking, is strangely fitting, considering Return of the Jedi was an apology for The Empire Strikes Back (which was not universally well-received at the time, despite what revisionists claim) and The Last Crusade was an apology for Temple of Doom. So yet again – it’s something we’ve seen before with George Lucas’ creations.

J.J. Abrams lets loose with a couple of things that annoyed Star Trek fans back in 2009 and 2013 – namely, messing with what can and can’t be done during faster-than-light travel, and giving his characters power over life and death. Sure, the end of The Last Jedi featured an astonishing show of power, but it also came at a cost. In Rise of Skywalker, Kylo and Rey are flinging the Force around like demigods.

What did I like about this film? Well, this won’t take long. The visuals are stunning, the VFX fantastic. There are some cool new worlds to explore. Most significant of all is the fact that the cast are acting their damn pants off. Despite the awkward exposition, plot contrivances and characters doing random 180s, they carry it off with aplomb. The undisputed hero of this trilogy is Adam Driver, who has consistently sold even the most ridiculous writing in all three of the films. But then there are so many characters that given short shrift. Leia, we can understand. But Lando? Luke? Rose? Finn? Wasted. Even new characters like Jannah (Naomie Ackie) serve little purpose.

So this is how it ends. At best, a constrained act of obeisance…and at worst, a whimpering apology. I’m sad to say that this trilogy will have to remain a two-parter on my Blu-ray shelf.

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6 Underground’s marketing is based primarily on the presence of Ryan Reynolds, and the incomprehensible trailer is matched only by the incoherence of the film. This film is a mess. It’s disheartening when one watches 127 minutes of a movie and then wonders what the f*ck they just sat through.

Reynolds stars as One, a billionaire who fakes his death to become the leader of a group of anonymous vigilantes operating on a global scale. Their mission is to take down the despotic leader of the fictional country Turgistan, but first they’ll have to complete a rescue mission and assassinate some generals.

Reynolds first came to my attention playing a pre-med student in the TV show Two Guys, a Girl and a Pizza Place, and it was clear from that moment that he could be a big star. After appearing in a series of college frat-boy movies, he has reinvented himself as an action man with a comedic edge in movies like Deadpool. In my opinion, Reynolds is one of the most watchable of all of Hollywood’s leading men. He oozes charm and has used it to achieve tremendous success.

Even Reynolds’ charm can’t save 6 Underground.

Bay deliberately obscures the narrative by employing a non-linear structure that confuses rather than enhancing the flow. Sometimes starting with a flashback or flashforward makes sense when considering the dramatic tension that can build, but in 6 Underground there seems to be no purpose other than to bewilder the viewer. The action sequences and set pieces make little overall sense within the disorganised narrative.

Melanie Laurent features opposite Reynolds but is strangely restrained, showing none of the vitality on display in her turns in Inglourious Basterds or Now You See Me. The remainder of the ensemble are placeholders and play their roles without ever becoming interesting. Of course, this is a Michael Bay film, and therefore the action sequences are given far more attention than character development.

There are moments – brief, but moments nonetheless – where the action threatens to become enjoyable or a chase scene surprises. It’s all shot in glorious Michael Bay Vision as well, so you know it’s going to look ok. Those moments are mirages, however, and things peter out into a disappointing and confusing film with little to recommend it.

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Surprisingly, this newest version isn’t actually a reboot – it acknowledges that which came before, all under the premise that there are now many, many Angels and Bosworths all over the world. (You know, that thing Ghost Corps was going to do until…well, we know what happened there.)

Kristen Stewart, Naomi Scott and Ella Balinska play lead roles this time around, and they’re having a great time. Their performances spark off each other, and all three have oodles of charisma to spread around. The worst that can be said is that they clearly get along well – even when the film suggests they shouldn’t. The bickering is too friendly in the early stages, which takes away from the inevitable mutual respect that we all know will surface by the time the credits role.

Bosworth is played by Elizabeth Banks, who’s a triple threat here, having also written and directed the film. And the writing is interesting. Some have criticised the film for being stuck in turn-of-the-millennium girl power, but to me that feels unfair. The film is clearly feminist, the difference here being the inclusion of an incredible list of micro-aggressions that women have to face in their everyday lives. But at the same time, we’ve got a trio of women who are, of course, stunning in the most traditional of ways. For obvious reasons, I am not the right person to be suggesting how a 2019 Charlie’s Angels should approach feminism, but it’s clear that the concessions made mean the themes don’t land as well as they could.

The action is fun – and I mean really fun. The editing is a mixture of great and rotten, and there are some dodgy gravity-defying moments that make no sense, but the film has such a brisk pace that this isn’t a problem. Comparing the action to the likes of Mission: Impossible – Fallout, is simply unfair, because, well, nothing can compete with that film. At first I wondered if a gritty approach may have been more successful (considering we’re in a post-Bourne world where Daniel Craig’s Bond still struggles to find the fun), but then Kingsman did all right as a silly action-comedy five years ago.

So put this down as one of those pleasant surprises. If the responses online have put you off, consider giving Charlie’s Angels a go. It’s fast-paced, fun entertainment with some great action sequences. And if you need another reason, Kristen Stewart is hilarious as Sabrina, getting some of the funniest lines in the film.

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The original film is a curious beast. Supposedly beloved by many, I’ve yet to find anyone who genuinely enjoys Jim Henson’s film as an adult. Even as a child, I found it a slow, plodding affair that failed to excite any emotions. The puppetry was the only thing worth writing home about. Henson’s next film, Labyrinth, was an improvement in every single way.

So I’m damning Age of Resistance with faint praise when I say that it’s a marked improvement on the original film. A prequel, it shows the world of Thra under the benevolent dictatorship of the Skeksis. The various tribes of Gelflings pay tribute to their overlords, variously in a state of denial or blissful ignorance as to fact that they are being taken advantage of. Everything changes when one of the Skeksis discovers they have the ability to use the Dark Crystal to siphon life force from the Gelflings, and extend his own life. Meanwhile, a mysterious force known as the Darkening (seriously) is taking over Thra…

With an expansive cast of characters, Age of Resistance sees the individual story threads spread across Thra, then intersecting more and more frequently until it all comes together at the end. If you’re fascinated by fantasy world-building, then this show has it in spades. The different landscapes, flora and fauna, various tribes and races – there’s a lot to take in, and I don’t remember the last time I watched a TV show that paid this much attention to the setting.

I should make clear that Age of Resistance has wonderful production values. The score is bold and uplifting, even if the main theme sounds distractingly reminiscent of Tears for Fears’ ‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’. The physical sets are incredible, and the costuming is stunning. When it comes to the puppets themselves, however, I’m on the fence. I’m not a huge fan of rubbery-looking puppets, so the Gelflings themselves are unimpressive. Then there’s the fact that the puppeteers aren’t providing the actual voices. Now, I mightn’t have noticed this if Brose Avard (head honcho of the Chatflix podcast) hadn’t mentioned it, but as with the original film, the voices are replaced by other actors’, which means that the physical ‘performances’ aren’t as impressive as they could be. Put simply, ‘Sesame Street’ puts on a better puppet show.

The voice cast is…overwhelming. Taron Egerton, Anya Taylor-Joy, Jason Isaacs, Simon Pegg, Benedict Wong, Mark Hamill, Keegan-Michael Key, Awkwafina, Eddie Izzard, Helena Bonham Carter, Lena Headey…I have to stop, because the list goes on. It’s basically a who’s who of actors from fantasy and sci-fi productions of the last 20 years. Also, could we take a moment to note that Simon Pegg has appeared in reboots of Star Trek, Star Wars, Tintin, The Chronicles of Narnia, ‘Doctor Who’ and now this? Are there any iconic geek properties from his childhood left for him to take part in?

Age of Resistance is a love letter to the original, but thankfully much more entertaining. I wasn’t exactly enthralled, and was regularly conscious of scenes or plot points that only served to pad out the episodes, but perhaps that’s because I’m aware that this is yet another example of a proposed film being changed to a TV series by Netflix (see also ‘Stranger Things’ Season 1). The potential for more big budget puppetry on streaming networks does get me excited, however. I’m glad that the art can still get the big budget treatment in 2019.

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Mackenzie Davis stars as the naked young woman and she is the best thing about this – hopefully final – Terminator film by a good measure. Anyone who has seen Halt and Catch Fire will know how powerful she can be, but this is probably her most prominent role since her small but important character in The Martian. Davis brings just the right amount of strength mixed with fear and fragility. She is fantastic in an otherwise mediocre film.

For anyone who watched Terminator 2: Judgment Day and marvelled at James Cameron’s VFX chops while enjoying an almost perfect conclusion to the story from The Terminator, the hack job that is done on the story and legacy of those films is hard to believe. This film was released with a bunch of ‘James Cameron is back doing Terminator’ publicity and his involvement as story author and producer was trumpeted as a reason that this Terminator reboot will get it right.

One must wonder if Cameron has forgotten what happened at the end of T2 as the retcon performed here makes no sense whatsoever.

Talk about a slap to the face. Arnie’s T800 didn’t need to lower himself into a vat of molten metal? The iconic image of his thumbs-up sign as he sacrifices himself was meaningless? Oh, dear.

via GIPHY

This is a competent film, with action sequences that are sometimes exciting and yet very often things just feel flat. Robert Patrick’s molten T-1000 was terrifying because he was incredibly hard to conquer and completely soulless. It is hard to specify exactly why Gabriel Luna’s REV-9 doesn’t invoke the same sense of hopelessness, but it means the turmoil inflicted on the lives of Dani and Diego Ramos is harder to engage with.

It is enjoyable to consider some of the broader ideas raised by having a different apocalypse to consider after Sarah & John Connor avert the Skynet disaster in T2. The concept of the alternative future being different but equally bad is alarming and makes a good point about Man’s tendency to self-destruct. It will be difficult for fans, however, to ignore the canon and accept this new Dark Fate on its merits.

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Given this pedigree, it might not be surprising that I still remember the era when Sylvester Stallone was both Rocky and Rambo. Sly was the biggest star of a time when action movies could be simple ‘us vs them’ creations without any nuance.

Which isn’t to say that the first film featuring John Rambo – First Blood, released in 1982 – wasn’t a film worth watching. The original Rambo film is a thriller that explores the dramatic story of a soldier who can’t escape his past. It is a dark and sad film, with Stallone giving a strong performance as the anti-hero. Subsequent outings have moved further and further from the original character such that the writer of the original novel reporting being embarrassed to be associated with this film.

I agree with these RAMBO: LAST BLOOD reviews. The film is a mess. Embarrassed to have my name associated with it.https://t.co/Yd2G9T7A9A pic.twitter.com/RS0gGHzL5h

— _DavidMorrell (@_DavidMorrell) September 20, 2019

In Rambo: Last Blood, John is a rancher in Arizona who tends to his horses and shares his home with a Mexican friend Maria (Adriana Barraza) and her granddaughter Gabrielle (Yvette Monreal). When Gabrielle goes missing after travelling to Mexico to see her estranged father, Rambo will go to war one last time.

It is hard to overstate just how anachronistic this film feels in 2019. For lovers of action films who don’t want to be challenged by their choice of entertainment – people who will say things like “it’s just a film, it doesn’t have to mean anything” – Last Blood will still be hard to accept. This film is overtly racist and doesn’t even pretend to be otherwise. Of course, so were the earlier films in the series so one shouldn’t be surprised, and yet it’s hard to see this film getting made in 2019 without the name of the lead character being John Rambo.

Obviously, he eventually wins by setting a series of elaborate traps – just like in the previous films – and achieving a body count to rival the number of lies told by Donald Trump while in office. None of the action sequences feels fresh or interesting, in what really feels like a paint-by-numbers approach to the writing.

The audience is asked simply to humour Stallone and his longing for the old days, and ignore the ridiculous plot and its many holes. Perhaps Stallone and his team really believed their fans wouldn’t notice the problems, or maybe they didn’t care.

Either way, Stallone needs to retire this dated action hero before he wastes more of our time.

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Whilst I’ve only mentioned She-Ra in passing here on hoopla.nu, it’s a show of such high quality that it consistently surprises me. With Noelle Stevenson behind the wheel, it was always going to be good (seriously, ‘Lumberjanes’ is one of the best kids comics I’ve ever read), but this show excels on every level.

First off, the character designs are great updates of the originals. Whenever we’re introduced to someone new, it’s fun to Google the old toys to see how much they’ve changed whilst still retaining the spirit of the original. The background art is also reminiscent of late 70s/early 80s sci-fi and fantasy. Overall it’s got a Moebius-meets-80s-Miyazaki vibe.

The script is equally impressive. Snappy and hilarious, the dialogue ensures the pacing never drags. Even better, all of the villains actually have depth. It’s invariably a case of “doing the wrong thing for the right reasons”, which ensures that, whilst it’s a cartoon, the antagonists are never purely cartoonish. And central to the drama is of course the relationship between Adora and Catra – one of the most interesting examples of friends-turned-rivals-turned-enemies that I’ve ever seen in children’s programming.

Season 3’s arc is epic, even if it only comprises six episodes. The mythos gets expanded in a big way, and we learn more and more about Etherea and Adora’s place in the world.

She-Ra and the Princesses of Power is effortlessly inclusive whilst also, at its core, being about your traditional good-versus-evil struggles. The emotional complexities put most of the 80s cartoons I watched growing up to shame. I can only hope that, like She-Ra, Kevin Smith’s recently-announced ‘He-Man and the Masters of the Universe’ reboot also manages to be as good as I remember the original series being, and not as lame as it actually was. (Seriously, if there’s one show that should remain in your memories, it’s He-Man; don’t be tempted to try and relive the glory days by rewatching it, folks.)

From a show purely designed to sell toys to a complex, hilarious and inclusive cartoon, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power continues to go from strength to strength. I’d just prefer if they released each actual season in its entirely, rather than splitting them up.

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The first thing that strikes you about The Clear Card is how little has changed. It’s incredible just how much this feels like 90s CCS. The character designs have been updated ever-so-slightly, but this is definitely a show designed to appeal to people who grew up watching the original. The background art is where the biggest difference can be seen, with some beautiful 3D work and contemporary lighting techniques. Madhouse animation studio has created the perfect visual update.

The story is a reboot of sorts. There are more cards for Sakura to tame, a new mystery to unravel. Like the original series, however, it’s not the kind of show that’s in a hurry to advance the ongoing plot. The day-to-day struggles of life in junior high are the focus, as Sakura and Syaoran get – gasp – serious (or at least as serious as junior high relationships can be). This would be my main criticism – the story isn’t moving fast enough. There’s also a strangely obsessive focus on food. I don’t remember the characters being quite so food-oriented in the original show, but it’s on full display here. Be prepared to watch everyone cooking, looking at, anticipating, eating and then finally reminiscing about food.

The one thing I’m glad they ditched is Sakura’s continued surprise that the source of any one episode’s chaos is a card. The number of times she expressed shock when someone said, “Hey, maybe this is the result of a Clow card?” was mind-boggling.

At this point in the show, 11 episodes in, I have no idea if 2019 Cardcaptor can be more transparent in presenting the non-heteronormative relationships portrayed in the manga. Toya and Yukito seem to know where the other one is and what they’re doing at any one time – as if they were a couple – yet the show never actually says as much. I suspect that, in the interests of maintaining canon with the original anime, they will continue to simply insinuate, rather than be as up front as the manga was.

It’s – ahem – clear that The Clear Card isn’t simply made for grown-up fans of the original show. This is still a kids’ show, and as such don’t expect any complex stories or challenging plot twists. As an exercise in updating a dormant story without reinventing it, however, The Clear Card is excellent.

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The animation here looks stunning. I am completely in love with the visual style. The sharp-edged characters remind me of ‘Batman: the Animated Series’, whilst the backgrounds have a wonderful 60s vibe. The action is perfectly framed, and it’s clear that the animators have a good sense of how to both mimic live action features and take advantage of all that 2D animation has to offer.

The story is a mix of genres, including heist caper, James Bond-type spy movie and even a dash of Indiana Jones. Carmen herself, voiced by Gina Rodriguez, is a great lead, whilst Finn Wolfhard continues his ascent as the biggest star to emerge from ‘Stranger Things’, portraying whiz kid computer hacker, Player. But the MVP is truly Rafael Petardi as the clueless policeman on Carmen’s trail, Chase Devineaux. His delivery constantly gets the biggest laughs, even if the punchlines aren’t that clever.

Carmen has made the switch from baddie to goodie – strange when you consider we spent the original videogames trying to catch her, rather than playing as her – but the really weird part is how similar her origin story is to She-Ra’s.

I love the educational diversions here, precisely because they are so obviously shoehorned in. The basic geography lessons are kind of charming. It is frustrating, however, to watch the episode set in Australia. The accents are woeful, and what’s more they decided to go with a plot concerning a rocket launch near Uluru – a strange choice, considering there haven’t been any rocket launches in Australia since 1970. If I fancy some mental acrobatics, I could try to convince myself that the show is actually set in the 1960s (but a 1960s with internet and smartphones and etc. etc.)

The only other disappointment is that the plot features some ‘surprises’ that we adults can see coming from a long way off. This didn’t annoy me too much, since the narrative construction and characterisation is tight enough that said twists are quite cleverly plotted – everything makes sense, rather than having abrupt 180 twists for the sake of them.

As far as rebooting 80s IPs so that grown-up kids of the era can watch the shows with their kids, this cartoon is surprisingly lacking in cynicism. Where ‘Stranger Things’ annoys me with its habit of reassuring late gen Xers and Millennials that yes, their era was GOAT, Carmen Sandiego is a solid story, well-told. Bring on season 2.

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