Fangirl Adventures 2013 Summer Movie Review

With blockbuster season behind us, I thought it was a great time to recap the 2013 summer movie season that was!   I saw a record 13 movies this summer in the theater, a personal best for me. Some were more memorable than others.  Here’s a quick recap.

It’s hard to pick an absolute favorite movie from this summer, but Iron Man 3, Star Trek Into Darkness and Pacific Rim are among the top three.  To me they truly define why we wait for the summer to get larger than life action flicks and why we have so much fun watching them.  When I get home today, Star Trek Into Darkness on Blu-ray should be waiting for me and I’m already counting down for Iron Man 3 and my pre-order of Pacific Rim. 

The World’s End was worth waiting for.  Edgar Wright ends the Cornetto Trilogy on a high note with a great cast and some one-liners that will stand the test of time.  The movie is fun and entertaining and Simon Pegg and Nick Frost are fantastic as always.  

 

We’re the Millers and 2 Guns were both surprise hits for me.   We’re the Millers was funnier than I expected.  Jennifer Aniston and Jason Sudeikis were great together and it’s been a long time since I’ve enjoyed a comedy this much.  2 Guns was a fun action/comedy!      The chemistry between Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg made the movie that much better.  I definitely recommend renting, if not buying, both of them when they come out on Blu-ray and DVD.

Moving on to the animated movies of the summer, I enjoyed Monsters University and Despicable Me 2, but thought both lacked the magic of the first go-round.  I would have to say that I enjoyed Monster University a bit more due to the fact that I love all things Pixar and Nathan Fillion was one of the Monster voices, but I have a special place in my heart for the Minions! I love those little yellow guys and they do steal every scene they’re in, but for me the first movie worked because of the strong story and the minions were an added bonus, the second movie had maybe too many minion gags and not enough story.  The last 20 minutes of the movie had a lot of great heart and story that I wish had been more of a focus throughout the entire film.

 

Another movie worth mentioning was The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones.  If it wasn’t for Dawn, I probably would not have gone to see this in the theater, but I must admit I enjoyed it.  If nothing else, I really want to read the books because the movie didn’t do great in the box office so a sequel is probably not going to happen.

Last but certainly not least, I loved Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters.  They did a wonderful job with bringing the book to life.  I really hope this does well enough to continue the series!  Percy was just a great family movie all around. 

Now for the movies that let me down this summer.  World War Z was a major disappointment.  Despite all the production issues and rumors surrounding the movie, I still had high hopes for it.  I heard the book was fantastic and was really excited to see it, but unfortunately it just didn’t impress me.  I was into it for the first 15 minutes and then it started to unravel and it never recovered for me.  Another huge disappointment was The Hangover III.  I love the first two Hangovers, but the third one left me wishing they had stopped at two. 

The biggest disappointment to me was Man of Steel.  I know, I know…what kind of Fangirl am I?  It’s nothing against DC, but I just didn’t care for it.  I’m a bit more hopeful for the sequel now that Ben Affleck is Batman.  I have faith that he will be an excellent Batman and that the fuss from the fanboys will be forgotten.

I wish I could have seen The Wolverine, This is the End and RIPD in the theater, but they are first day rentals/buys for sure.

What did you think of the Summer Blockbuster season of 2013?  Were you disappointed or pleasantly surprised by what it had to offer?

If you want to hear more on the 2013 summer blockbuster season that was, listen to Strange Adventures Podcast where I and my co-hosts, @NicholasStrange from strangeamuesments.com and Holly Strange, have a more in-depth discussion on the movies we saw this summer.

Here’s where you can find our Strange Adventures Podcast:

Check us out on iTunes at this link https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/strange-adventures-podcast/id669303705 If you like us, make sure to hit the subscribe button so that you always get our latest episode and be sure to rate us!  5 Stars are always welcome.

You can also find us on Stitcher by searching Strange Adventures Podcast or at this link http://app.stitcher.com/browse/feed/38550/episodes

For more Fangirl Adventures be sure to LIKE us on Facebook at and follow us on Twitter @Fangrladventure.

Thanks for reading and listening!

Let’s boo, boo,

Lisa

Pacific Rim: Dan's Review

Pacific Rim 

 

Today we are cancelling the apocalypse!

I have to start by confessing that I was against this film from day zero and that I am a rather harsh movie critic even by my own standards.  I generally have a hard time with big budget summer popcorn movies altogether.  However, if you were able to drift into my mind last night as I watched Pacific Rim the experience may have been something like “oh-my-god-this-is-so-rediculously-awesome-I-can’t-believe-that-huge-robot-just-smashed-his-face-with-wait-are-those-wings-and- is-that-a-sword?!?”

Overall I was very impressed with the movie.  In my mind this is basically Guillermo del Toro’s vision of a live-action westernized anime.  The movie starts out taking itself very seriously, which could be hard for some to take when dealing with giant robots (Jaegers) fighting huge monsters (Kaiju).  I would have enjoyed if that serious tone carried on through the rest of the film, but we are then introduced to some pretty eccentric characters along the way that in turn infuse more of an anime-style feel to the story.  That could have been a deal breaker for me as I tend to gravitate away from over the top characters in a live action setting, but once I reminded myself of the subject matter and retrofitted the movie into the anime archetypes established in my head (Neon Genesis Evangelion) I was pulled back in.

I absolutely loved the visual effects.  The Jaegers are enormous and like the Kaiju vary drastically in design from one to the next.  I liked seeing all the gears and intricate parts of the Jaegers in motion just as much as watching the next monstrous creature emerging from deep in the Pacific.  Had Jaws not been successful at keeping me out of the water as a kid, this movie would been more than happy to invoke that fear.  The destruction caused by the visceral combat is all gloriously rendered.  The locations are fantastic and everything down to the pilots suits exude a sleek sci-fi design.  I want a Kaiju skeleton boat base just as much as the next black market dealer.

While Pacific Rim is not out to reinvent the wheel as far as story is concerned, it is in its own right a pretty fantastic take on humanity’s last stand against overwhelming odds.  I was invested in the fight the whole time.  I really enjoyed the entire cast, eccentricities and all, and particularly enjoyed Idris Elba’s performance as Stacker Pentecost.  I thought Raleigh Becket (Charlie Hunnam) and Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi) had great chemistry and made me really feel for their characters.  The Jaegers themselves take on personalities of their own and add a certain charm to the chaos.  I could really feel the weight of their movements and the impact of their punches.  There were times when I would cheer and clap or just silently smirk along with the rest of the theater when Gipsy Danger would tread his way onto the screen.  He was there to fight and I had…well pretty good seats anyway.  His theme music has been stuck in my head all day!

There aren’t many spoilers to give away, but I still think you’ll find enough variety in the story and a few twists along the way to keep you invested.  Make sure to stay for the credits! 

Minus a few quirky moments and my initial reluctance to accept some characters, I give Pacific Rim 4 out of 5 Kaijus.

Thanks for reading,
Dan

Pacific Rim: A Fangirl Review

Pacific Rim: A Fangirl Review

Every year, Hollywood promises a summer full of blockbuster movies, but how often do they really deliver on that?   We get a lot of sequels and big budget movies that promise to entertain, but often leave us and our wallets feeling empty.

This summer has been hit or miss for me, so far.  I loved Iron Man 3 and Star Trek into Darkness but wasn’t thrilled with Man of Steel, and completely let down by World War Z.  I enjoyed Monsters University and Despicable Me 2 but didn’t leave the theater with the same love I had for the first ones.  Needless to say I had very high hopes that Pacific Rim would even out my summer movie experience.

My interest in this movie started last year at the New York Comic Con.  Guillermo del Toro held a panel with Legendary Studios and discussed Pacific Rim, and buzz over the movie quickly hit the show floor.  Sadly, I couldn’t get in to that panel, but I was infected by the buzz nonetheless and have kept up on its progress ever since.  Let’s face it, del Toro directing  a looming apocalypse, alien monsters that come from the deep rather than space and giant robots built to kick some monster ass…I’m all in! 

 

Pacific Rim is everything a summer blockbuster should be.  First and foremost, you should expect to be entertained, and you will be! Right from the start, we get an introduction into a world that has been invaded by Kaiju, gigantic monsters that do not come in peace.   They defeat the first one with Military firepower, but when they realize there are more, extreme measures must be taken and the Jaeger (Hunter in German) Program is born!

Please bear with me while my inner 12-year-old geeks out for a moment…the monsters are freakin’ cool and scary as hell!  The Kaiju (monster in Japanese) are measured on a Fujita-esque scale from 1-5: 1 being the first to emerge and 5 being the end of life as we know it.  They resemble dinosaurs and I love them all the more for it.  I would love to give more detail on them, but I really don’t want to give too much away. It’s much better to discover that for yourself.  I bit all my nails off during the fighting scenes with the Robots! Each time they would tackle, throw or spit toxic goo at the robots, I thought “Shit! How are they going to defeat this Kaiju?  It’s so powerful!”  As the movie progresses, they just get bigger and badder!

 

On to the robots!  You can’t help but be fired up over these things!  They are massive! They can fight on land and sea and they have some pretty cool gadgets for kicking some serious Kaiju ass.  Each Jaeger needs two pilots to control it, the stronger the bond between them, the better they fight.  The fight sequences between the Jaegers and the Kaiju are jaw-dropping.  We see them fight in all kinds of places, but the best one takes place in the Hong Kong bay.  The colorful background of Hong Kong and the intense fight between multiple Jaegers makes for one intense battle scene that garnered cheers from the audience at the end of it.  My personal favorite Jaeger was the Gypsy Danger, but they were all awesome.  I’m sure you’ll have your own favorite. 

Pacific Rim is 132 minutes of pure fun!  The plot is simple—Monsters bad, Robots good—but it’s a joy to watch.  Again, with this movie, the human storyline may take a backseat at times, but, honestly, who cares?  There’s enough of it to keep the story going and stay interested until the next epic battle. Personally, I liked the story; I thought it was well told and paced perfectly.  I cared just enough about everyone to feel something for them when they were in danger and to shed a tear or two at the end when…oh I won’t spoil it.  

Go see this movie!  If you’re tired of the crap that Hollywood gives you 90% of the time, then go see this movie and let the box office show that we still want original movies that for once can truly be called a summer blockbuster!