Reviews

Rating: 6.5

Wayyy to much romantic melodrama in this. The opening scene was Harry about the get laid and the ending scene (right after Dumbledore's funeral) was Hermione talking to Harry about "snogging" Ginny. That and having to watch the melodrama of Ron getting it on with comically crazy Lavender Brown while Hermione implodes and Harry avoids getting drugged by yet another love interest was cringe and disrupted the otherwise dark tone of the film. Many pivotal scenes in this didn't really make sense such as why Harry didn't just use the water spell directly in Dumbledore's mouth when he couldn't spoon feed him water, why Bellatrix randomly attacked the burrow (they can't harm harry so what's the point), or why Snape refers to himself as the Half blood prince. Why did he even decide to to become a death eater. Last movie he was teaching Harry how to protect his mind from Voldemort but it's unclear why he changed sides (this may be revealed in the subsequent movie). The revelation of the half blood prince as well as Dumbledore's death was weirdly anticlimactic since one revelation had zero leadup and the other suspends your disbelief that the most powerful wizard alive would go down to Snape without a fight. One could argue this is ok because he was weakened but a weakened master should still solo an advanced magic user. This entry was a tonal mess, that relied to heavily on corny interpersonal conflicts however we got to see more of Tom riddle pre-deformation which was the highlight of this film.

Rating: 7.0

This movie was about the psychological and political aftermath of the return of Voldemort. Having Harry struggle with PTSD after the encounter from the last film and attempting to shut off his friends and shoulder the burden like a true MC was interesting and well done. The political subplots about suppressing public knowledge on the impending conflict were realistic and the concept of Voldemort and Harry being a magic dyad was unexpected. There was also a slightly important character death in the demise of Sirius black. However, the power of friendship being something worth fighting for the theme at the end was cliche, and the room of requirement allowing only the main cast to train undetected was far too convenient. Overall an interesting addition to the franchise.

Rating: 7.2

Pretty good, it's essentially John Wick with a darker backstory, different race, and zero resources to execute his task. The movie was brutal as people would be getting visibly sliced open, fingers chopped off, shot etc, the action was intense, well choreographed and disturbing, and the ending was more realistic as monkey man succumbs to his injuries and dies. The side characters could've been stronger as the main antagonists motivations boiled down to "oppress and destroy because they're on sacred land we want," and the other protagonists like Pitobash weren't all that interesting they just helped out once and tagged along for the rest of the film. Some things make no sense like the police not attempting to recover Monkey Man's body when he was sniped yet the villagers did this without being detected. Or the final fight sequence where nobody had a gun to protect the most important person in the nation which conveniently allows Monkeyman to melee everyone. The villagers teaming up with monkey man was silly and Rana deciding to just wait on an upper floor for monkeyman to fight him instead of calling for more backup was stupid. Other than that a pretty good watch.

Rating: 7.0

The interpersonal drama in this was both heavy-handed and entertaining. Ron being angry at Harry for being able to participate in the tri-wizard tournament was irritating despite them making up in the end, and Hermione's anger towards Ron for not picking up her hints read like a high school fanfiction (granted they are children). The third act carries the film where Voldemort returns and Barty Crouch Jr.'s conspiracy is revealed. The movie leaves off on a dark note as the antagonist is now a palpable character in the plot. This movie raises more questions as to how deep the resurrect Voldemort conspiracy goes and why people are so devoted to him anyways. The movie ends in a named character's death which darkens the tone for future installments.

Rating: 1.0

Writing this review evoked more emotion than watching this destruction of an animated masterwork. Pragmatically this is a 4/10, but personally it's a solid 1. It doesn't have to be a 1-1 copy but most changes were complete garbage. Way too many to list but: Reversed sibling dynamics: (Azula inferiority arc, Sokka becomes the father figure Katara becomes the insolent child). An accelerated Katara power crawl (Aang told her one thing and she's now a water bending pro), amalgamations of unrelated arcs (ex: Jet in Omashu combined with the Mechanist air temple arc). Kyoshi character destruction (she became a gung-ho "forget your friends and FIGHT" character losing all nuance from the novels). Weird Gyatso power of friendship themes (Aang calms himself down at his grave by remembering their friendship not acknowledging his new support system in Sokka and Katara). Roku character destruction: (his first lines are jokes, Roku is supposed stoic, refined, and compassionate). Sokka's no longer sexist removing a core part of his character development. Idiotic plot points: (Aang going to Roku's temple alone to find a MacGuffin to free his friends, Ozai not knowing about Sozin's comet at the start of the series, Yue breaking off her engagement because she talked to Sokka once. Aang not trying to learn water bending, Kyoshi breaking the power system by showing Aang the future, etc. The show violates the fundamentals of storytelling by telling and not showing (characters go on preachy monologues by either explaining their own character traits, or other characters' traits or repeating the themes of the arc). The only good in this thing is that it looks incredible (for the most part), and made great changes such as removing Aang and Katara's romance, characterizing Ozai, showing the agni kai between Zuko and Ozai, showing the genocide, showing death and blood, introducing more previous avatars, making Zhao a more calculating threat, the 41st division addition to display Zuko's compassion, and making the spirit world disturbing. I don't care to see the remaining seasons so this is a review of season 1 only. They literally had a winning lotto ticket and decided to change the numbers. This could've been another masterwork.

Rating: 2.0

A good old-fashioned dumpster fire. This is fundamentally terrible due to the lack of narrative tension: (you know nothing of consequence will happen to anyone because you get spoilers due to Webb's ability every 20-ish minutes). Completely unlikeable characters, an unengaging villain: he wanted the spider powers to build his off-screened empire and didn't like Madam Webb's mom because her "path was clear cut" and he came from nothing?? He's also a moron who couldn't even hire a team of people to track down the girls and pinned it all on one person. Nonsensical plot points: the entire teen diner scene, as well as the spider people not protecting the spiders allowing them to be stolen despite acknowledging with great power comes great responsibility, why did they only step in when Madam Webb's mom was going to die? Weird product placement: The villain was defeated by a Pepsi sign; and clunky informal dialogue. This isn't even considering how it breaks Spider-Man canon as a prequel. You're better off watching Morbius at least that was funny.

Rating: 6.0

This movie was really just an extended preview into the next season of the anime. Much of the movie was recaps of the entire anime up until that point which was stupid as the target demographic of this movie would have already seen the prior seasons. The recap wasn't even good it was just clips of prior seasons with the subtitles removed. The new plot points revealed that the Hashira will just be training the Slayer Corps as they predict that an all-out assault will take place to capture Nezuko. There's a big contradiction in this as they decide to leave Nezuko with only Kanao to guard her at Shinobu's estate. But decide to invite Tamayo who is also a demon to the Hashira HQ to work along Shinobu?? Why would you leave your most valuable asset, what your enemy is after, not in the place that's the most protected?? As always the presentation was a masterpiece Ufotable continues to elevate the source material. Unfortunately, the source material itself is mediocre.

Rating: 7.0

Slightly better than the Chamber of Secrets. In the first act there was a lot of setup towards the third act where there were multiple callbacks making everything come full circle ex: The class learning about Animagus's vs Werewolf's, foreshadowing the final conflict between a werewolf (lupin) and Animagus (Sirius black). Hermione spawning into class revealed later to be her literally time traveling, a mechanic that resolves the main conflict etc. Some plot points don't make sense such as why Dumbledore would allow something as dangerous as dementors to guard the school when they've already attacked students like Harry and can literally kill them. Also there were interesting questioned posed in the ending such as why Pettigrew killed James Potter and became a servant of Voldemort. The time travel was deterministic so it didn't break the narrative. As a whole, it was a decent watch.

Rating: 7.6

This was a beatifically shot sequel that treads on similar themes of the prior blade runner such as what it means to be human, and discrimination against the unknown (replicants). Despite being slow in places (many scenes felt long as nothing would be happening characters would just be walking), it was mentally engaging as your placed in K's shoes figuring out what's real and what isn't (i.e is he the chosen one or not?). The twist that K wasn't the child of deckard and rachael was well done and allowed for a more interesting ending in where K decides to sacrifice himself for something real, and allow deckard to see his daughter; a stark contrast to the completely artificial life he was living. Some plot points weren't explained well such as how the resistance even formed in the first place, why Gen 8's are being hunted and why do they have longer lifespans, how the resistance knew to even question K in the first place, How much Deckard's daughter knows of the plan and how she went from an orphanage to containment, and why the resistance hasn't revealed her yet; that muddle the film. But its themes and execution were consistent and it ended well enough to be a fine movie.

Rating: 7.8

Watched this in UHD and the setpieces looked incredible nothing looked fake despite the movie tackling a cyberpunk aesthetic in 1982. The plot was mentally engaging as you followed Deckard's sleuthing skills on his hunt for the replicants, and the themes around what it truly means to be human were interesting because at the end of the day the replicants just wanted to live beyond there termination date despite there morally grey methods of achieving this. They weren't inherently evil so much so that Roy let himself die rather than seek revenge on Deckard for doing his job. I thought the romance didn't add all that much to the story. There were some stupid scenes like, pris deciding to do backflips to try and kill Deckard when she literally had him in a leglock a scene prior, and I would've liked to know more about Deckard himself such as why he's all alone and depressed.

Rating: 7.9

A dark creature feature with a couple of unexpected developments such as ash being a robot, the alien hiding aboard the shuttle, the mothers primary objective, and the death of the ships captain. These turns kept the narrative engaging, and the gore was genuinely disturbing as it didn't look cheap or fake like you would expect from a 1979 movie. The only thing that didn't make sense was how the crew decided to inspect the alien with no protective gear, not quarantine Kane after the alien left his face (this lead to the alien escaping them to begin with), and split up even after the alien was killing everyone (granted they had to divide the work of getting the coolant and setting the bomb but at this point they know sticking together is the best option). Dark and suspenseful film.

Rating: 7.9

I never saw the original color purple but from what I've deduced it's 1-1 with the source material. The main character inverts the trope that MC's have to be intelligent, beautiful, or powerful for the narrative to be compelling as Celie was none of those. Her journey to achieving self acceptance by learning from other women whose circumstances differ from her own was satisfying and the goes around comes around theme was well done and not preachy as those who wronged her paid the price but also achieve redemption. The domestic abuse was well directed as it was actually difficult to watch but wasn't overdone to the point it would become trauma pron. The short lived lesbian relationship between Shug avery and Cecile was weird and didn't add anything to the plot and the offscreened explanation as to why shug's father eventually forgave shug should've been expounded upon. The musical numbers at the end were repetitive because they were singing about the same thing (cecile receiving good fortune) but overall this was a potent story that wasn't muddled by the musical bits for the most part.

Rating: 6.9

This entry is similar to the first installment in that the main plot is the trio solving a mystery rooted in Voldemort pining for his resurrection. As usual the humor is terrible and the dialogue and acting especially from malfoy can be corny and childish (granted they're children). Blood is shown in this film an the among us plot regarding the chamber of secrets was generally well explained. We also learned a bit about Voldemort's origins (he is tom riddle). There were some elements where you have to suspend your disbelief such as the fact that nobody asked myrtle why she died, the fact that nobody decided to use the magic paper from the first movie that shows where everyone is in realtime to catch the culprit, the fact that Dumbledore did nothing despite having a similar incident 50 years prior you mean he couldn't locate the chamber in 50 years? The movie opens some interesting questions such as how did voldemort reduce is essence into a book, how harry relates to Voldemort now that we know he has some of Voldemort's power, why voldemort wanted to destroy "mudbloods" etc.

Rating: 6.9

Overall it was just ok. The world of Hogwarts is interesting, Harry's backstory is interesting, the main trio is ok, and the main antagonist is shrouded in mystery. The side characters felt like caricatures (Malfoy was the stereotypical school bully projecting his cowardice onto others, The Dursleys were comedically terrible etc). There were some drama contrivances near the end like Ron riding his chess piece as it was being destroyed rather than commanding it like he did other chess pieces (they still would've won the game and he wouldn't have gotten "injured"), and some things that made no sense like how Hogwarts is supposed to be kept on the downlow but to get to platform 9 3/4 you have to run through a wall in broad daylight. Other than that an ok setup film.

Rating: 6.9

Depressing tale about the price of greed on a morally grey protagonist. The elephant in the room is yes this movie is wayyy to long. The third act featured bloated scenes of tedious dialogue that could've been condensed (i.e courtroom scene). The characters are the highlight as they are all interesting, entertaining, nuanced, believable, and all around human which makes sense since this was based around a true story. I don't know the history but the realism in the end with Bill eventually getting out of prison while Ernest got life was well done. It did get repetitive with the whole a new indian has dirt on us so we have to kill him subplot since they did it 5+ times though overall an ok movie.

I'm expecting to get ratioed for this but someone has to be authentic here. I was a fan of this series since it came out and unfortunately I cannot give this a pass even though it was my favorite shonen anime by far. This one episode manages to undo all prior story themes, introduce new ones that were never built up, destroy character arcs and worst of all open up an absurd amount of blatant plot holes. You can't even rewatch the series because every sacrifice was in vain towards this conclusion. Here's a list of some of the narrative contradictions and absurdities introduced in this one episode:

The destruction of the Hallucigenia makes little sense. It made it seem like Since Eren died it didn't have a host therefore died. But this doesn't work since it survived in a tree without a host for years before Ymir made contact. Its evaporation into thin air is nothing short of a pothole especially since it was destroying everyone only one chapter ago. You could say It's implied Ymir willed its destruction but this only brings about more inconsistencies with the power of the founder (Whom we thought came from the worm).

The resurrection of past shifter's to help armin was completely left field and has no logical explanation except for fanservice.

Eren "becoming a dove" is fanservice and makes 0 sense. Symbolism and all it wasn't necessary for the final panel.

Mikasa's character arc seemingly invalidated, yes she had the will to kill Eren but was never able to move on from him. So what was the message here? Have her finally grow out and be a normal girl on her own, only for her never to be able to move on from her past love and grieve for the rest of her life even when she has a family? We made no progress.

Mikasa somehow teleported to Paradis, separating herself from the main cast and to the hill where it all started to bury Eren's head. Where was she even walking to in that panel? They have no mode of transportation to cross the sea. Have we just forgotten she was deemed a traitor by the yeagerists and aided in the slaughter of yeagerist personnel at the docks? I get the rest of the cast not coming to paradise till later but seriously I don't understand why Mikasa got a pass.

The destruction of historia's character. Why even have her lie about her pregnancy. Meet with Eren ("So what do you think about me having a child"), and not only never give us closure on that conversation, but have her look dead inside while pregnant, to make us think she didn't wan't to get pregnant to begin with. "You need to take care of your body", really Farmer?

The Farmer being the father made me sick, not because I wanted Eren to be the father but because there was no setup to this, and introduces a contradiction in Historia's character. Yeah, so this guy who threw rocks at me and bullied me as a child decided to work at the farm. Even though I barely know this guy and don't have any feelings for him atm, I'll be fine with him giving me a child. I live for myself anyways, but first, let me tell eren and see what he thinks. This pregnancy served little purpose besides to delay the inheritance of the beast titan, how can you as a writer have the most important FMC in your story, the QUEEN, get knocked up by a character who doesn't even have any relevant backstory or even a name?

Ymir being in love with king fritz, ok fine stockholme syndrome, but that introduces a plothole as to why she let herself die in episode From You 2000 Years Ago. It was implied she lost the will to live but why? If she loved him she would have gotten right back up. First Mikasa, now Ymir and Historia, this is a terrible message to female readers in regards to the romantic relationships in this show.

The rumbling stopping when zeke was killed was another plothole, since by this point ymir was seemingly not bound by that royal restriction. She was on Eren's side, so how did that even work?

Ymir fritz in general is swiss cheese, so she was waiting 2000 years for someone to help her break her Stockholm syndrome and it happened to be Mikasa because she killed Eren in front of her out of love. But in reality, Ymir has the power to peer into any eldians live's/memories via paths so she could've looked into anyone's lives to see them breaking free from there own Stockholm syndrome to empower herself to end it all. Surely some eldian out their health with her situation in 2000 years, right? There's now no reason for Eren or Mikasa or any of them to be involved now. She just needed to see someone else sever their emotional chains.

Eren making a post-partum reply all via paths introduces a new hole because it was established Ackermans can't have their minds altered with yet mikasa states she met with eren. Ackermans not being tamperable was what led to their persecution in S3P1 (What Uri was apologizing to Kenny for).

Eren guiding Dina to eat his mom is completely left wall garbage. I don't need to get into this one as other people have already broken down why this isn't a good plot point. If it ain't broke don't fix it, we would've been fine with her showing up because she just became an abnormal due to her royal blood and promise to Grisha in S3P2 (I'll always find you).

The fact that Eren attempted to pull a lelouch, but at the end of the day contradicted himself. ("I will keep moving forward until my enemies are destroyed"), but my actual plan is to move 80% forward and just hope that the remaining 20% do not create a weapon that could finish us all. As a result, his home to turn into a militarized fascist state on the brink of another war, and the cycle of hate continued. I'm not defending Lelouch, because even his ending wasn't necessary but Lelouch's ending was just in line with his character. In Eren's case, it was contradictory especially since he stated he wouldn't leave paradis up to fate and that unifying everyone was stupid in season 1.

So he had the hots for Mikasa this whole time, yet didn't do anything with her and wanted her to never move on after his death? What? If I knew I was going to die, and somebody liked me, I would tell them and love them, so that when my time came they at least could cherish the time we spent together and not have to grieve over a relationship that could've been.

Eren Kruger's if you want to save Mikasa an Armin see this through to the end. But he really didn't, he only finished 80% and left the world in the same cycle of hatred as before. Armin probably spent the rest of his life begging the world into not exterminating them. What was even the point?

Paradis gets destroyed proving my point about Eren's plan being absolute nonsense he made the situation worse yet had the audacity to call Zeke's plan "messed up". He let his friends live long lives but for everyone after his generation, he signed their Death note.

Ymir peering into Mikasa's head caused her headaches, which is a direct plothole I mentioned before these pages came out about how she could've just used anyone else to satisfy her Stockholm fetish. This is even dumber because she was established in episode from you 2000 years ago to not have the agency to freely use her powers yet she did this which means she could've ended the power of the titans using anyone else's situation. We don't need the main cast.

Not confirmed but Jean and Mikasa have a family, she should've been paired with a random if anyone at all because Jean doesn't deserve to be anyone's second choice. Mikasa still wears the scarf of her dead "lover" and shows her grandkids his grave like it's some kind of memorial, this is just cringe.

Titan powers are heavily implied to be still around, with the parallel to Ymir's tree in the final panel opening to the door for a sequel. This means eren didn't even get rid of the titans which was his lifelong goal. All in all, he accomplished nothing and made everyone's lives worse.

Rating: 6.9

This is an improvement on the temple of doom. The message of valuing what is truly important ties in well with the conflicts of the film: (Indy and his father's troubled relationship and the forces trying to acquire the grail for good and evil motives). There were some decent albeit predictable twists Elsa being "evil", Walter being evil, and as usual plenty of comical scenarios where Indy somehow makes it out: Indy stranded in the middle of the ocean somehow makes it back to shore in the first 10 minutes of the film. Another ok watch. After this film it apparently goes downhill so it's best to top here.

Rating: 6.8

Another decent popcorn adventure with a triumphant score. The Temple of Doom was entertaining to watch and like its predecessor the plot followed Indy on a quest stop evil people from using relics to their advantage (with a dame by his side). This movie was darker than expected as you had child slavery, cardiectomys, burning people alive, starvation etc. As repercussions to the antagonists' actions. The female lead here was nearly useless and primarily served as a damsel in distress, and the action as usual was comically "bad" in places: Indy literally jumped out of a plane on a life raft. But it was an ok watch as a whole.

Rating: 5.9

Part Five: Shadow Warrior

I've always enjoyed Dave's works but this show was just mediocre at best. From the wooden acting by from Rosario (yes this was done on purpose in the beginning but it persisted even after she became Ahsoka "who wants to live" the white.) Heavy-handed foreshadowing: (Huyang dramatically telling Sabine and Ahsoka to stick together then they predictably get separated.) Slow cumbersome choreography despite the Jedi in this show being prequel-era fighters. Off-screened conflicts: (We didn't see Ezra's reaction to Sabine nullifying his sacrifice to reunite with him, not to mention the entire Sabine Ahsoka training drama was completely off-screened.) Stake-less drama: (Sabine gets impaled in the side only to be perfectly fine a scene later in the next episode, they should've just cut her hand off to give a serious consequence to her not continuing her training.) Corny dialogue: (**Shin stops, stares for 5 seconds, and replies "Going somewhere?"**) Unexplainable plot points: (How Ahsoka even teleported to the world between worlds, did Anakin pull her in? Is it because she's the daughter? In Rebels you needed to intend to get there via a portal.) Plot-holes: (In a decade of searching Ahsoka and Sabine never thought to look for Purgill to take them to Ezra despite knowing that's how Ezra disappeared in the first place. Also Shin Hati not just choking Sabine in all her confrontations when she realized she had no powers despite doing this to Sabine after Sabine "bested" her on Peridea.) Character themes that don't correlate to the plot: (the Ahsoka choosing not to fight but to live theme? What? Sure she was a bit jaded in the beginning but she wasn't mentally ill or on her last straw or anything before Anakin's lesson. This also has nothing to do with her search for Ezra or fight to keep Thrawn at bay). And Lastly, the fatal flaw, how the force and force users were handled: (George Lucas said anyone can "use" the force but everyone's baseline potential is different so some people could train a lifetime to only move a rock while others are the chosen one by default. Sabine has the worst force affinity (stated by 25,000-year-old Huyang who has seen nearly all the Jedi's force progressions), and by Shin. Yet not only did Ahsoka decide to train her but by the series' end she is able to do a powerful force push, and force pull despite not even being able to move a cup two episodes prior. I understand she's been training on and off for years but this revelation devalues force users because If everyone's super nobody is. Also, her character was unique because not only was she a Mandalorian but also a technical genius. Now she's a Mandalorian Jedi who can do everything Ezra can and devaluing Ezra's role in the narrative. Her force potential should've capped out at the level of someone like Chirrut from Rogue One, where the force augments their physical abilities but does not allow them to use powerful techniques like force push and pull. That should be reserved for force users with natural affinity, which would keep the power system balanced.) Unfortunately the show doubles down on this by having Hera with NO POWERS be able to tap into the force and hear Ashoka's world-between-worlds duel like her son who's an actual force user. This theme destroys the power system and makes Star Wars less mystical. I didn't expect this from Dave Filoni who's usually lockstep with lore. This show isn't over yet but a lot of damage has been done.

Rating: 5.8

Favorite Episode: Islands Part 8: The Light Cloud

The definition of a mixed bag. The quality of this series is wildly inconsistent. There are great arcs that seamlessly blend mature topics into a vibrant package like the Marceline Mortality arc where you question the philosophy of immortality and self-fulfillment in conjunction with accepting yourself for who you are. The human islands arc which delves into matrix-esque messages around balancing freedom and life satisfaction, while also answering lore questions about the disappearance of the humans and Finn's mother. In addition, most of the characters are interesting and layered: e.g. The Ice King, a weirdo who abducts princesses later revealed to be a tormented shell of a scientist who lost his way protecting those he loved. PB a perfectionist scientist who later accepts the flaws in her character becoming a more down-to-earth and ethical leader etc... In the same vein, Finn's maturity change throughout the series was a highlight as he was a real idiot in the first couple of seasons. However, for episodes like these are equally as many garbage or pointless episodes to match: e.g. Any episode about tree trunks, the disgusting snail girlfriend episode, the silent king episode about a throwaway character who claps the cheeks of his subjects for no reason, any episode following LSP's repetitive teenage antics etc. It becomes mind-numbing since the series is almost 300 episodes long. This series is also a comedy, though I personally found it more pointless than funny (granted I'm outside the target audience). Lastly, the ending was a bit rushed: the gum war was resolved in 3 minutes, Glorb an antagonist with no abilities any different from the lich defeated in 5 minutes... But a lot of the villains in this series are defeated in whimsical ways so this is par for the course. Overall a long series with interesting lore and some worthwhile arcs.

Rating: 6.9

A story about survival and patriotic altriusm: the tension was decent and allowed the film to remain engaging. Since I don't know the history, the threat of the Nazi's potentially breaking the line and destroying Dunkirk at any given moment enhanced the entertainment value. On the other hand, the non-linear storytelling was pointless and only served to muddle the story. There was also no clear climax of the film; a lot of it felt like you were going through the motions of will they won't they be saved (granted this is historical and real life doesn't always follow an arc). I also didn't connect with any characters since there isn't much dialogue for you to understand them, (though the situation of Dunkirk is the selling point of the movie). As a whole, it was ok, nothing really caught my attention in this film as noteworthy.

Rating: 6.9

I thought this was going to be better than what it was. It was a finely crafted movie, the presentation was phenomenal, the message was potent and Cillian Murphy carries as Oppenheimer, but I found some of the intricacies a little hard to follow and unfortunately boring. A lot of the dialogue especially in the second act was just laying out the bureaucracy of building a bomb which isn't entertaining; security clearances, compartmentalization, acquiring personnel, etc. There are a lot of characters in this movie many aren't on screen long enough for me to fully understand their role in the narrative which leads to confusion for those who aren't history buffs. If you know the history this movie will probably fare better, but the real highlight was the visual imagery that conveys Oppenheimer's mental state, and the detonation itself. I'm not sure why in the beginning Oppenheimer was having nightmares and visions of quantum physics (at that point he hadn't built the bomb yet and shouldn't be suffering from any PTSD), but I might've missed something. As a whole an quickly paced slightly boring watch.

Rating: 5.0

Favorite Episode: Prelude to an Explosion of Madness

Megumin as a character doesn't work as a series protagonist. Her character just isn't interesting or funny enough to make the series worthwhile. Her character boils down to "I'm not like the other wizards". Also, the show repeats plot points we already knew from Konosuba (we already knew why Megumin uses explosion magic, and the Crimson Demon's origins, and why Yunyun is attached to Megumin, and that the Axis cult is insane, etc). The best part of this series was when Kazuma and Aqua showed up. The main trio of Konosuba complements each other, and their dynamics are what make Konosuba worthwhile. Isolating one doesn't make for an entertaining watch.

Rating: 7.1

Manga Rating: 7.0

Favorite Episode: The Strongest Hero

A parody of seinen/shonen with interesting and believable characters. Season 1 was a visual spectacle, though season 2's presentation was noticeably cheapened. The comedy was usually moderately funny but could be absolutely hilarious in places, especially the manga. Fights in this series were pretty standard as characters would finish off opponents with a new move/powerup, in combination with a strategy off of their existing move-set. This applies to everyone except Saitama who literally inverts the trope by throwing "normal consecutive punches." The only large con is that the overarching conflict aside from a few moments like Tatsumaki V Psykos, Tatsumaki V Saitama, Blizzard character development, and Garo V Silver Fang; aren't all that interesting because it's just a throwdown between the hero association and the monster association with a ridiculously OP monster sympathizer (Garo) thrown into the mix. They lost me with the God-given create anything in the universe ability it became ridiculous. Nobody important is killed off or permanently injured so the stakes felt like they reset themselves especially when Saitama went back in time. It's not about the fights though, the true value is in the characters. Overall a mostly fine series. Will update this review when it ends.

Rating: 6.6

Manga Rating: 6.4

Favorite Episode: Transformation

Presentation wise one of the best-looking shonens ever. Story-wise, no better than a mid-tier shonen. If it wasn't for the ufotable adaptation it would be forgotten like it was before the anime started. There are a lot of factors that contribute to this being "mid", from the cardboard two-dimensional characters: Zenitsu a screaming coward, inosuke a screaming battle-nut; an MC whose perfect in every way and reminds you of his perfect morals at the start of every fight (he literally led an assassin to his own spirit core to kill him because he's so nice). A ridiculous power system that started out sensical where controlling your breathing enhanced your physical prowess. Then devolved into controlling your breathing allows you to consciously heal the cells in your body, spawn flames, bugs, water, mist, snakes, love, lightning, and use toph level seismic sense (Inosuke). It also allows you to see through people and if you get mad enough attain a mark that can give you a power-up. Theres also a prominent plot device and mary sue: Nezuko was so strong despite not receiving a lot of Muzan's blood, she could defy the sun, use blood demon arts, survive being decapitated, and curb-stomp an upper-rank 6th all while not having to eat humans even though humans are the sustenance of demons. Nah she can just sleep it off and wake up when the plot needs her to. Lastly there are repetitive narrative elements that cheapen the impact of everything: nearly all the fights are resolved by a little strategy with a lot of convenient new mechanics: i.e Zenitsu defeating an upper rank by making his own form (despite being a one trick pony) and then it's never used again, Inosuke moving his heart around to avoid death fighting Daki, battle spirit mechanic in chapter 154, Yushiro's mind wipe ability in chapter 153, etc. Every antagonist doesn't need a sad backstory to give them more depth, the only villain who was straight-up terrible was Muzan and his backstory was underwhelming because it was just some no-name doctor gave him an elixir that made him a demon, and he just wanted to live forever. I was hoping this would be phenomenal but it seems the haters are mostly right.