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Reviews
Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022)
Good when its good, boring when its bad
For starters theres a lot of hate flying around on the internet for this series that has been nlown out of proportion. As far as disney plus shows go, I would put Obi-wan solidly between the book of boba fett and mandalorian season 2. For obi-wan kenobi, the episodes that are good are exceptional. 3 of the episodes are objectively good, 2 of whivh i would consider very good. The rest of the series however is "fine." Not bad just acceptable. There are bad 'scenes' but they don't permeate the series as a whole. The scenes with obi wan and with Darth Vader all shine. Darth vader is the real standout for the show but obi wan living a tortured rock bottom existence and having to slowly regain confidence was fitting and well portrayed.
Now to get to the flaws. The show lacks direction for much of the middle. Obi wans mission to save Leia isn't as convincing as it should be. This would have been enough of a plot to carry an episode or two, not be the throughline of the whole show. Many of the episodes were just plain boring. One episode in particular ends The same way it begins and nothing happens during the episode which literally made it pointless. The show had tons of potential that went wasted. The story would have beneifitted from being more focused on obi-wan and anakin/vader's relationship. Additionally there were some seriously questionable writing decisions made to further the plot that were pretty nonsensical. Also there werent really any new interesting characters to get excited about except maybe Reva who I have mixed feelings about.
Overall it had tons of potential, much of which was squandered. Maybe they will fix this in season 2. But regardless even with the flaws I enjoyed watching it but admittedly could have gotten the same enjoyment from just watching a compilation of the important scenes on YouTube instead of sitting through the whole show.
Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn (2020)
Entertaining, Good performances, unfocused direction.
Honestly this movie is one of the best ones in the current DC canon probably one below shazam in my opinion. Im glad they decided to.lean into Harley Quinn a bit more and Margot robbies performance of her brings most of the value much like Ryan reynolds performance of deadpool brings value to those films. Even though it has an all female main cast, it doesnt hamfist the "girl power" angle while still being able to be interpreted as feminist which is something many films have difficulty doing (captain marvel to name one that failed at this.) The majority of the story until the final act is far more show than tell than many previous dc films. There are set pieces and ideas in this movie that work fairly well. The club scene early in the movie, the two car chase scenes, the jailbreak scene, Harley blissfully or chaotically evading capture from multiple characters to name a few. These concepts play to the strengths of these characters for the most part. The characters: mostly fine. Harley and black canary work really well together and the detectives interactions with Harley for the majority of the movie work.and are entertaining. Hundreds however was very underutilized, she didnt even make contact with the core group of characters until the final act and they used half of her short time interacting with the core characters spouting exposition and backstory. They didnt do a good job setting up her role in the story. Thematically, this film feels like it doesnt really know what its trying to be and at times feels like it was directed by 3 different people. It feels like one person wrote a handful of very well crafted scenes and someone else was left to write what was in between. There are other problems that i havent explained but these were the main issues i have with the story. That being said it isnt a bad movie. It is leagues better than suicide squad and the writing does get you to care about these characters.
Captain Marvel (2019)
An overall good movie, but a pretty plain marvel movie. Carol needs more characterization.
I enjoyed the movie for the most part, The storyline was good and relatively clear, character's motivations made sense, effect were good, pacing was decent and a surprisingly good supporting cast. the only gripe i have with the plot was how some scenes seemed very forced or unnatural. i understand the female justice theme had to be a part of the movie, but a lot of scenes just seemed too on the nose. they came off as random and very hamfisted and didnt flow into the movie in a witty or natural way. it seemed like they cared too much about trying to make the movie relevant so it could be noticed and not enough about telling a cohesive story with clear character arcs. The movie is an overall enjoyable watch and as a movie it was pretty good. as a marvel movie however, it lacked in some pretty substancial ways. for starters, Brie Larson's performance wasn't terrible, but it was very clear that either she or the director weren't sure what direction to take the character in. at points she seems like she's arrogant and serious, others she's jovial and sarcastic, and her reactions to things seem somewhat unnatural. one minute she's angry, the next she's crying, the next she doesnt care and its just very jarring. she doesn't really feel like a real person like all the other MCU characters do. Maybe brie larson was trying to put too much of herself in the character instead of trying to make the character dynamic and realistic. either way theres this general ambiguity that falls over the character's actions, abilities and personality. the limitations of her strength seems pretty inconsistent from scene to scene. overall it seems like the storyline and the character were written by completely different writing teams. the story was solid but Carol herself just lacks direction as a character, any unique or interesting personality traits that help her stand out as a character and just doesnt act the way a normal person does. it seems to me like they didnt really know much about captain marvel as a character and didnt really understand how she works in general. I had been very much looing forward to the film and was only mildly disappointed walking out. i was really hoping she would be an incredibly badass and perfect front runner for the next phase of the MCU but i believe she needs more work. The writers should study captain marvel's appearances in the animated avengers cartoon series, as she is very well characterized there.
Darker Than Black: Kuro no keiyakusha (2007)
A captivating dark mystery
This series is one of my all time favorites. if you're someone who doesn't easily connect dots however, it is not for you. the story is incredibly captivating without needing to give you much information. A lot of the story is left open and the characters are incredibly dynamic. You spend the entire series trying to solve questions like what happened? What does that mean? what will happen next? The directors have a keen understanding of setting, narrative and foreshadowing. The series is different than most anime, as you aren't given all the details in some drawn out boring exposition speech. You are left to connect events through meticulous clues and hopeful symbols left by the writers. An expert use of dialogue as there is very little dialogue that is worth nothing. Every word is important to the overall story. Perfect and thought provoking. Got more attached to the main 3 contractors than pretty much any anime characters.