Films and TV (Untagged spoilers)

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-E-IGQCsPo

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nchh-qezCOI

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8XFIfjkm1s

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5546NL6gkE

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3R7HrDGQWrQ

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6q93pzTw2rY

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jA1gK7kQ_Ug

"Zack Snyder reveals a makeup test of one of the aliens from ‘REBEL MOON’."

[Dragaros]

[Dragaros]

[Dragaros]

"Director Todd Phillips shared on Instagram that he has completed a Joker sequel script co-written with Scott Silver under the working title “Joker: Folie à Deux,” along with a photo of star Joaquin Phoenix reading its pages. Folie à deux is a reference to a medical term for a mental disorder that affects two or more individuals."

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aH1FOkJys3Y

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v42q-blX2RQ

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9FvvsC0B5Q

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMS8jvHN32s

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaV7mmc9HGw

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAI1_0xnmL0

Alright, Rob Zombie, the ball is in your court.

[Dragaros]

"New image of HBO’s The Last of Us live-action series."

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AuWc6nem8o

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=30ks2k0f1AI

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUgmq_8PlRY

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_73MRQSGO1w

[Dragaros]

Ok, got back from Jurassic World Dominion.

This is a very sloppy and messy movie. If you go into this as a "turn your brain off popcorn-muncher to enjoy the dumb fun and spectacle of dinosaur hijinks and the nostalgia of seeing the big trio of the original JP again" kind of movie, then its ok-ish. Nothing spectacular, but nothing foul. If you want a serious, smartly written techno-thriller with rich character stories and deeply explored themes of the perils of genetic engineering's consequences, the impact of invasive species on a global scale, and the dangers of hubris and avarice, you're going to be gravely disappointed. So while this isn't the worst movie in the Jurassic franchise, it is very frustrating in many areas. It has its moments, but is also fails to truly captivate and engross, wasting its potential. The pacing is way too fast; it never lets anything slow down to breathe or sink in. It's clear this movie got chopped up heavily in the editing room. There's a 3+ hour cut out there that would substantially help this movie. (Maybe if we're lucky we'll get a directors cut on blu-ray/dvd) In addition, not including that prologue scene they released on Youtube and showed in theaters awhile back was a mistake; its inclusion would have helped. The special effects in some shots are fantastic, and in others very bad, which makes me think they ran out of a money in the budget at some point and the studio wouldn't give them anymore. The big climax is sadly very underwhelming and very forced, as is the much-hyped Giga, which while looking cool, utterly fails to live up to said hype. Our human villain also fails to impress as well; I was hoping for a sinister Albert Wesker type of baddie, but instead we got the same boring "cookie-cutter evil but unthreatening quirky greedy business CEO" template Hollywood uses over and over to the same lame, lazy effect.

The central conflict of this film has proven itself to be very divisive among people from what I'm reading online; I myself had no problem with it on principle as its still related to the larger idea of the power of genetic engineering being misused and disrespected, its very Crichton-esque in its implementation, and its still related to the concept of paleo-DNA even if its only tangentially related to dinosaurs themselves, but the way it was executed could have been much better, I'll grant. A lot of interesting things happened off screen between films, both in regards to certain characters and to the world-at-large, which sometimes has the effect of making you feel like you accidentally skipped a movie between this one and Fallen Kingdom. Still, I can't deny that it's a lot of fun seeing Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum together again, even if it feels like one of them gets a lot less plot relevancy than the other two. Also, this is a very safe and tame PG-13. Not a lot of people die, and when they do there's never any blood and its super quick. A little more dino carnage could have gone a long way. Again, the movie has its moments, but there are lot of annoying and disappointing issues preventing it from being that epic summer blockbuster it could have been. If the Jurassic movies get any dumber though, then the only direction left to them is to crossover with the Fast and Furious series and go full crazy.

As of right now, I think I'd rank the movies as:

Top Tier: Jurassic Park
High Tier: none
Mid Tier: Lost World, Jurassic World, Jurassic World Dominion
Low Tier: Jurassic Park 3
Bottom Tier: Fallen Kingdom

Spoilers:

► Show Spoiler

Blue's baby is cute, but it's obvious she was made only to sell toys and capitalize on the Baby Yoda thing; she could have been cut out of the narrative entirely. Still, it was nice to see her reunited with her mom, and Blue "thanking" Owen for returning her baby back to her was touching. She even built her nest close by to Owen's cabin. Clever girl.

Wasted opportunity to not have Owen and Grant sit down and have a detailed conversation about raptors.

Grant and Sattler got together at the end, for all those who didn't like what JP3 did with their relationship.

The retcon with the clone girl was random, but harmless in regards to the plot, so whatever.

There was a Moros in a park in Washington DC being treated as if it were no more than a duck by a little girl, and no one cares to report it. Its a miracle that "only 37 people die each year to dinosaur attacks" if you ask me.

While it's interesting to see Wu finally develop a conscience, it would have been great to actually see this develop onscreen, see how his doubts and regrets finally shatter through the walls of arrogance and callous indifference and motivate him to change. Also, pretty sure he's going to be serving jail time for all the illegal cloning shit he's been doing for years and years. Nice that you helped fix the problem you helped create with the super-locusts, but that doesn't balance the scales of Lady Justice.

Those super-locusts took forever to burn and die, didn't they? And what moron designed their containment rooms? They were so easily breached when they got set on fire!

When the Atrociraptors were slowly coming out of their cages, why were all the CIA dudes with guns not shooting?! This is your best chance to kill them before they start running and leaping around! Why are you waiting for the evil black market smuggler lady to sick them on you?

The Giga was just a dumb brute, all power and no brains. For all my issues with the hybrids, at least they had some personality. The Giga is just an obstacle to overcome, not a character. All that Joker talk was nonsense. If anything the Giga was the most naturalistically animalistic of all the "evil dinos" in the entire franchise. He never behaved in any way that was deliberately malicious or sadistic, and he even gave up pursuit of our heroes once he realized it wasn't worth wasting energy on them and moved on to hunting easier prey. His rivalry with Rexy lacks impact or build-up thanks to the lack of screen time, and their final battle was a huge step down from the hype fest that was seeing Rexy tear down the Indominus. Over too fast and hard to see. The killing blow is so sudden its anti-climatic. Instead of being a "fuck yeah!" moment it's almost comedic. The Therizinosaurus might as well have shouted WTF when Rexy slammed the Giga onto her talons.

The Therizinosaurus was neat, but her inclusion into the final battle and team up feels really forced and steals some of Rexy's thunder. Seemed like the Therizin was blind in one or both eyes. That or her eyesight was just shitty to point of almost being blind. Seemed like she uses her nose and ears to locate things. She was a grumpy old bird; she swipes with her claws first and asks questions never, ready to throw down at a moment's notice.

Rexy got a happy ending. A part of me would have preferred seeing her take down the Giga but die afterwards from mortal wounds sustained during the battle, make the tears flow, but this is nice too. Don't bring her back anymore, let the old girl retire; seriously, she's ancient by T-Rex standards, even taking into account the "clones live longer" thing Fallen Kingdom established. Let her enjoy her twilight years in peace. Also, the T-Rex pair she interacts with at the very end are indeed the Buck and Doe from Site B, confirmed by the director himself online when a fan asked.

[Alienmorph]

Yeahhh, pretty much. As I was saying last week, it feels a lot like GvK... aka some executive must have thought the full lenght cut of the movie was too boring and slow and had it chopped to bits to feel more like a "theme park ride movie" (how ironic) and get more screenings per day.

There's already pre-orders for home video releases of the film, and even boxets with all six movies, but I'm gonna wait to see if there's any hope of getting the full lenght cut. I bet we're missing out on a bunch of interesting thing, because this one really felt like there was some extra effort put into it, compared to the first two, that got wasted in the cutting room floor.

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieEF6Mm4Y0w

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/4ZwKcSlhbu4

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfI-DTtw6fo

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGM7BeZsNII

[Dragaros]

"Lithograph illustrated by Jesús Alonso Iglesias and new image for Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Sony Pictures Animation has also announced three new cast members for Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse at the Annecy Festival 2022. Cast additions: Jason Schwartzman as The Spot, Jorma Tacome as Vulture, and Shea Whigham as George Stacy."

[Dragaros]

"Lady Gaga is in talks to play Harley Quinn in the sequel to Todd Phillips’ Joker under the working title “Joker: Folie à deux”. The sequel is also planned to be a musical. Joaquin Phoenix still doesn’t have a deal to return, but he is in advanced talks."

"More Spider-Man is on the horizon, as an extended cut of the fan-favorite Spider-Man: No Way Home is set to release in theaters later this year on September 2, 2022. The new extended cut of the film, which is officially titled Spider-Man: No Way Home: The More Fun Stuff Version, came in celebration of the Spider-Man character, which recently turned 60. In a video posted on the film’s Twitter account, actors Tobey Maguire, Tom Holland, and Andrew Garfield — who have all played Spider-Man and appeared in the film together — announced the news, along with sharing a brief clip of one of the extended scenes."

"Jurassic World Dominion — which is touted as the "conclusion" of the series and reunites stars of the 1993 original Jurassic Park — earned $143.3 million at the domestic box office over the weekend, according to Variety and The Hollywood Reporter. That marks the second-biggest opening weekend of the year so far, just behind Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness's $187 million and beating out other 2022 hits like The Batman and Top Gun: Maverick."

"‘Top Gun: Maverick’ flies past $700 Million at global box office and overtakes ‘The Batman’ Domestically; Hitting the $1 billion mark shouldn't be out of the realm of possibility."

"Duke Nukem, the 1990s video game that helped popularize the first-person shooter genre, is getting the feature film treatment. Legendary Entertainment, the company behind Dune and the Godzilla movie series, has picked up the movie rights from Gearbox, with Cobra Kai creators Josh Heald, Jon Hurwitz and Hayden Schlossberg on board to produce."

"The third installment in the Paddington film series is officially titled “Paddington in Peru”. Award-winning commercials filmmaker Dougal Wilson has been set to direct the latest installment. Paddington 1 and 2 Director Paul King will stay on the project as an executive producer and wrote the story for the film with previous Paddington collaborators Simon Farnaby and Mark Burton. Burton, Jon Foster and James Lamont wrote the script. Paddington in Peru will begin principal photography in 2023, filming on location in both London and Peru."

"The Fast and the Furious series Director Justin Lin has been set to set to direct the live-action film adaptation of One Punch Man for Sony Pictures. Lin will also be a producer and will work with the scribes on a rewrite with the intention to begin production by the end of 2022. Jumanji: The Next Level and Venom writers Scott Rosenberg and Jeff Pinkner are set to write the live-action film. Avi Arad and Ari Arad of Arad Productions are producing the film."

[Dragaros]

"Ezra Miller will not be a part of any future DC projects after ‘THE FLASH’ “regardless if there are more allegations or not.”"

"Warner Bros. reportedly cuts Amber Heard’s Mera from DC’s Aquaman and the Lost City of Kingdom and will reshoot her scenes with a new actor. UPDATE: Sources close to the production of Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom have stated that Heard "has not been completely cut from the film. She still has a very small role"."

"Chris Rock and Dwayne Johnson have both been offered to host the Emmys but both are reportedly planning to turn it down."

"A ‘GAME OF THRONES’ sequel series is in the works. The series will have Kit Harington reprise his role as Jon Snow."

"Guy Ritchie is set to direct Disney’s live-action ‘HERCULES’ remake with The Russo Brothers set to produce."

"Pixar is developing a solo Sheriff Woody movie in the style of this year’s upcoming Lightyear."

"The Matrix isn’t the only franchise Reeves is returning to. Reeves has signed on to the long-awaited sequel Speed 3, and as well as reprising the role of LAPD SWAT Officer Jack Traven, Reeves is boarding the project as a producer."

"Sandra Bullock is officially on board for Bird Box 2. Along with a sequel movie, a spin-off series set in the same post-apocalyptic narrative is in the works."

"Top Gun Maverick has passed $800M and has become Tom Cruise’s biggest movie ever worldwide. It is also the highest grossing movie of 2022 at the domestic box office."

"‘Lightyear’ Falls Prey to ‘Jurassic World Dominion’, Underwhelms with $20 Million at Friday Box Office. 'Lightyear' is estimated to finish with half of what 'Toy Story 4' made in its opening weekend."

"Universal/Amblin Entertainment’s Jurassic World Dominion is set to thrash past $500M worldwide today. The global total through Thursday is $493.2M. That includes $302.1M from the international box office and $191.1M domestic."

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SAceDYFDXI

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DSh3j_PtMMw

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2l4tuNYvPa4

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boQCuXmL1mU

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSUImnh7meE

[Dragaros]

"Some new concept arts for Jurassic World Dominion."

[Dragaros]

"Paleoartist Raul Martin has shared some early concept designs he created for Jurassic World Dominion."

[Dragaros]

14 minutes, eh? I was hoping for more, but certainly better than nothing.

[TTTX]

"Some new concept arts for Jurassic World Dominion."

that color scheme reminds of the raptors from the game Trespasser.

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBEvEcpnG7k

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImYI7fAUgCU

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxU-eJ571VM

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkwqvz1kLYw

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MIanN5VWjo

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJIOPbEC-yw

[Dragaros]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l113tj52TN8

[Dragaros]

Remember that leaked photo of a Godzilla toy from the GvK line that had that weird armor on it that spawned so much speculation and fan theories? Regardless of wether or not it was ever meant to actually be in an earlier draft of the film before being scrapped, looks like they recycled that concept for more toy sales. Nice shades, Kong!

[Dragaros]

[Dragaros]

[Mazder]

At least the Orks look good.
Giving me Shadow of Mordor/War vibes in the best way.