Thor: The Dark World

 

Expectations:
As "Phase 2" of Disney's never-ending Marvel overload continues, expectations for stand-alone, superhero movies have plummeted, because we know how great it is when all these guys get together. People used to get genuinely ecstatic about each and every superhero film, but, now, people are just waiting around for the next Avengers film. Personally, I have even more excitement for the new X-Men film, but most of my excitement can be attributed to the great mass of superheroes and great actors that will be featured in the film. However, for the moment, let's pretend that The Avengers never happened. What are my expectations for the Thor sequel, now?... Well... they are even lower! I'm sorry, but I didn't care for the first Thor film, and he was easily my least favorite Avenger. So, with that being said, my only motivation to see Thor: The Dark World was to avoid missing something crucial in the Marvel universe. Also, Loki is kinda the man...

Plot:
My least favorite part of this sequel was the insignificance of the bad guys, Malekith and Algrim. Of course, their existence meant the end of the earth, but their motivation and power came off as a bit ambiguous, in my opinion. Basically, it was as if they needed someone to take the evil attention away from Loki, but, in the end, it just fell flat. Aside from that, the plot wasn't too bad. However, two weeks after watching the film, it is kind of hard to remember many details. So, maybe it wasn't so great either. I do remember that I was impressed with the way that Loki's return to Asgard was dealt with, and the ending was much less abrupt, compared to the first Thor film. Additionally, I enjoyed the story surrounding Thor and Jane Foster, played by Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman, a lot more than in the first film. It wasn't quite as forced.

Characters:
Loki is easily Thor's saving grace, and there was no doubt that Tom Hiddleston carried The Dark World farther than any other character. Unfortunately for us, Loki is expected to be absent from the second Avengers, which will make it interesting to see how the development of a bad guy may engulf the second Captain America film, due out in April. Aside from Loki, mediocrity was the name of the Thor character game. Below are a few exceptions...

Negatives:
As I said before, the bad guys, played by Christopher Eccleston and Mr. Echo (I'm not going to try to type out his real name), were pretty much pointless, and I highly doubt that anyone truly enjoyed their presence in the film. Also, Erik Selvig, played by Stellan Skarsgard, continued to become less and less important in the grand scheme of the Thor storyline. To me, this reduction of importance is quite disappointing, as he was one of the few characters that I enjoyed in the first film. My final negative is the big man himself, Thor!, who is the stupidest and most awkward of all the Avengers, yet he manages to be the only thing that ties every super's story together. Regardless, I can't stand him! Seriously, if you took Chris Hemsworth and put him in Troy or Clash of the Titans, you would realize just how ridiculous this character turned out to be.

Positives:
Loki is the man! This film would have been more appropriately titled Loki: The Cooler Brother. I mean, is there any way that we can get Loki in The Avengers 2? I'll let you keep Thor, Joss! Just give me a little Loki. I predict a bright future for Tom Hiddleston, and I can't wait to see what's in store for him. As was the case with the first Thor film, I really enjoyed the character of Heimdall, played by Idris Elba. His wisdom and loyalty is a great accent to the various rebellious characters throughout Asgard, and I really wish he would find his way into an Avengers movie.

Conclusion:
In comparison to its preceding Phase 2 project, Iron Man 3, I would put Thor: The Dark World on exactly the same level. The film was better than Thor's last stand-alone film, just like Iron Man 3 was better than Iron Man 2, featured a lot of hearty laughing moment, just like Iron Man 3, and contributed very little to the overall, Avengers-based storyline (with what we know at this point), just like Iron Man 3. I don't know how everyone else feels, but, after seeing Iron Man 3 and Thor: The Dark World, I am afraid that these Marvel films are going to become a bit too generic. Don't get me wrong... I enjoyed the story, some of the acting, and, of course, I will go back to see Thor 3. However, as the movie wrapped up, I had that same underwhelming feeling that came after Iron Man 3. It was that same feeling you get after you watch any plot-twisting, action-filled, depth-lacking movie on the big screen. You know what I'm talking about! At this point, I just hope that The Avengers: Age of Ultron has something unique and exciting in store for Marvel fans. If not, Phase 2 may turn out to be the highest grossing and least exciting of the infinite future Marvel phases. I give Thor: The Dark World 3.12 out of 5 stars.

Great Expectations: November 2013

Marvel and Disney may have done a great job with The Avengers franchise, as a whole, but there are very few sequel-meriting movie characters that I have come to despise as much as Thor. It could be Chris Hemsworth's portrayal of the character. It could be the fact that he doesn't fit in with the other Avengers. It could even be because of those long, flowing locks, featured in the picture above. Regardless, I don't like him, and I don't really expect my opinion of him to be changed by the upcoming Thor: The Dark World. The movie would be way more interesting if it centered on Loki or Heimdall or whoever it is that Mr. Echo is playing! I mostly just want us to all take a moment to realize that Marvel is not quite perfect, and, even though I will be watching Thor: The Dark World, I highly doubt it will live up to the previous three Disney-made Marvel films (Captain America, The Avengers, and Iron Man 3), each of which were absolutely amazing. Here are the films that I am actually looking forward to in November:

 

Last Vegas

(November 1)

 

 

The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

(November 22)

 

 

Delivery Man

(November 22)



The Notscars 2012

While 2012 got off to a pretty rocky start movie-wise, the end of the year was quite good, which made it difficult to really come up with a whole list of the worst of 2012. Also, this year, I've done a much better job of picking movies to watch that I know I will enjoy. So, unlike last year, I'm not going to list everything out categorically. Instead, I'm going to give out some random awards to various actors, actresses, and movies. These awards are meant to be funny, so please laugh, if only to make me feel accomplished!

The Stupid Avenger
Chris Hemsworth - The Avengers

Worst Steve Carell Movie EVER
Seeking a Friend for the End of the World

Forgot How to Act
Anna Kendrick - Pitch Perfect/What to Expect When You're Expecting














Worst Five Performances in One Movie
Tom Hanks - Cloud Atlas

Finally Picked a Bad Role
Joseph Gordon-Levitt - Lincoln

Waste of Funny
Jason Sudeikis - The Campaign

Sings WAY Worse Than Russell Crowe
Paul Giamatti - Rock of Ages

Twilight Was Ten Times Better Than You
Snow White and the Huntsman

Worst Sideburns/Beard Ever
Wes Bentley - The Hunger Games

Worst Performance of the Year
Cobie Smulders - The Avengers

Worst Film of the Year
What to Expect When You're Expecting

Snow White and the Hunstman

Expectations:

After watching nothing but the trailer for Mirror Mirror with Julia Roberts, it was fairly simple to choose which 2012 Snow White movie was for me. I mean, come on Julia! That was just awful! Even with the obvious avoidance of Mirror Mirror, on my part, I wasn't uber thrilled to see Snow White and the Huntsman. The main reason I wasn't excited about the film was the setting. For some unknown reason, I cannot stand movies set in medieval times. Hollywood has been off of the medieval kick for a while now, but they will still throw one at us every once in a while. Maybe it is the appropriate setting for the story, but it's not a setting that I love. And we all know that it's all about pleasing me...

Plot:

To be honest, the plot wasn't too, too bad. This is really where I thought Snow White would fall short of satisfactory. I mean it's hard to make an already famous story MORE interesting in any way possible. However, the entire vibe of the film added a unique, mystical feel to the traditional story. You might ask how a "fairy" tale could become even more mystical, yet Snow White did so by bringing in almost the exact same feel of Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland. The visual effects were done so well that the story was almost unimportant. I was only focused on how they went about displaying said story for the moviegoers. Was it an Oscar-winning story? Heck no! But it certainly exceeded my expectations.

Characters:

Where Snow White was successful in the story-telling category, they failed to be in the category of creating interesting characters. As usual, Kristin Stewart utilized her no-talking, let's-just-make-distraught-faces acting methods, which I have never enjoyed. Chris Hemsworth is not really a good actor (he was the low point in The Avengers), and that showed yet again in this film. While Charlize Theron's Ravenna was a very good creation, her performance was quite lacking. There were just too many dorky, stupid moments that could have been avoided if a better actress were chosen.

Best Character: I did enjoy the more dramatic, yet still goofy, take on the seven dwarfs. Without having seen them in the previews, I was wondering if they would even appear in the film, so it was a nice relief when they showed up.

Worst Character: Sam Claflin's William is the easy choice for worst (absolutely stupidest) character. I had no idea why he was even a part of the storyline. If you take him away, the movie would be twice as good.

Conclusion:

While it wasn't a complete flop, Snow White and the Huntsman had too many flaws to deserve too much praise. Whoever did the casting should probably be fired. Of course, Kristen Stewart was cast for the purpose of seducing the thousands of mindless teenagers into watching a movie that they would otherwise have no interest in. Those poor, poor girls! The medieval feel was a bit much for me, at times, but the fantastic visual effects made up for that for the most part. I'm sure it was at least 100 times better than Mirror Mirror. I give Snow White and the Huntsman 2.67 out of 5 stars, and urge you to avoid Kristen Stewart at all cost!



The Avengers

Expectations:
Let's be honest with one another for just a minute. How many people have ever seen a movie with a ton of really famous stars in it that just really, really sucked? Answer: Everyone. How many people have a seen a movie with so much CGI and so much unrealistic crap that it just really, really sucked? Answer: Everyone. Now my expectations were that, when you combine those two elements of suckiness, you get The Avengers. There is just no way that you could possibly set your expectations too high for this film. We all know how awful Thor and Iron Man 2 were. We all know that nobody can make a good Hulk movie. We all know that Loki looks retarded with that antler helmet on. Sure, the action scenes would rock, and every comic book guru would pee in their pants while waiting in the theater at midnight. The question was could they overcome all of the aforementioned problems and make a good, solid movie?

Plot:
While the plot of the movie certainly wasn't deep or real, I will hand it to Joss Whedon and crew for coming up with a way to make every character share an almost equal-sized role. This film had so many big characters, which is not an easy aspect to deal with, but they dealt with it almost perfectly. The only real big problem I had with the plot structure was the fact that it took so long for us to actually see them all together. There was too much jumping around from place to place at the beginning of the film. The other small problem that I had was not really a problem with the movie but, instead, a problem with film critics and watchers. No one can tell me that the final battle scene didn't mimic the final scene in Transformers: Dark of the Moon (a film that everyone hated for no reason at all). While I loved the scenes in both films, can someone please explain to me how you can love the one film and hate the other? Regardless, I was completely surprised at how sound the plot was. While it certainly isn't Oscar-worthy, people can still love more than the just the characters in the film, and that is a strong statement for a superhero movie.

Characters:
While there were a few low points character-wise, most every character was dealt with fantastically well. There was very little randomness to the interaction and appearance of these characters. Robert Downey Jr. was fantastic, as usual, in his role as Iron Man. While I expected her to fade into the background, Scarlett Johannson really surprised me at how interesting her character was. Samuel L. Jackson was just as so so as he ever is. Chris Evans certainly carried his momentum from Captain America into this film. Tom Hiddleston's performance as Loki turned out to be much more real and raw than I ever could have imagined. While the antler helmet did take away from your ability to accept him as real, I was very impressed with his performance. On a negative side of things, there were a few characters that I didn't quite like in the film. Looking back, Chris Hemsworth's Thor really had no major role in the movie at all. I think Hulk's presence really took away from Thor's ability shine as the big strong dude that does big strong dude stuff. Also, I was not a big fan of Hawkeye, played by Jeremy Renner. I don't really know why, but I just wasn't impressed.

Best Character: Although I never saw the newest Hulk film, I have heard nothing positive about it, which is what lead everyone to think that Hulk would be a low point in The Avengers. Boy were we wrong! Everyone who has seen the movie knows exactly how great Hulk was portrayed, but I'm not completely sold that it was because of Mark Ruffalo's performance. I give the credit, yet again, to Joss Whedon.

Worst Character: Agent Maria Hill, played by Cobie Smulders, was absolutely the stupidest character in the whole film. I do not understand why she had anywhere close to that big of a role. She wasn't basically just a person that gave Nick Fury a reason to have lines.

Conclusion:
The Avengers shattered mine and everyone else's expectations, while taking the box office numbers for quite a spin as well. Was it the most solid movie ever? No. However, it was extremely well put together, which means that comic freaks and movie freaks all need to invite Joss Whedon to their birthday party this year! The comedy in the film was a bit over-bearing at times, but it was certainly fun to watch with everyone cracking up at 1 o'clock in the morning. The plot wasn't realistic, but it wasn't supposed to be. Almost everything that went wrong in The Avengers had an excuse, which is rare. With all the positive things that have been said, I must say one thing that everyone may not agree on. Contrary to what everyone was putting on Facebook and what not, The Avengers is NOT the best superhero movie ever made. That title is held and will likely always be held by The Dark Knight, and don't you ever forget that. I give The Avengers 4.11 out of 5 stars.