[EXPRESSO] Donkey Kong Bananza NSWITCH2 | Potassium Primus

Holy banana Batman, this is some primo 3D platformers with some bonkers mesh of a Red Faction style terrain-enviroment destructibility, an 3D DK platformer (with some stylings taken from both Mario Odyssey and Bowser Fury) that plays with the open world idea without being one for the sake of it, and often feels like the recent Zelda mainline games, with climbing, falling down and how it handles challenge rooms/levels.

The plot sees DK going on a island where they’re mining a new kind of banana-gem, encountering an odd talking rock, that (in a reverse Jojolion twist) turns out to be a very young Pauline, whom DK then travels with – Wreck It Ralph style – by exploring the many layes of an abyss leading to the planet core, where a special vein of “Banandium” is located, apparently able to grant any wish, which is why the greedy Void Kong and his underlings are also after it and want Pauline for unknown reasons..

Gameplay it’s a mesh of lot of things from DK games, Mario, other Nintendo games, and a lot more, but done in a way that is original, fresh, and unique, managing to feel and play new even when old time fans might see some crazy ideas as “remixes” of old DK staples (especially from the Country series), it looks great, runs mostly well, and it’s a treasure trove of stuff to find, all fun and constantly rewarding, it’s a massive world full of secrets to find, that is also constantly fun simply indulging how you can break almost everything in a level, even more with the weird “Bananza” transformations that go from “DK SSJ4” to weird hybrids.

I will have a proper review for it down the line, let’s just say this is a Switch 2 MUST HAVE.

[EXPRESSO] Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025) | Freaks On A Leash

I didn’t see the 2015 reboot and i barely remember some things from the 2005 iteration (“no one” has seen the Roger Corman version so i’m not gonna ask), but i’d say fans of the Fantastic Four will be pleased with finally having a more than solid film made about the beloved superhero quartet.

It definitely helps that Fantastic Four: First Steps is basically a standalone entry, taking place in another version of Earth where everything is a retrofuturistic 60s space age utopia, and (like the recent Superman reboot) it skips doing the origin story and it starts with the team already established, with a ABC style show recapping how they got their powers and became the city heroes/guardians, mythologized and even with their own saturday morning cartoon.

It does indeed play heavily on the family angle, as Sue and Richard are to have a baby….a joy shortlived by the appearance of a female Silver Surfer announcing their planet will be destroyed by Galactus, prompting the team to go back to space and trying to resolve the situation, complicated by an odd proposition i won’t spoil…

Again, it does play his card sincerely (as did Gunn’s Superman, guess this is new style for comic book movies now), there’s space travel, a bit of fighting, and it’s definitely the best offering from Marvel in a while…. it’s simply not as good as the James Gunn’s Superman reboot that we saw just 2 weeks ago, but i can’t fault the movie for that.

I can fault it for the characterization being somewhat lacking, as the Fantastic Four come off – despite the great performances – as a bit too perfect, too easily accepted and with any rough edges or weirdness (mostly) sanded off, like their media image plastered on ads or products.

Earth Defense Force: World Brothers 2 PS4 [REVIEW] | Gaia’s Wrath

Given the first World Brothers turned out quite well in terms of review and profits, D3 did the obvious, by greenlighting a sequel, simply called EDF World Brothers 2.

Obvious to a certain degree because EDF spin-off never received sequels, but i did like the first World Brothers, so i was more than happy to see Yuke’s (also behind EDF Iron Rain) come back for more voxel Earth Defense Force.

This is a direct sequel as well, and this time, after watching the skies so hard in case of another alien invasion coming from there, we get bitten in the ass by a monster that was inside our squared, voxely Mother Earth, Gaiarch, which erupts from its core and breaks the world apart, meaning it’s up to the EDF once again to make the planet whole by sticking back the destroyed pieces.

This is done by your team of newbies trying to find the more experienced EDF members scattered around the globe, and also new allies like an alien-esque amnesiac girl (that’s like an anthromorphized version of the Daroga enemies, since she loves the buggers and has a Daroga style hat of sorts), new and old bros and sisters, a time travelling Caesar (not the monkey), highlighted by odd giant replicas of the main EDF classes to fight as enemies before taking down a mothership.

Continua a leggere

[EXPRESSO] 100 Liters Of Gold (2024) | Moonshine Madness

Finland (and Italy since it’s a Finnish-Italian coproduction) time for 100 Liters Of Gold, a comedy by Finnish director Teemu Nikki (Euthanizer, The Blind Man Did Not Want To See The Titanic, Death Is A Problem For The Living, about two sisters, Taina and Pirrko, that run a successful – yet seemingly illegal – brewery renowed for their “sahti”, a traditional kind of Finnish beer (usually done with homemade methods as a secular family activity), and do it extremely well.

Things go south when their third sister orders them 100 liters of sahti for her wedding, as a series of family issues and petty yet almost deadly rivarlies surface, alongside a series of infortunate events and their desire to taste the product lead the two to guzzle down the entire batch for the wedding, then having to scramble and fix the situation in time for the wedding..

It’s a slow burn, off beat comedy about family and alcoholism also big on black comedy and nonsense, since the two middle aged sisters won’t stop out of stealing from the dead (among other things) to get out of their predicament and keep the promise with her soon-to-be-married sister, whom also previously lost a leg in a car accident, making age old dysfunctional family issues bubble up for the event, leading to a surprisingly dramatic resolution.

I think it’s decent movie and far from boring, though it’s also strangely meandering after a point, and it’s not a case of having too little going on, there’s a lot but none it’s really properly explored/developer comedy or drama (ending aside) as it could – and should -, resulting in a duo of protagonists – and by extent the many foul things they do – that’s hard to properly care for, despite the talented lead actresses.

[EXPRESSO] Superman (2025) | Acape Anew

The long awaited Superman reboot by James Gunn (Tromeo And Juliet, Slither, Guardians Of The Galaxy) is here, after the whole reboot thing done with The Flash movie, so WB can cleanse their hands of previous promises and concept it didn’t want to committ to anymore (when it didn’t flush entire finished movies down the drain).

And indeed it’s a James Gunn superhero film, i mean that in a flattering way because it was the right choice to just point at him and say “fix our shit”, he knows how to do them good and this ain’t no exception. Plus i feel fans of the “Man of steel” have been clamoring for something different from Snyder edginess, and this definitely does change things for the sillier, which it’s a good thing because it acknowledges superhero films can be proper silly without having to be ashamed of some specific silly parts of the source material, which it embraces (Superman’s dog, Krypto, is actually a major side character, and yes he has the lil ‘cape on) but without being lazy about it.

It’s a reboot that also understands it doesn’t have to restabilish the whole mythos by redoing the same things as previous Superman films, people know the character, and the script demonstrates Gunn does too, so it cuts some vestigial superhero film traditions of old for the better, by demonstrating instead of telling or expositioning to death, the plot (itself plucking a lot of characters and plot beats from well known iconic iterations and classic storylines) centering on the public perception of Superman after he’s already established as a hero, despite also ignoring pressing geopolitical matters in order to do the right thing, and Lex Luthor’s efforts to undermine his actions and antagonize the whole world against him.

Good, fun stuff!

Tank! Tank! Tank! WIIU [REVIEW] | The Tank Defence Force Deploys?

Nintendo ported the shit out of the Wii U library, reasonably so, hence there are very few exclusives that are “trapped” on the Switch precedessor… most are crap like Devil’s Third and Sonic Boom: Rise Of Lyric, Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival, some sports-fitness games or party games, and somehow STILL the HD ports of Wind Waker and Twilight Princess.

Tank Tank Tank is technically not an exclusive, since it’s a port of a 2009 arcade game published and developed by Namco Bandai internally (itself a spiritual successor on a previous arcade game by Namco, 1996’s Tokyo Wars, according to Wikipedia), rereleased in 2012 on Wii U, serving as launch title for the console in North America.

It was initally released digitally as a free to play thingie where you could play the single player campaign for free but had to buy the various multiplayer mode as DLC (which it eventually reverted to 1 year later) but it was also released physically as a complete package, which its the version i own and i’m basing the review on.

Continua a leggere

[EXPRESSO] Jurassic World: Rebirth (2025) | Site R

5 years after the events of Jurassic World Dominion, dinosaurs didn’t quite adapt too well, with the surviving ones now living in remote off-limits islands with equatorial style climates.

A pharma company tasks a mercenary unit to visit one of these remote “dinosaur islands” in order to retrieve blood samples from 3 apex dinosaurs and helping further a medical research on preventing heart diseases… pity is that the island was also one of the lab sites for the original Jurassic Park where they tested hybrid dinos.

It’s kinda telling that they can’t-wont let of the Jurassic World name even when doing such an obvious “soft reboot” that mentions some things from previous Jurassic films but otherwise it’s a pretty straightforward self-contained story that aims to “go back to the basics”, “return to form”….. but actually pulls that off in pretty much regard, managing to get a good sense of adventure, of actual peril going on, alongside solid characters.

Having an actual renowed director and bringing back the screenwriter of Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park II helps too.

There’s nothing new that hasn’t been done before in basically any dinosaur media, but its familiar without feeling dull, and i do like some of the hybrid mutant dinos inhabiting the island.

It’s more than a notable improvement over the enjoyable but basically big budget Asylum affairs that were the previous JW films, undeniable…. but just “not being Jurassic Prey” doesn’t necessarily make Jurassic World Rebirth “good”, even if now for dino film is either this or way too homegrown shit films with a budget of 30 bucks and a ham sandwich.

I did quite like it personally, but it is kinda a curated “best of” that doesn’t adds anything new to the formula, maybe due to overabundant reverence to the source material.

Jurassic Shark 3: Seavenge (2023) [REVIEW] | #sharkapalooza

After Jurassic Shark 2: Aquapocalypse, Mark Polonia was pretty much given the legal status as guardian of the Jurassic Shark franchise, i guess why not?

The second one….actually, the “other second one”, since Raiders Of The Lost Shark would actually be a more proper sequel made by the same director, this is the level of decadence we’re at, with Jurassic Shark having both official and “more official” sub-series.

I think i just puked in my brain a little. Or a lottle.

Back to the topic at hand, Jurassic Shark 2: Aquapocalypse was another typical Mark Polonia affair, i remember it had “young Popeye cosplaying as the captain from Tin Tin” (maybe a hint of shit to come, in hindsight), it was about another drilling underwater gig bringing out another megalodon shark, and an assassination subplot, or something?

I barely remember, which i guess is the ideal state of mind to watch these.

Continua a leggere

Land Shark (2017) [REVIEW] | #sharkapalooza

As we learned through years of shark movies, pretty much anything goes, especially as the budgets move closer to zero, even in these cases you can do a poster that’s way better than the movie could ever be, at the very least. Money is important, but lacking it can’t stop you making your movies about shark of any kind or type, as we already saw in Snow Shark: Ancient Snow Beast.

It’s another Mark Polonia film, but it’s one that immediatly, even after hundreds of these no budget sharks film (often made by him or his friends-colleagues), does make one stop and reflect on the fact that – maybe, maybe – this is crossing some unspoken line or etiquette, even amongst this kind of shark film, when you make a rip-off of Sand Sharks.

And also of Super Shark, which had a giant shark somehow moving on land, but that one was actually so craptastic to be memorable, both movies far older than this, so one has to wonder if – maybe – it wasn’t intentional, but i find it hard to believe the Polonia Brothers (of all people) weren’t aware of previous movies like Sand Sharks. To be more correct, i simply don’t.

Continua a leggere

[EXPRESSO] M3GAN 2.0 (2025) | Panzer Kunt

2 years after the M3GAN killer robot was destroyed, her creator, Gemma, moved on and kept working in robotics while advocating for more cautious laws about IA, while taking care of her niece Cady, but unknown to them, someone stole M3GAN technology and created another killer robot, AMELIA, which has gone rogue and start killing anyone involved with the project.

M3GAN, whom has been hiding in their home cloud network, springs back to alert Gemma she could be next, and that if they want to have a chance of stopping AMELIA killing her and her niece, they need to graft M3GAN a new robot body, even more as the stakes quickly escalate…

Yeah, it’s not really a horror movie anymore, the gore is still pretty graphic but the tone is completely different, going basically for a ubercharged pastiche that skips a lot of modern narration to go for satirical and autoironical, which still has that 90s sci fi-horror aesthetic, as it’s a bit Robocop, a bit Ghost In The Shell, Matrix, Terminator, heck, you can even feel drafts of Alita Battle Angel, with M3GAN basically needing a new berserker body to fight.

It does manage to develop further the characters from the previous film, especially M3GAN herself, and it all does work since she’s indeed “the bitch”, “the slay queen”, she is incredibly fun to see in action and sells it.

If you expect a more in-depth critique of modern use of IA, or a more conservative sequel that’s actually a horror film, you might detest this one, which is understandable but honestly i do commend the effort to keep it fresh and not just rehash the first film, since it does embrace his deliberate sarcastic detour into action sci-fi, and for what it is, it’s a riot, hugely entertaining.