[EXPRESSO] Sonic The Hedgehog 3 (2024) | Chaos Control(led)

Time for Shadow to enter the fray, in the third live action Sonic The Hedgehog film.

The plot sees Sonic and his friends Tails and Knuckles summoned to fight a new menace, Shadow, a nother powerful alien hedgehog that was sealed away for the last 50 years in a remote prison, until someone freed him, framing the defeated and basically retired Ivo “Eggman” Robotnik as the culprit, so the trio has to team up with the “Eggster” to find what is going on..

The first one was ok, the second i liked more and felt was a step up from the previous one, and once again this is an improvement, upping the stakes, introducing new characters , managing to pick up the right/good elements from the videogame series (Sonic Adventure 2 in this case) and use them well in this new narrative, committing to its 90s ‘tude even more by having Jim Carrey go full Dumb And Dumber as he plays two characters, both “Eggman” and his grandfather, Gerald Robotnik, doubling the slapstick ham and sillyness, for better or worse.

Honestly, i do enjoy Carrey doing some of his old schtick, even if it’s a bit too much at times.

Also, the effects and CG for Sonic and friends are top notch, arguably the best they’vee ever been, seamlessly blended, he action delivers some fun corny “DBZ but even more for kids” fights, and it does manage to be silly and referential but without being grating, even for adults.

While i find it to be a quite decent kids film, honestly it’s about as good as a Sonic live action filn could have been, in both spirit and form, and while the post ending credits scenes tease of more, it is the cap of a trilogy, providing some closure indeed.

12 Days Of Dino Dicember #42: Caveman (1981)

Ah yes, the caveman movie with Ringo Starr, that was a thing, and honestly anything with actors or people that are actually known in the wider sphere of interests… it’s a welcome break from a lot cheap ass dinosaur flicks done with nobodies and with the cash of a ham sandwich, i’ve said this before but i’ll repeat myself since the 30 cents trash is by far the more numerically abudant.

Especially as it’s kind of ambitious for what’s conceptually just another cavemen comedy, as the main appeal is the cast, with Ringo Starr, Dennis Quaid, Barbara Bach, but it’s almost completely recited in “caveman language”, and in some theathers they even gave out a translation phamplet for 30 words in caveman lingo, which isn’t a complete gimmick since there is a sort of caveman dialect-vocabulary that’s recurring through the film, so no subtitles will ever be needed to watch it.

There is a plot of sorts, with Atouk, a caveman a bit too thinky and curious for its tribe, getting kicked out and joining a merry band of outcast cavemen, and with them they basically go on to improve themselves, invent fire, weapons, learn to walk not hunched like a baboon, all that stuff.

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12 Days Of Dino Dicember #41: One Of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing (1975)

Enough of these dinosaur films with no goddamn budget, and enough with any semblance of sensitivity, we’re going Disney.

Old school live action Disney, with One Of Our Dinosaur Is Missing, the penultimate film directed by Robert Stevenson for Disney, and one of his last movies, after the success he brought to the company by directing well loved (and successful) films like the Herbie movies, The Love Bug, and more importantly Mary Poppins and Bedknobs And Broomsticks.

Yeah, we’re not doing such obscure and cheap ass dinosaur films made by some randos in his garage for 20 bucks, for a change.

That said, this i feel it’s a forgotten film by Stevenson… and it’s most likely also bound to never show up again anywhere, especially on Disney +, if the spineless rats never managed to find some backbone and put Song Of South on there, this one ain’t gonna fly either, for similar reasons.

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12 Days Of Dino Dicember #40: Planet Of Dinosaurs (1977)

Yep, without the “The”, because dinosaurs in space don’t need proper grammar or explanation.

More sci-fi dinos, but this time with more of a budget, kinda, thought it’s one of those cases where the movie just will never be able to live up properly to it’s theathrical poster, which i love, it’s such a perfect sum of late 70s/80s cheese that’s kinda glorious.

I’m not even kidding, that theatherical poster kicks ass, ironically or not, it does.

The movie is actually a fairly typical mash of sci-fi and dinosaur flicks, set in a generic “future” where space travel is a thing, with the crew of the starship Odyssey forced to crashland on a planet that looks a lot like Earth, despite being many light-years away, and a prehistoric sort of Earth, ruled and inhabited as it is by many kinds of dinosaur.

The surviving members, lead by Captain Lee, try to survive in the hope of being rescued, until they encounter a mighty Tyrannosaurus Rex, that proves to be a toughie, forcing them to find a way to kill it in order to survive on the planet.

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12 Days Of Dino Dicember #39: Dinosaur From The Deep (1993)

Don’t worry, this one has dinosaurs in it.

Most likely, anyway.

Didn’t think about that being a required feature, but that’s why you should do some research first, just in case, otherwise you get duped into watching a cannibal movie, somehow.

No my friends, this time we’re in for some semi-notorious lower case Z-grade filet from France, with Norbert Moutier’s Dinosaur From The Deep.

After all, the success of Jurassic Park wasn’t an USA thing only, at all, so here comes a low budget film done to capitalize on Spielberg’s dino opus and hopefully trick enough people (especially younger dinosaur enthusiasts) into renting or buying it on VHS, only to realize it’s basically a “shot in shitteo”/”home video film” of French people with no budget.

What were they gonna in 1993/4, look up the metascore on sites that didn’t exist yet, or required anyone in the household NOT to use the phone?

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12 Days Of Dino Dicember #38: Massacre In Dinosaur Valley (1985)

In a way, we’re breaking ourselves new ground in terms of dinosaur movies.

Technically.

What i’m getting at is that Massacre In Dinosaur Valley… doesn’t actually feature any dinosaur.

Come one, couldn’t even be arsed to reuse footage from a more recent dinosaur film? Sure as shit they couldn’t reuse footage from One Million B.C. Or the 1925 The Lost World, since this one is in color… because that would imply them spending time in colourizing the old b&w footage.

But yeah, i’m not surprised that some synopses do actually list anything BUT dinosaurs being into the actual film, because guess what, this isn’t a dinosaur film.

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12 Days Of Dino Dicember #37: Two Lost Worlds (1951)

h boy, two lost worlds for the price of one?

Sign me up for one ticket, Jimmy boy, because you know a movie it’s good when it marketed the same way as grocery store coupon for breakfast cereals or boxes of cuetips.

It’s kinda funny too how curiously there wasn’t a Lost World adaptation (talking about the Conan Doyle book, obviously) in the 50s, so i guess, just in case, they doubled the worlds lost, just to give you more bang for your buck, or make you believe that only to get suckered into watching a dinosaur film that couldn’t even afford its own dinosaurs.

Leaving aside the dinosaurs/reptiles don’t show up until 45 minutes into this… 61 minutes film, this in independent production that literally borrows his dinosaur footage from One Million B.C., the 1940 film that will end up being mined of its of stock footage for decades, as in used not a quick reference to the olden days, just ripped off because they couldn’t afford the special effects for the prehistoric creatures they wanted to as a selling point on the poster.

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Sabretooth (2022) [REVIEW] | Beeg Cat Means Beeg Trouble!

Before the year ends, it’s time to fullfil some promises nobody care about, so after reviewing Attack Of The Sabretooth (AKA Primal Park) back in whenever that happened, i realized almost before i finished writing the review, that this was sorta/kinda/vaguely a sequel to another movie about sabertooth tigers, as in they were sequelized only when localized in some foreign markets, as they have nothing to do with each other… aside from the writer, being Tom Woosley for both otherwise unrelated movies about extinct tiger species going about killing people.

Still more sensible than most of the italian cannibal film being retitled as “Cannibal Holocaust 2” when not even the lead actor’s dingus is a shared asset.

Simply titled “Sabretooth”, this is yet another TV movie that debutted on the ol’ Sci-Fi channel about killer animals that might or not be mutants or resurrected extinct evolutionary cul-de-sacs because Spielberg did a killing resurrecting the ancient lineage of the KFC bucket a decade ago.

And Roger Corman was also there to rip chickens up with its Carnosaur, then again, Clint Howard WAS eating chicken in front a chicken coup (and dinosaurs).

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[EXPRESSO] Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom (2024) | Lichdom: Battlemage

After the 4^th season of the anime, we got a Overlord film, depicting the Sacred/Holy Kingdom Arc that was discussed/teased but not shown during Season 4 itself.

For reference, the series is about a regular guy that get stuck in a VR MMORPG when the servers close, as its character, Momonga, an elder lich, with previous NPCs start acting on their own, including the servants/characters made by his fellow guild members basically electing him as supreme leader, and he’s basically forced to live up to their expectations while plotting schemes for world domination as the Overlord.

The plot here sees Momonga/Ainz Ooal Gown, finally having established its territory and himself as the “Sorcerer King” getting into an alliance with the Sacred Kingdom, needing help to slay the Demon Emperor Jaldabaoth that’s attacking them with his hordes of humanoid monsters..

Again, this is as about as good a synopsis as it gets without doing huge spoilers, and while it strikes a good compromise between being watchable on its own, since the story here presented (picking up the previously established but basically ignored “Jaldabaoth” storyline) has mostly original characters, provides enough closure, and you can guess/deduce some things… having context for the characters and situations definitely benefits the experience (since it doesn’t recap shit, just giving a very brief text explanation of the premise), which does deliver on both the spectacle, violence and some honestly fun, enjoyable “anime isekai non-sense”, including fantasy politics.

I was worried the animation might had the “CG-isms” seen in later Season 3 and Season 4… not as much, the animation isn’t notably better but you can tell there’s a bump in quality and direction to take advantage of it being a film, more battles to show the animation off, etc.

Quite satisfied with it, i must say.

[EXPRESSO] Kraven The Hunter (2024) | Vodka Drunkenski

With the Venom trilogy wrapped up, we’re back to the Sony Spider Man Universe thingie, this time with a character that actually a LOT more well known (not as Venom, but more than frigging Morbius), with Kraven The Hunter, depicting the origin story of the Russian big game hunter villain.

And what a surprise, it’s another pile of toss, but first, the plot.

Sergei Kravinoff, one of the two sons of a Russian criminal (Russel Crowe) , while taking them on a hunt in Tanzania, is attacked by a rare lion, and on the brink of death is given a special potion that not only saves his life, but gives him the power and heightened perception/senses of animals, enhancing his strength, speed, stamina, etc. He leaves home, but years later, after he made himself a name as “Kraven The Hunter” by offing criminals like his father, is forced to confront a menace from the past…

It’s not good, it’s not, that much was fully expected, and it fits the bill of every flaw we expect from these Sony “Spider Man but his name is Voldemort” films: bad acting, uninspired plot, passable at best action scenes, generic characters at best (often with completely unexplained powers, like the assassin with the quasi-Stand ability), uninteresting protagonist, the main villain being a joke, i laughed when i saw the transformation effects, but then again even the CG animals are barely convincing at their best.

It’s not as bad as i expected, but that just shows how low the bar is for these; even so it’s mostly dull, ininspired, and honestly i won’t be surprised if Sony actually pulls the plug on these even before that Sinister Six movie drops.

I will say that’s arguably a bit better than Madame Web, but it’s still toss.