Categoria: Boats

[EXPRESSO] Avatar: Fire And Ash (2025) | Cigarette Butts

Here we are again.

Somehow “disappointed”.

Sound silly, i know, the second one was admittedly a bit better than i expected and had some surprises in there… this one having a new Nav’i tribe of brutal savages (just short of being cannibals) isn’t enough to stave off boredom, but then again plot comes third or fourth more than usual this time around, taking a backset for just repeating almost verbatim the same plot beats of Way Of The Water, with some extra piles of new stuff that conveniently happens just because the script needs to -once again – free from capture these dumbass characters.

It’s pointless to be angry about an Avatar movie being another pile of shallow, utter nonsense, but this time around is even more boring dull nonsense that goes for a 3 hours equivalent of jiggling keys to infants, and it has framerate issues, which i don’t remember being a thing when i watched Way Of The Water in theathers just 3 years ago.

Maybe i got lucky back then, but regardless of how it looks that way, it’s distracting since it often fluctuates from looking like a big budget cutscene of a videogame, looking like we’re a HD camera feed from the set, looking actually cinematic, and so on.

It’s just insanely distracting and the added motion smoothing almost gave me a headache, and mind you, this was for a 2D screening.

I was reminded of something actually borderline unwatchable, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, but the sentiment is there, as i wonder why Cameron keeps making tech demo movies for proven tech (or telling a worthwhile plot with this astounding technological prowess), or he just doesn’t go make videogames instead.

Not that anything of this matters, as people will go see this on droves anyway.

[EXPRESSO] Lupin The IIIrd The Movie: The Immortal Bloodline (2025) | Mystery Of Monkey

So, i did decide to just go see this new Lupin The 3rd film for funsies, i mean, i sure do love me some Lupin (and it’s a freakin institution here in Italy, so it’s already screening here), and is directed by Takeshi Koike, of Redline fame, i am in.

Problem is, i haven’t really kept up with Lupin many anime iterations, i’m more of a casual enjoyer, and this is meant as the conclusion of Koike’s “Lupin the IIIrd” subseries, maybe a send off for the character of Lupin itself, as it also takes story elements from the very first Lupin The 3rd movie, The Mistery Of Mamo.

Not that you needed this digest as the movie does a handy recap, which also makes it obvious this isn’t a random Lupin movie at all, but for what concerns this film, is about Lupin & the gang being lured into an uncharted island by someone that knows them very well, and forced to face not only the island venomous mists, but an apparently immortal being known as “Muom”….

I don’t know if this will actually be the last Lupin III film ever, doubt it, but it’s the first one in 30 frigging years made in traditional animation, and it sure as hell looks great, even with the occasional 3D CG bits for the monsters, it’s very stilish, the action is great, but it’s also lacking on plot and character development, despite the very strong start the pacing also suffers as soon as the story does, so it ends up being “almost good” but nothing feels properly developed, more focused on being stylish old school pulp action (more serious in tone than “classic Lupin”), which it is still fun, but the film does ultimately suffer from it.

Decent, but kinda disappointing.

[EXPRESSO] Frankenstein (2025) | At Stein’s Gate

Sadly no theathers in my area or close did limited screenings of Guillermo Del Toro’s Frankenstein, so i had to wait and watch in when it dropped some days ago on Netflix, like most people will,

Which is fine and all, but you know…

That said, i think it’s kinda funny to see how it compares against odd choice of Luc Besson doing a very romance heavy version of Dracula…when he didn’t get distracted, almost accidentally did a Dracula Dead And Loving It kinda spoof of sorts, and remembered he left the subplot with Christopher Waltz as Van Helsing waiting for a call back to be resolved.

Both films do indulge in the nature of their literary sources as gothic sacred beasts, but Del Toro’s version stands on the opposite of the spectrum, and unlike its recent take on Pinocchio, his retelling of Frankenstein it surprisingly simple from a conceptual standpoint, being a fairly faithful retelling of the story as written by Mary Shelley, even with the narration starting out at the end at the North Pole and then Victor Frankenstein telling his story and the Creature’s to the captain of the icebreaker ship that rescued him, then having the Creature tell his side of the tale.

Even at is most “unoriginal”, it is Del Toro doing one of the gothic magnus opuses, so it’s exactly what you’d expected from him, and i mean that in a purely flattening fashion, i really do, he obviously loves and treats Frankenstein with such respect i understand why not try a subversive take on it, despite how many times the story has been done in film, as it’s not pedantic in recreating verbatim the book, and strays enough to avoid it feeling like stale regurgitation, kinda needed given the sizable runtime.

Pretty good.

The Spooktacular Eight #31: Dante’s Inferno: An Animated Epic (2010)

As an Italian, it always tickled me silly how back in the late 2000s EA’s idea for competiting with Sony’s God Of War franchise was to pillage The Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri and basically transform it into a power fantasy action game about saving a damsel in distress, which happens to be done by traversing Hell as described by the Tuscanian poet.

I guess because it was a well known public domain literary work that would also work as a quick and dirty band-aid to feign some refinement, and to be honest everyone was jumping on the hack n slash action game bandwagon at the time, so of course EA would have tried their hands at it.

Still feels fuckin random because they could just have made a Roman Empire themed hack n slash, but i guess they couldn’t push a marketing campaign literally encouraging to “go to hell” and the “sin to win” marketing shizzle.

I’m not even offended because this is so fuckin american it’s hilarious, i mean, sure, it’s based on Alighieri’s first book of The Divine Comedy as in it has the concept of venturing through Hell, it has a guy named Dante, a gal named Beatrice, and The Devil(TM) sure, it’s the same thing.

Continua a leggere “The Spooktacular Eight #31: Dante’s Inferno: An Animated Epic (2010)”

Platformation Time Again #5: Yooka Laylee PS4

HISTORY

I’ve played Banjo Kazooie to completition. Twice.

Both on the N64 and the XBLA release pre-Rare Replay.

I’m prefacing this because i definitely fit the profile, i am the target demographic for retro plaftormers like Yooka Laylee, as i love the original Banjo Kazooie, like its sequel and even enjoyed that oversprawling excess that is Donkey Kong 64, and i love 3D collecthathon platformers from the early days of PS and Nintendo 64, especially if made by Rareware/Rare.

Heck, i love them so much i made this rubric. Twice.

When it was announced on Kickstarter, i was excited at the idea of a spiritual sequel to Banjo Kazooie, made by a team of ex-Rare employees, and they also got Grant Kirkhope back for the soundtrack. But i didn’t back it because the idea of Kickstarter and crowdfunding was still new to me, so i just waited for the game to come out.

Which eventually did, to mixed reception.

In hindsight, Yooka Laylee does deserve a spotlight and a place in the history of platforming games, but not for the reasons Playtonic might have liked.

To give some of the younger readers context, back then we were excited because Kickstarter projects would swoop in and serve a specific “niche” of games the big companies simply didn’t made anymore, as in they were chasing the more modern gaming trends of their time.

One of these “underserved niches” was definitely collecthaton platformer in the style of the late 90s and of the 3D kind, as 2D style retro platformer were already starting to get made for the audience that craved them, and aside from Nintendo franchises, 3D platformers as a whole were old hat, left behind by most of the industry as it hurled ever more into F2P monetization and “services”.

Continua a leggere “Platformation Time Again #5: Yooka Laylee PS4”

[EXPRESSO] Dangerous Animals (2025) | Three On A Sharkhook

New shark movie with a big budget, a widespread cinematic release and it’s not a Jason Staham trashfest romp, another gonzo shark movie about an Esper Shark (TM) or something done with lunch money-allowance budget?

What has the gone world to?

Apparantly something good and conceptually simple, i guess that’s why it took so long for someone to make a good shark movie that also plays the “Uno reverse” card on the concept without overcomplicating it or being outlandish.

Meaning that Dangerous Animals is about a serial killer that hides his murderous calling by posing as a shark cage experience activity for tourist in Australia (which fittingly all good modern shark movies seem to hail from), killing people and filming as he feeds them to the sharks.

His next victim is a surfer girl, Zephyr, living a nomadic sort of lifestyle, whom finds herself kidnapped by the killer in preparation for his macabre rituals…

it’s so simple that a shark movie like this hasn’t been made before, but on the flipside it’s actually pretty good, thanks to a good budget, very solid acting and good characters, with a resilient leading lady/final girl and a good psychotic villain that does have a humourous side that actually makes him more believable as he use it alongside some charm to better camouflage his true self, without going overboard and making him feel cartoony or excessive.

It’s also pretty gory without going into full splatter territory, going for a more realistic tone to the chases and attempts of his victims to escape his grasp, making for a very tense film that is less predictable than one would expect, yet very satisfying even when it hits the expected notes, one also basically devoid of filler, exactly as long as it needs.

Pretty good.

One Piece: Grand Adventure PS2 [REVIEW] | Grand Battle Rushed

One Piece videogames were actually quite wild in terms of what got released out of Japan during the PS1 and PS2 era, with a very inconsistent series of releases outside of Japan, some esclusive to North America, some to European countries, some like One Piece for the GBA being the weird case of being regionally exclusive to North America, as in, there doesn’t exists a Japanese GBA cart of that game because it was never made in the first place.

One Piece Grand Adventure also falls into this category, as it was never released in Japan but made esclusively for North America and Europe, still by the same developer of the Grand Battle series (and behind a lot of One Piece games over the years), Ganbarion, to profit off the good sales for One Piece Grand Battle Rush (just One Piece Grand Battle in NA and EUR territories) on PS2.

I said PS2 as in the Gamecube version is a NA exclusive, in Europe we just got it on PS2.

But yeah, keep in the mind the “to profit off” part, which will also explain why this review might be shorter than expected.

Continua a leggere “One Piece: Grand Adventure PS2 [REVIEW] | Grand Battle Rushed”

Pirate Warriors 4 and The DLC-enening, Part 3 [The Endurance] (UPDATED)

Yesterday was One Piece Day, so as expected and announced, they revealed the winners for that poll/survey for characters fans would like to see as future DLCs for Pirate Warriors 4…. well, indirectly revealed some of the winners.

As in, they announced the third Character Pass, which this time is gonna be made of 2 character packs instead of 3, with the second (technically DLC Pack 8) being a “Legends” sort of deal, since it has fan favourite Enel back into the fray (being one of the characters culled from the roster despite being in Pirate Warriors 3), King, which was basically a given due its popularity, and Zephyr, from One Piece Film Z, this not a given at all, i was kinda expecting Shiki to make the cut, but i’m glad because Film Z is one of my favourites of the OP films, and my boy “Z” deserve some more representation.

As for the other DLC pack that is slated to released first this fall (with DLC Pack 8 instead having a “Early 2026” release date as of now), DLC Pack 7, they just revealed that the first of the batch will be Rob Lucci in its CP0-Egghead version, as in with the Awakening form and all of that.

The other two characters will be revealed later as the release window for the DLC pack approaches, and i would love to see Kaku (damn he loves giraffes) but i doubt it, same for Vivi, playing as her with Karoo as the built-in mount would be funny, but i think Baby 5 could be more interesting to play as given her literal “weapons morphing” Devil Fruit.

Honestly a bit miffed this is just 6 characters instead of 9, you can pre-order the Season Pass itself and the bonuses are 3 bonus costumes (not sure for whom) and a new special ability/move for Shanks, that both his base and Film Red versions can use.

No word on that next-gen versions they announced on upcoming, not here anyway, but i would be surprised if it’s not out by October.

(also, damn, that new trailer for the second season of the Netflix live action One Piece show looks good)

So see you for the eventual reviews of both DLC packs, bye!

UPDATE: the PSN store page for the Character Pass 3 is up in my region…. and it’s still 30 euros, like the other Character Passes, which had 9 characters.

This has 6. And i’m NOT ruling out the other two undisclosed characters of DLC Pack 7 being more new/slighty revised updated version of already playable ones, like Egghead versions of Zoro and Sanji, especially since i assume that’s the theme they’re gonna go with.

Jesus Christ, Namco Bandai, wanna make the next character pass even more famished of content? Fuck’ sake.

One Piece: Grand Battle/Grand Battle Rush PS2 [REVIEW] | “Chaser”, the other White Hunter

No i didn’t review this before, it just happens that Bandai “did a Konami” and released this new entry in the Grand Battle subseries as One Piece Grand Battle…. yes, with the same exact name as the first PS1 game that launched what it is now an established subseries of One Piece videogames.

Then again, this is technically Grand Battle 4, they never released Grand Battle 2 (which was still rocking that 2.5D gameplay) or Grand Battle 3 but when they started selling the anime with the 4Kids license/treatment i guess it was time to resume locazing these again, and keeping the original title of “One Piece Grand Battle Rush” must have made too much sense… but then again this time around we have a Power Stone clone.

As in, a proper one this time around, Grand Battle 3 did go full 3D first, but unless you lived in Japan or imported it at the times, you wouldn’t know (plus the more i find about GB3 the more GB Rush seems more like a Turbo Edition than a proper sequel).

So i’ll chalk it up to the localizers not giving a shit and just reusing the title of the series because who cares, after all this is first One Piece game of this sub-series to even reach North American lids.

Continua a leggere “One Piece: Grand Battle/Grand Battle Rush PS2 [REVIEW] | “Chaser”, the other White Hunter”