Mario Kart World NSWITCH 2 [REVIEW] | Open Kart Policy

So, yep, this review is a bit late, but given there was no communicated immediate plans for their “content roadmap”, i feel what i have to say now would have applied at launch and might apply despite future updates, but we’ll see about that, though i don’t plan to update the review as they add stuff either as part of DLC expansions or free software updates.

I mean, i also didn’t plan to keep reviewing Pirate Warriors 4 DLC as i did, so time will tell, but as of now they haven’t hinted or said anything about what they plan to do with the title in the future, so here we go.

That said, i did play a good chunk of the game at launch, then i came back after DK Bananza to dig into the “open world-free roam” mode, play some online matches occasionally, and trying to have the RNG grant me the other hidden characters like mah boi Fish Bone.

[EXPRESSO] Locked (2025) | Small Theft Auto

Locked has a simple, yet fairly intriguing hook: a small time thief desperate for cash one day finds a strangely unlocked high-tech smartcar (like a Tesla that doesn’t randomly burst into fire) to loot it, but once in he then realizes he’s locked into the vehicle, and gets contacted by the owner, whom remotely controls everything in the car, making it act as a trap for whoever tried to steal it.

The guy then has to survive locked inside, while the unseen owner keeps torturing him, playing mind games and keeping the complex trap scenario of his own design going…

Sadly for Locked, this is the kind of script with a decent-good idea/concept…. but ultimately doesn’t really know what to do with it outside of slightly escalating the tortures, and boiling the explanation for this cruel trap to basically the same “eat the rich” surface level class warfare bit A24 movies have done to death recently, just done in a more utilitarian and even more shallow fashion, with the car owner (Anthony Hopkins) also written as being completely callous, a straight up empathy-free psycho, for better or worse.

It’s also not tense enough to make you question for real if escape is even possible to begin with, which is an issue (as is the unsatisfying ending) but i will say it’s not boring, even though it’s a film carried entirely by Bill Skarksgard’s performance as the low tier criminal that is forced by circumstance to thieve and such in order to care for his family, and if Hopkins kinda phones it in (literally for most of the film), he seems to be having fun with such a stock Jigsaw wannabe, which does help.

Overall, Locked feels middling, not bad but makes one wonder for the movie that could have been.

P.S.: This also is another foreign remake of a 2019 Argentinian movie called 4X4 (which has now has been remade thrice), itself having a similar premise to a 1998 direct-to-video film named Captured.

[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.

[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] Death Of A Unicorn (2025) | Mediocricorns Out

Like i lamented in my review of Opus, this kind of satire about “eating the rich” has just about plateu’d itself into a modern clichè, despite the sentiment itself being more and more relevant, and Death Of A Unicorn just cements this further.

Even if it’s a killer creature feature mashed with The Menu (again, that or Knives Out), and there’s something to the concept, given the unicorn’s folklore.

The premise sees a lawyer bring along his estranged daughter to meet with the wealthy family he works for, but they accidentally hit something with the car.

That being an actual, factual unicorn, which is eventually discovered by the rich family that immediatly seizes it when they realize just their blood can do near miracolous things, and ignore the warnings of the daughter, who briefly but profondedly mind-linked with the unicorn cub…

It’s not that it doesn’t commit to its silly concept of “killer unicorns stalking-killing rich assholes”, it does so to the point its detrimental, mostly taking the idea too seriously while being stupid in a way that’s more exhauting and annoying than fun, the good cast can’t do much when these character are too fuckin stupid, it lacks some needed self-awareness, and it’s nowhere as fun as it sounds.

It also doesn’t take advantage of the absurd premise to make something creative with it, the effects are fairly good but don’t expect anything of inventive in terms of kills, for example, and while it’s under 2 hours, it feels longer, like they stretched a short movie or a comedy skit into feature lenght.

It’s at least a more coherent with itself than Opus, i will say that much, and it’s not awful, it’s just another middling entry in this already overdone, oversatured “eat the rich” style of satirical comedy.

Zombie Virus PS2 [REVIEW] | Ambulance VS Zombies

Yeah, October is far, far away, but extreme times call for extreme measures, and even more extreme unaccounted issues call for improvisation, so we’re unearth a real piece of shit game from the bargain bin dimension of the PS2, with this rewrite for Zombie Virus..

The generic title does bely a more interesting idea that the original title, The Zombie VS The Ambulance, which might give away to more expert gamers that, yes, this is more trash coming from D3 Publisher budget line of releases, the Simple 2000 Series for the PS2, developed by an obscure studio, Vingt-Et-Un Systems, that mainly did work on these budget Simple Series title…. and to my total surprise is far from defunct, as in the last decade has worked for Capcom titles such as the RE 3 Remake, Ghost N Goblins Resurrection, and the Capcom Arcade Stadium collections.

Not to be confused with another budget title from the very same collection/line, Zombie Attack, which is an action game by Tamsoft, so eventually i’ll have to feature it here in some way.

This one is about the age old tale of zombies and their natural enemy, a sentient ambulance, or so i would say, but the game actually has a plot, because there has to be, not that it amounts to much and it’s hard to care about it since it’s a budget release through and through, with dialogues after important story beats but no voice acting, and most of the story told by silent walls of text.

Again, the usual fare for a budget release of this era sporting the various labels D3 published these things outside of Japan (as in, mostly in European territories), pretty much to be expected.

In short, everything was fine and dandy in the utopia known as Sunlight City, until an eartquake happened, literal dark clouds start spreading about, and presto, not even 1 minute into the intro cutscene and a good 90 % of people turned into zombies.

Continua a leggere

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.

Continua a leggere

[EXPRESSO] Smile 2 (2024) | Aphex Twin

Smile was a surprise release in many regards, but i guess we couldn’t leave it alone as a single good horror film, hence there’s a “sequel”, quotations because after seeing the trailer i figured this was more of a loose continuation than anything else.

While is true that the plot basically doesn’t really require to have seen Smile to be followed, it does actually pick up after its ending, with a police officer trying to pass on the curse on a couple of criminals, somehow managing that only to try escaping and getting torn apart by a car that smashes over him. Later on, in NY, we follow popstar Skye Riley preparing her comeback tour, after struggling with drug abuse and surviving a car crash that killed her boyfriend, a famous actor.

While she is helped by her mother, manager and assistant, Riley sneak out to buy vicodin for her crippling back pain from a dealer that begins to sport a vicious smile, and then kills himself before her, passing on the curse…

The first Smile worked so well in spite of everything sounding like it shouldn’t, committing to the idea and making for quite the good film that managed to walk the fine line between the silly and the freaky, and this one is arguably another surprise, as it does know the novelty factor of the “Richard D. James” face is gone, so it upstages the first in gore, jumpscares, plot, spectacle, freaky visuals, special effects, arguably even in terms of main character, with Naomi Scott being great as the manic, guilt ridden popstar with everything to lose from even the smallest fuck up on her way to reclaim her career.

It’s a rare case of a sequel being on par with the first good entry, arguably even better.

[EXPRESSO] Borderlands (2024) | Money does grow on trees

Despite “Randy BoBandy” reminds us this thing was actually coming along and not going the way of the Bioshock film….i kinda wish it did, as it’s hard to believe this thing actually exists, not helped by lack of any real promotion for a 100 millions budgeted movie with actors like Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart and Jamie Lee Curtis.

The plot follows the one of the first Borderlands but also borrows some characters from the sequel, with a bounty hunter, Lilith, tasked by the CEO of the Atlas corporation to get back his daughter, Tina, lastly seen on Pandora, a wasteland planet overrun by thugs, monsters and mercenaries, where is said to reisde Vault, a fabled crypt that allegedly contains the artifacts of a long lost, technologically advanced civilization.

Lilith then inadvertly becomes a Vault Hunter and is forced to team up with a gaggle of renegades, weirdos and psychos, including a robot unit called “Claptrap”.

Having played up to Borderlands 2 and some of its expansions, i will say that at least the Borderlands movie looks the part, and this might be one of the more apt videogames to film adaptations… shame the source material was not really good to draw inspiration for an action comedy film, given the puerile, meme-ridden and often more annoying than charming “sense of humour” the games had, which was tolerable at the time and didn’t quite age great…but heck, even the games were funnier, overall, thanks to their “throw shit at the wall” approach.

It’s a movie 10 years too late, and for an Eli Roth directed film based on a hyper violent videogame series, it’s a PG-13 affair, but the main issue it’s the movie just being a boring, unfunny, honestly kinda lethargic romp, where the weirdly casted A-listers half-ass it big time.

[EXPRESSO] Twisters (2024) | That Power Is Yet Unknown

I have to say, for generational reasons, i missed the time where this movie was so widespread, so i watched the 1996 original for the first time just hours before going into theathers to see this follow-up/stand alone sequel, simply called Twisters.

The original was a fun ride, full of hilarious characters played by an amazing cast, though the main focus where the admittely amazing special effects for 1996, and plain old tornadoes were enough to intrigue general audiences.

That said, there is a strangely refreshing quality today to the 90s style approach to disaster movies, even if it’s less “sequel” and more of a remake (a “remaquel”?), as there are parallels, some elements carrying over and characters having similar dynamics, and a similar premise of groups of “tornado hunters”, despite no returning characters from the 1996 movie.

It feels very 90s and it does harness the energy of the original for the most part, with good effects too, in general managing well to update the formula, but intriguingly the core plot actually tackles more how these natural disasters impact peoples’ lives, who’s actually profitting from these, etc.

It’s a shame the movie isn’t willing to concede some needed characterization, more depth to the themes, anything that detract from the “rollercoaster” type of entertaiment, i mean, climate change isn’t mentioned once, and the co-protagonist could almost be cut, as Glenn Powell’s amazing performance of “Tyler Owens”, the ringmaster of a hillbilly storm chasers posse, steals the show.

Twisters almost manages to marry these two different approaches to the formula, but kinda falls short, though in the end it’s still a more than decent movie, one that does feel like a modern take on Twister, even if a bit frustrating since it feels crutched by compromises because of its very legacy.