Suicide Squad Isekai (2024) [REVIEW] | Through The Unlooking Glass

Why i am reviewing this, you may be asking yourself.

Just for the trash factor? Just because its seems like “easy prey”?

Not quite, it’s more due to how since its debut (and even then, i learn this was gonna be through the collaboration with V-tuber and singer Mori Calliope, as she composed the ending theme) i never heard a single peep online about it, not even to shit on it, which worried me even more.

Also i learned after searching that it was being streamed in my region via a sub-channel on Amazon Prime Video, absolutely zero marketing had been spent to even make people know it was legally available on a commonly used streaming platform (FIY, there’s no HBO Max or Hulu here).

But still, this looked and sounded like like the kind of trash Twitter (not calling it X) loves to shit on weekly, just for the hell of it, but the only thing i saw on there was someone else befuddled by how the internet decided to skip having any discourse on it all together, that it was likely not even worth that kind of engagement, as nobody bothered, not even for the finale…..if anyone knew this series was a thing to begin with, that is. No one using the new Joker and Harley designs for their profile pictures, it was THAT much ignored or just never actually marketed properly after its announcement.

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[One Piece: Side Pieces | Retrospective] Cross Epoch (manga) [REVIEW]

To close off this little retrospective, there was no other choice, given the recent passing of Akira Toriyama, the author of Doctor Slump & Arale (and nothing else), may he rest in peace.

We’re also going back in time more than with the previous spin-offs (Monsters aside), as Cross Epoch was a 20 pages one-shot manga done by both Oda and Toriyama in 2006, apparently because they wanted to… actually yeah, that’s about the extent on the “why” this came to be.

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[EXPRESSO] Deadpool & Wolverine (2024) | Stabbing Friends

I do not know if it’s still “cool” to hate on Deadpool (both the character and the film series), but laughably wanton changes of popular opinion aside, i quite liked Deadpool and i was glad to see that he would return and drag back Hugh Jackman to play Wolverine again in the third Deadpool live action film, Deadpool & Wolverine, as they go through a multiverse hopping adventure to avoid the timelines being erased, and for spoilers’ sake i will leave it at that.

Not that you’re here for the story anyway, you’re here for Ryan Reynolds’s Deadpool and to see him interact with Hugh Jackman back in his iconic Wolverine role/persona, and honestly i can’t deny it works well as a buddy comedy adventure, as the two actors work off each other perfectly.

I will not chastize the series style and humour and characters for actually being consistent with themselves as they were before, but i also won’t deny i would be quite okay with this being the last Deadpool film, as nothing here works badly or anything, is just the formula at this point in time lacks any real surprise, and the “annoying” aspect of Deadpool deliberate meta-massacring humour is even more noticeable than it’s purposedly made to, like dial it back a bit.

Also, there’s the fact the plot is weaker and meandering, as much as it makes some cameos possible from Marvel characters otherwise stuck in stupid limbos, it’s more derivative, the new characters could be better, and the movie – which is still decent-and-above fun overall – is quite funny but noticeably not as funny (or well directed) as Deadpool 2 was, and the meta referencing und self deprecating humour ends up feeling kind old hat, even if you enjoyed Deadpool whole shtick so far.

Samurai Maiden PS4 [REVIEW] #meleemay

I’ve been waiting to cover this one for a while, but i had to wait for it to go on a decent discount, since D3 Publisher went extra crazy and asked 50 bucks (70 for the Deluxe Edition that includes all DLCs, mostly costumes and music from other D3 franchise like Bullet Girls) for what was obviously another budget game of theirs.

Having played all Oneechanbara games and waiting for the Namco Bandai owned company to finally announce the western release for EDF 6 (which was supposed to be out this spring but was eventually delayed to late July 2024), i did want to play Samurai Maiden earlier, but the absurd price really held me off, i’m not fucking paying 70 bucks for a complete edition of a digital only release of a D3 Publisher budget hack n slash anime game.

Curiously, despite the publisher involved and the premise of hack n slash action using a japanese anime high school girl, this is NOT the fanservicey fest you’d expected, i guess after the “prude crusade” Sony went (for whatever reason, since they were the main platform for most Senran Kagura games before), niche titles like this had to tippy toe on their tits to see what’s ok now.

the plot sees regular high school girl Tsumugi transported back to the Sengoku period, isekai’d directly during the Honno-ji incident so she can chat up Oda Nobunaga and have three female anime ninjas explain she was summoned there because she’s a discendant of a so called “Miko Of Prosperity”, and a prophecy involving her and a Demon Lord was foretold, etc.

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[EXPRESSO] Barbie (2023) | Life In Plastic

For once i’m glad here in Italy we don’t get movie releases as the US do, because Oppenheimer is releasing in late August here, so i can bury that stupid “Barbenheimer” shit.

So, the Barbie movie, by renowed director Greta Gerwig, it’s definitely something i’d been looking forward since announcement, wondering what the fuck the plot of a live-action Barbie movie could be, this isn’t aimed at children like the dozens of animated Barbie movies we’ve seen over the years, at all.

The basic gist is similar to Enchanted, as we’re introduced to Barbieland, a world where Barbies live perfect days, party and have fun in perpetuity… until the “Stereotype Barbie” (Margot Robbie) has an existential crisis, seek help from the wise old “Weird Barbie” that tells her she has to go to the real world and reconnect with the girl that played with her in order to fix the situation. Problem is, Mattel itself learns that “Barbie has breached contaiment”, and one of the Kens (Ryan Gosling) sneaks away into the real world too…

It’s a feminist comedy that use the brand to tackle the obvious themes you’d think, in modern ouvert (and very meta) fashion as expected and… well, neeeded, because at this point we know audiences can be quite “thick”, but it’s as brazen as it’s funny and caring in poking fun, showing a profound love of cinema in doing so, with some really nice musical segments and amazing sets.

It’s not perfect, for example the main plot is basically resolved 40 minutes in and then it kinda feels like they had to follow a “b-plot” for the sake of the runtime, the feminism itself it’s slightly superficial (not shallow, but not deep either), but even with its flaws, it’s a really sincere, entertaining and witty film.

[EXPRESSO] Spider Man: Across The Spiderverse (2023) | Peter Parter

This review it’s only a formality, but yes, indeed, i had high expectations of this new Spider Man animated movie after Into The Spiderverse was a surprise smash hit, an unexpected excellent opus from an animation studio mostly known for Hotel Transylvania and The Angry Birds movie.

We never saw it coming, but it happened and while it had the side effect of making the live-action Marvel offerings kinda redundant and pointless, i would have been happy even if there wasn’t a sequel, despite being no reason to stop there, i mean, we got the new origin story/introduction of Miles Morales as one of the many Spider Man personas, the studio was gonna follow that up regardless.

This sequel to Into The Spiderverse also follows in the recent resurgence of “two parters” (giving even more proof that time is a flat circle, at least in terms of entertaiment media), and in this “part 1” we see Miles (and Gwen) venture deeper into the multiverse of various Spider personas from many dimensions/universes, meeting a new team of “Spidersonas” known as Spider Society, led by Miguel O’Hara (aka Spider Man 2099), but instead of collaborating they end up clashing in regards of how to deal with the villain at hand.

And honestly it meets the high expectations set by the previous movie, delivering a lot of inspired visuals, variety of animation styles and stylization, new charming and likable characters, plus the story dwelves deeper into the multiverse aspect, Miles’ role in this, so even if it ends on a cliffhanger for “part 2”, it’s not just 2 hours and 1/2 of setup, it’s already very very good as expected, and again it manages to make you really care even if you weren’t already much invested in Spiderman his many comic book incarnations/iterations.

[EXPRESSO] Super Mario Bros The Movie (2023) | Fungine Fun

Anteprima in una nuova scheda

So the new Super Mario Bros movie, the new animated one, is here, and i gotta say i’m pleasantly surprised, since it’s still handled by Illumination, which is… a prolific studio, let’s put it like that.

The plot is what about you’d expect and combines elements from both the previous film iterations of the Mario franchise, so you have Mario and Luigi as unsuccessful plumbers in Brooklyn that one day, while trying to fix a flood, get transported into the Mushroom Kingdom, where Princess Peach is preparing a plan to fight Bowser, as he got hold of the magical Super Star and is bent on world domination… after he pops the question to Peach, that is.

Yeah, there is the isekai element but the world isn’t the weird Blade Runner-looking dino society of the 1993 live action film, instead the one most audiences remember from the videogames, and i say “the videogames” because basically every popular iteration of Mario is represented, there’s even the karts and the Kongs play a not small role in it, as the movie crams a lot of action, varied setpieces and fuckton of references in every scene, making for a pleasing 90 minutes romp where there’s no downtime nor faffing about random shit to pad out the runtime.

Animation is top notch and the script (which is still very “Illumination”) it’s also a lot funnier than one would wager, so older audiences will get more laughs out of it than expected, instead of groaning their way through most of it.

If i went to see it when i was 12, i would have lost my shit, but even disregarding that, The Super Mario Bros animated film stands as a good kids movie, very fun indeed.

It’s better than the Sonic live-action films, i’d say.

Super Mario: The Great Mission To Rescue Princess Peach! (1986) [REVIEW]

Before this deal of an animated Mario movie was written between Nintendo and Illumination, heck, 7 years before the infamous live-action film with Bob Hopkins and John Leguizamo, Nintendo already had its Super Mario anime movie, with Super Mario: The Great Mission To Rescue Princess Peach, based on the seminal Super Mario Bros game, which was released just 1 year prior.

While not totally unknown, for years it had been quite the rare, obscure and elusive piece of forgotten Mario media, with some horrible VHS rips flying around the web of thing, until some absolute chads in 2021 came together to fund and execute a 4K restoration project of the film from a rare (possibly even the only surviving) 16 mm print secured by another madlad called “Carnivol”, and then put it on Youtube for free, with updated (and upgraded) english subs.

So you can easily check it out there, not gonna put the link directly because Nintendo, but the effort it’s more than laudable and the people behind the restoration deserve some money thrown at them.

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[EXPRESSO] Alice In Borderland (Season Two) (2022) | Fallen Figures

After a good year plus of waiting, the second season of Alice In Borderland is here (again, as a Netflix exclusive show), picking up where the cliffhanger finale left our protagonists, who now are pretty much forced to confront the new games held by the high ranking card figures, with teams of “inhabitants” that challenge the players directly, in the hope of figuring out a way to come back home, or if there’s even a way out to begin with..

There are some surprise comebacks, new faces, and the various games are quite entertaining and creative, the returning characters get more characterization, and ultimately we also learn a lot more about this “Borderland” world, even though we don’t get many answers because we’d lose that vague mystique and there’s technically enough source material for a third season.

Speaking of which, while i’m personally kinda tempted to lower the overall score/vote for the ending alone – that and some really cliched and basic philosophical wafflings – … i will give it credit since it could work as a proper conclusion for the series overall.

As i said before, you can clearly tell it’s adapted from a manga series, one that draw easily into the popular branch of suspense/supernatural death games (very akin to The World Ends With You crossed with stuff like As The Gods Will) and also belongs to the battle royale subgenre, though this live-action adaptation had the accidental luxury of releasing worlwide just before Squid Game – and its craze that re-popularized the battle royale – came into existence.

Overall, i’ve enjoyed this one more than the first season, it’s just more compelling in terms of characters, death games and stakes, making me surprisingly glad i gave it a chance, even if it’s a bit flawed at times.

12 Days Of Dino Dicember #23: Land Of The Lost (2009)

FIY, i didn’t know this movie’s history beforehand, i figured we could use a mainstream released feature with actors people might have actually have seen before, you know, in theathers and all, it wasn’t an obscure product from a country that no longer exists and it was “2YK survivor”.

So i just slotted into the list, only to later find out i basically enlisted “comedy Hitler” for this Dino Dicember, as this thing was widely hated back in 2009, with the deadly combo of being both a box office bomb and receiving overwhelming amounts of negative reviews from the press.

And also won 7 Razzies, which – as said before – i don’t really acknowledge, but by all accounts it had everything going against it, as it was regarded as an awful, awful sketch comedy, and made people extra salty because it was technically one of those “parody movie adaptations/remakes” of an older, beloved TV series, in this case Sid and Marty Krofft’s Land Of The Lost from 1974.

Which i never saw since i’m technically a Millennial and whatnot.

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