Pinata Survival Island AKA Demon Island (2002) [REVIEW] | Cinco De Pantyo

This is the “something” i eventually went with as an excuse for having to cut down One Piece August reviews (which are coming up soon after this), some rando film i had in my Amazon Prime Video watchlist, Demon Island…. under its Italian title, Pinata: Terror Island (still showing the title of Pinata: Survival Island in the film itself, as you do), which immediatly has primo “please rent me from Blockbuster, please!” direct-to-video trash film energy.

And now is a 20 years old aged serving of trash filet, hopefully so, let’s roll the dice with something from the directors of King Cobra (the cobra killer movie with Pat Morita i did review back then), National Lampoon’s Dorm Daze and the tv mini-series Deadtime Stories.

One might wonder why retitle a movie called “Demon Island” as “Pinata” or “Pinata Survival Island”…. unless you actually read a synopsis and realize it’s a bit more direct, since that’s the source of the daemons.

You see, an isolated tribe, cursed by spirits for their sins, decides to craft a pinata to house all their evil, and then sends the thing into the fuckin ocean to get rid of it and advert famines and such.

Not their problem anymore, i guess, so its up to a couple of teens to find the pinata on a island, while they are there to do a weird fraternity-sorority thing during Cinco De Mayo, which is getting fraternity guys and sorority girls put into teams of two and…..basically do a Senran Kagura questline that somehow never happened but easily could have, as in they compete for who can find the most underwear strewn around the island, with a prize of 20000 bucks for the winners.

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Kancolle 1944: Itsuka Ano Umi De/See You Again On Another Quiet Blue Sea (2022) [REVIEW] | The Real Fleet Girls

So yeah, that “season 2 which it’s actually not a second season” of the Kancolle anime did happen, i wasn’t able to re/write any of my old pieces on the first season and the follow-up movie, but we can actually do that next year, since this – let’s make it EXTRA clear – this ain’t the continuation/second season, but a completely different Kancolle anime project that had been years in the works without any info or proof it wasn’t scrapped… until it resurfaced in early 2022 as Kancolle 1944: Itsuka Ano Umi De, translated/localized “Kancolle 1944: See You Again On Another Quiet Blue Sea”.

And by “years in the works” i mean that there was enough time for rival series Azur Lane to make its own anime series with Azur Lane: The Animation, and then adapt a spin-off 4 panel manga into animation with Azur Lane: Slow Ahead… so much time that i did review that!

Look, i’m sure Kancolle still has its fans (me included) and a decent player base in its original browser game iteration, but even when this new anime series eventually surfaced… it did so to a dead fanbase, as the franchise was basically “dead” in terms of international appeal, with most people moving on to either Azur Lane, give Arpeggio Of Blue Steel a rewatch, or moving on to other gacha (or gacha adjacent) games with a similar theme, a healthy playerbase or some other anime-multimedia franchise that had content and had become popular, like Umamusume Pretty Derby, with the anime series and its seasons managing to keep interest even when the main product (a F2P smarthphone game) was delayed for 3 years before even just Japanese players could get their hands on it, alongside the spin-offs, related projects, even a brand new feature film.

Sometimes there’s taking so long that the fanbase dies in the meantime in terms of “being late”, as Kancolle 1944 demonstrates, but let’s get to it!

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[EXPRESSO] Dedalus (2024) | Game Of Influence

Italian film time again, with Dedalus from director Roberto Manzetti, which premiered last December at Noir In Festival, and is now hitting theathers (during the now usual nationwide summer cinema promotional sale for European and Italian films).

The premise sees 6 influencers selected to partecipate in “Dedalus”, a highly marketed social network event that will see the partecipants compete in a series of trials, all livestreamed from a secret location, with the promise of further fame and riches.

But as the program goes on, the trails reveal themselves to be more and more dangerous, as the influencers end up caught in an elaborate vengeance plot…

It’s odd, because at times it looks like a influencer version of Squid Game, but it’s not that, yet it’s not really Saw, nor it’s akin to “PG13 non-horror Saw” that was Escape Room (there no enviromental puzzles or elaborate escape scenarios), and while it occasionally uses horror imagery and some horror adjacent material, it’s not a horror film.

I’ve seen a decent share of modern italian films that flirt with horror without having the nerve to actually commit to that, or do but give up half-way or simply don’t label themselves as such…. this one actually works well and i wasn’t left wishing it was gory, it works quite well (in spite of a shaky first act) since it is a thriller about vengeance at heart.

Also, Dedalus has some good atmosphere, good acting, some good plot twists too, i do like how utterly despicable – to be kind – its protagonists are, and while it could dig more into the modern themes – and issues of the social media world we live in – it tackles, i do like how it also avoids trying to clump together some cheap moralisms and “excuse” anyone.

[EXPRESSO] 28 Years Later (2025) | Mighty Morphin Jimmy Rangers

Almost 20 years of absence, this seminal zombie series is back in cinemas with 28 Years Later, actually the first of a new trilogy that brings back Danny Boyle in the directing chair and Alex Garland as screenwriter …. and indeed it immediatly feels like a continuation of 28 Days Later and what most feel 28 Weeks Later should have been, as it expands upon this perpetually quarantined UK, where the “rage virus” started spreading and turning people in feral fast running zombies.

This time we focus on a community that lives in a secluded island, but has the tradition of sending teens in a coming of age hunting trip inland (through a tiny strip of land that disappears with high tides), and its the turn of Spike, a 12yo boy reluctant and worried about his mother’s ailing health, for this rite of passage, with the help of his father, showing him “the ropes”.

This experience brings him new wonders and horrors, forcing him to confront his fears and eventually take drastic measures, exploring the zombie ridden inland territories and confront everevolving strains of Infected, maybe in the hope he can find answers and a cure for his mother’s illness and dementia….

It does expand upon the world, the zombies ecosystem, it does deliver on the gore and brutality all around, there are some good characters, but it has some questionable choices, like the second act development that feels a bit strange and almost random, but it leads to some great scenes and the movie it is quite good that i’m willing to overlook that (alongside a slightly redundant feeling due to the genre being milked dry in the last 2 decades of zombie media) and even a Power Ranger-esque final scene with dudes dressed like Tiger from Ninja Terminator.

[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.

Earth Defense Force 6 PS4 [REVIEW] | All You Need Is Kill

As with what is now tradition, after a reboot follows a direct sequel, so Earth Defense Force 6 picks up some years after you killed God (or an alien God), with the global population reduced to a 10 % of what it was, but hey, you won, and reconstruction begun, as it always does.

You play as one of the elite soldiers from Team Storm that succeded in saving the planet years before, sent to a base that needs manpower as while the aliens retreated after… well, the “Hell Comes To Frogtown” ones were left abandoned on Earth, so they kinda still kick around in pure desperation, and you’re sent to deal with these poor bastards after a speech from EDF bootleg (and surprisingly nice) version of Sergeant Hartman from Full Metal Jacket, during the tutorial mission that continues the more attention given to presentation that started with EDF 5.

Then some old teleporting devices start teleporting monsters on Earth again, the monsters start laying down eggs to up their numbers, so it feels like you’re stuck on a loop of exterminating the hordes to avoid the enemies gaining more ground, and it feels like this stalemate is gonna keep going… until the biblical accurate alien mothership comes back, transports and un-transports another mothership kind of vehicle, then drops an entirely new kind of alien foes, very 50s/60s scifi style android enemies that launch their grabby knifed claws from afar.

So shit was already a desperate fight for a ruins filled Earth, NOW it’s basically a desperate struggle to fuck with a 0% chance of winning against super alien Hitler with a box of green army men as actual troops…. until you fight the biblically accurate ring shaped mothership again, fuck up something… and then you’re literally in an early mission of EDF 5.

That’s true, because after this – as the game itself puts it – “The Earth Defense Force 6 begins now”.

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Aquaslash (2019) [REVIEW] | Slasher Action Park

What a waste of time.

I could have made a longer lead up to that, but sadly this one it’s just a sour disappointment, even going in just expecting it to be an enjoyable teen slasher set in an aquatic park, setting the bar fairly low but in a way that’s reasonable.

Cool title, but i’m not being too hyperbolic when i say it feels like a waste of time, period, since 80 % of Aquaslash it’s build up for the slipslide kills, and by “build up” i mean a lot of exagerrated romantic drama with deliberately exaggerated douchy teens and asshole adults characters, and a lot of cliches, which would be fine if the pay off was worth it… it ain’t.

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Maneater (2022) [REVIEW] | #sharkapalooza

Some “fresh” meat from…. 3 years ago. Yum.

Another one i randomly bought new for cheap on DVD via Amazon, sight unseen, because my hunger for shark movies it’s apparently endless.

Written and directed by Justin Lee, Maneater’s plot is pretty much the usual affair when talking modern shark movies: a group of friends go on vacation, board a boat that brings them to a remote deserted island where to get their party on, shark happens and it’s one that developed a knack (leave Mark Cerny alone) for human flesh.

This time we don’t have teens, but people in the 30s that have been married or just concluded a long education path, which is something different, i guess, especially since the movie doesn’t have the asshole that fucks everything that moves, or cheating bullshit to pad out the human drama parts, with a subplot involving an old fisherman that harbours vengeance as great white sharks took not only his wife but also recently his daughter.

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Popeye’s Revenge (2025) [REVIEW] | Hamburger Friday The 13th

Surprise!

As i said prefacing the review for Popeye The Slayer Man, i’m not gonna change the schedule for these films, but since i also don’t want to have these hanging off the “to do” list like dingleberries, we’re doing overtime.. well, I am doing overtime, let’s cover these now and hope i won’t have to do another round of Popeye-xploitation in the fall.

And yes, i guess i should have done this before Popeye The Slayer Man, since it came out earlier and it’s actually the first one to capitalize on Popeye’s character falling into public domain (the other free idea bucket alongside mythology), and surprising no one it’s by one of the production companies behind the Winnie Pooh Blood And Honey movies (though it’s not part of their Twisted Childhood Universe), heck, it’s written by Harry Boxley (Dinosaur Hotel 3, Jurassic Triangle, Tsunami Sharks, and of course a couple of the Steamboat Willy-xploitation flicks, Mouseboat Massacre and Mouse Of Horrors), and directed by William Stead, curiously not his feature lenght debut, as directed something called “Children Of The Night” back in 2023.

The plot is that in a UK coastal town, a boy with abnormal arms and a pronounced chin is born, his appereance leading to him getting relentelessly getting bullied at school (where he often dons his sailor outfit), until one day he snaps and fights back, killing one of his bullies.

His parents hide him in the basement for his own good, but the townspeople form an angry mob and they torch down Popeye’s family home, with his parents dying in the fire and apparently him drowning in a nearby lake.

Years later some douchy young adults inherit the house, unaware of his dark history, but as they try to settle in more and more of them keep disappearing off…

You know what this sounds like?

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Warriors Abyss PS4 [REVIEW] | #musoumay

As promised, here we are tackling the stealth release latest Warriors spin-off, Warriors Abyss, which is Omega Force trying to apply the ever-so-popular-still roguelike spin to the musou gameplay.

Digital only even in Japan, played on a PS4 Pro because i still haven’t got a PS5… and since i’m getting a Switch 2 on launch (as i mentioned before= i don’t see it happening anytime soon.

The story is pure fluff, just a pretense to have a narrative (and reuse various assets from decades old games) to the roguelike X Warriors idea, which can really be boiled down to “the gang goes to hell”, as in the king of hell/makai/the underworld summons back fallen heroes from the Sengoku and Three Kingdoms eras to fight on his side, as the demon known as Gohma/Gouma

is rising in power in Hell and is seeking to become the new ruler of hell and escape it.

Good to see the Yu Yu Hakusho style (but it could be an even older trend) representation of Enma, the king of hell, as a child, still being a thing, as here Enma is basically a very otome style shota-twink that would be catcalled out immediatly by Neco Arc. No pacifier this time around, and honestly i’m glad for it, i’ve had enough of seeing those fucking things, especially after Tutor Hitman Reborn.

He is very tsun tsun, also.

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