Fantastic Four: First Steps

 

There’s a joke amongst comic fans that the only good Fantastic Four movie is an Incredibles movie. Fox tried four different times to make enjoyable movies based on

Marvel’s First Family, and although I do have a bit of a soft spot for the campy Tim Story films of 2005 and 2007 none of the attempts really captured the essence of the Fantastic Four, something that Pixar’s The Incredibles did quite effortlessly: They may be superheroes, but they are a family first. Ten years and one multi-billion-dollar acquisition later, it might finally be time to put that tired joke to rest, as Marvel Studios’ Fantastic Four: First Steps not only nails the family dynamic but also proves to be one of the best MCU films since Avengers: Endgame.

If you have seen a trailer or poster for the film you know that it utilizes a really cool retro[1]-futuristic aesthetic, much like the Tomorrowland areas in various Disney parks. This instantly gives First Steps a buttload of charm, and it also gets points for never using this visual flair as a crutch. No, it's got other things going for it as well, not the least of which is the chemistry between our four leads and the earnestness of the script. Like the latest Superman film, Fantastic Four: First Steps embraces its comic book roots by being unrepentantly outlandish and embracing simple messages of good triumphing over, well, everything.

Every one of the Four gets a nice little character moment or two, even if the villain is fairly one-[1]dimensional. This is true to the comics, where Galactus is less of a character and more of a force of nature, but what he lacks in motivation he makes up for in menace. The stakes in First Steps feel high, and it makes the lighter moments feel all the better for it. Overall it's one of the most balanced MCU films when it comes to tone, which is a relief in a universe that often veers more towards quippy comedy than drama. 

And speaking of the overall Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole, one of the best parts of Fantastic Four: First Steps is how self-contained it is. You don't need to remember a person that showed up once five movies ago, nor do you need to see some random show on Disney+ to understand the special context of a two-minute scene. Everything you need to enjoy First Steps is in First Steps, and enjoy it you probably will. 

Fantastic Four: First Steps is now playing in theaters.

Duck Soup (1933) Mini Review

 

              I did not expect a comedy from 1933 to be this effective in 2025.

              Duck Soup is considered by some to be the quintessential Marx Brothers film, and in the name of cultural literacy I tuned in to see what the nearly century-old fuss was about. While some of the jokes landed flat or just didn’t translate across the gulf of time it didn’t really matter, as there are just so many of them per minute. Groucho and Chico rarely shut up, Harpo has barely any screentime where he isn’t acting like the most caffeinated clown in history, and I suppose Zippo was somewhere in there as well, at least according to the opening credits. There is a reason Groucho is often considered to be the best of them, as his mile-a-minute wordplay (which I imagine must be an absolute nightmare for someone who speaks English as a second language) has undoubtedly aged the best, whereas the physical comedy of Harpo didn’t really appeal much to me (I guess he liked cutting stuff with scissors and bullying lemonade salesmen and everyone thought that was funny for some reason?) and Chico sometimes came off as a poor man’s Groucho. There is also a singular racist joke that wouldn’t fly in the late twentieth century let alone today, but honestly I’m just glad that it was just the one. This is the 1930s we’re talking about, after all.  

The film is truly anarchic, and I’m not just referring to the brothers themselves. It eschews logic, it eschews plot. It is as poorly paced as my eating schedule on Thanksgiving Day. But ultimately it doesn’t matter, as all of that stuff is just window dressing for the jokes, and the jokes work, even ninety-two years later.  And who can beat that just-over-an-hour runtime?

Superman (2025)

 

That Superman sure is nice guy, isn’t he? This primary characteristic of the Last Son of Krypton has been out of focus in the last decade or so as Hollywood had tried to cast him as a darker hero more in the vein of his Gotham City compatriot, but if the newest Superman film does anything it reminds us that Big Blue wants to help us, from the biggest alien invader to the smallest squirrel. It proudly wears its comic book heritage on its sleeve, and though its unironic earnestness sometimes slips into corny territory it mostly makes for a fun, if simple, viewing experience.

It's David Corenswet’s turn in the cape, and his broad shoulders wear it well. In Superman the titular hero’s brand of simple altruism is tested when geopolitical realities enter the picture and the realities of life conflict with his ideals. But the film's ultimate optimism is never in doubt, nor is the inherent goodness of the character. But as good as Corenswet is, it is Rachel Brosnahan (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, House of Cards) as Lois Lane and Nicholas Hoult as Lex Luthor that steel the show (“steel” as in “Man of Steel?” Never mind), each embodying their characters perfectly with pure electricity. There have been a couple of good to great Superman films over the years, and Christopher Reeve will forever embody the character for most people including myself, but this is the first time it has ever felt like I was actually watching a Superman comic in movie form, and it is largely thanks to pitch perfect casting and acting.

Another big part of the appeal is the unashamed silliness of some of the concepts. Krypto the Superdog is in this movie, and his mere presence shows that Superman is not afraid of its often goofy heritage. I for one loved this unabashed embracing of what makes comic books so unique, but there is no doubting that Superman occasionally goes over the line and dips into campy territory. Again, this wasn’t a problem for me and it won’t be a problem for a lot of people, but others I can see rolling their eyes.

It's not the most complex film, and the real-life parallels are a bit clumsy and obvious, but any film that celebrates kindness in our turbulent age while still managing to be loads of fun is welcome in my book. Superman is the first entry in what Warner Bros./DC Studios promises to be a sprawling new connected movie-verse, but even if you’re tired of them at this point it’s still worth checking this one out.

Superman is now playing in theaters.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966) Mini Review

    

    This movie drives a Ferrari while wearing a leather jacket and getting its back rubbed by supermodels and it isn't afraid to let you know. Hot damn it was cool. I might be a western guy now? Should I put spurs on my crocs and take up smoking? 

    Even though it is one of the highest-ranking movies on IMDb I still expected to be a bit bored while watching The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. It came out just four years after the first James Bond film, Dr. No, which was occasionally so slow I may have done a crossword or two while watching it, and it is over three hours long. But this boredom never came. Instead of stopping halfway through the movie so I could watch the rest later, as often happens with films of this length, I just kept on going. Sergio Leone, renowned spaghetti western director, truly crafted a masterpiece of the genre. 

    I'm not going to say anything new with this mini review. Much better writers than me have gone to much greater lengths to describe the sweeping scope of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly's cinematography, surprisingly deep themes, and fantastic soundtrack that everyone everywhere has heard regardless of whether or not they have seen the film. It's not exactly a revelation when I say that Clint Eastwood, Eli Wallach, and Lee Van Cleef are slicker and cooler than a greasy penguin with sunglasses. 

    The only real complaint I have is something that was inherent to the spaghetti western filming process in general, according to a cursory Google search. Many of the actors in The Good, The Bad and the Ugly spoke their lines in their native languages only to be dubbed in English later, making for some really awkward moments where the words don't even remotely match the lip movements. It can be super goofy looking, although I can't really dock the film for it because it was unavoidable when filming a movie about America in Spain with an Italian director. 

    It also drives me insane that the title does not have an Oxford comma. For this it only gets a 9/10. 

Predator: Killer of Killers

 

The titular predators of the Predator franchise are pretty tough cookies. They’ve taken on some of the best warriors the galaxy has to offer-- Comanche hunters, Schwarzeneggers, and even the xenomorphs from the Alien franchise once or twice. But could they totally beat up a Viking or a samurai or an Ace pilot from WWII? The answer is yes, yes they can, and this glorious action figure mashing happens in Predator: Killer of Killers, much to the delight of my inner twelve-year-old.  

Killer of Killers is animated much like the Spider-Verse films, as it has a purposefully low frame-rate that takes some getting used to at first. This sometimes makes the action look a little choppy and hard to follow, but it also gives the film a unique personality that is hard to deny. And if one of the action sequences is a bit indecipherable, don’t you worry... Killer of Killers has a whooooooooooooole lot of them that work amazingly. You could say, in fact, that it doesn’t offer much more besides these extended scenes of grizzly carnage. But what carnage it is! 

An anthology film of sorts, Predator: Killer of Killers visits three distinct vignettes based on three different earthly warriors from three different time periods. There is the revenge-obsessed Viking warrior, the samurai-turned-ninja outcast (this one was my favorite), and the plucky Floridian soldier who takes on one of the predators in the skies of World War II. These stories all get woven together in the final act, and the brutal action rarely pauses for any of it, despite a token attempt at character development or two.  

So did I like Killer of Killers despite the fact that it’s not exactly a cerebral work of art? Heck yes, I did. The action is what I came for and, my occasional gripes with the animation style aside, it did not disappoint. There’s stuff in Killers of Killers that you just couldn’t do in a live-action film, at least not without a budget that would rival the GDP of a small nation. Despite the low frames, the action is fluid and well-choreographed, and the predator species sure brought their a-game when it comes to fun new murder toys. It’s a shame that some people will undoubtedly sleep on this latest Predator film simply because it is animation, but it’s their loss. Because let me reiterate: In Predator: Killer of Killers some alien warriors fight a Viking, a ninja, and get into a dogfight with a WWII airplane. That’s cinema, baby!  

Predator: Killer of Killers is now available on Hulu.  

 

Dr. No (1962) Mini Review

There's no way this was only an hour and fifty minutes. By the time he got to Bad Guy Island I thought surely the movie must be close to over by now. Nope, he still needed to meet this movie's Bond girl as well as the villain. He still needed to do all the stuff to get to the base. He still needed to have his nice little dinner with the bad guy as he got the plan explained to him. This movie, despite having a good deal of the Bond tropes established right from the very beginning, was boooooring for long stretches. I didn't even get to appreciate the silly secret base and the Doctor's even sillier robot hand because by that time I was pretty checked out.

As you can imagine, some things aged pretty poorly (including Sean Connery, who was somehow a year younger than me when the movie released despite looking like he was in his early fifties already) but even the tropes that would prove to be more fun and exciting in later entries proved to be dull in this, all thanks to that lethargic sixties pacing. Maybe I'm spoiled by the faster pacing in modern movies or maybe a Bond movie where the most intense moment is the squishing of a spider just ain't it.

 

Thunderbolts*

 

“Everyone deserves a second shot” was one of the official taglines I saw floating around for Thunderbolts*, and although this is ostensibly in reference to the scrappy characters that populate the film it could also just as easily apply to Marvel Studios and the long-running cinematic universe it birthed back in 2008 with Iron Man. Ever since the culmination of storytelling that was Avengers: Endgame in 2019 it seems like the MCU has had more misses than hits, with existing fans shrugging their shoulders and longing for the glory days with almost every new release and potential new audiences being completely locked out thanks to the sheer weight of each movie’s legacy. Thunderbolts* (yes, the asterisk is an actual part of the title) is a return to form of sorts that injects some much-needed energy into the nearly twenty-year-old franchise, and its themes of depression and mental health also make it one of the more meaningful superhero films in a while.

The cast of Thunderbolts* is technically an ensemble one, but there is no doubt that the show really belongs to Florence Pugh’s Yelena and Lewis Pullman’s Bob, the former of whom was introduced in 2021’s Black Widow and the latter being a newcomer to the MCU. David Harbour’s Red Guardian is also there to steal a laugh or two, and the other team members are there more or less to take up space. But Pugh and Pullman carry the emotional weight well, bringing gravitas to a universe that sometimes offers nothing deeper than popcorn-munching fun.  

Up until the fairly cerebral and touching ending, Thunderbolts* does not deviate too much from the usual Marvel formula, however. There is still a lot of action to be had, even if it does seem a bit toned down from previous entries, and that action still very much feels like a child gleefully mashing action figures together.  There are plenty of snarky quips from sassy characters, and the end credit scenes dutifully tease what is to come next in a never-ending conga line of content. That being said, this tried-and-true formula works pretty well here—the metaphorical action figure child has a pretty good eye for fight choreography and the snarkiness is genuinely fun without being obnoxious.

Thunderbolts* doesn’t reinvent the wheel, in other words, but it does add some oil to the squeaky axles of the Marvel Cinematic Universe thanks to some solid performances and a focused theme of depression and loss. It offers some much needed energy to a franchise that desperately needed it, and as a fan I couldn’t be happier.

Thunderbolts* is now playing in theaters.