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.

 

 

Sinners

 

Horror only ever seems to transcend forgettable fun when it is about something deeper than the surface-level scares it provides. Films like Midsommar and Pearl have a feminist bent, commenting on the stifling effects of the patriarchy even as they thrill audiences, while movies like The Babadook and Hereditary explore themes of loss and family to chilling effect. Vampires have always been prime canvases for metaphor, so it will come as no surprise that Ryan Coogler’s Sinners uses them to tell a story that is deeper than it appears to be on paper. Sure, blood is let, garlic is munched, and hearts are staked, but Sinners is really about the power of music, the fear of cultural assimilation, and much more; but let’s not forget the fact that it is also just very, very good, if not particularly scary.

As writer, producer, and director, Ryan Coogler’s fingerprints are all over Sinners, his first big-budget project that wasn’t based on an existing property, and they are fingerprints that I hope to see more often. The dialogue is authentic and believable, and Coogler once again proves that he has a knack not only for action scenes but also for the quieter, more dramatic ones. The more grounded first half of Sinners, which is set in Great Depression-era, heavily segregated Mississippi, is an extended set up for the vampire carnage that takes place later, but finding out who these characters are and what they’ve been through is actually more interesting than the supernatural second half, which is exciting but isn’t quite as engaging.

Much more interesting than the vampires themselves are what they represent, as well as the musical qualities and themes that Sinners fully leans into to beautiful effect. The soundtrack by Ludwig Goransson, as well as the performance of newcomer Miles Canton, who plays blues prodigy Sammie “Preacher Boy” Moore, give the film an infectious energy and will leave audiences tapping their toes even as they fear for the jugulars of the characters (Coogler’s muse, Michael B. Jordan, pulls double duty as two of the film’s other main characters, cousins Smoke and Stack, in disparate performances that showcase his fantastic range, and Hailee Steinfeld also wows as past flame Mary). I would have been perfectly happy watching a film simply about Preacher Boy’s journey to become a musician, vampires be damned, but then again if you cut them an important bit of symbolism would be lost. As I said earlier, here the blood suckers are stand-ins for cultural assimilation, a fear that joining a melting pot of people might erase one’s cultural identity, but they also represent Sammie’s struggle against his father’s wish for him to follow his footsteps as a preacher.

Sinners isn’t particularly scary and it isn’t without a corny moment or two, but overall it’s not just a great vampire film but a great film period.

Sinners is now playing in theaters.

 

Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022) Mini Review

 

As movie titles go, this was a pretty accurate one.

There is A LOT in Everything Everywhere All At Once (I would have loved to have reviewed this movie for the newspaper because repeating the title every now and then would have easily gotten me to the five hundred word minimum), and I’m not talking about all the multiverse shenanigans. This was a long one, with tons of emotional moments and themes, and I am certain that they did not need all of it. This could have been a perfect movie, but what it ended up being instead was a super good movie that left me feeling unnecessarily exhausted by the end.

What surprised me the most was how funny Everything Everywhere All At Once was. I knew going in that it was a universe-hopping adventure with lots of Kung Fu action, and that was about it. I was not ready for the surrealist brilliance of hot dog fingers or Racacoonie, and every time the mood went from serious to goofy and back again it was a delight. Michelle Yeoh proves for the billionth time that not only is she the world’s greatest action heroine but also an incredible comedic force, and equally as fun to watch was Ke Huy Quan as her eternally optimistic husband.

Superbly written and brilliantly directed, Everything was rightfully hyped up at the time of release as an award-winning tour de force, but I wish it was one that didn’t try to do, well, everything.

Fargo (1996) Mini Review

 

Great accents can take a production far. That was one of my biggest takeaways from Fargo, along with the gratitude that I don't live in a place where I have to worry too much about snow.  

Fargo would be much less than it is if not for its charm, whether it arises from Frances McDormand’s “oh jeez” Minnesotan innocence or the pure incompetence of William H. Macy's wannabe criminal mastermind character. Even the two kidnappers, played by Steve Buscemi and Peter Stormare, have a certain bumbling appeal to them, even when they commit extreme acts of violence and cruelty. You know who they reminded me of? The Wet Bandits, if the Home Alone criminals were a little toned down and a little more vicious and capable.  

Fargo was the recipient of two Oscar’s (Best Actor for McDormand and Best Screenplay for the Coen brothers) and was nominated for several more. I was therefore expecting something… bigger, in a way. But the smallness is what makes it a great movie. As the tagine says, it is a homespun murder mystery, and it’s one that feels real (the win for best screenplay is well deserved) and funny and charming all at the same time. Great movie.  

Eraserhead (1977) Mini Review

 

    I've been watching a lot of classic movies recently and figured that I might as well jot down some thoughts. Enjoy!

It was a mistake to watch this one right before my sister was scheduled to have her C-section.

Eraserhead is the very first full-length film by David Lynch, master of surrealist cinema. It was also the first I have seen of his, and I was not sufficiently prepared for how bizarre, disorienting, and most of all disturbing the 1977 film would be. In the most basic terms it is the story of a father's struggles with caring for his newborn child, but that child also happens to be the most horrifying creature I have ever seen come to life with practical effects. There is also a deformed lady who lives in the radiator, a diseased man who pulls levers inside of a meteor, and a decapitated head that is used to make pencil erasers.

The film is nonsensical when you try to treat it as a narrative that follows normal logic, but as a cinematic representation of a nightmare it is quite effective. I was unsure of whether or not I liked it when I was watching it—there is a certain film-school student level of pretentiousness to Eraserhead, as if Lynch is making things as obtuse as he can, pretending they mean something, and then laughing at us when we don’t understand his genius, or maybe I’m just dumb and this is all coming from my frustration with not understanding everything. There is also no doubting that Eraserhead is unpleasant to experience, which was, of course, intentional. The music, an omnipresent drone of discordant industrial noise, made sure I was never comfortable, even when the disturbing and disorienting visuals took a break from messing with my brain, and the acting work by Jack Nance and his supporting cast is so alien that it made me feel like I was watching… well, aliens. 

So did I like Eraserhead? The jury’s still out. There is no doubt that it is an effective film, and it is one that I have thought about a lot since I have watched it (compare that to Mufasa: The Lion King, which I watched a day after and couldn’t tell you anything about). The metaphors are strong, the visuals appropriately haunting, and the filmmaking unquestionably solid. But like any nightmare I sure never wish to experience it again.

Mickey 17

    

 

I watched Mickey 17 last week and don't feel like writing an entire essay-style review for it. Instead I thought I would just experiment with format a bit and jot down some thoughts. 

 

 Pros: 

-The acting. Robert Pattinson is incredible as the main characters (plural, as this is a movie about clones), his performance(s) endearingly quirky and goofy. Mark Ruffalo and Toni Collette give off an unsettlingly bizarre energy as the film’s villains. They keep things interesting even when things drag.

- The film looks good, from the CGI on the aliens to the directing.

Cons:

- The film tends to be a bit boring in spots and never fully explores the implications of its interesting premise.

-  It’s a film made of two separate stories—the story of the clone whoopsie and the first contact with new aliens deal. These two halves seem oddly distinct from each other, as if they initially existed in other films and were then mashed together. It would have been nice if they were a little more intertwined, thematically if nothing else.

- The satire isn't exactly subtle 

Misc. Observations:

- My expectations for Mickey 17 were pretty high. I still haven’t seen Bong Joon Ho’s Parasite, which won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 2019, but I did enjoy Snowpiercer and expected to love Mickey 17. I did not. It was fine. I might have enjoyed it more if I wasn’t expecting so much.

Mickey 17 is now playing in theaters. 

Captain America: Brave New World

I’ll let you in on a little secret: Unless the directing in a film is particularly bad or particularly exceptional, I will usually not notice its quality. This can be a bit of a blind spot for a reviewer, but I figure it’s fine; there are plenty of other things to pay attention to in a film, and there is a reason mediocrity is a synonym for unremarkable, right? So when I say that I was very aware of the directing in Captain America: Brave New World it is probably not a great sign.

The 35th film in the increasingly stale Marvel Cinematic Universe, the fourth in the Captain America sub-series, and the direct sequel to the wholly forgettable Disney+ series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Brave New World had a lot of baggage from the start, which is appropriate given the film’s focus on legacy. Despite this I found it decently entertaining, although that might just be the comic book fan in me, as it’s really not a good film from a technical standpoint.

The directing in Brave New World is shockingly amateurish, with many scenes coming across as poorly blocked and shot to the point of distraction. Equally as ugly is the CGI, which is overly clean and weightless looking (an issue that is not New to MCU films, unfortunately). I did enjoy some of the fight choreography, perhaps because it is often fast paced enough to hide any of these issues, but when things slow down the cracks in the foundation start showing.

Anthony Mackie does well in the spotlight, despite his character’s arc being less of an arc and more of a straight line, and Harrison Ford steps flawlessly into the long-running series as President Ross, an appropriately grumpy character that was previously played by the late William Hurt. The dialogue that they and their fellow actors have to chew through is sometimes ugly, and not even the joy of simply listening to Ford say silly comic book things while knowing that he secretly hates it can cover up for the fact that there simply isn’t any punch or edge to the script. Not every film needs to have some greater point to it, but when your Captain America film’s most politically charged and poignant moment involves a Hulk walloping the main character with the American flag (or more accurately, the pole that it is on) then you’ve clearly wasted an opportunity.

I can’t in good conscience recommend Captain America: Brave New World unless you’re already a big fan of the MCU. Even then your enjoyment might vary, as a lot of the movie hearkens back to 2008’s oft forgotten The Incredible Hulk, the black sheep of the MCU that many people skipped back in the day. But if you’ve got a pre-investment in the characters and world I’m sure you’ll find Brave New World perfectly serviceable if you’re willing to see past its flaws; just don’t expect that world to actually be anything new or brave.

Captain America: Brave New World is now playing in theaters.

Number 24 (01.17.25)

 

How far would you go to fight evil? How much of yourself do you give to the effort, and will there be anything left when the struggle is over? For Gunnar Sønsteby, Norwegian war hero, there was only the mission: Disrupt the German occupation of his homeland by any means necessary. This single-mindedness kept him alive and helped enormously in the war effort, but it is the brief moment where he finally lets life in that Number 24 is at its most satisfying.

Number 24 (also referred to as Nr. 24 in various places) is a story told in two eras. The primary focus for much of the film is on Sønsteby as a young man (played by Sjur Vatne Brean) as he sabotages the Nazi occupation of Oslo during World War II, while the elder version (Erik Hivju) narrates things in the 2000s (or possibly the ‘10s). At first I found this framing superfluous; indeed, it has the unfortunate side effect of robbing the WWII story of some of its suspense, as even those who aren’t familiar with the real-life Gunnar Sønsteby can pretty easily conclude that he survives. But by the last few minutes the latter-day story is the emotional driver of the movie as Sønsteby lets his guard down just the one time decades after the war has ended. The film never insinuates that Number 24 (his wartime codename) is anything other than heroic for his inflexible resolve, even when his duty forces him to make the hard choices, but reminds us that life must be lived even while it is being fought for. Number 24 could have done more to make these choices seem more difficult to Gunnar, if anything, but if the actual person didn’t have a hard time with some of his actions then I suppose it would be a disservice to make the fictional version doubt himself.

Number 24 manages to find tension and excitement even with the knowledge that our main character survives. Sjur Vatne Brean gives a strong performance as our main Sønsteby, which was not an easy thing to pull off when stoicism and professionalism are the character’s primary traits. He does not appear to ever open up to anyone, so he never opens up to the audience, but Brean manages to make Gunnar Sønsteby a compelling primary character nonetheless. 

The music choices are interesting if questionable—the use of Radiohead's Exit Music (For a Film) works well emotionally but feels out of place, and the song that plays during the final scene and first batch of credits (I couldn’t find a name) makes the pivotal scene of the elder Sønsteby laying down his war feel a bit corny and saccharine. But Number 24 is an impressive and effective film overall, managing to distill one man’s life (or at least a decent chunk of it) into a succinct and simple message of sacrificing all that one is for the greater purpose of freedom and peace.

Number 24 is now available on Netflix.

 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on January 17^th, 2025. Visit at www.keizertimes.com.