Blade Trinity

Well it wasn't that bad.

I expected a major drop in quality after reading about all the production issues and trouble with the star, but upon rewatching it well over a decade later I was happily proven wrong about the overall quality. The only thing I feel that isn't up to par is the stroy itself, with Blade finally coming face to face with the father of all vampires Drake, who I believe has some mthological history to it in exactly who the first vampire was, and fairly soon he teams up with Jessica Biel and Ryan Reynolds to end it all. I will say good things about it, I am very impressed and amazed how much practical effects were used in this movie, when they blow shit up they blow it up, when they trash a car they absolutely total it, they truly only use CG when absolutely necessary and for a film made in 2004 I just have to give props to that. Taking into account how much good grief Wesley Snipes gave on set he still does decent work, though my favorite was Jessica Biel. Like I buy she hunts vampires and kicks ass, her training in hand to hand combat and archery were on the level, and I feel she did very admirable work. Paul Levesque or better known to the world as Triple H while obviously a product of the time when Dwayne Johnson first tried to kick off his movie career so you started seeing wrestlers in films, he was great fun to see and apparently was such a stand up guy and worked super well with the crew they just kept giving him more dialogue and stuff to do. That's awesome. Though not anywhere close to the amount of action in the last movie, they did still put effort into it and while it looks a bit more fake than it actually is closer to the end I could still appreciate it. I think the worst part is, even though it is by absolutely no means an incompetently made movie it still doesn't do much for me and doesn't have a good story or strong direction. I know David S. Goyer had a hand in all 3 movies, and I don't even know what the consensus is on his works or if people just do not like the guy personally, I frankly have no idea so I'm just stating while the direction is okay it's nothing to write home about. This movie really fell dead square in the middle for me which if you've been here long enough you know I hate that more than a bad movie. Cause there is good stuff to be found here and there, but the stuff that just isn't good really cancels out the good things. You're probably saying, oh he just didn't like it cause it had Ryan Reynolds, and you are partly right because it's just the same old shit regardless of film, tone, or intention on behalf of his performance. He wasn't grating like a certain other Marvel movie, which we do not speak about here but the big problem I have with this is, I'm sorry he should have died. I'm not saying that to be an asshole, it just perfectly summarizes my problem with this script. Cause the secret hideout is found out, damn near everyone dies including Patton Oswalt who I just had a great time seeing him in a movie though very little screentime unfortunately, and yet! And yet, he's the one that makes it out, though he was targeted by Drake first before anybody else got bodied. What the f*** is that shit?? There's no true justice in the world if Patton Oswalt dies offscreen but chuckles over there is just used as a prisoner for precisely zero reason. I am a logical reasonable guy but I've just experienced some very unreasonable things. Bollocks! Do better! I'm bored of this, I'm going for a Twix. 2 stars, 5/10.

Blade II

Yep this is the best one, we're done here.

Story time! When I was a young bean a bit before my teen years I saw Blade 2 many times, and I never saw the first one so this was my introduction to the character and the world. My God, what a great entry to be introduced to. So big shock, we get nothing but improvements in the sequel being an unlikely but entirely superior sequel which is already a rare category, as we pick up awhiles after the first film with Blade in Russia working in tandem with the vampiric council (insert What We Do In The Shadows joke here) trying to stop a new vampiric strain that targets both humans and vampires. Great, taking a basic premise and expanding upon it with new ideas and better production, good times be here. You may be a bit surprised Guillermo del Toro directed this, before Hellboy and even Pan's Labyrinth, bringing his visual style of direction in full force, I mean it's almost night and day the style between the first and second film. With a lot more camera movement, lots of great wirework, super slick at times editing where even I had to rewind to fully appreciate it, and visual effects that you don't forget. I think they knew exactly what to give in this movie, they double down on the action cause that's what people want to see, they want to see vampires get dead and this movie by God delivers, while still keeping a good pace and letting the story have it's moments too. I think Wesley is on top form, greatly outdoing himself in the previous movie and being more badass than before. I must give hardcore props to Luke Goss who plays our main villain, I can't fully put my finger on it but I feel he's just a compelling and even slightly tragic villain with his own motives that don't revolve around Blade all the time, he knocks it out of the park for me. Leonor Varela on the other hand, I...can't tell if she just can't give a good line delivery or if her character is supposed to be more on the monotone side. You know we don't bad talk actors, I don't like doing it, but man did her performance fall so flat for me. Another extra special guest appearance we get Ron Perlman, and Norman Reedus which is wild to see him before he became a household name in recent years. Some people give good grief that Ron Perlman plays a complete f***face but I attribute it to his acting talent but I am firmly in the camp of seeing him as a goodie and not a baddie. So cast 9 times out of 10 is solid. The effects got a lot better, it does have moments where you're like, "Whew boy that looks like a PS2 game." and it is rough but that is a rare thing, most other times it is pretty dang good and holds up I think excellently. The soundtrack isn't as bumping though, but a few of the rap tracks got me so no foul there. Yeah, it's a very solid entertaining film and I don't think it's gonna be outdone, they play their cards as good as they can and I really don't got much to complain about. 4 stars, 7.5/10, this is the one to see for sure and God I was hoping I could avoid him. Alright Ryan, come on in you fffffff- friendly guy.

Blade

You could genuinely make the case that Blade started getting comic book movies back on track.

After the global panning of Batman & Robin in 1997 comic book movies were in a rough place and DC was out of the game for a good while. This led Marvel to make a firm advance with their characters, Blade in 1998, X-Men in 2000, and Spider-Man in 2002, and with Morbius coming up it was an appropriate time to discuss other Marvel vampire movies. I'm actually fairly impressed with the first Blade movie, pretty much building this character and the world from the ground up since they heavily departed from the comic book version, yet it still is entertaining and doesn't try to be the next mega blockbuster. It undeniably has influence from the decade it was made, so it has some cheesy tinge to it but I wouldn't have it any other way. So our story follows quite possibly the coolest vampire hunter in media cleaning house around New Orleans and more specifically targeting a rising vampire by the name of Deacon Frost who has his own big plans for the world. Very easy story to tell, but how they do it is what counts. I really have a bit to commend the production team on in this movie, casting Wesley Snipes was a no brainer and he handles it with an ultra cool and experienced demeanor with the actor himself championing putting a lot of martial arts in the film because he admired foreign action films so much. And it does show in the choreography and action, while still having some gunplay and gadgets. I like how the story progresses and how they build the world, with only a few slight clunky pieces of info delivered but overall is done seamlessly and has good pacing throughout. Our main viewpoint character played by N'Bushe Wright though honestly not having too much to do besides be our human window into this supernatural world does a decent job, Stephen Dorff though not the biggest comic fan nails that cocky asshole villain role and at times seems to enjoy himself, knowing what I know I thought Kris Kristofferson was excellently cast as a semi-mentor/quartermaster with so much grumpiness and wiseass remarks he fits perfectly in the movie. Out of curiosity I compared this movies staking effects to Buffy, cause the CG is not great but it works okay and I actually prefer the staking effect here more. I am however disappointed that they had a Stan Lee cameo filmed but it didn't make the cut and I even heard tale Dr. Michael Morbius was also gonna get some screentime here but it never came to pass. That's a bummer, but all in all it's a decent movie. I give it 3 stars, 7/10, and in the meantime before we review the second film tomorrow I'm gonna tear up the dance floor with that rave song.

Gamera Vs. Zigra

I may surprise some people with this.

I'm just gonna say it, this is my favorite Gamera movie. Now I wouldn't say it's the best Gamera movie, I hold that for Gamera Vs. Gyaos but there was something about this movie that got me in just the right spot. Full disclosure here, I was in a terrible mood, downright hostile angry this morning but I knew I had to get this review done and said it might just be the movie I need right now. We take a bit of a relapse into sci-fi territory as another alien race comes to colonize Earth specifically it's oceans as we are introduced to our human cast who also have affiliations with the sea and Gamera is called upon one more time to save the day. I don't know if I can properly pinpoint exactly why I loved this movie as much as I did cause it really doesn't stray from the Gamera formula all that much. You still have your child protagonists, both japanese this time, who are actually funny and cute and enjoyable. Kids in kaiju movies are almost a death sentence to the majority of fans but here I very much enjoyed their interactions and stance on the story. The production values though in my opinion not as high as Jiger still did pretty good work, and the fact the movie is shot around the Kamogawa Sea World makes for an interesting location. I also quite liked the relatively small fact that they shoot the monsters from far away on ground level, like seeing it from a human's perspective, I just noticed it and thought it was interesting. Despite our main alien antagonist having a fair bit of screentime, I was interested more in the space girl we meet and no it wasn't because she ran around in a bathing suit for awhile you dirty dirty scoundrels. I digged the green spacesuit, her Master like ability to hypnotize people, the fact she was hunting down two kids makes for a decent villain. And the movie had just little touches and moments that made me laugh considerably, with highlights being how one of the kids says spaceships he can pilot but a motorboat isn't his forte just cracked me up, and Gamera has a few "What the hell?" moments that I just couldn't stop myself laughing at. This movie easily takes the most innocent and childlike style and tone of the entire series but plays it off in a way where it's rather endearing and entertaining rather than just roll your eyes nonsensical. I'm beyond thrilled this series did not spiral into the depths of horribleness as I thought it would. It really only was Viras that did nothing much for me, and it was a fascinating experience going through all these movies and appreciating the more silly and fun style of it all. The director Noriaki Yuasa always said he wanted Gamera to be a figure children could trust and obviously he had a lot of passion to keep making these movies, despite the dwindling budgets to the point where this was the last Gamera movie to come out because the studio Daiei went bankrupt before the movie even hit theaters. It was a dark time for kaiju movie fans, first Gamera gets the ax in 1971 and then just three years later Godzilla ended in 1974 for a decade. That sucks, it seemed like I finally got it, I finally understood, appreciated, and enjoyed the kid friendly, sweetly naive, bonkers but fun kaiju series this was just at the very end of it all. That's a bummer man, and while I don't have plans to discuss Gamera Super Monster, I most definitely will dive into it and tell as much information as I can before we review the 90s Gamera movies one day. But I finally got Gamera off my list and overall enjoyed it. I give this movie a very partial and biased 4 stars, 7.5/10, but objectively it would be a 7/10. Take of that what you will and I'll see you next week for some horror inspired comic book movies.

Captain's Log: Year 7

Stardate 75696.3, we have reached our 7th year in the continuing encounter of countless types of cinema and visual media. Databanks show a current number of 920 reviews and still going. Yet I wonder if we'll reach #1000 before the end of the year or even next year's anniversary, I don't believe in the no win scenario. I don't like to lose. There are always possibilities Spock said, and come what may I am happy to still be doing this. I also have much to be thankful for, least of all my readers regardless of volume or nationality for their interest in my humble and unprofessional opinions and ramblings. I do not feel this endeavor to be a vain or empty one and of my friends who continue to read and explore with me I can only say this, of all the memories I have made in my life these are the most gratifying. I hope to continue for some years more, and still contribute good entertaining recommendations for all. By my calculations in the coming weeks we'll be visiting comic book movies, video game movies, magical movies and movies that defy genre, needless to mention another personal event that prompts one to somewhat feel old...worn out. But I'd rather be speaking my opinions, speaking them before I turn into a part of my collection, before I really do grow old. Cheers to the site and all those who attend, and tomorrow we'll knock out this kaiju series. Live long and rock on.

Gamera Vs. Jiger

May be speaking too soon, but this is the best one so far with the kids.

Again, pretty damn shocked how good this was. Thankfully it takes a departure from aliens and sci-fi and gets back down to Earth, as we meet another japanese-american double act of kids where they learn about the really real 1970 Expo where a relic is uncovered and in classic horror fashion a monster is awakened after the relic is taken, leading to destruction as Gamera gains another adversary. Quite a few good things to say again so let's talk production. Apparently each subsequent Gamera movie had less and less of a budget but this movie looks gooood, it actually seemed to have money behind it from the sets, monster effects, the film stock looks better, it looks like a true competitor to the Godzilla movies that were kind of winding down by this decade. But I was very impressed with the visuals and like we get a lot more focus on the monsters throughout. It's like if they took elements from Barugon and Gyaos and mixed it with the kid centric light entertainment of the past two movies, leading to a very entertaining and balanced story. I know not everyone is a fan of children being the main story aspect of the Gamera series, but even I must admit I have seen more competent and good child actors from Japan more than here in the States before the new millenium. Plus it was just interesting seeing this Expo showcased as this brand new event which was true at the time in 1970, and I'd honestly go to one today if I had the opportunity. Now for the kaiju, I feel as if the Gamera suit got updated and beautifully so, and also they got a new suit actor which might explain why it looks different. Jiger is more on the normal side, or as normal as Gamera villains get with a brown reptilian design complete with Spinosaurus fins on the back, and the abilities he has are both new and old. Able to fire needles from it's horns, it has Barugon's death beam sans the magnificent colors, I think it flat out has telekenisis and can fly, so it's a formidable opponent. Needless to say I appreciate going back to the kaiju having a strong stance throughout, even if they aren't on screen they still have bearing and weight on the plot just like in Gyaos. And just to throw it out there, outstanding work on the set design when we see Gamera's internal systems, just the fact we see the walls pulse and move in his lungs like he was breathing was proper good set design. Top notch work found here man. It breaks from the overly goofy and weird stuff for the most part and gets grounded again which helped my enjoyment a great deal, and I actually hold it high up on the ranks like Barugon and Gyaos. So I give it 3.5 stars, 7.5/10, could we end on a high note as we cap off the original series? I hope so at least.

Gamera Vs. Guiron

Okay, I was pleasantly surprised.

For the fifth movie in this series, I was kinda shocked how much I liked this more than Viras. Which is really bizzare to say cause the plot isn't terribly different, two young boys discover a spaceship and are stolen away to the alien's home planet where they try to survive and come face to face with their monster Guiron, a four legged reptile with a literal blade as part of his skull, while Gamera makes the trek to the planet to save them. And I actually have a fair bit to talk about than last time so I just hope I remember all my points. So let's talk about the fun random stuff first. I cannot believe even in this version they still retain the line "A world without wars and traffic accidents" which has become an in joke to the kaiju community at large which is repeated once, twice, three times a space girl so I got a good laugh out of that. We meet policeman Kon-chan, or as we effectionately call him Officer Corn-Job who I believe we will see again in the next movie. And we get my favorite version of the Gamera song, along with a true Olympic display of acrobatics and poise. I think I was just in a grumpy mood yesterday, because the child like mentality and absurd monster stuff actually worked for me quite a bit this time. I again give major credit to the designers of the aliens and their "star" (Yes they did it again.), with the world looking like something straight out of the original series of Star Trek mixed with some Lost In Space set design. The aliens are wild, helmets with antennae, super short capes, Kamen Rider style belts, it's a sight to behold. However, the actors playing the aliens are excellent being able to give more subtle moments of interaction and never go truly over the top while still having a tiny bit of threat. The monster fights I feel are the best yet, with exaggerated and humorous emotions, awkward but highly entertaining hits, and just a weird fun tone to it all. You know guys, it just dawned on me how kinda weird these films are, they're kinda goofy. It's rather interesting seeing this as a time capsule movie, they bring up the Apollo moon mission several times and it really puts it into perspective the time these movies were made. It took until movie number 5 for man to land on the moon, and space craze was in full swing. I don't mind our child actors this time around, and I'm not sure I brought this up last time but we have a japanese kid and a caucasian kid but what's fascinating about that is, both speak in japanese there's no dubbing or japanese subtitles filling in the english dialogue. That's...never happened much, even Nick Adams was dubbed in Astro-Monster, you really don't see white american actors speaking the native language. It's cool, I like that, but it's a rare anomaly for these types of pictures. All in all, it's silly but fun kid's entertainment and a nicely done entry in the Gamera series. 3 stars, 7/10, and we only got 2 more to go.