Friday, August 11, 2023

Twisted Metal (Season One)

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In case you haven’t seen the intro from my entry dated 1/26/19 (it’s in my archives whenever you want to read it), I’m no longer going to review every single movie I see.  I’m going to review one, with the occasional bonus, and just give ratings for the rest from now on (unless I decide to pick it up again in the future).  You can always ask me why I gave the ratings for the films without reviews though (via comments or the e-mail addresses under the ‘About Me’ section).
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Twisted Metal (Season One)                                       OK/G
I don’t remember actually playing the videogame this Peacock series is based on, but I do remember when it came out.  All I knew about the game was that there were cars and an evil clown (the latter is sure to always pique my interest).  Now, I’ve never been the biggest fan of entertainment adapted from videogames; I’m not really a fan of any of the Resident Evil flicks (the ones I saw; I don’t even know which ones I didn’t see), the Silent Hill movies, the Mortal Kombats, and wasn’t a fan of the latest Super Mario Bros. Movie (and Mario Kart from Nintendo 64 is one of my all-time favorites).  Hell, I’ve never truly been what one might call a gamer (the aforementioned Mario Kart and this one bowling game from PSone are probably my favorites).  That doesn’t mean I won’t check out entertainment based on them though.  I was curious about this one solely because there was an evil clown involved.  Said evil clown (Sweet Tooth) is a bit whimsical, but is responsible for some bloody mayhem (so was Pennywise, for that matter).  Sweet Tooth is only one character amongst several though in a post-apocalyptic America wherein people try to survive while some get violent (you know the drill in these kinds of stories).  Anthony Mackie (8 Mile) plays a “milkman” tasked with traveling through this landscape from what used to be California to New Chicago to retrieve a package with promises of a reward once returned.  I will say that I actually enjoyed this series more than I thought I would and never felt like I was forcing myself to continue with the ten episodes (roughly 30-minutes each, give or take).  It’s fairly engaging with worthy characterizations.  And there is violence, as I’m sure there is in the videogame.  The story obviously isn’t over (no confirmation of a season two, as of this writing) and I’d be willing to give it at least one more visit (we all know how franchises can overstay their welcome).  8/10/2023

Bonus reviews:

River Wild                                                                   EH
They seriously remade the 1994 film of the same name (with The in front)?  I wasn’t even a fan of that film despite all the names involved (Kevin Bacon, Meryl Streep, David Strathairn, Joseph Mazzello, John C. Reilly).  I remember being disappointed when it came out because I felt it fell short (I was only in 6th grade too).  I read this is supposed to be a reimagining, but remake, reimagining, whatever!  The circumstances may be a bit different here, but there is still a villain, a river, a raft, and danger (both human and water).  Even as a standalone film, this is rather lame.  Don’t waste your time with this un-un-unnecessary remake/reimagining/whatever.  8/9/2023

Scare Package II:  Rad Chad’s Revenge                    EH
I didn’t review the predecessor (Scare Package) in this blog, but here’s what I said about it in an Instagram post---I love anthology films, if I never made that clear before. They're not always good though and this collection was just okay. There's gore, that's for sure, some of it gross, some of it impressive, obviously low-budget (maybe middle-budget), but the tone doesn't mesh well with the content. It's a bit too silly for my tastes and the whole self-referential thing for horror movies is old hat by now, thus ineffective. The wraparound segment seems to have three separate parts (they are actually separate in the credits) and there are 5 other tales, so I'm not sure if it's 8 segments or 6 (including the wraparound); the promo art says 7. Their hearts are in the right place and having a video store (something long gone that none of us truly appreciated until they became obsolete) in the wraparound segment (at least one of them) is awesome, but this anthology film was merely just okay, like I said, and it's never a good sign if you can't wait for a film to be over long before it actually is. I've seen worse though. Available on Shudder.  I gave it an OK rating in my ‘Ratings Only’ blog.  Like many sequels, as you can see from my rating, this was worse.  For those of you that actually saw the first one and thought it was meta (and it was), this ratchets up the meta-ness by like 500 (I know sequels try to outdo their predecessors, but this one really went for it in that department).  I thought I was watching another Scary Movie.  It is still an anthology film, like the first one, but the wraparound segment takes up about half the run-time (if not more).  Even though it is an anthology film (mostly), it’s still wise to watch Scare Package first (despite some flashbacks being provided here).  Rad Chad is a video store clerk returning from the first one and the wraparound segment here parodies the Saw films, in addition to others, but largely the Saw films.  Parodies are so overdone.  The first film was meta, yes (as mentioned), and was far from perfect, but it was okay (as mentioned).  I didn’t enjoy this sequel much at all (as hinted).  8/6/2023

The Slumber Party                                                      OK
(haiku review)
Disney+ movie.
The Hangover for young teens.
Harmless for that group.  8/8/2023

Other movies I've seen and their ratings (see above):

Brooklyn 45  >>>OK
       (Shudder)

Celia (1989)  >>>EH

Disquiet  >>>EH

Gator Bait  >>>EH

Huesera:  The Bone Woman  >>>EH/OK
            (In Spanish with subtitles)

Influencer  >>>EH/OK
            (Shudder)

Lyle  >>>EH

My Cherry Pie   >>>EH

Pizza (2005)  >>>OK

Sharksploitation  >>>G
            (Shudder)

Taurus   >>>VB

---Sean O.
8/11/2023

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