Kick Ass 2 (WARNING: Strong Language used)

In 2010, director Matthew Vaughn had brought the viewing audiences the comic book movie, "Kick-Ass." Based on the graphic novel by Mark Millar, the film told of a dorky high school geek, Dave Lizewski, who decides to become a superhero, Kick-Ass. He has no superpowers, but that doesn't stop him from getting into fights with crooks, who work under the kingpin of it all, Frank D'Amico. And he's not the only one, as a little girl and her father take on criminals as well, as Hit Girl and Big Daddy. Now the duo and Kick-Ass must join forces to take down the organization and bring peace to the city. For a film, based on a superhero parody, to be made in the middle of the superhero film craze, this film had so many things that made it stand out from the average superhero movie. It also made the careers of both Aaron Taylor Johnson and Chloe Grace Moretz into more of the public, allowing them to appear more frequently. That, and Nicholas Cage was straight up awesome in the movie.

Today, we'll be discussing it's sequel. How was it? Well, let's find out...

In "Kick-Ass 2," more people have been inspired to dawn their own superhero persona and fight crime. Mindy (Hit Girl), now living with her father's friend, helps Dave train to get back into the superhero business after a while, as she is now trying to live a normal high school life. It's then Dave joins a group of superheroes, under the name "Justice Forever," as they start to go up against Frank D'Amico's son, Chris (formally Red Mist in the first movie, now The Motherfucker), who wants revenge on Kick-Ass for killing his father, by forming an army of super villains, known as the Toxic Megacunts. Like most sequels, this film tries to make itself bigger and have more things that the first film had, but doesn't have the exact charm that was given. The film feels the need to give shock value, as opposed to polishing things out.

For starters, the new heroes introduced that form Justice Forever aren't really developed as much as they could have been. We hear some of the back stories that are told, but when we hear the best friend's backstory to be a lie, it leaves us to think if the others were lies too. Not only that, but the love story between Dave and his crush in the first film is completely thrown out the window because of a misunderstanding, that could have easily been fixed; and to add insult to injury, the girlfriend admits that she was cheating on Dave the whole time. Now, the misunderstanding cliche has been done to death in film, but here there's no point to even have it. The whole point of this being here was only so the other member of Justice Forever, Night-Bitch, could have a romantic interest with Kick-Ass, which begs the question, what the hell was the point of having the girlfriend in the film to begin with? If you had just cut her part out of the film, nothing would have been taken away from this film. Plus, Night-Bitch and Kick-Ass's relationship is really underdeveloped, and there's hardly any chemistry between the two. If they didn't spend so much time with gross-out humor and Mindy dealing with the skank squad, we could have had more development among the characters.

Oh, that's another thing; the scenes with Mindy trying to have a school life and dealing with those """"popular"""" girls, I hated. I can understand it would make it funnier if the girls got what they deserved, but just how it's built up and executed doesn't really make it work. They do the same cliched "oh we pranked you good, you're new which means you suck" crap, and it was REALLY dull to watch. I mean, the so called "prank" they pull is just drive her out into the woods to a party that isn't there, come out of hiding with beer, leave...and that's it. They don't have her in the dark kissing an animal or anything like that...that's not a prank, that's just lying. And that payoff of Mindy getting her revenge on them was simply underwhelming and disgusting (both bad and gross).

The action scenes, while not bad, had way too much shaky cam that half of the time I could see what was going on. When are filmmakers going to learn that shaky cam doesn't make the scene more effective, it only makes it aggravating? It's about as useful as jump-scares in horror movies.

Now what WAS good about his movie? Well, the ones returning from the first film still do great, and the new people in are fairly good too. John Leguizamo as Chris's caretaker, and he manages to get in some of the more funnier lines in the movie. The members of the Toxic Megacunts were also great villains, especially Mother Russia, who straight up goes Jason Vorehees on almost anyone she comes in contact with. Her fight scene with Hit-Girl was also a big highlight of the film, and really added much excitement to the climax. Not to mention, the members of Justice Forever were also enjoyable to watch, despite the lack of development. However, the biggest highlight was Jim Carrey as Colonel Stars and Stripes. He really pulled through with this performance, having a mix between his bat-shit insane attitude to his calm moral nature, which I can tell is an homage to his first comic-book performance, "The Mask." And it really bugs me that he didn't want to promote this film, because his argument makes no damn sense. For a guy going against a film with a lot of violence, let alone a sequel that was just as, you'd think he'd look over what the hell he was signing up for. And if his excuse is for the Sandy Hook shooting, then let me ask this Mr. Carrey: where were you when OTHER shootings have happened in the past? I'm not saying people don't have a right to view things, I just want some consistency here.

Overall, while "Kick-Ass 2" does have problems, it still manages to be an entertaining film. It's got good humor, the acting is still enjoyable, certain action scenes worked out decently (aside from the shaky cam), and I do hope they do a third film to end things out. However, I am hoping they try to make it less choppy.

Rating: 6/10

Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters

In the past decade, there have been many film studios trying to capitalize on the Harry Potter popularity, by adapting a book to a film series in the same vain. The end result, all have them have sucked or at best okay. One of those films happened to have the director of the first two Harry Potter films, Chris Columbus; and that film was "Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightening Theif."

The film told of a young boy named Percy Jackson, the demi-god son of Poseidon, who is accused of stealing Zeus's master lightning bolt. He then sets out to Camp Half-Blood, where he meets up with other demi-gods of the world he's entered, but now enters a fork in the road between putting balance back into the world and bringing back his mother who was killed. For a film that establishes Greek Mythology into its own way, which I think is an interesting idea, it really didn't strike that much to me. It wasn't the worst of this trend of Potter-clones, but it still wasn't a good movie. The best aspect that I got from this film were the actors, especially Logan Lerman who has really evolved more as the years have gone by.

It's then it got it's sequel, "Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters." How was it? Pretty boring actually.

This time around, the long dead half-blood-now-tree that keeps the strong barrier around Camp Half-Blood, Thalia, is starting to die and soon will leave everyone defenseless. It's then Percy learns of the Golden Fleece, which can heal anything it's put over and even more. Despite not being picked for the quest to find it, Percy and his friends, Grover and Annabeth, along with Percy's cyclops half-brother, Tyson, set out to find the Fleece. The troubles that lie ahead for them is that Luke, the demi-god son of Hermes, is still alive and is after the Fleece too, so he can bring back Kronos. While this idea does seem like it should be an easy hour and thirty minute film, the manage to stretch it out to almost two hours, and it really gets unpleasant.

The actors that do return, like Stanley Tucci, Jake Abel, Alexandra Daddario, Brandon T. Jackson, and Logan Lerman pretty much give the same performance from the first film, but then there are new characters who felt unneeded or just unlikable. Douglas Smith plays Percy's half-brother, Tyson, and while I do think he's trying his best here, he didn't feel all that needed, except for the encounter with Polyphemus. Aside from that, there really wasn't much needed from him, even after he saves Percy's life. Though the character that became hard to watch was Levin Rambin as Clarisse La Rue. The minute she was on screen and gave that snarky insult, I knew I was going to hate this character. If I went into more one why I didn't like her, we'd be here all day.

The action scenes, while not great were watchable. Though it does get annoying when characters with swords only use the hilt, up until they're fighting a big special effect. Which brings me to the special effects, which looked awful, especially when you see Kronos, who looks like that ghost rock monster from "Super Mario Galaxy." That, and for a film that was almost two hours long, that final battle felt rushed, which really pissed me off, since I wanted to see what they could have REALLY done with that.

Overall, "Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters" was just a waste of time. I haven't read the books, and after these films, I probably won't have much interest in them. While it has its moments, it doesn't save the film enough.

Rating: 4/10

Elysium

Ever since he gained the strongest point of recognition with "Good Will Hunting," Matt Damon has made it as one of Hollywood's top actors. Since then films like "Dogma," "Ocean's Eleven," "True Grit," "The Departed," and "The Bourne Trilogy" have all shown us how strong an actor he can be. And that leads us to his newest film, "Elysium."

In the year 2154, Max Da Costa is among many people that are stuck on Earth, while the richest people in the world live paradise on Elysium, a country sized space station that allows humans to live life in the strongest luxary. When Max is exposed to radiation, he is then equipped with an exoskeleton, and now it's up to him to override Elysium and save his friends and the many people of Earth. The film does have many interesting ideas going, and it also manages to keep that flow going fairly well with exciting things coming in certain directions.

Matt Damon as Max manages to do well in the role, and you can see the conflict really come into play after his accident. The only problem I had was his character wasn't quite developed enough for me to have that much sympathy for him, which does tend to bring the film down a bit. Jodie Foster plays the head of Elysium, and honestly...she felt pretty unnecessary. She wasn't bad, I'm just saying if you took her out of the film, it wouldn't have changed much at all. William Fichtner plays Da Costa's boss, John Carlyle, and he does fairly decent, but not much is done with this character as I was expecting. I would have loved to see more happen with him. Sharlto Copley plays the villain, Kruger, and he's very entertaining to watch in this movie. He's crooked, he's determined, and has great personality. He manages to come back from death after being hit by a grenade, showing how this character can be a force reckoned with. However, his character seems pretty one dimensional, as all his character's nothing more than a hitman.

The action scenes and special effects are pretty decent, but the shaky came does get annoying, AS ALWAYS. The film was directed by Neil Blomkamp, the man behind "District 9;" people actually thought that this movie was supposed to be a sequel to that, but there are so many heavy differences that I don't know why people would think that. That's like saying the "Hellboy" movies are a continuation to "Pan's Labyrinth," just because of the director and look of the film.

Overall, "Elysium" was...okay at best. If you thought that "D9" was overrated and you're curious about this film...I'd say skip it, it's pretty much the same level.

Rating: 6/10

Despicable Me 2

                In 2010, Universal’s newest animation studio, Illumination, had brought itself to the public with their first film, “Despicable Me.” The film tells of Gru, a villain who wants to be #1, but is always one step behind his rival, Vector. In an attempt to get Vector’s invention and succeed in stealing the moon, Gru adopts three little girls to assist him. And throughout the film, we see Gru start to become attached to them the more he spends time with them. While it wasn’t really anything ground-breaking, especially since it was a month after “Toy Story 3,” it was a good movie. For a first time with animation, Illumination did a fairly decent job and made something that’s fun for both kids and adults, with some likable characters and some very decent voice acting. And with a film like this, it was bound to have gotten a sequel.

                In the new film, Gru has given up the villain’s business and moved on to be a better father to his children: Margo, Edith, and Agnes. When a villain steals a formula to turn anyone into a berserk hairy beast, Gru is recruited by the Anti-Villain League to capture him and bring him to justice. During his mission, he starts to develop a relationship with his partner, Lucy, especially since his girls want him to find love and give them a new mommy. The film does an especially good job, adding new ideas and jokes, all while still being genuine. It continues the story, and doesn’t try to repeat the same story and keeps it going strong.

                Steve Carell reprises his role of Gru again, and he manages to keep the character fresh, making sure that the character is made his own. Miranda Cosgrove, Dana Gaier, and Elsie Fisher return as Margo, Edith, and Agnes, and they have a much bigger part relating to the movie this time around. Here, Margo is starting to show her interest in boys, which is something Gru is trying to cope with, especially when she’s falling for the villain’s son. And let me say, the pay off it leads to is hilarious. Agnes and Edith are also trying to find Gru a perfect match, so they can have the feeling of having a mother, especially when Agnes has to recite a performance for Mother’s Day. It really adds to the touching factor that was done well with the first film, which is made better here as well. Kristen Wiig also returns to the film, but this time she’s playing Gru’s partner and love-interest, Lucy Wilde. Surprisingly, she was actually my favorite character in the film, since I’m not too big a fan of her work, but here she managed to prove me wrong and be very likable. She’s energetic, crazy, and her personality was just all over the place that I could hardly keep myself from laughing every time she was on screen.

                One thing this film made work so much better were the minions. In the first film, the minions really didn’t do much aside from just being comic relief. Here, they actually serve more purpose to the plot, and are actually a key element involved with the villain’s plan. Speaking of which, the villain El Macho was just a joy to watch. Originally, he was played by Al Pacino, and was put all over the promotional ads for it, but for some reason he dropped out and was replaced by Benjamin Bratt. Bratt does a pretty good job you can’t tell that much difference.

                The one problem that I had has to do with the final act, but that dives right into spoilers. I’ll I can say is if you’re going to establish a character with certain traits, only for her to forget about them at the end, give a better reason for them to not work.  If you’ve seen the film, you know what I’m talking about. Also, I wish the final battle with Gru and El Macho had lasted a bit longer. Other than that, there isn’t that much I had a problem with it.

Overall, “Despicable Me 2” was an enjoyable film with a big audience, and there are plenty of jokes for both kids and adults to enjoy. If this does spawn another film, aside from the minions’ film, I’m open to see what comes next.

Rating: 8/10

The Wolverine

                The year 1998 started up the golden age of Marvel’s Comic book films, as the Wesley Snipes film, “Blade,” brought in much of the possibilities come to life. Since then, we’ve seen many studios make adaptations of famous Marvel comic book films. Following in “Blade’s” success was the 2000 flick, “X-Men,” the first superhero team-up film that instantly sparked into a franchise. And today, we’re given the newest to the franchise, “The Wolverine.”

                Years after the events of “X-Men 3: The Last Stand,” Logan has gone into hiding, trying to deal with the pain of killing Jean Grey. He is then taken to Japan to meet Ichiro Yashida, a man who Logan had saved during World War II, who wants to repay him for what he’s done for him and wants Logan to give him his powers so Logan can have a normal life and die like a normal person. After declining, Logan is soon found protecting Yashida’s granddaughter, who is next in line to take her place as head of the family, but also has the problem of not healing right after an encounter with the Viper. Out of all the “X-Men” films that have been released in the past, this one stands as not only the best, but the most enjoyable out of any of them. It really sets itself as more of an American Samurai flick, but also being true to heart on what it is. To a lot of people, this is the TRUE Wolverine movie we have all been waiting for.

                Hugh Jackman does it again, showing off his amazing portrayal of the character, but does it so much better this time around. He still stands high as my favorite actor, and this film doesn’t disappoint on that. Tao Okamato as Mariko, Yashida’s granddaughter, gave off a good performance as well, but her character did seem a bit off to me. She has some scenes where it looks like she can hold her own, but that’s often disregarded when she’s being taken hostage. Aside from that, she did exceptionally well in the film. Rika Fukushima as Yukio, the one who brings Logan to Japan, was all kinds of badass samurai. Her interactions with Logan really do stand out among the rest of the film, and her actions scenes really do make her look like she sprung out of an anime. Famke Jansen also appears in the film, and surprisingly more than I expected. I thought that her scene in the trailers would have been it, but they managed to use more of her and in an effective way, as she portrays Logan’s side of wanting to die, so he could be with her. Haruhiko Yamanouchi as Yashida proved to be a great character as well, but there are things about him that do lead into spoilers, but he really has such a deep presence to him that just feels so enhancing and connecting.

                The action scenes and effects are incredible to watch, and you can just feel the intensity of it in each heavy hit. If there is any action scene that really hits it strong, it’s the train scene. At first, it could have been cheesy, but this film (along with a good amount of other films) manages to make it a fantastic action scene, that you feel the speed and wind in your hair as you’re watching it. The only action scene that was my least favorite, which is my only problem with the movie, was the last one. Not that it was bad, but that it felt rushed and a little confusing. I don’t want to spoil it, but when you see it you’ll get what I mean.

                Overall, “The Wolverine” stands as my favorite X-Men movie, and I’m going to be looking forward to the upcoming “Days of Future Past” next year.

Rating: 8/10