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Avengers: Age of Ultron

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Avengers: Age of Ultron
  • IMDb: link

Avengers: Age of Ultron

Despite the build-up to an Infinity War Avengers film, Marvel Studio threw everyone for a loop when they announced fascist robot Ultron (James Spader) would be the villain of The Avengers sequel. Unlike 2012’s The Avengers which was the culmination and payoff for the entirety of Marvel’s Phase One films (everything from Iron Man to Captain America: The First Avenger), Avengers: Age of Ultron suffers from some of the same problems that weighed down Iron Man 2.

Not only does the film have to introduce a brand-new villain (something The Avengers didn’t have to spend time on) and three new supporting characters (with vastly different origins than their comic counterparts), and weave in ongoing events from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. while providing separate in-depth character moments for every single Avenger, Age of Ultron also has to lay the groundwork for the next two Avengers films, Captain America: Civil War, and Thor: Ragnarok. While also throwing in supporting characters from pretty much every Marvel film so far it’s something of a marvel, if you’ll forgive the pun, that Avengers: Age of Ultron doesn’t buckle under its own considerable weight.

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Furious 7

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Furious 7
  • IMDb: link

“Cars don’t fly.”

Furious 7The latest entry is neither the best (Fast Five) nor the worst (2 Fast 2 Furious) of the franchise. Taking place after the events of Fast & Furious 6, Furious 7 introduces Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham) as the brother of Owen Shaw (Luke Evans), who the team took down in the last movie, and the man responsible for killing Han (Sung Kang) in The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift. Now Shaw is targeting Hobbs (Dwayne “It’s Okay to Call Me The Rock Again” Johnson) and every member of Dominic Toretto‘s (Vin Diesel) team.

Despite Paul Walker‘s death during filming, Brian O’Conner‘s role in the film isn’t truncated thanks to the use of CGI and a little trick photography involving his two brothers. The film ends with a nice farewell for its fallen star although, despite discussion of making more Fast & Furious films, the character isn’t killed off on-screen making you wonder what kind of role Brian could possibly play going forward.

As with all the previous movies, the strengths of the latest film are its stunts which get larger and more ridiculous. Like the last film, this one stretches all credibility during its climax.

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Samurai Jack #17

/ / Comics

Samurai Jack #17As I’m a fan of both Samurai Jack and countless heist films Samurai Jack #17 delivers its share of fun right in my wheelhouse. Teaming up with “the Thief” (we have still yet to learn his real name), Jack and his new partner spend most of the issue breaking into the Master of Time’s highly-guarded compound. This includes guards, alarms, death traps, laser grids, and the need for a good deal of stealth from both characters (and when that fails swift legs and forceful fisticuffs).

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Human Target – Rewind

/ / Television Reviews
  • Title: Human Target – Rewind
  • wiki: link

Human Target - Rewind

The show’s second episode sends Christopher Chance (Mark Valley) and Winston (Chi McBride) on-board a commercial flight to protect a hacker in possession of an Internet skeleton key which the wrong people will kill to get their hands on. Unsure as to what Casper (Ali Liebert) looks like or how the threat will unfold, Chance takes on the role of a passenger while Winston draws the short straw as one of flight attendants. Unfortunately for the good guys, the bad guys had the same idea putting members of their own team in the same locations. Chance is able to deal with the hitman among the passengers but Flight Attendant Laura (Courtney Ford) proves to be a bit trickier.

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Kingsman: The Secret Service

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Kingsman: The Secret Service
  • IMDb: link

Kingsman: The Secret ServiceKingsman: The Secret Service isn’t the first time director Matthew Vaughn has signed on to bring a Mark Millar comic to the big screen. Like Kick-Ass, Kingsman: The Secret Service centers on the life of a young punk who enters a world of violence, ridiculous adventures, and even more ridiculous villains. This time, however, the subject of spies rather than comic book heroes is both celebrated and lampooned.

Based on Millar’s comic The Secret Service, Taron Egerton stars as a working class kid from a bad neighborhood raised by a single mother after his father died in mysterious circumstances working for a secret organization of spies (and tailors?) known as Kingsman. Recruited by the same agent (Colin Firth) who recruited his father, Egsy spends most of the film proving himself against other candidates (Sophie Cookson, Edward Holcroft, Nicholas Banks, Tom Prior, Fiona Hampton) working to take the place of the latest Kingsman (Jack Davenport) who died investigating a link between a kidnapped professor (Mark Hamill) and an eccentric billionaire known as Valentine (Samuel L. Jackson) who has some extreme ideas about lowering the population of the Earth.

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