Fantasy

Aladdin

  • Title: Aladdin (1992)
  • IMDb: link

Released to critical and box office acclaim, although not without controversy for its depiction of Arab characters and culture, it’s easy to forget the success Disney’s Aladdin had given it would be soon eclipsed by The Lion King just two years later. While not the title character, it’s impossible not to begin with Robin Williams as the voice of the Genie. Despite the negative experience with working with Disney, Robin’s stream-of-consciousness comic style translated terrifically to an animated character (even if I could do without some of the more obvious Disney pop-culture references).

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A Big Bold Beautiful Journey

  • Title: A Big Bold Beautiful Journey
  • IMDb: link

Set in a world not unlike our own, albeit one with a bit more magic underneath, Colin Farrell and Margot Robbie star as two single New Yorkers who meet at a wedding of mutual friends. While that may sound like a pretty typical setup, the road to the wedding (and the road home) are anything but normal. David and Sarah each make use of an odd car rental agency using old cars and yet highly advanced GPS (voiced by Jodie Turner-Smith) which knows where each of them need to go. After both agree to go on a big bold beautiful journey, the pair are reunited and begin a series of adventures that will take them into each other’s pasts reliving key moments of their lives.

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The Sandman – The Song of Orpheus / Family Blood

  • Title: The Sandman – The Song of Orpheus / Family Blood
  • IMDb: link | link

Guilty over recent events, Morpheus (Tom Sturridge) makes up with his sister Delirium (Esmé Creed-Miles) and this time earnestly sets out to find their missing brother. While successful, leading to a meeting with Destruction (Barry Sloane), that’s not the family reunion that is the most memorable. For Dream, its the unexpected crossing of paths with his estranged son Orpheus (Ruairi O’Connor ) that allows for a look back at the dream lord’s past and the tragedy of his son. Orpheus’ backstory is most notable for his song to Hades (Garry Cooper) and Persephone (Antonia Desplat) and for the return of Jenna Coleman (albeit reprising the lesser interesting of the two Constantine women she’s played on the show – something which will be rectified in the next episode).

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The Sandman – Brief Lives

  • Title: The Sandman – Brief Lives
  • IMDb: link

With no real intention of success, Morpheus (Tom Sturridge) agrees to help his sister Delirium (Esmé Creed-Miles) in her search to find their missing brother believing there’s a chance he might run across Nada (Umulisa Gahiga) on their travels. However, all he does is further infuriate his siblings. The old friends of the missing Destruction (Barry Sloane) turn up dead, infuriating Desire (Mason Alexander Park), and Delirium learns the truth of Dream’s manipulation abandoning her siblings and locking herself up in her realm. While Creed-Miles’ Delirium is fun to behold, and there’s certainly more to Destruction that we’ve yet to see, Morpheus’ continued obsession with Nada isn’t what I was hoping for given the limited number of stories left to tell and how much more of his world there is yet to explore.

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Ne Zha 2

  • Title: Ne Zha 2
  • IMDb: link

The sequel to the Chinese animated film Ne Zha (which was based, partly on Chinese mythology), Ne Zha 2 continues the story of Ne Zha and Ao Bing who are forced to share Ne Zha’s body (leading to All of Me style comedic bits throughout the film). To help put things right, and to save Chentang Pass from invasion, Ne Zha agrees to undertake three quests to become an immortal which would allow him to restore the Sacred Lotus and create a new body for Ao Bing. However, as Ne Zha soon learns, being an immortal isn’t all its cracked up to be.

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