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thegoatandhammer
Reviews
Top Gear: Episode #24.1 (2017)
Better than the 23rd season... but that's all.
"It took the three of them (Clarkson, Hammond, May) years to find their feet as a trio. Another reason I think the show works, the BBC left us alone to let them find their own rhythm, their own groove, their own characters. They don't throw strangers together and go ' Right, you're funny friends now', they let that develop"
-Andy Wilman
This is an improvement on the 23rd season, getting rid of Evans was the right choice... But this is still not something I would watch.
Matt LeBlanc is a good presenter, so is Chris Harris, and so is Rory Reid... But they don't have the chemistry that the original trio, the holy trinity had.
We all know that it takes years for people to develop this kind of chemistry between them, so we can't blame the new hosts for that, but having them try to act like they do doesn't look good, in fact it's quite transparent that they treat this as just another job and nothing more, the jokes are undeserved, the humor falls flat and then the fact that they just go and use the challenge format that was invented by the original cast like it's their own with no original though put into it is sad.
It's not as bad as the last season, but watching pain dry is better than the last season, so the bar isn't really that high. Being better than one of the worst seasons of television ever, is not that hard.
Just watch the grand tour, even though heavily scripted, the chemistry is the same good old bunch of Brits doing stupid stuff in cars to make you laugh while teaching you some things about cars in motoring in the process.
Top Gear: Episode #23.1 (2016)
Dear god! WHY?!
I think we've really taken this show for granted all up to the moment they fired Clarkson, which made made Hammond, May, and Andy Wilman leave the show and basically kill it.
For years I avoided watching the show past the 22nd season, and a few days ago I decided to finally try and give it a go, telling myself "how bad could it be?", nothing could have prepared me for the atrocity I was about to watch.
Matt LeBlanc does his absolute best, but he has to play off of Chris Evans, who is one of the worst on screen personalities ever, running around and shouting like a child everywhere. This season was dead on arrival.
The best way to describe this failure is what Andy Wilman said about why the show worked in the first place: "It took the three of them (Clarkson, Hammond, May) years to find their feet as a trio. Another reason I think the show works, the BBC left us alone to let them find their own rhythm, their own groove, their own characters. They don't throw strangers together and go ' Right, you're funny friends now', they let that develop".
The BBC fired Clarkson, lost everyone else that made the show what it was, and just carried on like nothing happened, but top gear will never be what it was before season 23.
El Camino (2019)
Almost two hours for 20 minutes of plot
This movie is a big nothing burger.
After watching five seasons of Better Call Saul and then re watching Breaking Bad for the second time, I then watched this movie for the first time, and if you remove all the member berries, you might get maybe 20-25 minutes worth of story.
Most of the movie is flashbacks and flashback filler, things that don't add anything to the plot or to the Breaking Bad story.
The whole thing could have been a 20 minute post show episode and it would have been better.
Throughout the movie I found myself asking the question "why?!" pretty much every time there was a flashback, and very quickly it became apparent that it was all to pad out the running time, though I don't know what for. This movie was made by Netflix for Netflix, so it's not like they were trying to pad it out to feature length to get it into theaters, and yet somehow the whole thing is almost 2 hours.
If this was never made, no one would have ever asked for it.
Give this 5 for effort.
What We Do in the Shadows (2014)
Felt like it was 200 minutes
Okay, so there are funny moments.
This is a British style comedy shot in New Zealand, so the humor is very British.
But why did it feel like the 86 minutes of the run time were so damn long?
So the reason is that the whole thing seems so dumb, there weren't any kind of attempts of world building, nothing made too much sense, it's like part of the joke is the fact that it's all nonsense which works in something like The Office, but not here.
I was watching it with my wife and we both ended up asking each other "How much more is there left in the run time?"
So it's pretty dry, pretty on the nose, even if shot soft of well.
Top Gear (2002)
Skip everything after season 22
A show is only as good as the host, and Top Gear is a prime example a formula that works until what makes it work is fired, and then it just doesn't work anymore.
Richard Hammond, Jeremy Clarkson and James May are the secret sauce that made this show great.
How great? Did you know that there was a Top Gear USA? Or Top Gear Australia? Because there were. Now how many people actually watched them? How many cared? Not too many because the UK program was the best.
The chemistry between Clarkson, May and Hammond is the best on television, better than any other show in anything, they just work amazingly together.
Now I know that Clarkson is a bit of a primadonna and he is difficult too work with due to his ego, which ultimately led to the incident which led to him being fired (he punched a producer over catering in one of their specials).
After Clarkson was fired, his two colleagues inevitably left the show, leaving the BBC to look for other hosts, and they never found anyone even close to the original trio.
Top gear is a show that gets you into cars even if you aren't a car person, it is entertaining, exiting, emotional and hilarious. All these things left with the trio to The Grand Tour, leaving Top Gear as just another boring car show. They're still trying to make it interesting, but the hosts are just not right, the new seasons are not Top Gear, they are just a boring motoring show that no one asked for.
Fargo (2014)
Great start with a harsh fall
Fargo is a very interesting show, it plays with the themes that don't stray too far from the movie and though no made by the Cohen's, it does feel like something they might have made... at least season one.
The show starts out great, in the 10/10 territory with season one being one of the best watching experiences out there with great characters played by great actors. The story arch of the first season is very good and the main villain is written very well and remains enough of a mystery till the very end.
Season two serves as sort of a prequel to some of the characters in season one, and though it doesn't have as strong of a story and characters as in season one, it is still a great viewing experience, with a fantastic job from the cast.
Season three is a nose dive, taking everything right with the series, tossing it in the dumpster and setting it on fire.
The story starts well, but breaks apart quickly and eventually becomes full of itself to the point that you have to force yourself to keep watching.
The main villain is ridicules and so far removed from reality that it becomes funny and then just dull. The plot is pointless and riddled with ungodly amounts of plot holes and "twists" that make the story even more boring.
The ending of seasons three has the appearance of trying to be clever but actually being flat out stupid.
In conclusion, the first season is a masterpiece, the second is a neat story and the third is a televised abortion made by a creatively bankrupt mind that takes itself way too seriously.
In the Shadow of the Moon (2019)
Another garbage flick from netflix
This movie begins so well, it has a great start! And then it goes the way of 99% of all Netflix movie production.
They thought they could just take a political opinion and turn it into a movie.
This is one of those films that could have been made on Netflix and never on the big screen simply because of just how half baked and stupid it is.
Save yourself the 110 minutes (this joke is that long!).
Iron Fist (2017)
Season 1 was bad, season 2 was even worst
Watching this feels like a chore, where the whole show feel like filler, like they had enough story for about 2 hours and someone at netflix said "this has to be at least 10 episodes!" so there is a lot of nonsense, a lot of pointless dialog and just so much stalling!!! It's like the whole show is just one big stretched episode.
And they give you just enough interesting stuff here and there to keep you watching in hope of seeing something good.
Like accidentally watching a homosexual pornographic film all the way through, expecting the girls to show up... but the girls never come!
So here you are, watching a boring "superhero" show, waiting for the interesting part... and it never comes.
So season 2 is a lot like that, but much worst, with characters as deep as a pool of cat urine on the floor of your living room, with motivation as clear as toilet water after bad diarrhea.
Skip this one, it's so bad, it's embarrassing.
Still not worst than Luke Cage, but it's down there for sure.
Red Sparrow (2018)
There are bad movies, there is trash, there is pure trash, and then there is this "thing"
Where can I even begin? The fear of everything "Russia"? The "book" that this "movie" is based on that claims that it's all true? The fact that instead of feeding the homeless, someone dumped 70 million $$$ on this dumpster fire?
I'm used by now to Hollywood releasing fear fueled anti Soviet/Russian propaganda, but this one takes the cake.
First, where the hell is this taking place? Europe in this looks like it's 2018 while "Russia" looks like it's 1970 at best.
The acting is all over the place, especially all the fake Russian accents. I mean cool, you want to make a propaganda film about Russia and you can't actually use Russian speaking actors to do it because they would laugh themselves to death if they read the script, so why do the Russian thing at all?
The look of the film is trash as well, I know the filters are there to make the "movie" look dark and gloomy, but it just looks like someone got sick on the camera lens.
No one actually stopped to ask while filming if this is how real people act anywhere?
This "movie" pretends to tell a "true story" from a "book" written by an ex CIA agent, going with the "well, if he wrote it, then it must be true!" reason.
Honestly, this makes every fantasy movie into a documentary in comparison.
I won't say don't watch it, because it's up to you to decide, but I cannot with a clear conscience recommend this to anyone.
PURE GARBAGE!
Batman: Assault on Arkham (2014)
This is how Suicide Squad should have been
This is damn near perfect in every way, all the things that WB got wrong with Suicide Squad (and they have got everything wrong), DC animations got just right.
The villains! Oh my God! The villains! The Joker! All hail the voice acting of Troy Baker as the Joker, rivaling only the performance of Mark Hamill in other DC animations.
If you are a DC fan, you have to watch this movie, it's everything you wanted Suicide Squad to be, but came out of the theater saying "WTF was that?", this is everything that's right about the concept of Suicide Squad, and nothing of the cringe worthy stuff that we've gotten in the theatrical live action release.
This movie is dark, gritty, bloody and mature, a true animated masterpiece!
Batman: Gotham by Gaslight (2018)
Dark and gritty, just like a Batman comic
People seem to miss the point of this one, as they are expecting Batman to have superhuman powers, while forgetting that in the end, he's just a man.
Sure the caped crusader is a skilled fighter, but if he'd be all powerful, then it won't be any good to watch. What good is a hero if he can't be in danger? This picture delivers us just enough suspense to make it feel believable.
And let's not forget that this is 19th century Gotham, where Batman doesn't have all the usual gadgets that we are used to, and he's not an all skilled, jack of all trades warrior like in the modern setting, where you need superpowers or overwhelming numbers to stand up in a fight with him.
The atmosphere in this is great, the pacing is also spot on and the ending is just a little less predictable, where it has left me guessing till the very end toward the reveal of the killers identity.
This is a fresh take on Batman, and if you're a DC fan like myself, you should properly enjoy this one, and it's defiantly for a mature audience, so keep your kids away from this one.
It (2017)
Why was this made?!
This film had probably the best PR team in the last 20 year, because this movie is garbage.
I just finished watching this movie, and I can only remember two characters: Pennywise & Georgie! And that's because it was in the trailer and the name Pennywise I remember from the 90's adaptation.
This barely has plot, it's more funny than scary, the characters have no clear motivation, and for almost half the movie there is nothing connecting scenes! No plot points! There are more filler scenes than actual plot advancing scenes!
And the best part is: This is only chapter one!
This means that there is going to be more of this shIT!
It feels like Hollywood truly finally lost IT.
Just don't watch this. I gave it 2 starts for some of the effects, nothing more.
The Punisher (2017)
Right up there with Daredevil
Marvel's The Punisher is a brooding, greedy and brutal.
It's no secret to the fans of the character, that the image of Frank Castle has never gotten the proper treatment on the big screen. After seeing Jon Bernthal take on the role of Castle in the second season of Daredevil, I knew that I have finally witnessed the Punisher come to life in all of his glory. Jon Bernthal makes you forget the bad dream that was the 2004 movie with Thomas Jane, and even Ray Stevenson in the 2008 movie that had a good character, but was just a bad movie in general.
Jon Bernthal brings Frank Castle to life like we've never seen before; Brutal, focused, calculating, effective, but this human, still flesh and blood. He's broken, he's full of guilt, and you want him to win.
The show does a great job of making the character work, and the chemistry between Castle and Ebon Moss-Bachrach's David Lieberman really makes it stand out, and creates a source of comic relief in an otherwise very serious show. Just how dark and serious are we talking here? Well, the first laugh I had was around episode 4, and the show maintains a serious tone all the way through, reminding you that you're not watching the Disney version of Marvel, and not even the last Marvel shows on Netflix, this is Frank Castle, The Punisher, this is not for the faint of heart, this is not a kids show, this is not a family show. The Punisher was always the Marvel hero for young adults, never intended for children, it's bloody, brutal, and violent.
The show also talks about really heavy things that not a lot of shows dare to, like war veterans and how the system fails them, PTSD and how it's not treated properly, and stolen valor, something that people don't talk about enough, it's heavy, and hard to watch at times, but it's also incorporated very well into the script.
I'm glad this show didn't fall victim to the PC culture, this is currently one of the best shows on Netflix, and the best adaptation of The Punisher to date. If you're a fan of the Punisher, you must watch this show, but stay away if you didn't yet watch Daredevil, just to cover all the plot points.
My only problem with it, is that it gets a little predictable, not hiding the plot twists very well.
Alien: Covenant (2017)
2 hours of nonsense
This movie has nothing to do with the originals, it's connected loosely to Prometheus, and it is the weakest attempt for a sequel.
Ridley Scott shows us just how little he cares about the source material and the fans of the series, by creating 2 hours of nonsense, fueled by an overload of plot holes and some so the dumbest and most forgettable characters in cinema history, all the while full of shout outs to the Bible, like Stan Lee in a Marvel movie.
If you watched the interviews with Scott, you'll know that he has never watched Aliens, so he doesn't know about the continuity established by the work of James Cameron's excellent sequel to the original Alien movie that was directed by Scott, so naturally Scott acts like he's the creator of Aline and proceeds to do as he pleases with the Alien franchise, as he rapes the source material and shows us weak action, hollow characters, CG aliens (because who needs practical effects if you can just use CG for everything), and finally, a plot so idiotic and so predictable, that it leaves you puzzled as to what exactly did you just watch and why did anyone fund this turd in the first place.
The things that this movie does teach us, is just how good the first two films were, and that Ridley Scott has a very high opinion of himself.
Give this one a pass, and go watch Aliens again, it was the last good film for this franchise...
Oh yeah, one last thing: They say that they are going to make six more of these turds, so get ready for Scott to full scale Terminator this thing.
Luke Cage (2016)
How did this get any higher than 2?
Okay, so after watching Daredevil I was hyped for the next Marvell show on Netflix, and Jessica Jones was pretty good too and since it had Luke Cage in it, I thought that his series is going to be great! Oh boy, I couldn't have been any more wrong.
So let's just get to what kills the whole show: the pacing. This is the slowest show ever, even slower than the walking dead. They put in to much time into developing characters without making anyone care about them anyway, in fact, after watching all episodes, I couldn't remember most of them, they were just so boring.
The action: there is no action, just a tease of it from time to time, it's all boring dialogue that no one cares about, characters that act like idiots, and seemingly pointless plot points.
The acting is okay, it's like they were trying to write a story from the middle, without establishing the key plot points, and then just kind of drop them randomly everywhere. This feels like they had actual material for like 3 episodes at best, but they stretched it into 13! I know that Netflix need to fill up gaps and make the show longer to get more episodes out, but really, did they need to make this 13 episodes long? Why couldn't they go for 4 or 6? It would surly be enough to tell the story of the character, they could have put the origin story right at the beginning like it Daredevil, and then just like in Daredevil, they could stretch it through multiple episodes in different parts.
And finally, the logic, which puts the kill shot to the shows head just to make sure it stays down is the logic, there is no logic in what most of the characters do in the show, no deeper explanation into why they do what they do, there is no motive at all most of the time, and no explanation to some of the props used in the show, they are just there, and the bad guys just happen to have them, like there is no NSA, CIA, FBI, ATF, or any other government body around, it's like they are alone in the world, like the city is the only one on earth, where you can just have massive shootouts and no one will notice.
I hate myself after watching this boring show, maybe it's just me, but I just really want to get my wasted time back to do something a little more productive with it.
Jurassic World (2015)
How is this rated 7?!
So having grown up with the original, I was very low expectations from this, and well, they were met.
Where do we start? The predictable story line, the two dimensional characters, the idiotic sub plot just to have kids in there like in the original.
The only redeeming part of this shitty remake, is the effects, but guess what, if the movie sucks, then the effects are going to be overlooked.
If you're 12, you'll probably like it... but all the people that grew up with the original, are over 25 today, so how was the target audience for this?