Originally published on 16 April 2022.
Last updated on 8 January 2023.
After I stopped writing my yearly “Best Of” articles in 2014, I still wanted to update my friends on what I watched and give some comments and recommendations. Since 2017 I’ve been sharing my thoughts on the movies and TV series I’ve watched in quarterly updates. Below are the posts covering 2022.
As always, you can find the entire list of all the movies, series and documentaries I’ve seen here.
2022 Q1
Eternals (2021)
Hawkeye (2021)
Loki (2021)
Marvel Studios: Assembling a Universe (2014)
Metal Evolution (2011)
Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey (2005)
Soul (2020)
Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (2021)
The Wheel of Time (2021, Season 1)
WandaVision (2021)
What If...? (2021, Season 1)
Y: The Last Man (2021, Season 1)
This quarter’s haul: all the remaining Marvel Cinematic Universe stuff (including all the MCU series on Disney+), some music, and two TV series — both, in a way, post-apocalyptic.
Eternals (2021) on Eternals: the art house movie of the MCU, it introduces the bizarro cosmic, out-there concepts of the late Jack Kirby. Apparently there are no less than 10 Eternals, so that means a massive cast, among them Angelina Jolie, Kit “Jon Snow” Harington and Richard “Robb Stark” Madden. (I’m half convinced they cast these two in a movie with a character called Sersi for the lulz of it.) Apparently a lot of people thought it was boring or meandering, but I thoroughly enjoyed the character-driven story of it. More of these wild swings, please.
Spider-Man: No Way Home: Upon re-watching the first two Tom Holland Spider-Man movies, they appealed a lot less than when I first watched them, so I’m not sure how well this entry will age. With that disclaimer out of the way, I really liked No Way Home.
As the trailer already showed us, Cumberbatch does some Dr. Strange stuff and there are multiverse shenanigans. I thought that the trailer showed maybe too much, and was kind of afraid that there were no surprises left. Turns out, there are quite some surprises remaining. And it’s actually not about the twists, it’s once again about the characters and their emotional journey. I can’t tell much more because that would spoil the movie, but let me tell you that multiple times I thought “there’s no way this should work as well as it does”. There are throwbacks to multiple movies, returning characters, setups, and resets. If Eternals was the art house movie, then No Way Home is a nostalgia-driven victory lap.
Regarding the MCU series on Disney+, I’ll just start off by saying that they’re all worth your time, except What If…? Not that What If is necessarily bad, it’s just that even its highpoints are rather low compared to other Marvel fare. It’s also very uneven, and that’s saying something as all five series are all over the place. The pandemic clearly affected the production of all of these, as pacing and production values are inconsistent and sometimes below par. Each one has at least one episode that’s just spinning wheels, or setting up things that are never paid off.
On the other hand, Marvel obviously knows how to make interesting stories, helped by its impossibly large vault of characters and plotlines that were test-run in the comics for decades. Just like the movies, each TV series has its own genre. For example, WandaVision plays with the unheimlich atmosphere of seemingly benevolent small American towns a la David Lynch, while The Falcon and The Winter Soldier is basically a spy thriller like Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Each series has its own themes, which are sometimes brought to bear rather unsubtly. And then there are the actors, most of which are good to great. Surely helped by its treasure vault, Disney can pay to have people like Owen Wilson play secondary characters.
The rest of the world thought WandaVision was game-changing, and while the premise (“Wanda is in a ’50s sitcom”) is intriguing and well-executed, it tested my patience with its gimmick-y setup. Of course, Elizabeth Olsen and Paul Bettany are great leads, but the scene is stolen (and then some) by Debra Jo Rupp. And then there is the line, delivered impeccably by Bettany, that floored me: “But what is grief, if not love persevering?”
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier: for me the unexpected best of the Disney+ Marvel series so far. The production quality is steller, with certain set pieces feeling like they’re made for the big screen. Great chemistry between the leads Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan, with the former especially delivering gravitas. Topical themes, like “what does it mean for a Black man to fight for the USA”, and the return of one of the greatest MCU villains (Daniel Brühl as Helmut Zemo). The pacing is a bit wonky at places, and there are the plotholes and weird characterisation. Sharon Carter’s radicalisation seems especially off. (Also, is it just me or does Emily VanCamp look a lot like Jennifer Lawrence?) But then there’s this:
Loki: so I really dug The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and adore Tom Hiddleston as Loki, but the series Loki didn’t do it for me. Again, there are great leads (the aforementioned Owen Wilson as Mobius is great in his laid-back intensity) with chemistry between them, and an interesting theme: self-acceptance and self-love. The pacing feels really off, the pairing of Wilson and Hiddleston is abruptly shoved off halfway through the series in favour of a romantic pairing between Loki and an alternate Loki (Sophia Di Martino tries hard as Silvie but her character is just less appealing). It’s by no means bad, and apparently I’m in a minority with my opinion on the series: it’s the highest-rated Marvel series so far. That’s good, because it’s pretty much required viewing for Phase 4 of the MCU in how it sets up so much.
What If…?: borrowing a page from the comic books (hah), this animated series looks at alternate histories: what would happen if something was slightly different in a past MCU story? For example, “what if Peggy Carter would take the super soldier serum instead of Steve Rogers?”, which is the premise of the first episode. Hijinks ensue, and they can be interesting or funny, but rarely touching. Especially if you’re a big Marvel geek who invested a lot in this Cinematic Universe, you’ll get a kick out of all the smaller and bigger differences, the references and the in-jokes. A lot of the original actors provided voice acting, and that certainly helps, but not all of the jumping-off points are interesting and not all of the “what happens next” stories are compelling in their own right. The animation ranges the gamut from beautiful to rough to silly. Each episode looks at one hypothetical, so it can’t help but feel like an anthology — until it actually ties things together in the last two episodes. All the while I couldn’t help but think that I was watching a season’s worth of market research being conducted on me. So it feels redundant, but some of the experiments will probably be followed up on, for better or worse.
Hawkeye (2021) on Hawkeye: this is the Christmas-themed superhero show you didn’t know you needed. Pairing Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye, easily the gruffest and most grounded character in the MCU, with the eager adorable eager-puppy-energy of Hailee Steinfeld is endlessly entertaining in itself. Fortunately, there’s more, with a slightly wonky plot, great supporting cast (Florence Pugh steals every scene she’s in) and a return to the “low-level” crime of the Netflix Marvel series like Daredevil and Jessica Jones. It made me realise that I really missed that, and that my two favourites so far (Falcon and Hawkeye) are about lower stakes and more “realistic” stuff, especially compared to the high-concept WandaVision and the cosmic time-travel shenanigans of Loki.
With that, I’m fully up to date with the MCU. On, then, to the remaining titles:
There’s little I can tell you about Soul: it’s a rock-solid Pixar entry, with a great message to adults. I loved the character design and the energy. If you like Pixar movies and/or jazz, you’ll probably like this one.
Metal Evolution (2011) on
I don’t know when I first watched Metal: A Headbanger’s Journey but I liked it. Sam Dunn, the co-writer, co-producer and presenter is an anthropologist with a love for heavy metal music that permeates the documentary. In a little more than 90 minutes he goes on a whirlwind tour of hard rock and heavy metal’s history and touches upon some of the various subgenres, interviewing some of the legends (like Ronnie James Dio) and journalists. Then, in 2010, I watched the “sequel” Global Metal, where Dunn and his collaborators expand their view towards the entire world and how different communities are inspired by the music.
This quarter I rewatched the Headbanger’s Journey when I found out that they made Metal Evolution, where the crew have a bigger budget and a longer runtime, and basically make the Headbanger’s Journey (But Now With Actual Resources Available, and Years of Experience). The eleven episodes each cover a subgenre of metal and nicely draw connections of influence between them, while keeping to the basic format of interviewing bands, journalists and other notable characters, intercut with performances and Sam travelling across the world. Dunn is very much a fan of the genre, and while he raises some of its more controversial topics (like the violence at Woodstock ’99 and Limp Bizkit’s place in it), he doesn’t really dig into them.
The Wheel of Time: the 14-novel series (begun by Robert Jordan, ably wrapped up by Brandon Sanderson after Jordan’s death) is a huge, sprawling, messy thing. It begins with an almost beat-for-beat recreation of The Lord of the Rings but then finds its feet with intricate worldbuilding and an enormous cast of characters, which are subsequently rather woodenly written in glacially paced plots that are somehow still engaging. I (re)read it about 5 years ago and really liked it, but to make a TV series out of this seemed a tall order. And it still does, even after the first season mostly delivered.
The casting is mostly on point and admirably diverse, with Rosamund Pike leading the way as the steely Moiraine. The production looks appropriately grand, the CGI holds up. There are diversions from the book, and that was unavoidable: there is no way you can bring the books to the screen without changing things. Most of the time these changes work, and some of them make me curious how they’ll resolve the changed or even omitted storylines in future seasons. This holds particularly for the (very unevenly paced) final episode, where the biggest departures from the book take place.
Y: The Last Man: according to my Best of 2012 article, that’s when I started reading the comic by Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra. The TV series spent years in development hell, but finally came out last year. The premise is simple: one day, all mammals with a Y-chromosome drop dead — except the protagonist Yorick (Ben Schnetzer) and his pet monkey Ampersand. Why did this happen? Why did slacker Yorick survive? Who is Agent 355 (Ashley Romans) and what’s her role in this? Can Yorick’s sister Hero (Olivia Thirlby) be any more annoying? Why are so many characters in the show so unsympathetic? These questions will haunt the viewer and they may never be answered, because after a 9-episode season the series was cancelled. 2021 was probably not a good moment to release your pandemic-based post-apocalyptic tale with problematic views on gender. (Although, to be honest, most were addressed and updated to modern standards.)
2022 Q2
Bad Times at the El Royale (2018)
Cheer (2020) (Season 2)
Death on the Nile (2022)
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
Dota: Dragon’s Blood (2021, Season 2)
F9: The Fast Saga (2021, Theatrical Cut & Director's Cut)
Metal Lords (2022)
Moon Knight (2022, Season 1)
Narcos: Mexico (2018, Season 3)
Peaky Blinders (2013, Season 6)
Red Notice (2021)
Sex Education (2019, Season 3)
Summer of Soul (...Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) (2021)
Taylor Tomlinson: Look at You (2022)
The Northman (2022)
Top Gun: Maverick (2022)
West Side Story (2021)
Bad Times at the El Royale (2018) on Bad Times at the El Royale: interesting noir thriller by director, writer and producer Drew Goddard (Buffy, The Cabin in the Woods). Jeff Bridges brings his earthy qualities to ground the proceedings, and Cynthia Erivo brings the heart in a stunning debut. If you like Tarantino’s movies, you’ll probably like Bad Times as it has some of the same qualities while (mostly) avoiding Tarantino’s excesses.
Cheer: the first season was an unexpected delight for me so one of the first things I watched when I restarted my Netflix subscription was its second season. After winning the 2019 championship and the release (and astounding success) of the first season, the Navarro College cheer team is distracted and going through rough times. Can their rivals from Trinity Valley Community College claim their throne? Oh and a corona-virus epidemic hits.
This second season tries to balance a multitude of storylines and mostly succeeds, but the lack of focus is felt, and there are less sympathetic “focus” characters this time around. Even with 9 instead of 6 episodes, or maybe because of it, there’s just too much stuff. Still well worth your time!
Death on the Nile: the sequel to 2017’s Murder on the Orient Express, Kenneth Branagh once again directs (and stars in) an Agatha Christie adaptation with a star-studded cast. Among them is Sex Education’s Emma Mackey who shines and shows she can easily make the step onto the silver screen.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness: set up by multiple Marvel/Disney+ series, this “Dr. Strange 2” dives into the whole multiverse thing with gusto. There’s a lot to do, like paying off those previous threads, introducing a new Young Avenger, showing off Strange and Wong’s bond, fast-forwarding through Wanda’s character arc in a way that sells her short… Sam Raimi mostly delivers on this, but the movie only really sings when he gets to flex his Evil Dead horror/comedy muscles. Please Marvel, hire auteurs and let them cut loose!
Dota: Dragon’s Blood: after the first season I hoped that the successor would explain things more, and it did in some ways. We get some much-wanted background to Mirana, but it’s still all rather confusing. The universe doesn’t seem to have any rules so you never know when something is impossible or just seems impossible, which makes it hard to invest emotion into the core characters.
F9: The Fast Saga: this is the instalment in the long-running Fast & Furious franchise where we finally go into space — which kind of says it all, I guess. We’ve not just jumped a shark here, it was a shark with friggin’ lasers on its head and a rocket-powered jetpack on its back. Or something. The series knows full well that it’s ridiculous and that helps, as do the amazing stunts, but more does not equal better and at this point I’m (mostly) tapping out.
Metal Lords: a surprisingly fun high-school coming-of-age comedy written by one of the Game of Throneswriters (D.B. Weiss). The main character is an awkward nerdy teen, who’s roped into playing the drums in a metal band by his self-righteous METAL friend. There’s a band competition, a rival band of “normies”, a training montage and a love interest — a lot of the tropes are checked off. But a lot of them are subverted or just side-stepped, and there’s a genuine affection for the main characters shining through. Executive music producer Tom Morello (a friend of Weiss) also shows up with some other metal legends in nice cameo sequence.
Moon Knight: at this point Marvel can do whatever they like and people will still gobble it up, as shown by this series, starring a largely unknown character. In a refreshing twist the series is (almost!) entirely disconnected from the rest of the MCU, giving us a self-contained story. Beautiful shots, a masterclass of acting by Oscar Isaacs, Egyptian gods and set design, it’s all good. The cliffhanger was played as a big reveal, but hints had been occurring throughout already, so that felt weird.
Narcos: Mexico: this third season ties a neat bow on the story of the previous seasons. It’s amazing how a TV show can make you root for despicable characters (like the largest drug trafficker in Mexico) but here it is. The good guys are broken inside, the bad guys don’t understand they’re not the heroes (or don’t want to be heroes if they could), and the innocents are caught in between. Recommended, but you won’t necessarily have fun.
Peaky Blinders: it can’t have been easy to shoot the final season of the slick British gangster drama. They had to deliver a worthy close to a hit show, Helen McCrory’s death left a gaping wound while having to film during Corona-times. Steven Knight and his crew pull the feat off, sometimes with flying colours and sometimes awkwardly. Cillian Murphy delivers even hampered with a script where’s his character is passive for the first three episodes. Some of the other regulars (like Paul Anderson and the now-famous Anya Taylor-Joy) get even less to work with, so they have to shine brightly with the meagre scenes they’re dealt. MVP for the season is Sophie Rundle’s Ada, who gives us all the Shelby sharpness that Murphy was allowed to deliver in previous seasons. Hopefully she can shine again in the upcoming movie.
Red Notice: a silly heist movie on Netflix starring Dwayne Johnson, Gal Gadot and Ryan Reynolds. Pretty much the definition of a popcorn flick that you forget in one hour after having seen it.
Sex Education: the stakes at school are raised with a very strict headteacher who’s actually capable, Jean is pregnant, but most importantly: the main character is more likeable than in Season 2. Still highly recommended even though it can’t quite reach the heights of the first season.
Summer of Soul (...Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) (2021) on Summer of Soul (...Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised): Later billed as “Black Woodstock”, the Harlem Cultural Festival took place in the summer of 1969, was recorded and then… largely forgotten. The tapes were rediscovered in 2004, and Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson whittled about 40 hours down to a neat 2. Mixed with contemporary shots, and after the fact interviews with attendees and performers, are beautiful recordings of super groovy performances by the likes of B.B. King Stevie Wonder, Sly and the Family Stone. I’m not the biggest fan of soul or R&B, but these are amazing jams. Questlove paints a picture of the time and place the festival occurred in, and the importance of it. Compare this neat, concise documentary about a musical festival with very American music, with the 12-hour long, indulgent and utterly British Get Back.
Taylor Tomlinson: Look at You: Tomlinson’s 2020 Quarter-Life Crisis was a rare, actually-funny gem in between Netflix’s American stand-up comedy offerings, which usually are not that funny, let alone deliver something like a message, and Look at You is again of excellent quality.
The Northman (2022) on The Northman: I heard a lot of good about this, and our RPG group is playing a semi-historical Viking campaign, so I decided to watch The Northman in the cinema. Based on the folk tale which is the origin of Hamlet, it brings Alexander Skarsgård as prince Amleth, who sees his father killed by his uncle Fjölnir. So his mantra becomes: “I will avenge you, father. I will save you, mother. I will kill you, Fjölnir.” Years later, his fate stirs and guides him to fulfil those vows. It’s a rather straight-forward story (except one swerve near the end), brought as a moody and intense epic, beautifully shot. The acting is great, led by Skarsgård, aided by Nicole Kidman, Anya Taylor-Joy, Ethan Hawke and Willem Dafoe.
Top Gun: Maverick: The original Top Gun (1986) surely is among those movies nobody needed a sequel to. It’s pure popcorn, a high-octane advertisement for the U.S. navy and its pilots, polished to a gleaming sheen by Tony Scott and powered by a blockbuster soundtrack. It’s also a relic of its time, is brimming with machismo, has barely any plot and certainly nobody thought “I’m super interested in the further adventures of Maverick!”. (Well, beyond “will he and Iceman kiss?”, if you’re into that.) Top Gun: Maverick (2022) on
But its star was Tom Cruise, and normal rules don’t constrain him. He can make this sequel, and update it to slightly more modern mores, but leave the basic ingredients and take the Cruise factor all the way up to 11. And somehow, he pulls it off. Much like last quarter’s Spider-Man: No Way Home, and allow me to quote myself, “multiple times I thought ‘there’s no way this should work as well as it does.’” Don’t ask me how he does it, but I was thoroughly entertained from start to finish.
West Side Story: talking about updating a movie to more modern sensibilities, here’s a 1961 movie remade sixty years later. I grew up with the original and love to bits, but in retrospect it has a lot of unfortunate elements, like a cast of white people and making them wear brownface to make them Puerto Ricans!
Director Steven Spielberg (you might have heard of him) removes these elements, for example having a Latinx cast for the Sharks. He also chose not to subtitle the Spanish spoken by the Puerto Ricans: “If I subtitled the Spanish I’d simply be doubling down on the English and giving English the power over the Spanish.” The story is still set in the ’50s and Spielberg’s version stays close to the original movie, while not being a slavish copy. The direction and cinematography are amazing.
2022 Q3
Cowboy Bebop (2021, Season 1)
Dota: Dragon's Blood (Season 3)
Event Horizon (1997)
Jupiter Ascending (2015)
Mo (2022, Season 1)
Small Axe (2020)
The Chef Show (2019, Season 1 Volume 1)
The Witcher (2019, Season 2)
Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
Who Killed the KLF? (2021)
Cowboy Bebop: Netflix delivers a live-action adaptation of the beloved anime. While it works in some places, it fails hard in others. What works: mostly stellar casting (especially of the three core crew members, played by John Cho, Mustafa Shakir and Danielle Pineda), great visuals (1950’s noir by way of 1990’s anime), music (by the original artist Yôko Kanno), and capturing most of the stylish stylishness that defines the anime. What doesn’t work: the casting of the love interest and the main antagonist, the out-of-nowhere twist in the last episode. What really doesn’t work: giving said main antagonist more background, which makes him less cool, less relatable and more of a windbag — which probably was exactly the opposite of what you aimed to achieve.
Dota: Dragon's Blood: The first two seasons were messy in that particular way anime can be messy. A lot of momentous stuff was hinted at, but since there was little in the way of explanation, it mostly didn’t work. What always worked were some of the characters, breathed to life by the excellent voice acting. The third season delivered a reset button, but one that somehow made the first two seasons more important. Add to that a bigger focus on Mirana, already easily the most rounded character, and I can say that this season absolutely delivers.
Event Horizon (1997) on Event Horizon: Science fiction in the vein of Alien, a Haunted House but In Space. During the ending the horror and gore escalates while there’s less and less sense to the proceedings. This is probably the result of rushed production schedules, including for shooting and editing. Still recommended, if only for the awesome set design. Good inspiration for our Coriolis RPG campaign. (I also like the fan theory that this movie takes place in the Warhammer 40,000 universe.)
Jupiter Ascending: I was on a bit of a sci-fi streak with the new RPG campaign and I read some Valerian comics. The internet told me that if I liked Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, I’d like Jupiter Ascending. The internet wasn’t exactly wrong, but I should’ve paid more attention to the ratings the movie received. Currently standing at a 5.3 at IMDb, the movie is a glorious mess of beautiful designs, cool visuals let down by a weak plot and non-existant characterisation.
Eddie Redmayne is trying to do something with the role he’s given but his weird whisper doesn’t do him any favours: his villain (much like the two others) is a spoiled brat, and there’s little to save that. I mean, he’s a perfect spoiled brat — just don’t expect me to find him interesting or threatening. The Wachowski’s recycle a key plot point from The Matrix and use it as a “big twist”, which therefore doesn’t work. Mila Kunis is a charismatic lead but even she can’t save it — mostly because her character (a literal princess) is given very little agency. The action sequences with Channing Tatum’s gravity boots are awesome though.
Mo: Interesting comedy / drama about a Palestinian man hustling through life in the USA, trying to provide for his family while dealing with pent-up trauma. There’s some dark stuff but the episodes are funny and have a positive vibe.
Small Axe (2020) on Small Axe: Steve McQueen delivers a TV-series where each episode is a high quality, feature-length movie. And although there’s no overarching plot, the episodes complement each other, sketching the trials and tribulations of the Caribbean community in London during the 1970’s. Especially watch the first episode “Mangrove”, a courtroom drama about racial injustice and police brutality.
The Chef Show: Jon Favreau once made Chef, a sympathetic movie in which a stressed-out top chef rediscovers his love for cooking, and his daughter, by becoming a food truck chef. Real-life chef Roy Choi consulted on the movie. Apparently they bonded and liked the experience, so now there are multiple seasons in which Jon and Roy visit other chefs (both in restaurants and food trucks) and exchange recipes. Along the way their friends join. The first two episodes are a must-see for Marvel fans as Gwyneth Paltrow, Robert Downey Jr., Tom Holland, Kevin Feige and the Russo brothers join.
I’m not a foodie, but Jon and Roy have an easy-going chemistry with each other and the guests.
The Witcher: The first season was scattered all over the place, just like the books it was based on. Apparently a lot of viewers were super confused with the different timelines. They’ll be happy to hear that (just like the later books) the second season streamlines the storylines a lot. The main characters are still scattered over the continent (of which we still don’t have any idea how it’s laid out), but the story arc is more focused and things are certainly heating up.
Thor: Love and Thunder: Taika Waititi once again delivers excellent comedy, mixed with affecting personal problems. Natalie Portman returns to the franchise and seems to have fun, as does everybody else in the cast. Russell Crowe eats scenery (much like Goldblum did in Thor: Ragnarok). However, the story meanders, with the bit in the “city of the gods” not delivering the gravitas it could. Actually, the movie feels rather indulgent with nobody reining in Waititi who subsequently trips over the fine line between honest, touching and funny over into cringey and embarrassing.
Christian Bale is top notch as the villain Gorr the Godbutcher, and wrings pathos out of a part that on paper seems like an excess of the emo ’90s.
Who Killed the KLF? (2021) on Who Killed the KLF?: Intriguing documentary about the iconoclastic pop/dance/rock duo that stormed the charts with bangers like “Last Train to Trancentral” and “3AM Eternal”, made loads of money, wrote a manual on how to write hits, burned one million pounds sterling of money and then vanished.
This is not a critical deepdive into the band or its members, but works as an after-the-fact history lesson of a fascinating topic, while still packing an effective insight into the minds of two driven creators.
2022 Q4
Addams Family Values (1993)
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022)
Is That Black Enough for You?!? (2022)
Mo Amer: The Vagabond (2018)
Plan A Plan B (2022)
See How They Run (2022)
Space Sweepers (2021)
The Crown (2016, Season 5)
The Gray Man (2022)
The Menu (2022)
The Sandman (2022, Season 1)
Tony Hawk: Until the Wheels Fall Off (2022)
Trainwreck: Woodstock ’99 (2022)
Addams Family Values: I never watched the 1991 Addams Family, but it’s not required to enjoy this instalment. The spooky comedy has an overarching story and theme (family is important!) but the separate scenes come so fast they can sometimes be overwhelmed a bit. The short scenes are the perfect vehicle for the many subtle and not-so-subtle jokes. Christina Ricci has a ball with Wednesday's straight delivery of the many puns. (After this, I started watching Wednesday on Netflix, but I haven’t finished it yet.)
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever: The loss of Chadwick Boseman permeates this Marvel superhero movie, with themes of grief and legacy. The villain Namor is an interesting figure, until he actually isn’t. Tenoch Huerta tries but is let down by the script.
The movie feels about half an hour too long, trying to add in a few too many secondary stories and lacking punch. Bonus points for unexpectedly granting me a “I’ve recently been there!” moment — turns out I visited Mexico just in time.
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery: Writer/director Rian Johnson was against the “A Knives Out Mystery” byline, but it’s not wrong, either. Yes, it’s a stand-alone movie, but it’s very much in the same vein. It’s an ensemble movie, at the same time paying homage and deconstructing whodunnits. (See also: See How They Run, below.) It has a sharp script, a murder and a secluded location. Daniel Craig is once again playing the shrewd Benoit Blanc. This time he’s joined by the likes of Edward Norton, Kate Hudson and Dave Bautista. Maybe it’s not as good as Knives Out, but it’s certainly fun!
Is That Black Enough for You?!?: Interesting documentary about Black cinema, in particular the rise of its popularity during the 1968-1978 decade with Blaxploitation, and its subsequent diminishment. Its 2+ hours are jam-packed with interesting examples and insights. So much so that it’s a bit overwhelming at times and makes me wonder if it wouldn’t have fit better in 3 1-hour episodes.
Elvis Mitchell does the great voice-over. Short clips of the discussed movies are alternated with contemporary clips of the main cast and crew, and clips of interviews with cinematic giants like Laurence Fishburne, Whoopi Goldberg and Samuel L. Jackson.
Mo Amer: The Vagabond: After watching the series Mo (see above), this hour of stand-up comedy by Mo Amer felt kind of repetitive. Not because it’s not good (it is, and makes many poignant points about the life of immigrants in America), but because a lot of the material pops up in the later Mo. Recommended!
Plan A Plan B: Agreeable, predictable Indian romcom. A free-spirited female matchmaker and a straight-laced male divorce attorney are our protagonists, and with that data point you can pretty much write down the story beats yourself. I can’t be sure which behaviour or situations are a result of the Indian movie culture, and which are from the heightened style that is part of the romcom setup.
See How They Run: A delightful whodunnit in the vein of Agatha Christie’s stories (currently being redone by Brannagh), a loving homage while gently poking fun at the source material. Saoirse Ronan, Sam Rockwell and Adrien Brody are a joy to behold as they mug their way through the proceedings. I could watch an entire series of Ronan and Rockwell playing off of eachother.
Space Sweepers (2021) on Space Sweepers: With a tiny budget this Korean science fiction movie has an ’80s sensibility with ’20s production values. Everything looks used in that good old Star Wars / Firefly sense, while an archetypical rag-tag group of lovable rogues (an RPG group if I ever saw one) navigates the plot.
Not sure if it’s a Korean thing, but the tonal shifts are something to behold: we go from heartfelt drama to silly slapstick in a blink of an eye. It’s also a nice touch that in this vision of the future, not everybody speaks English.
The Crown: If you’ve stuck to the series this far, you know what you’ll get. The third cast arrives and does an admirable job of inhabiting the royals we’ve come to know. (It doesn’t help that Queen Elizabeth is now played by Imelda Staunton, who I only associate with her role as Headmistress Umbridge in the Harry Potter franchise.) The marriage between Diana and Charles is now in shambles, they try to score points on the other, it’s an altogether very unpleasant affair. The script is surprisingly positive toward Charles as he’s not painted as the big bad meanie, which I honestly expected. Dodi Al-Fayed is introduced, but his father is actually getting more attention. In the meanwhile, the elder royals are hopelessly out of touch — a theme that is getting tiresome.
The Gray Man: Pretty much the definition of a “Netflix movie”. The Russo brothers (I know them from the last two Captain America and the last two Avenger movies) deliver an entertaining action movie. Captain America shows up (Chris Evans in the role of the villain), as do Ana de Armas and Ryan Gosling. Ms. De Armas answers the question whether her turn as action heroine in Spectre was a fluke with a firm “no!”. Hollywood, give this woman her own action movie, please. The globetrotting and awesome action scenes can’t quite hide the fact that the script can’t make me care about these characters.
The Menu (2022) on The Menu: Another satire, it must be something in the water! Anya Taylor-Joy plays the new plus-one for her foodie boyfriend (Nicholas Hoult) as they’re invited to a hyper-exclusive dinner prepared by master chef Ralph Fiennes on a secluded island. What could possibly go wrong?
I thought the finale kind of loses itself, but along the way the acting is great, as is the script and its biting humour. If that doesn’t do it for you, you can always drown in Taylor-Joy’s eyes or cut yourself on her cheekbones. And speaking of cheekbones...
The Sandman: I’m still slightly weirded out by the fact that we live in a time where there are lavish adaptations of niche comic book series (celebrated, but still niche) on a streaming service. Since The Sandman is one of my favourite series, it was with a bit of unease that I followed the announcements. Especially so since Gaiman’s previous adaptation American Gods started off so well but was ultimately a disappointment.
I’m happy to report that The Sandman is a big success! Just the ensemble cast will make you swoon: Tom Sturridge is the embodiment of Morpheus, King of Dreams; Boyd Holbrook, Patton Oswald, David Thewlis, Jenna Cole and Gwendoline Christie as Lucifer Morningstar. They even have Stephen Fry as Fiddler’s Green, as well he should be. The Sandman (2022) on
Not every episode quite hits its mark, but when it’s good, it’s amazing. “The Sound of her Wings”, one of my favourite issues in the comic, is somehow done justice, resulting in the best hour of television of the year. Before you get there, though, there’s quite a bit of heavy lifting of lore to be done. I’m not sure how well the series can be followed for the uninitiated, but it’s certainly worth your time. The original series had 75 instalments. If Netflix continues to support this, we’re in it for the long haul, maybe 5 or 6 seasons.
It’s probably also wise to mention that as in the comics, while Dream is the main character of the story, not every episode is focused on him.
P.S. Dear streaming services, The Chronicles of Amber, The Belgariad and Gentleman Bastard series have not been adapted yet. Just saying…
Tony Hawk: Until the Wheels Fall Off: Fascinating documentary about one of skateboarding’s greatest. Shows the path of his childhood till unexpected success, to superstardom. It also shows the obsessive perseverance that brought him there, the all-consuming drive to master the hardest tricks, and the costs those exact from his relationships. It doesn’t dwell on the latter, and it paints Hawk largely as the hero of his story. Enlivened by interviews with his peers, among them the inimitable Rodney Mullen.
As with any good sports documentary, knowledge of the sport is not a prerequisite.
Trainwreck: Woodstock ’99 (2021) on Trainwreck: Woodstock ’99: Fascinating documentary about the ill-begotten festival. It was supposed to be a celebration of the same values that reigned 30 years earlier during the mythical original festival. Fueled by greed and an absolutely stunning row of mismanagement and downright dumb decisions, it became something else entirely. More than 22 years later, the organisers still are not taking any responsibility.
It doesn’t even try to pretend to be impartial. This must’ve been a real ball for the editors: “I have this footage of the press conference where they’re saying it’s just a few bad apples spoiling the festival for everybody else.” “Sweet, I have this grainy footage of literal hordes of angry teenagers setting fire to the festival grounds and threatening the production crew’s lives!” “Let’s goooooo!” “Subtlety is for cowards!”
Rewatch-Watch
On the way back from Mexico I had plenty of time to enjoy these movies again:
Pitch Perfect: still my “guilty pleasure”, still fun with nice jokes, great songs and the great cathartic finale. And what do you know, this time I actually noticed some new things.
Blue Crush: Kate Bosworth and go-to “tough girl” Michelle Rodriguez shine in this surf movie, which has a very stereotypical structure but it works for me.
