I think I'm still in kinda disbelief that that happened. Like, maybe don't take me too seriously, but the true sign that the world is going to shit was right there with The Force Awakens. When Star Wars devolved to a totally fluffed up cash grab that we all ate up, that was the sign that we'd lost the plot.
Thing is, they could have done it right, but they went straight to a hack who throws mystery boxes around, takes lazy shortcuts at every conceivable turn, and can be even mildly realistic with space, distances and their visuals, but refuses to be.
And they let him not only direct, but also write the framework and story.
I went in after not having watched any matrix movies in a very long time, and enjoyed it. I think people overprepared for the movie by watching all matrix movies back to back, and the movie ended up recapping the previous movies for 1/3rd of the runtime. It’s a true reboot for a new generation where you don’t need to have watched any of the previous movies. It’s enough if you just knew about them. That’s what I think.
I went in not expecting anything good of it (I think I had an intuitive hunch about exactly where it was going to come from) and ended up really enjoying it. I wouldn't really recommend it to anyone and don't think it's "good" ... but as a long time Matrix fan I feel like I could get where the film was coming from, and while watching it in the cinema, that was a unique experience.
Also, the idea of the new matrix being based not on consent to a fantasy but constantly unmet but tantalising satisfaction ... I felt that and it was a good extension to the trilogy IMO.
I know this is probably one of those 'fun facts' that everybody knows but learning that it wasn't written or made as a sequel and the studio shoehorning that in after the fact to market it makes it a lot less atrocious. It's still not a great movie but not as offensive as it would've been had it been made as a sequel from the beginning.
Fun to watch once, but definitely not a "rewatch every Christmas" kind of fun movie. So much bad crap just happens over and over again and it just doesn't feel like a happy story!
Anchorman 2. The first is such a great movie start to finish with so many legendary quotable lines. The second could never have compared to the original. Sticking with Will Ferrell, I really hope noone ever gets the idea to make a Step Brothers 2.
Hear me out.
I watched the first R.I.P.D. on a flight, expecting it to be enjoyably bad, but it wasn't. Instead, it was just enjoyable. The whimsical lore of combining ancient prophecy with modern people and boring bureaucracy was pretty funny. Was it an absolutely fantastic movie? No, but it was good.
The sequel, however, explored none of the above any further. Instead, it tried to replace all that with a much more dramatic tone. So when I watched this one on the flight back, it wasn't even enjoyably bad. It was just simple and dull.
Lost Boys 2 is pretty tragic. Dunno about worst ever.. but first thing that sprung to mind. Those sequels are rough and capture none of the magic of the original. They shouldn't have bothered.
The Sting is a near-perfect movie which wraps up an entire story, spawning an entire genre of copycat clever-twisting ensemble movies. It wasn't the first movie about the grift, but it was the best.
Wings of Desire is one of my all time top 10 movies, as tempting as it was to make a sequel, it never should have happened. It definitely should not have had a pie fight.
Conan the destroyer. The first movie (Conan the barbarian) was absolutely amazing, the second one was a cheap cash grab about some super team setting out to save a girl from an evil bad guy.
Terminator 3 was fun and I genuinely liked how it ended.
Salvation is ok for the most part, purely because I've always wanted to see more of the Future War.
Genisys was just terrible and the marketing ruined the big twist of the whole film. Plus Jai Courtney isn't the best actor and I can't believe I checked the time on my watch during a Terminator film.
Apart from the impressive opening sequence, Dark Fate wasn't that good either.