Batman Forever

Batman for... a while at least.

"Courage now, truth always...."

I know, I've been working up to this for a while, and now here it is! A special Saturday Tagline for you all today, and I'll be talking about a very difficult topic that we all have to try and cope with. Sometimes it can be difficult to admit to yourself that an old, trusted friend has become somebody else, and it can be even more difficult to confront THEM about it. That's how I think we all felt when we saw Batman Forever. We were two good Batman movies in, maybe felt like we could rely on those good times, and then... this happened. Thank Warner Brothers for that. They decided after the release of the fantastic Batman Returns that it hadn't grossed enough money, and that if it were more "mainstream" it would do better. To this evil end, they gave Burton and his Gotham City the boot out of the director's chair (though Burton had been lukewarm about even doing a second Batman) and tapped Joel Schumacher to direct, with Burton restricted to producing. This film struck a completely different tone from the previous two, with villains so flamboyant that they make Jack Nicholson's turn as the Joker look positively subdued. This movie also introduces the character of Robin, portrayed here by Chris O'Donnell, although originally Marlon Wayans was cast. Presumably he was replaced because Hollywood is intensely racist. Anyway, the most important swap out here was Michael Keaton, who opted not to appear in another Batman because he didn't like the new direction (though apparently he still considers himself to be the ONLY Batman), was replaced by Val Kilmer. Now I enjoyed Top Gun at least as much as the next guy, but that is not an equation with equal values on both ends of it. That being said, Val Kilmer is still a much better Batman than George Clooney. Squaring off against the new caped crusader are Two-Face (portrayed in explosively red tiger-striped fashion by Tommy Lee Jones) and The Riddler/Edward Nigma (here played by Jim Carey). It seems like the common wisdom is that unless the primary villain is the Joker, there must be at least two villains on the stage at any given time (and in The Dark Knight even there was still Two Face) Okay, the stage is set, now let's talk about this FANTASTIC MOVIE

The Rocketeer

Come on look at how sweet this poster is.

"Three years before the United States declares war, Cliff Secord leads America's first battle against the Nazis."

Hello all and welcome back to a new week at the Tagline, with Thanksgiving right around the corner! Starting this week I am implementing the first wave of changes to the way I conduct this blog, though this part at least probably won't result in a noticeable front-end change. Just thought I would share! Anyway, let's start off the week right, with a story about Nazis and airships and rocket packs. Also as promised, this will be an excursion into another Disney movie! Today I will be talking about the 1991 movie The Rocketeer, This movie was based on the comic of the same name, featuring a airplane stunt pilot named Cliff Secord who after a series of chance occurrences comes into possession of a experimental rocket pack that was being developed by Howard Hughes. During the misadventure that led to him acquiring the rocket pack Cliff's airplane was shot to pieces and then blown up, leaving him with a sore need for a new source of income. This causes him and his partner Peevy to keep the thing, but this has consequences they maybe didn't anticipate, such as the rocket pack being missed by certain individuals. For starters a bunch of mob types with machine guns trying to get it back, and intending to give it to the guy who paid to have it stolen in the first place. Howard Hughes meanwhile believes the pack was destroyed, and is glad because the government wanted to use it as a weapon. The movie is set in 1938, so we're talking about a country just coming out of the depression and nearing war against the Nazis. Don't worry though, just because the U.S. hadn't entered the war yet doesn't mean there won't be plenty of fascists.

Galaxy Quest

Never give up, never surrender.

"The show has been cancelled... But the adventure is just beginning."

Hello all, welcome to the encore edition of this week's Tagline, where I actually post a second time in the week and don't just disappear into the internet for five days like a deadbeat! It's more Netflix today as I wait for the weekend and the coming of Drakul to kick off this most spooky of months, before I go into full spook mode for the duration. We aren't quite there though, so here's another Netflix revelation, Galaxy Quest was put up with the last batch of new arrivals and I knew immediately that I had to review it. Really how could I NOT?! So today we venture into the world of parody, though in this case it is an exceptional parody that becomes so well regarded that it becomes a sort of weird meta-commentary on the original work. So, for the unfamiliar Galaxy Quest is a 1999 movie that parodies not just Star Trek, but also the fandom and professional lives of the TOS main cast, mainly that they became the prototype for the modern idea OF fandom, and conventions held by fans featuring them as guests. Galaxy Quest stars Tim Allen (yeah you heard me Tim the tool man Taylor so what) as Jason Nesmith, who portrayed Commander Peter Quincy Taggart who commanded the starship Protector in the Galaxy Quest television show (which is imaginary and like Star Trek more or less). Alongside him is Gwen DeMarco (played by Sigourney Weaver) who played Lt. Tawny Madison, a character whose principal responsibility on the show seemed to be to repeat the computer, Alexander Dane (played by Alan Rickman) who portrayed the alien Dr. Lazarus (the Spock stand-in) Fred Kwan (portrayed by Tony Shalhoub) who played Tech Sgt. Chen, and Tommy Webber, who played child prodigy pilot Lt. Laredo. Also their guest appearances seem to be facilitated by Sam Rockwell's character Guy, who was a crew extra that died in the first five minutes of one of the show's episodes (so the equivalent of a Star Trek "red shirt").

The Maze Runner

Run dat maze boyee.

"Based on the Best-Selling Novel"

Hello everyone! Welcome back to another thrilling, chilling edition of the Tagline! Today I am going to jump back to the present and review a movie that I don't recall fondly from 20 years ago (god it is so unreal to think that 1993 was over 20 years ago). So instead of that, today we're jumping back into the vibrant genre of "movies based on young adult novels featuring dystopic or post-apocalyptic settings" Because hell if one movie like that is good then surely eight or nine hundred will be GREAT RIGHT? I don't know. Anyway today I'm going to be talking about the Maze Runner and not the Giver, I know it was a real toss up but there it is. The Maze Runner is a thrilling film based on a novel of the same name, and starring that kid from Teen Wolf as Thomas, a boy who wakes up in a cage that has opened into a grove full of young dudes, and is understandably freaked out, because really who knows what they might do to him. Fortunately it's not that kind of movie, and Thomas discovers that he has been released into the center of a massive labyrinth where many other youths have been released before him. He learns that there is no known escape from the maze, and that at night the area outside of the grove (the maze proper) is prowled by things called grievers, which no one has encountered and survived. They sound like shrieking hell monsters, and for the curious out there, once they show us one we as the audience discover that they also LOOK like shrieking hell monsters, that are also have mechanical. They're basically like something out of doom, as I was watching I had to ask myself like... why did they build them like that? Any mechanical thing chasing you would be scary, but these guys really went the extra mile in the bowel-voiding terror department. Anyway, no one has any memories of how or why they ended up in the maze, but they all want to get out, because living in a grassy grove surrounded by monsters and with a bunch of other dirty dudes isn't the greatest way to spend the rest of your life... I mean unless that's your thing I guess. No judgement.

Van Helsing

Look at his awesome hat.

"Adventure lives forever."

Adventure DOES live forever, man that tagline has a really good point. Welcome back folks, as always I am your host on this breathtaking tour of the underworld of cinema, and today I'm going to be digging deep into the past to 2004, with the release of Van Helsing, a kind of Universal Studios monster orgy that happened somehow and was gifted with an absolutely insane 160 million dollar budget. Yeah that's right, watch that movie and try to guess where they dumped 160 million smackaroos, because I can't quite figure it out. Anyway Van Helsing is not about Abraham Van Helsing, the character from Bram Stoker's Dracula, but it does involve Dracula prominently. In this iteration Hugh Jackman is Gabriel Van Helsing, an agent of the Vatican who is dispatched to kill Dracula. That seems pretty reasonable, because I'm sure that no one in Rome is a big Dracula fan, on account of him being a vampire and all. So Van Helsing travels to Transylvania with his loyal ammo monk in tow (the guy who played Faramir in the Lord of the Rings no less!) to try and deep six Drac. The Holy Order also charges Van Helsing with helping ensure that the Valerious family doesn't end up ever getting stuck outside of heaven's gates, because I guess they don't get to go to heaven unless they kill Dracula or something who fucking even knows. Of course Dracula isn't the only thing that can kill you in Transylvania. There's also werewolves, and Dracula brides, and... gross baby vampires that explode because they need different kinds of batteries or something... stay with me here guys.

Dylan Dog: Dead of Night

No problem indeed.

"No pulse? No problem."

Hello friends, welcome back to another hopeless walk through the trackless desert that is September, a month that has thus far proven to be a cinematic death march into the fall season. I mean really what's taking me to the box office this month? I guess A Walk Among the Tombstones (aka Taken 2.5)? Maybe the Maze Runner? I guess I shouldn't complain too much, as October will bring Left Behind, a movie based on the long running series of novels about the end times. Why am I looking forward to this ridiculous guaranteed shitpile? Because it stars Nicholas Cage, and that means that Thanksgiving is coming early for this boy. So there's at least a light at the end of this tunnel, and that light is the flames from the lake of fire I guess. Enough of that though, today I'm here to talk about mediocre and under-promoted movies about paranormal detectives. As an expert of mediocre paranormal fiction it seemed only fitting that I deliver the prognosis for Dylan Dog: Dead of Night. This was a movie that I'd initially intended to review over a year ago, when I first saw it, but I became occupied with movies that were more pressing, so it ended up on the back burner until the world class famine I have on my hands now. In case you aren't really into Italian comic books (how weird!) Dylan Dog is a long running Italian horror comic (started in 1986) about the eponymous Dylan Dog, an investigator who is an expert in dealing with the nightmarish and bizarre. In the film adaptation this holds true, with a few changed details (namely his assistant is not a Groucho Marx impersonator, and I personally am really grateful to whoever made that executive decision, because that sounds terrible). Dylan works in New Orleans instead of London, that makes sense, this is an American movie after all and we couldn't possibly have an UN-AMERICAN HERO, that's insane. Along with his undead buddy Marcus (Sam Huntington, also known as the werewolf on the U.S. Being Human) Dylan doesn't just go around blowing the faces off of the things that go bump in the night. Rather he also acts as an intermediary between them, working to maintain the uneasy peace that exists between various groups.

Tron (1982)

Yeah the cover's pretty similar too.

"Trapped in a fight to the finish inside the video world he created."

Hello all, welcome to a new week at The Tagline! Summer is meandering towards its conclusion, and I am slowly being driven insane, so I thought now would be an opportune moment to explore a movie that features less preposterous science fiction than Hackers. To that end, I will be talking about Tron today. Yeah maybe it was a lame joke, but seriously, today I'm reaching back deep into history so that we can have a chat about the original Tron, a movie that spawned a franchise over the course of several decades, and eventually a sequel in 2010, which some people who clearly had never seen the original didn't like (and I'll talk more about that in a little bit). Originally conceived in 1976 by its director and writer Steve Lisberger, Tron was intended at first to be an animated feature, but as time went on and no one picked up the production, the emphasis slowly shifted towards backlit animation mixed with live action and computer animation, which was what ended up happening when Disney eventually picked up the film (yes it was always Disney, some people didn't know that I guess? I shouldn't be surprised but...) There it developed into the work that would eventually spawn a fairly prolific franchise, including a cartoon and a number of games. It's important to take this movie in a little bit in context of when it was made. In 1982 computers were very much not the mainstream, and even video games in their earliest form (Pong being a major inspiration for Lisberger) were an extremely niche attraction. It was the director's hope that he could sort of open up that world, and eventually that DID happen, though at the time Tron was not extremely successful (that being said it wasn't a flop either, it almost doubled its money).

Guardians of the Galaxy

This IS a badass poster though.

"All heroes start somewhere."

Hello former friends and colleagues, welcome back to The Tagline! Originally I had planned to put off seeing Guardians until a little later (mostly just because I knew it would be in theaters forever and I wanted to see some other things that were less likely to stick around) but circumstances shifted and I ended up seeing it over the weekend. If you've lived in deep space for the past week or so... I imagine you still were picking up a lot of chatter about this movie, as roughly the entire internet has been orgasming about it basically since it was released, or some time that was significantly BEFORE that. Still, some background. Guardians of the Galaxy represents a relatively gutsy gamble on the part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, focusing on a group of interplanetary misfits who end up... guarding the galaxy I guess. First among them, as the unifying force that makes them a team, is Peter Quill, aka Starlord (Chris Pratt, having a busy year between this and The Lego Movie), who in the movie is abducted by aliens approximately 3 minutes after the movie starts, and 10 seconds after his mom dies from what looked like cancer. The movie jumps forward to his adulthood, where he has become a Ravager (who are like space pirates I guess? They are the guys who abducted him) and steals stuff from places while banging ladies who are interesting colors like pink why not. A particular salvage brings him into conflict with Ronan the Accuser, who if that sounds like a guy you don't want to be in conflict with to you, you've got a good sense for guys who hang out in giant space ships waiting to kill you with a fucking hammer. The guy's space fortress is called the Dark Aster for crap's sake. This is clearly a dude lacking a sense of humor, which is too bad for Starlord because that's one of his strongest attributes? I guess. Starlord's lot is tossed together with a motley group of cock-ups, including Gamora (Zoe Saldana gets green, maybe she liked the looks of her roomate at Starfleet Academy), who has betrayed Ronan and Thanos in order to prevent disaster, Draxx the Destroyer (Dave Batista, as in the pro wrestler) who seeks revenge against Ronan for the death of his family, and the duo Rocket (who is a talking raccoon voiced by Bradley Cooper) and Groot (a humanoid tree voiced and motion captured by Vin Diesel). 

Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters

This would be hotter with Jeremy Renner
in front.

"Revenge is sweeter than candy."

Hey everyone, welcome back to The Tagline, with a fresh week filled with movies about shooting things for reasons. Today, as long promised I will be delving into less than stellar cinema once again, this time with the obviously dubious looking Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters. This was the sort of movie that I was honestly surprised was getting a wide movie theater release, but then again I suppose it has actors in it who need to be paid in real money so I shouldn't be too shocked. Even then you're almost surprised they'd even attach themselves to a movie about Hansel & Gretel that looks like Van Helsing. That in itself is pretty damning, as Van Helsing was a total train wreck of a movie, even when compared to other pulpy cinema. So with all of that weighing on my mind I didn't enter into this movie with very high expectations. Let me set up the premise for you, parts should be familiar. Hansel & Gretel are left in the woods by their dad. They find a gingerbread house, a witch who lives their plans to eat them, but they get the drop on her and burn her in her own stupid oven. Following this event, Hansel is left Diabetic and has to take regular injections or else he'll die (Naturally. They didn't have insulin shots in the 1800s but I guess I have no real idea or really where this movie is taking place so probably don't let that trip me up). Together he and his sister become renowned witch hunters, killing tons of witches in no small part because they seem to be immune to the dark magic they employ. At the movie's outset the two arrive in who-the-hell caresville where the sheriff is a real dildo, and the mayor is less of one. The mayor hires Hansel and Gretel to try and find out why children are disappearing (hint it's witches). Before they do that though they have to take a moment to stop sheriff jackhole from executing some hot chick that they think is a witch. Hansel explains that witches can only pretend to be hot, and are actually gross, whereas this girl is actually hot. This is all really advanced high-class stuff so try and keep up guys.

How to Train Your Dragon 2

Why do I still have no dragon.

"THIS SUMMER THERE'S ONLY ONE WAY TO FLY"

Hi all, welcome to a brand new, uncomfortably humid, blisteringly hot week at the Tagline, which is located in a claustrophobic basement that has no air flow or windows or any real environment control other than this stupid box fan I keep knocking over with my damned computer chair. I'm not here to talk about the lacking circumstances surrounding my living conditions though, nor my displeasure with the fire orb that's constantly exploding in the sky. No today I'm going to be talking about explosions that happen in a considerably closer region to our persons. I'll be talking about How to Train Your Dragon 2, the sequel to another movie with that name, minus the 2 (obviously) about a young boy outcast who decides that people could coexist with dragons instead of murdering them with ballistas and such. This lad, Hiccup (Jay Baruchel, the Sorcerer's Apprentice) befriends a fearsome Nightfury, that he names Toothless. This creature is essentially what an adorable pet cat would be if it were also a dragon, and so is the cutest creature in existence. At the opening of this second movie (about five years after the first movie, in-universe) Hiccup's home of Berk has greatly changed, as now everyone there has their own dragon pretty much (or almost everyone at least maybe there are some sad dragonless losers off-screen). While Hiccup's dad Stoick (who is Gerard Butler somehow and that is really confusing) is all about him finally owning up and taking his place as chief-in-waiting, Hiccup is less than enthusiastic and spends his days flying around mapping the surrounding lands, and generally shirking his duties. This is sort of a nice sequel setup I thought, because it shows viewers (young and old) something that a lot of movies choose to gloss over. In the first movie Hiccup learns that he's good at befriending dragons, and he is no longer utterly ostracized by his home. That detail not-withstanding, finding a way to not be an outcast doesn't mean you've found your place in the world forever. Not being a disgrace doesn't mean that you feel like you've found your place in the world, and I found that refreshing.

The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones

Teen Angst Squad.

"There is a world hidden within our own."

Hello all, and welcome back to The Tagline! Today I will at long last deliver on broken promises, and talk about The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones, seeing as it now looks inevitable that we will be seeing more of this series (at least one more movie is already in the pipe). Starring Lily Collins as Clary Fray, normal girl living in the city, City of Bones follows her as she discovers that she is intensely and gruesomely not ordinary. This movie, like any movie that is not about comic book characters or that has a female protagonist, is based on a series of young adult novels, set in a world where unknown to regular people, a race of half-angels (Nephilim if you want to be sassy about it) are charged with fighting against demons and other varieties of nightmare creatures, all while the rest of the world's assholes are oblivious to the fact that Dracula is trying to summon the devil or something, with help from Moriarty. Don't worry though, some rail thin teenage girls and teen heartthrobs are more than ready to eff those demons in the A, by which I mean mostly be moody at each other. This cast of likable jack-holes includes Jace (who you DON'T remember as Caius from the Twilight movies, but see him here in Anonymous as the young Oxford) who is Clary's sexy love interest who might be her brother, which makes some of the stuff that happens in the movie Luke & Leia levels of awkward, Alec who is a douchebag with few if any redeeming qualities we see, and his sister Isabelle, who has this whole leather vixen thing going on that was kind of awkward but I guess it was probably the way she was described in the books, given how frequently it comes up in the movie. Also I'd be remiss if I forgot to mention Clary's boy in waiting who will always be waiting, Simon, who just doesn't stand a chance against the brooding possibly sibling Jace. Like how much does that hurt, she thinks the guy is her brother and you still can't compete. Ouch Simon.

Gravity

I think they could've let go.

"Don't Let Go."

Except for that one part, then you can totally let go. Hello Tagliners, welcome back. Today I'm going to exercise my rights as a card carrying contrarian, by disagreeing with virtually every critic in existence. Correct former friends, today I will be talking about the universally acclaimed and award winning film Gravity. Gravity stars Sandra Bullock as medical engineer Ryan Stone, who is on a space mission and servicing the Hubble Telescope alongside Lt. Matt Kowalski (George Clooney), when a storm of debris from a Russian missile striking an inactive satellite passes their ship, the Explorer, and kills everyone except Kowalski and Stone, and propel them into a life or death situation. The movie is frequently and extensively experienced from the perspective of Stone, who as a novice in space is frequently (and understandably) terrified as she attempts to survive in an extreme situation that undoubtedly would push even the hardiest individual to their limits. The movie is essentially a film about survival, about Stone overcoming existential dread and her personal demons in order to survive and make it back to the Earth. I want it to be known before I get into the rest of my review that I fully understand all of the above. I recognize the movie's intent, and I even recognize that it succeeds at what it sets out to do, and that it accomplishes great things in terms of 3D cinematography. Now that I've gotten that out of the way, let's talk about how I liked the movie. I didn't. I am here to tell you that I did not give a single shit about anything that happened in this movie.

Riddick

Musclesandbald Man.

"Rule the Dark"

Hello everyone, welcome back to my humble corner of the internet, where it's all movies all the time, except when it's awkward personal stories that tie into movie watching, though I guess it's still KIND of about movies. Anyway, today I will not be regaling you with weird sad stories about how I once ran across my college campus in the dark and fell into a pond and then had to go back to my room so no one would know. This isn't about that, it's about Riddick, the much anticipated by someone I'm sure sequel to The Chronicles of Riddick, which was the not anticipated sequel sort of to Pitch Black, a movie about people being killed by monsters on a planet that gets dark. One has to wonder when watching these movies why anyone would want to go to any of these awful planets, but I guess if we only had people on safe planets there wouldn't be much to watch in the way of movies. Anyway, Riddick takes place directly after the events at the end of The Chronicles of Riddick, and if you hadn't guessed from his name appearing all over the titles of both of those movies, this movie is fucking about Riddick okay. If you haven't figured that out yet I must assume you cannot actually read, but you're welcome to keep looking at the pictures I guess. Anyway Riddick (portrayed by the stoically bald Vin Diesel) has become king of the Necromongers who are like really bad murderer guys I guess, I'll be honest I only half paid attention to The Chronicles of Riddick. Being the rebel he is though, Riddick gives two fucks about these clowns, and so decides to look for his home planet Furya, which the Necromongers had thoughtfully blown up when Riddick was a baby, specifically BECAUSE of him (a prophecy said he'd kill the Necroboss). Huge dicks that they are, the Necrodouches double cross Riddick, and leave him for dead on some nowhere planet, probably because Keith Urban didn't really want to be in the movie all that much. His loss I guess.

47 Ronin

They fit all the unimportant parts
of the movie onto one poster.

"Seize eternity."

At long last, as promised I will be talking about 47 Ronin today! This film, released on Christmas day, is an extremely fictionalized western take on an already heavily fictionalized series of event that make up one of Japan's most popular stories from the Genroku era, about a group of Ronin (masterless samurai) who seek revenge for the death of their master, who was forced to commit seppuku after attacking an official of the shogunate while in Edo Castle. The ronin planned carefully to slay this official, before then all committing seppuku themselves, as was demanded to satisfy honor. Granted, official records and most versions of the story don't involve witches, dragons, or demons, but the general story is there. This version of the story, like most fan fiction, inserts a totally bad ass OC who is a super fighter who was trained by demons and is all angsty and shit and also has a love story with the daughter of the Ronins' lord. Also this guy is white, because come on HOW COULD HE NOT BE LET'S GET REAL HERE. I'm seriously not kidding though there is a character in this movie that is all of those things and he is played by Keanu Reeves and his name is Kai.

Your Highness

Time for some strong homoerotic overtones.

"Get your quest on."

Hey y'all, welcome back to The Tagline, it's another exciting week filled to the brim with broken promises, broken dreams, and mediocre movies I watched while I was spacing out after work. Today I will be continuing the trend I started last week by reviewing a movie that was both vulgar and stupid. Today I will be dipping into the robust film pool that is the career of Seth Rogan's boyfriend, James Franco. That's right, I'll be talking about Your Highness, a film starring Franco as a probably molested prince of considerable heroism, and also kind of homoerotic stature, named Fabious, who often goes on adventures to kick ass with his shifty clearly going to betray him later knights. In comparison, his brother Thadeous (Danny McBride, who like Franco was in This is the End) is a drunken, lascivious boor, who travels around the kingdom participating in debauchery with his servant Courtney. All this fuckery ends however when Fabious returns to his father Tywin Lannister (no I'm not kidding Charles Dance is the king) with a ditsy girl he saved from imprisonment in a tower (Zooey Deschanel) that he intends to marry. Thadeous gets super jealous, because he is a stupid asshole, but before the wedding can finish, the evil wizard Leezar shows up to kidnap the girl, so he can bone her and she will give birth to a dragon that he will use to kill everyone because he's a huge asshole. With his fiance kidnapped for nefarious ends, Fabious sets off after her, and Thadeous is forced by their father to tag along, even though he is a craven moron.

District 9

That's not nice.

"For humans only. Non-humans banned!"

It's Thursday, and that means it's time for the Tagline: PART TWO. Today I'm going to be digging up a film from my backlog of "Movies that I reviewed in an alternate universe but think I reviewed here." Today's featured film is District 9, a movie about one man with a funny sounding accent who evicts a bunch of aliens from their homes where they're minding their own business, and then is later given cause to regret his hurtful, speciesist actions. The film stars Sharlto Copley as Wikus van de Merwe (I talked about him as a psychopath government killer in Elysium). Wikus works for MNU, a corporation that has been put in charge of the... relocation of the alien race referred to derogatorily as "Prawns" by the South African government. What?! Aliens you say? Yes, well in the movie, some time around 1982 a large alien space ship appeared, and stopped over Johannesburg, South Africa. Investigations inside the ship revealed a large number of half starved aliens who were then relocated and restricted to District 9, a ghetto specified specifically for the aliens. Eventually, even THAT doesn't satisfy the bunch of racists, and so they now want to move them somewhere else. ANYWAY Wikus has been put in charge of the relocation, but that all goes straight into the crapper after he is exposed to a strange alien fluid while attempting to relocate several of the aliens. Wikus begins to undergo a transformation into one of the aliens, and so is detained by MNU for study (as you might expect of an evil corporation, they eventually decide to vivisect him) Wikus eventually escapes, and flees to District 9, where he agrees to help the alien Christopher Johnson (no I'm not kidding) who says he can reverse the mutation if he can only get back to the mothership. 

Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters

My favorite Transformers movie.

Hey y'all, welcome to another week at The Tagline! Today because I haven't watched any new movies and I'm kind of feeling like a jerk, I'm going to talk about that sequel to the Percy Jackson movie that came out like a month ago. Most of the time, most people I think go to movies because they imagine there is at least a chance that they will be half-way decent. In comparison, I often go to movies because I know they will be regrettable shitshows. I crave that kind of sordid fuckfest, the way normal people crave actually good movies. Do I take a twisted enjoyment out of movies that are comically awful? Yes, I certainly do (On that score I am filled with regret that my schedule has yet to permit The Mortal Instruments into my viewing area. I think that is definitely what I'm after, but it still eludes me). This was the general attitude that drew me into the theater in August to go see Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters, the sequel to Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief. Both are based at least nominally on a series of young adult books, all focusing on the eponymous Percy Jackson(the kid from Perks of Being a Wallflower, who is a scion of the god Poseidon. He hangs out with all his half godly friends at a camp which is specially set aside for them, with a really stupid name (Camp Halfblood how creative right?) After the events of the first movie, where Percy stopped some bad god related stuff from happening, Percy has been experiencing a dry spell. In the hero department I mean. Probably in other departments too, he only hangs around this one Athena daughter who's clearly not giving him any action, and this other Mars daughter who is just making him look like a chump all the time.

Troll Hunter

That's no Bjørn at all!

"You'll believe it when you see it!"

Hello everyone! Welcome back all you Tagline readers! Today I'm going to talk about another Netflix movie today, one that I've been meaning to watch for a long time, but hadn't gotten around to. That movie is Troll Hunter, and it is more or less exactly what it sounds like. As has been so popular to do, the movie is filmed in a "found footage" style, following three college students as they attempt to interview a man they believe to be a bear poacher. Of course, this man is not, in fact, hunting bears, nor is he a poacher. Instead we discover that he is hunting trolls, and that he is in the employ of the government. Through the experiences of the would be film makers we discover that Norway has all kinds of trolls in it, some of them very large. They normally keep to themselves, but for some reason the trolls are getting restless, and so Hans (the hunter) has had his hands full hunting the errant ones. You see some trolls are relatively small. Others are... quite large. Like giant large. Bigger than trees even.

Street Fighter

English as a second language never
made bad lines sound so... bad I guess.

Well, I threatened to do it, and I like to think if nothing else I'm as good as my awful words, so here it is, a full length review of Street Fighter. Released in 1994, this film was a monument to bad script, poor acting, ridiculous plotting, lame effects, and other general tom-foolery. Jean-Claude Van Damme, renowned around the world for being in stupid action movies where he acts poorly, plays Colonel William Guile, who is heading a task force of Allied Nation soldiers as they attempt to wrest control of the fictional, and EXTREMELY stupid sounding Shadaloo (which granted is Capcom's fault but whatever it's still contributing to the dumb) from the grip of drug lord turned dictator M. Bison (Raul Julia, best known to the current generation as Gomez Addams) who has kidnapped AN relief workers in the hopes of extorting an insane amount of money out of them. Guile has a personal vendetta against Bison, as does news anchor/actually a secret ninja Chun-Li (Ming Na) Also there are like a million other characters from the street fighter franchise, thrown in for good measure and serving only a passing purpose in the film's plot, which outside of the central Bison vs. most everyone else, doesn't make much of anything remotely resembling sense.

Star Trek Into Darkness

Spoilers: They never really go INTO darkness.

"In our darkest hour, when our leaders have fallen, a hero will rise."

Hey everyone, welcome to Thursday's Tagline! Today I will be talking about the new Star Trek film, INTO DARKNESS, which sees the crew of the Enterprise face their deadliest adversary yet, and shout "KHAAAAN!!!!!!!!!!" For those who missed the last Star Trek, it stars Chris Pine as James Tiberius Kirk (Kirk is basically the feather in his cap) Zoe Saldana (who graced my blog in The Losers) also John Cho as Sulu (He's Harold who went to White Castle, forever) Simon Pegg as Scotty (most notably from Shaun of the Dead, and also Hot Fuzz was awesome) Anton Yelchin as Chekov (also appeared in Charley Bartlett) and Zachary Quinto as Spock (though I have a tough time not seeing him as Sylar cutting open people's heads on Heroes) and Karl Urban as Dr. McCoy (last seen here when I reviewed Dredd). Joining them is Star Trek nemesis Khan, portrayed by Bumblebee Cabbagepatch best known for his role on the BBC as Shylock (Benedict Cumberbatch from Sherlock you get it). The movie starts with Kirk getting a serious dressing down from Admiral Pike, before having his command stripped away. Of course that all goes out the window when a whole bunch of stuff gets blown up by Bandersnatch Cumberbuns for reasons that are not immediately clear.