DPF_1

And a way to tack on a happy ending for Neo and Trinity. Makes fun of itself about being a cash grab and adds little to the original story. CGI was good but the action scenes appeared stiff and unnatural. A lot longer than it needed to be, and it still appeared disjointed.

Perfect for people who have an extremely pessimistic view about humanity, replete with despicable, hateful and ugly characters. Maybe I'm watching the wrong shows, but this seems to be a hallmark of South Korean filmmaking. Appears to be a commentary about zealotry and the slide into fascism but the story is a sledgehammer with little finesse.

This is a Sherlock Holmes/MacGyver mashup fantasy, which is fine, the problem is it uses a real historical figure and takes extreme liberties with his life. It would have been better for the main character to be named Mycroft MacVinci, Leonardo's smarter older cousin.

The only thing remotely related to Da Vinci is the name and that he was talented. They didn't just take liberties with Da Vinci's life they rewrote it. Da Vinci lived in a time where, as an artist, you didn't survive without patronage, no mater how much of a genius you may be you didn't get patronage by acting like a smug jerk to potential patrons. What I find most offensive is the portrayal of his relationship with his father being the complete opposite of what history indicates.

To paint career German military in a better light. Lets not forget that the Wehrmacht swore an oath of allegiance to Hitler and kept that oath until things stopped going their way. When Rommel started having a crisis of conscience about the brutality of the Third Reich, Rommel's wife summed up the state of mind of the average German at the time, "Let's not talk about those things".

On one side you have the fanboys who would lick the sweat from his armpits rating this a ten, and the I hate Vin Diesel crowd (who probably didn't bother to watch the movie) giving one star reviews. Despite it's flaws this is an entertaining, slickly produced, mindless sci-fi/action film. Vin Diesel knows what he's good at and he does it pretty well, if you're expecting something else that's your fault.

The lighting is so bad it might as well be a radio play. I see they spared no expense astroturfing this dog though.

The nonlinear narrative is confusing until you realize it's happening. The major action scene is replayed at least five times throughout the movie shown from different points of view, this isn't done sequentially but with multiple other scenes interspersed between each revisit. It is an impressive setup and camera orchestration effort.

The alien backdrop is driven by a never ending series of Diablo ex Machina and Deus ex Machina events (miracles and bad luck), it's trite and lazy, there is even an event that is both a Diablo ex Machina and a Deus ex Machina simultaneously. The family drama is tedious and repetitive, even the main supporting cast comments on being tired of the Mason family drama, not sure if its a cry for help from the writers or an ad lib from the actors. I haven't been this disappointed in the big reveal of the reason for an alien invasion since I found out the alien invaders in the 5th Wave were simply radical environmentalists trying to save the planet. Even so you don't go 5 seasons by being a one star production, it's not, but it does get old seeing the same formula repeated every episode esp. if you are binge watching.

Neil Gaiman should've heeded his own advice to Terry Pratchett about altering the source material "so if you do something else, you risk alienating the fans on a monumental scale. It's not Batman if he's now a news reporter in a yellow trenchcoat with a pet bat".

They completely destroyed one of my favorite characters, Anansi, turned him into a raving lunatic for race war. He can also see 300 years into the future, which creates a huge continuity issue for the end of the story, if he can see the future he sure as hell wouldn't be aligned with Odin. There is no subtlety in the SJ stuff it is frequent, ham handed, and over the top.

The acting is good, as a character study it's fine, the science is abysmal and ridiculous. Jupiter has a previously undiscovered habitable earth size moon? All radio emanations on earth end in three weeks? Our dying hero needs to contact the returning space mission and warn them off, sure just stomp on the brakes and throw the ship in reverse? With idiotic contrivances like this it's no surprise it has many 1 star ratings. However, it's not a one star production, the acting and production values are very high, George Clooney could make reading a grocery store receipt sound dramatic, but in the end it is just a grocery store receipt.

With both sides using mecha, the obligatory over the top teen angst and high school drama, if you can make it to the big reveal at the end of ep 6 it improves. Liked the nod to the original Star Trek and Lazarus at the end.