Month: July 2015

Super Recaps: Sailor Moon Episode 1 (The Crybaby: Usagi’s Beautiful Transformation)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 3 Comments

Sailor Moon and all the images you see in this recap are owned by Toei Animation and licensed by Viz Media

Episode directed by Junichi Satou

When I first started watching Sailor Moon Crystal, I vowed to not watch any of the original series or read the original manga while I was writing recaps for it.  I felt that I was in a unique situation where I had always wanted to give Sailor Moon a shot, but never got around to actually watching it which means I would be in a perfect position to WANT to like Sailor Moon Crystal without having the original to compare it against.  I think it ended up serving me well, not that reviews of comparison are bad, but I figured plenty of people were going to do that already and I wanted to see if it was any good from a newbie’s perspective. After a year of watching Sailor Moon Crystal though, the season has finally come to a close and I’m now gonna start watching the original series and giving you my thoughts on it!   To start with, let’s discuss which version of the show I’m watching.  I’ll be watching the modern dub of the series.  Not the original dub which many Sailor Moon fans started off with, and not the original Japanese sub with all the original content unperturbed.  From what I understand, the Viz Media dub is supposed to be an uncut and unedited version of the original Japanese version so I guess it’s the best of both worlds!  Still, I am gonna miss the fact that I won’t get to see the nineties special effects, the Sailor Moon Morals at the end of each episode, and that Luna won’t sound like an old lady.  Unfortunately, if this version DOES miss certain aspects of the original Japanese version, I won’t be able to spot it but that’s what the comments section is for!  So now that we got that out of the way, will Sailor Moon live up to the hype, or is it just another nostalgic property that’s not as good as people remember it!?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with our main character Usagi waking up late for school and having to rush through her morning routine.  Wait, isn’t this how EVERY magical girl show begins!?

“Are you going to be late AGAIN!?”     “I’ll try NOT to be!!”     “Well say hi to A-ko, Yohko, Ranma, and Madoka if you pass by them.”
“Are you going to be late AGAIN!?”     “I’ll try NOT to be!!”     “Well say hi to A-ko, Yohko, Ranma, and Madoka if you pass by them.”

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Cinema Dispatch: Pixels

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 5 Comments

PIXELS0

Pixels and all the images you see in this review are owned by Columbia Pictures

Directed by Chris Columbus

You know, it’s actually not that bad.  No, I’m kidding.  This movie is absolutely dreadful.  I can’t imagine how you could have made this worse.  It didn’t give me a terminal illness so at least there’s that much, but this low effort cash grab by Adam Sandler and Chris Columbus is probably the worst thing I’ll see all year.  Yes, this is worse than Terminator Genisys.   How bad is it?  Well you probably already know if you’ve heard anything about this film, but let’s find out JUST how low Happy Madison can sink with this heinous train wreck of a movie!!

Pixels is about Sam Brenner (played by America’s favorite hack, Adam Sandler) who was a video game wiz during his childhood but never lived up to his potential as a… good video game player I guess, and is now a forty something loser who installs electronic equipment for rich people who can’t be bothered to plug in an HDMI cable.  Not that his JOB makes him a loser; It’s his entire personality and outlook at life that makes him one of those.  Sam is a smartass, doesn’t take responsibility for his own life choices, and blames everyone around him for his failures.  His best friend is the god damn President of the United States (Kevin James) yet he still treats him like the fat kid he used to know when they were younger.  Not in a “you’re still my best friend” sort of way, but in a “remember when I was cooler than you?” sort of way.  Anyway, this pathetic loser is going through his sad life until one day aliens start to invade the Earth and for reasons too convoluted to even bother describing here, they’re doing so in the form of arcade games from 1982 and earlier.  Because no one else in the world is as good as three guys who played games in the eighties (therefore conferring the idea that being a Gamer is an exclusive club of badasses who need a minimum level of skill and conformity before being granted the prestigious label), the President enlist Sam, another creepo friend of theirs called Ludlow Lamonsoff (Josh Gadd) and eventually Sam’s rival from his childhood Eddie Plant (Peter Dinklage) to fight the alien menace.

Can we get The Last Starfighter instead?  Hell, the Wing Commanders would be preferable to this.  The MOVIE version of Wing Commander.
Can we get The Last Starfighter instead?  Hell, the Wing Commanders would be preferable to this.  The MOVIE version of Wing Commander.

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Cinema Dispatch: Trailer Talk (Spectre)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

SPECTRE0

Oh look!  Another James Bond film is coming out!  Who could have seen that coming!?  The new film, simply called Spectre, is the twenty-fourth film in the long running series and the fourth film to star Daniel Craig in the title role.  His track record has actually been pretty good so far with Casino Royale and Skyfall being great films in their own right (no one remembers Quantum of Solace so just shut up about it), but with them finally tackling the infamous organization in earnest (bringing in more of the old school features of the franchise), are they finally going to end up biting off more than they can chew?  Well we won’t know until November, but for now let’s look at the trailer!!

The trailer begins with James Bond getting lectured by the new M (if you want to know what happened to the old M, watch Skyfall) for going off on his own to Mexico for some reason.  Not sure what he was doing there, but it involved blowing up a building.

“DAMN IT JAMES!!  YOU BLEW UP TWENTY CARS AND THREE STADIUMS!!”     “Sorry Chief.”     “SORRY NOTHING!!  THE COMMISSIONER'S GONNA HAVE MY ASS!!”
“DAMN IT JAMES!!  YOU BLEW UP TWENTY CARS AND THREE STADIUMS!!”     “Sorry Chief.”     “SORRY NOTHING!!  THE COMMISSIONER’S GONNA HAVE MY ASS!!”

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Super Recaps: Dragon Ball Super (Battle of Gods)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

If you don’t know already, I am a HUGE fan of the Dragon Ball franchise, especially Dragon Ball Z!  That said, the last decade of constant video games, re releases and whatever the hell else Funimation and Toei were doing to squeeze out every last cent they can just ended up alienating me as a fan and I never thought the series was ever going to return to its former glory.  That was okay though!  The legacy this series left behind more than makes up for the constant selling out.  Still, Akira Toriyama has starting coming back to the franchise; starting with Battle of Gods and more recently the new series Dragon Ball Super!  After all this time, are we finally going to get the Dragon Ball Z sequel we’ve all been waiting for!?  Well I plan to find out!  First by reviewing the two movies released since his return and then by starting to recap Dragon Ball Super as it comes out!  PLEASE DON’T SUCK!!  I DON’T THINK MY NOSTALGIA CAN TAKE IT!!  Anyway, let’s get started with Battle of Gods!!

The movie begins with a REALLY cool retelling of the entire series with new animation to show key events throughout Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z.  THIS IS WHAT DRAGON BALL KAI SHOULD HAVE BEEN!!!  No seriously, if ONE franchise can afford to have movie sized animation budgets per episode, it would be a remake of Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z!  The flashbacks end just after the end of the Buu saga (but before Uub or Pan are around) and we see that Old Kai (AKA Hitler Kai) senses a disturbance in the force.  He starts to inform the other Kais… for some reason.  Honestly, do they have any real significance anymore?  That’s what I REALLY didn’t like about the Buu Saga.  The show was constantly throwing in new characters of UNBELIEVABLE POWER who would get their asses kicked two episodes later and become background characters for the rest of the arc.  For crying out loud, Grand Kai got like one appearance before being subsumed by Supreme Kai!  Anyway, King Kai is receiving his message about whatever the hell the other Kai’s are sensing but unfortunately Goku is training on the planet and tries to eavesdrop.

“Is there something I can beat up!?”     “NO GOKU!  NOT TODAY!!!”     “Aw…”
“Is there something I can beat up!?”     “NO GOKU!  NOT TODAY!!!”     “Aw…”

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Super Recaps: Sailor Moon Crystal (Episode 26) Season one Finale!!

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 10 Comments

Just over a year since its premiere, Sailor Moon Crystal’s first season is coming to a close.  There’s been much discussion around this show and its obvious flaws since its release, which is to be expected for a remake of a franchise that meant so much to a lot of people.   Now that we’re at the end of this series (at least until season two comes out), does it go out with a bang and a strong closing for the Black Moon Clan story arc, or are we going to get yet another disappointing ending such as the one we got to the Silver Millennium story arc, which many would see as fitting for a series that has been plagued with so many glaring issues?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with Sailor Moon and her entourage falling through an endless abyss of some sort towards the disembodied skull of Wiseman or Death Phantom or Nemesis, or whatever the hell it is.  The point is that Sailor Moon has nice big target to aim her magic wand at and she does just that.

“Feel the power of love and friendship!”     “I COULDN’T BE IN MORE PAIN!!!!”
“Feel the power of love and friendship!”     “I COULDN’T BE IN MORE PAIN!!!!”

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Cinema Dispatch: Ant-Man

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

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Ant-Man and all the images you see in this review are owned by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures

Directed by Peyton Reed

Marvel films have gotten quite a bit of criticism recently which is to be expected with a studio that has become so omnipresent in popular culture.  When something gets this big, it’s only natural that a lot more voices enter the conversation which means that the overall discussion turns into a diverse mix of varying opinions, and not all of them are going to be positive.  Still, it seems that with Ant-Man, Marvel is trying to expand what these movies can be with this one primarily being a heist film rather than what we usually get from this studio, though it hasn’t been a smooth ride what with the original director (Edgar Wright) leaving production partway through.  Does this movie succeed in tweaking the formula that made the other films a success, or has the shaky production surrounding this film led to a sub-par outing for a studio trying desperately to convince us that they’re totally going to keep up this track record of excellence for the next decade?  Let’s find out!!

The movie begins with a flashback to that most infamous of decades, the eighties.  Hank Pym (played by Michael Douglas) is at the height of his career and is respected by all his peers.  Unfortunately, it turns out to be 1889 and just like Michael Douglas, Hank’s career is about to take a turn for the worse.  He’s working for Shield (which is actually Hydra but whatever) and is the discoverer of what is known as the Pym Particle.  Essentially, he made super science goo that makes things shrink which makes aid goo super valuable.  Valuable enough that Shield is going behind his back and trying to recreate the formula which is enough for him to quit his job and he vows to let the secret formula die with him.

Michael Douglas’s secret to his success on the other hand is something he’s willing to tell everyone.  Spoiler alert:  It’s his dick.
Michael Douglas’s secret to his success on the other hand is something he’s willing to tell everyone.  Spoiler alert:  It’s his dick.

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Cinema Dispatch: Trailer Talk (Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

Not long ago, we got trailers for the upcoming DC Comics films, namely Superman v Batman and Suicide Squad.  Needless to say that both of them have been HUGE presences in entertainment media since they’ve come out with everyone giving their two cents about the trailers and what their movies will ultimately be about, and not one to avoid jumping on the bandwagon, I’ve decided to use my little platform to give you my thoughts on them as well.  Do they inspire confidence in DC’s unique direction to take their superhero films, or are they the further indication that they have no idea what the hell they’re doing over there other than desperately try to scramble together a cinematic universe after Marvel did it so effortlessly?  Let’s find out!!

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Batman v Superman

The trailer begins with what appears to be some sort of senate hear4ing where Superman is being brought before them to explain his actions in the previous film.  We also get to see that Bruce Wayne was in Metropolis at the time of Zod’s attack and saw the destruction that these super humans can dish out.  From there we get to see as things escalate between the two with Batman coming out of retirement (I think) to get ready to fight Superman, while Clark Kent is still trying to figure out what his purpose on this planet is (I think).  If you’re wondering why I’m so uncertain about those things, it’s because the trailer does a pretty poor job conveying where in Batman’s history we are and giving us ANY reason to even give even the TINIEST of shits about Superman or understand him in any way.

“A LOT of bad shit went down when you dragged that alien through Metroplis, right?”     “…”     “I mean, I’m SURE you did the best you could, but there was quite a bit of damage in the process, right?”     “…meh.”     “Okay, fuck this.  GUILTY!!”
“A LOT of bad shit went down when you dragged that alien through Metroplis, right?”     “…”     “I mean, I’m SURE you did the best you could, but there was quite a bit of damage in the process, right?”     “…meh.”     “Okay, fuck this.  GUILTY!!”

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Super Recaps: My Little Pony season 5 (Do Princesses Dream of Magic Sheep?)

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 2 Comments

WHAT!?  We’re not gonna have ponies to talk about for a couple of months!?  HERESY!!  First Sailor Moon Crystal is ending its first season and now this!?  What will become of me without magical girls and magical ponies to talk about!?!?  NO!  I CANNOT LET THIS GET ME DOWN!!  I HAVE A JOB TO DO HERE AND I’M GONNA GIVE IT MY ALL!!!  So how do they decide to end this half of the season?  Why with a Luna episode of course!  Everyone’s favorite princess gets the spot light this week as we find out more about what’s going on inside her head and the trouble it causes for everyone else!  Will we get another classic episode like Luna Eclipsed, Bloom & Gloom, For Whom the Sweetie Belle Tolls, and several others, or will we get another bad one like… huh.  Actually, I don’t think she’s HAD a bad episode.  There were episodes where she was underutilized for sure, but never one that was bad.  Well THAT’S certainly a good sign, but can they keep up the trend in this episode!?  Let’s find out!!

The episode begins with the Mane 6 barreling down the halls of the Castle of the Two Sisters, clearly looking for something with the utmost of haste.  Their goal seems to be Princess Luna who’s standing in the main hall of the castle and seems to be expecting their arrival.  While waiting, a small cloud of star energy or whatnot appears behind her, and Luna address it as Tantibus and lets it know she’s ready for whatever happens next.

“My body is ready.”
“My body is ready.”

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