Tinseltown Reviews

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse  is an animated superhero film directed by Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman, starring Shameik Moore, Jake Johnson, Hailee Steinfeld, Mahershala Ali, Brian Tyree Henry, Nicolas Cage, Kimiko Glenn, John Mulaney, and Liev Schreiber. The movie follows Miles Morales, a black-latino middle schooler who struggles to adjust to his new school and live up to his parents' expectations. After getting bitten by a genetically modified spider, he develops spider-like abilities and comes in contact with a variety of Spider-Men from different alternate universes, including an aged and disheveled Peter Parker who reluctantly teaches Miles how to become the next Spider-Man. I think it's no secret that I'm a big fan of Spider-Man. I kinda wrote a really long essay on why he's the best superhero don't @ me . And I'd probably be lying if I said my feelings on the character don't affect how I view his portrayals in media....

Daredevil  is a Marvel-Netflix miniseries created by Drew Goddard, starring Charlie Cox, Deborah Ann Woll, Elden Henson, Vincent D'Onofrio, Wilson Bethel, Jay Ali, and Joanne Whalley. The third season follows the titular vigilante at his lowest, recovering from the events of The Defenders . Upon hearing of Wilson Fisk's release from prison by the FBI, Matt Murdock decides to completely abandon his civilian life and embrace his identity as the Devil of Hell's Kitchen, committing to kill the Fisk--the Kingpin of Crime--himself. The Context I've been fairly vocal on this movie blog of how disappointing the Marvel Netflix Universe has been lately. The first two seasons of Daredevil  and the first seasons of Jessica Jones  and Luke Cage  all came out at a time when many people were questioning the longevity of the superhero genre as a whole. After all, we were getting titles like Thor: The Dark World , Avengers: Age of Ultron ,  Ant Man , and Batman v...

A Star is Born  is a romantic musical drama directed by Bradley Cooper and starring himself, Lady Gaga, Sam Elliot, Andrew Dice Clay, and Rafi Gavron. The movie, the fourth iteration of this story on the big screen, centers on the relationship between a rock-country musician who is nearing the end of his career due to his recklessness and deep alcoholism. He happens to meet a young waitress with a beautiful voice who aspires to become a singer, and the two begin a relationship where he tries to push her to "tell the world what she has to say" while also trying to overcome his personal struggles. This movie absolutely took me by surprise. Judging from the trailer, I expected this movie to be a fairly generic romance movie/chick flick about an established and jaded musician who pushes the young and naive girl to chase after her dreams, and in doing so remembers his own love for music. I expected a cheesy love story with twists and turns, ups and downs, ending with eith...

Black Panther is a Marvel superhero film directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong'o, Danai Gurira, Letitia Wright, Daniel Kaluuya, and Martin Freeman and Andy Serkis as the only white characters in the entire movie. The film follows T'Challa as he officially takes on the mantle of the Black Panther and the king of Wakanda, and having to learn to deal with the hardships of being a king, especially when a secret from his father's past starts to become unveiled and a new man rises to challenge his position on the throne. It's hard to deny the amount of hype that came with the release of Black Panther , one that I was worried might damage the movie's reputation like it did with The Last Jedi just a few months ago. There was also a part of me that was afraid that a large portion of the movie's praise would be due to white guilt (the "if you didn't like it you're a racist" effect, AKA the only r...

Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi is a 2017 space epic film written and directed by Rian Johnson and starring Daisy Ridley, Mark Hamill, Adam Driver, Carrie Fisher, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Kelly Marie Tran, and a whole lot of Porgs. The movie takes place where 2015's The Force Awakens left off, with Rey seeking training from the legendary Luke Skywalker while General Leia Organa and her Resistance fighters try to escape the clutches of the First Order. Throughout the film, we see both Rey and Kylo Ren struggle with the light and dark sides as they deal with their pasts and relationships with their masters. This film is an interesting one--come out as the most divisive Star Wars movie yet (yes, even more so than the prequels)--with at the time of this review a 93% critic score and 55% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes . You either think it's the best since Empire Strikes Back or you think Rian Johnson murdered your childhood and is an even worse abomination tha...

Coco is a Pixar fantasy adventure film directed by Lee Unkrich and starring Anthony Gonzalez, Gael García Bernal, Benjamin Bratt, Renée Victor, and Alanna Ubach. The movie follows 12-year-old Miguel Rivera, an aspiring musician who accidentally stumbles into the land of the dead during Dia de los Muertos, and embarks on a journey to find the legendary musician Ernesto de la Cruz. I think it was about 15 minutes into the movie that I thought to myself, "Yeah. This movie's going to make me cry." Coco is a suckerpunch of beauty and emotion that really comes out of nowhere, with near-Studio Ghibli levels of visual beauty and a surprisingly emotional story rivaling that of Up 's opening sequence, easily making this Pixar's finest work since at least Toy Story 3 . Coco is one of Pixar's three movies featuring an actual human cast (following The Incredibles and Brave ) and really surprised me with how unmarketable they are. The characters really a...