Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

George Miller is back, directing and co-writing a return to the franchise he started decades ago, a film series that pretty much defined post-apocalyptic film making and of which all post-apocalyptic films are compared. Tom Hardy plays the title role (replacing Mel Gibson) as Max and Charlize Theron his female counterpart. Simply said, this is the best film I’ve seen so far this year, a bombastic, adrenalin ride through a nightmarish wasteland of mutants, road pirates and runaway breeders. It’s the kind of film action fans have wanted to see for some time. It’s violent, it’s well-crafted, it’s fun and surprisingly emotionally rewarding. There really is not a dull moment through the entire race across the desert. Miller doesn’t copy himself, he re-invents his world, making it bolder and giving us even more strange and disturbing images. This is the world after we nuke it, it’s the world we deserve after we wasted what was so precious. Unless someone didn’t care for the originals, I really can’t see how anyone would dislike this film. The art direction is superb and the acting is perfect. The only complain I have is that it ended at all. Bring me more Mad Max, please, and don’t make me wait another thirty years. Grade: A

Daredevil (Season 1)

This is how you adapt a comic book superhero.  As a fan of Daredevil, I am dancing with glee.   Drew Goddard nails it, giving us the dark crime fighter we all want to see and the complex villain in Kingpin we’ve always yearned for.  I’m so excited by this television series and the future of this Marvel television world.  For one, it’s not meant for younger viewers.  Which is great; this is for us adults who read the comics and want something dark and exciting.  It’s violent and gritty and doesn’t glaze over the fact that fighting criminals is dangerous.   My only disappointment is that DC didn’t choose this same outlet for Batman; this kind of treatment would be perfect for the Dark Knight.  In fact there are times I felt like I was watching a blind Bruce Wayne learn to become a hero.   That said, Marvel did it first, and I hope this show is the beginning of the end to cinematic superheroes.   Superheroes deserve this kind depth and attention to detail.   Cinema isn’t for serialized properties; this is where comics should go.  Save the movie screen for stories that actually have endings.  A

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

One of the most highly anticipated films of the year lands with a loud mostly satisfying bang. The biggest problem with this sequel to the 2012 film also written and directed by Joss Wheadon is it’s trying to service so many objectives at once making it feel like a compression bomb. One, it must be an entertaining film in its own right. Two, it must somehow take numerous main characters and give them each their own hero’s journey. Three, it must satisfy the egos of all involved including many A-list actors. And four, most importantly it seems, it must continue to develop the Marvel Cinematic Universe like one long promo for future franchises. While doing this the product must be light and comically and full of action because that’s the Marvel way. I actually have to give Wheadon and company a big round of applause for a job well done and in mostly succeeding at accomplishing three of their four goals. Still this is a lot to take in and I left the theater feeling letdown and a lot less entertained then I was the last time the Avengers Assembled. It might not be fair to compare a sequel to its presiding adventure but with Marvel films it’s impossible not to. The last film had all the same objectives but Wheadon did a much more seamless job blending it all together.

I’m in a quandary because there is a lot to cheer. There are many funny jokes and great action sequences. The acting is on par with each actor doing what is needed to service the story. The story is never confusing and builds to a decent climax that is fun to watch. Why do I complain? Because in the end this film is emotionally flat. There are way too many moments where I felt exposition and development was rushed as if not important. Example: Thor’s search for the Infinity stones. New characters seem less interesting and almost there for no other reason but to allow characters we love to someday retire. Are we really going to want to follow Scarlet Witch after Iron Man or Thor leaves the Avengers? The villain, Ultron, starts off as a great and scary robot but once he fails at one of his endeavors his bite is gone and so with it my suspense that he can defeated the Avengers. The villain should seem unstoppable all the way to the bitter end but in this film it’s clear he’s going to lose and that the Avengers are just there at the end of the film to rescue innocent bystanders. I wasn’t bored necessarily but the element of danger was pretty much gone. It’s also hard to have that element of danger when its clear Marvel doesn’t like to kill any of their main heroes. How can they when we know six years in advance which Marvel films are coming out?

Who is the main character in the film? There isn’t one. Sure the first Avengers didn’t really have one either but I’d argue Tony Stark was the centerpiece, he was the guy the story revolved around with everyone else being subplots. Not here, Tony Stark or Steve Rogers could have acted as the axle to the story’s wheel but atlas that’s not the case. Tony Stark is the mad man that creates Ultron but then his story is done. Steve Rogers is the group’s leader but he doesn’t really change much from that role. Thor isn’t the main character, he’s just the guy that disappears and returns with important facts that really aren’t that important (until the next Avengers that is). Banner is just moody and easily convinced to build whatever Tony Stark wants. The emotional rise and fall just isn’t there to keep the narrative going. The first Avengers had Agent Coulson’s death be the moment to pull everyone together. Here they’re already together and there’s never a feeling that they’re going to be pulled apart. That’s not to say it lacked emotional moments, it did have some good ones. I loved Hawkeye’s story line and the development of his personal life and Black Widow’s flashbacks prove again that Marvel is making a big mistake not giving their one popular female hero her own standalone film. I even liked Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver’s journey, even if it felt forced at the end (oh now they’re good guys). Really what Marvel is doing is changing how films are structured. They’re more like television shows with twelve hours of story being compressed into two hours and twenty minutes of film time. While it’s perfect for the comic book film genre, it lessens the cinematic experience as an actual film. It doesn’t have to be this way. The Dark Knight was a great standalone (and it’s part of a trilogy). X-Men Days of Future Past succeeded with having a lot of characters and various story threads without feeling rushed and cluttered. Look no further than the last two Marvel films on how to do it right. I’m not really certain what would have made this film better. I suspect making Tony Stark’s redemption more clear would have helped. Maybe if Ultron’s objective was stronger and his actions more diabolical I’d have loved it more. Even the romance between Banner and Black Widow could have been better if they had resolved it in some way. Regardless this film is going to make over a billion dollars and make Disney very happy, but I for one would have enjoyed it more if they had thought less about Avengers: Infinity and more about Avengers: Age of Ultron. Grade: B+

Spoilers:

One of the parts of the film that I enjoyed but left me kind of cold was the introduction of Vision. Paul Bettany is great as the newly born A.I. superhero and I like the promise of what his character might bring to this world in the future but as soon as he appears and is able to lift Thor’s hammer any of Ultron’s strength as a villain is gone. I question the need for Vision to fight in the last battle. What if they had made him and yet he was still developing and only showed up at the very end. Or what if Ultron took control of him and made the battle more interesting? What I would have loved to have seen is Ultron’s wish to create Vision be more of a diversion to preoccupy the Avengers as he preps for the destruction of Earth. This would make Ultron more intelligent than he ended up being.   Also I must add, upon reflection, Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver really didn't need to be in this film.  If you take them out everything they do could have been accomplished just as easily with other options.  Of course, Marvel needs Scarlet Witch to be in the next film (another female) so stick her in there and put Quicksilver in too so his death will be her motivation to join up.  When you see that's why they're there you begin to see how manipulative this money machine is.  And like the rest of the world I'm a sucker.  

Mrs. Frisby And The Secret Of NIMH by Robert C. O'Brien

Stories about animals that talk and act like humans can be really fun and this is one of the classics.  Mrs. Frisby is a widow mouse who is trying to protect her family and save her youngest, Timothy, from a sickness.  For help she seeks out a society of super smart rats and learns the truth about how her husband died.  I love the characters in this book.   I read this one aloud to my son and the characters have very distinctive voices.  I highly recommend this one.  A

Three Body Problem by Liu Cixin Translated by Ken Liu (Novel)

This is one of the best science fiction novels I’ve read in a long time. It’s filled with smart sciencific  theory, historical details of China and some visual concepts that I still can’t get out of my mind. China sends out a signal to the stars in an attempt to find intelligent life. Except when a lone scientist receives a message basically begging her not to respond, what is she to do, a woman who watched her family be torn apart by revolution, a woman who believes with all her heart Earth needs to be challenged? She joins the enemy. The first part of a trilogy, I can’t wait for the other translated parts to come out. It’s so nice to be able to read science fiction from another culture’s point of view. There are so many parts to this book that I found inspiring and made me want to look for other countries best of the genre. So do yourself a favor and read this book, embrace your puny existence and challenge the idea that science fiction is only an American craft. Grade: A

Ex Machina (2015)

Alex Garland write and directs a nice contained science fiction thriller about a billionaire who flies in a young programmer to his isolated resort lab to test his newest creation, a female android to see if it has artificial intelligence. Oscar Isaac plays the billionaire and Domhnall Gleeson is the programmer. What I loved about this film was the dialogue from these two extreme intellects. The psychological tension builds with great skill. Alicia Vikander, the android, is also quite good. While I recommend this film for its dramatic work and the gorgeous art design I don’t wish to overpraise it. The ending is good but I wanted it to be so much better, especially when everything up to that point was so great. Also there were some twists and turns that I saw coming. Still this is the kind of “smart” science fiction that I miss seeing in cinema so if you want to celebrate that kind of work, you must see this wonderful almost-masterpiece. Grade: A-