Aeronautic Primates and Other Delights

Still living that Mass Effect life. Working through ME3 as Shepard Shepard, Earthborn Sole Survivor Infiltrator (although I never, ever use Tactical Cloak). I'm determined to unlock Synthesis (although maybe I'll pick Control, as I've literally never done that before because f**k you Illusive Man).

Movies I've seen before are in italics

To Catch a Thief (1955)
Gilda (1946)
The Sparks Brothers (2021)

I forgot how utterly middling To Catch a Thief is.

I love love love Gilda, except for the ending, which is utterly unearned. But leaving that aside, every sentence in this film has at least two meanings and just working through the layers of subtext is delicious.

I'd never heard of Sparks, but I do know Edgar Wright, so I checked out this documentary. In the end, the band seems very cool but I don't think I'd ever be into them. Quite an array of talking heads in this one.

Still living that Mass Effect lifestyle. Eventually I have to get sick of it, right? Right?

We also finished Steven Universe Future and I didn't cry, but I came damn close. Man, the whole Steven Universe thing is just so good, but Future is really dark and hard to watch in places.

Apparently Critical Role ended its second campaign last week. I feel a bit left out, but that's my own fault for dropping out of the fandom. I'm still in wonderment at how easily I used to be able to just sit and watch four hours of RPG play in a single go. I don't think I'm capable of that anymore.

The Conjuring (2013)
The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (2021)
Rifftrax: Dragon Wars: D-War

I'd never seen The Conjuring (although I did see The Conjuring 2), so sol_se and I pulled it up on HBO Max and watched it in anticipation of the third movie. It's pretty good, but I think The Conjuring 2 is probably better.

As for the third Conjuring movie, they really opened things up a lot, which I think was ultimately to the film's detriment. It's fine, but it's the least of the three films thus far.

Dragon Wars: D-War is a love letter to downtown Los Angeles in a lot of ways, if your love letters end in explosions. It has some incomprehensible mythology and roles for some currently well-known actors before they really hit it big.

Most of this week has been taken up by playing Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2. I burned through both games in about nine days and I'm now on Mass Effect 3. I really expected these games to last me longer, so I'll probably end up doing a Renegade playthrough next (still Fem!Shep because of course).

I went out and about for fun for the first time since the pandemic started (yay for vaccination). I just went to the comic book shop. They didn't have what I wanted, but they did have the first art book for the Mighty Nein Critical Role campaign. I don't watch Critical Role anymore, but I have very fond memories of the time I did, so I picked it up.

Movies I've seen before are in italics

Godzilla vs. Destroyah (1995)
Steven Universe: The Movie (2019)

sol_se and I finished up the Heisei/Versus Godzilla series with a very meh entry. The series started pretty strong and went downhill about midway through. At least this one doesn't feel like it was edited by an amateur.

I am proud to say I only nearly cried during Steven Universe: The Movie. Man, Steven's mom was an asshole.

Finished Steven Universe. Cried like a baby twice in the last episode. Such a good show. Still have to watch the movie and Steven Universe Future. Also watched Lego Masters, which was great, if a little winky-noddy about being a reality competition program.

This week's list is short because most of my time was taken up by television.

Rifftrax: The Journey: Absolution

The Journey: Absolution contains no journeys and no absolution. It does contain Mario Lopez, a scenery-and-cigar-chewing Richard Grieco, and some truly inane dialogue.

On Wednesday, sol_se and I celebrated the third anniversary of our first date. I took the day off and we ate Cheesecake Factory and watched movies and Project Runway All Stars.

Movies I've seen before are in italics

One Dark Night (1983)
Speed Racer (2008)
Rifftrax: The Amazing Mr. X
Rifftrax: Radical Jack
Rifftrax: To Catch a Yeti
Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah (1991)

One Dark Night is weird. It's about a dead psychic messing about in a mausoleum terrorizing high school girls who are there as part of an initiation. It sets up a particular twist ending pretty clearly and then just... doesn't do it. Apparently the distributors cut the original ending? I didn't love it.

We watch Speed Racer every year because it's the first movie we ever watched together. It was nice to actually watch it on the anniversary this year, as last year we were delayed by the pandemic and the move.

I typically wake up earlier than sol_se so I watch Rifftrax and catch up on Twitter. Sometimes it's more Twitter than Rifftrax, as when I slogged through The Amazing Mr. X. Sometimes I'm practically stapled to the Rifftrax though, as with Radical Jack. Overall, the Rifftrax Friends subscription is paying for itself.

We're still working through the Heisei/Versus era of Godzilla in order. Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah is one of my favorites, as it really decides to work in all the goofy stuff and isn't shy about it.

More Project Runway! I also finished Ted Lasso. What a good show.

Been having a run of meh-to-bad days. I need to get vaccinated so I can get out of the house again.

Movies I've seen before are in italics

Rifftrax: Death Promise
Terror of Mechagodzilla (1975)

With Terror of Mechagodzilla, I've officially taken sol_se on the full tour of the Showa-era Godzilla movies. I might like to do the Heisei series next, but I don't own most of it anymore, so it would be somewhat difficult.

Due to an oversight, I forgot to mention Slaxx in my most recent My Week in Movies post. This is a crime. This is a new horror movie on Shudder about a pair of killer pants. It is much better than it has any right to be. It's not only funny, it also has a very specific point of view and something to say.

I haven't forgotten about My Week in Movies. This week at work has been a trash fire and I just haven't had the brain cycles for it, especially since last week was a vacation week so there were a lot of movies. With any luck, there should be a double-size post on Sunday.

The fact that I don't have a Godzilla icon is tragic, but I'd have to cut something like 39 other icons in order to upload a new one, owing to the fact that I still have old icons from when I had a paid account.

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

Rifftrax: Gammera the Invincible
Variety Lights (1950)
Rifftrax: Bermuda Triangle
Lucky (2020)
Color Out of Space (2019)
The White Sheik (1952)
Godzilla vs. Hedorah (1971)
Satanic Panic (2019)

Two things happened in the last week that are probably going to alter the content of the movie lists for at least a little bit. First, I bought Criterion's Essential Fellini box set on sale. It's fourteen of Fellini's greatest films. I'll be watching all of them in order, except I'm skipping La Strada because f**k that movie. Second, sol_se subscribed to Shudder, the horror-dedicated streaming service. We already have something like 40-50 movies in our shared queue.

Variety Lights says it's co-directed by Fellini, but the other director basically just put his name on it to give him a leg up in the film industry. Still, it's Fellini's script and it follows some of Fellini's particular interests. It also features Fellini's wife in a major role. I liked it, but it was tricky to get through because the protagonist was kind of a terrible person.

Bermuda Triangle was awful. Just awful. The Rifftrax team worked really hard to make it work, but they were stretched a bit thin during the interminable scuba diving scene.

Lucky has an interesting concept. Every night, a man comes and tries to kill the same woman. If he's killed, he simply disappears to reappear the following night. sol_se and I were ready to dig into the mystery, but eventually the film came out waving a big flag that said "ALLEGORY FOR VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN". Overall disappointing.

Color Out of Space is very good. It's also disturbing as hell. Nicolas Cage goes full Cage, so your mileage may vary.

The White Sheik is Fellini's first full directorial effort and I was not expecting much. It's just not a film that really comes up when you talk about Fellini, so I figured it was probably him still working out the kinks. It is, to some extent, but it's also a very easy watch. There's very little that really wows, but the story is solid and keeps you interested.

We're still slowly working through the Godzilla box set from my birthday. We're firmly in the weeds now. At least Godzilla vs. Hedorah isn't as bad as Son of Godzilla.

Satanic Panic probably should have been a better movie. It's fine. It does what it wants to do and it does it in less than 90 minutes. I'm not sure what choices they could've made to improve the film, but I do feel like there were missed opportunities.

It was my birthday on Monday! It's also been my first birthday in a long time that didn't coincide with TGIF/F. sol_se made it all magical with a present of Rifftrax and chocolate sheet cake!

Movies I've seen before are in italics

My Bloody Valentine (1981)
The Seventh Seal (1957)
Rifftrax: Attack of the Super Monsters
Wet Hot American Summer (2001)
Rifftrax Live: Summer Shorts Beach Party
20 Million Miles to Earth (1957)
Godzilla Raids Again (1955)
Rifftrax: Wonder Women

Yes, we watched My Bloody Valentine on Valentine's Day. It is not good, but for the genre, it's not bad either.

I leveraged my birthday to make sol_se watch Ingmar Bergman. It occurred to me halfway through that a better introduction probably would have been Wild Strawberries, but alas. Still such a good film and unexpectedly funny in places.

Attack of the Super Monsters is... amazing. It's live action monsters-in-suits, but animated people. It seems like it should be the other way around or all animated. It's very bad and very well riffed.

I love Wet Hot American Summer and I may very well rewatch the prequel series now. I still haven't seen the sequel series all the way through.

20 Million Miles to Earth is one of the original Harryhausen classics and it stands up. It's no great shakes in terms of plot or anything, but if you want stop-motion monster action, this will hit the spot.

Mom sent me a gift card for my birthday and I used it to buy Criterion's Godzilla collection, which is all Godzilla movies 1954 - 1975 in a beautiful art book. In some ways, it's a downgrade from my existing Godzilla box set, because it doesn't have many special features except on the original, but it's gorgeous and complete and I love it. We watched Godzilla Raids Again which is... fine. It doesn't really get why the original is special and the climax is super-tedious.

Wonder Women has nothing to do with Diana Prince. It's a weird action-women-sci-fi thing, filmed with absolutely no regard for human or animal life.