Aeronautic Primates and Other Delights

Oops. Let's not do that again.

I had a miserable week last week when I was off my ADHD meds for five days due to an ever-cascading series of f**kups, mostly not mine. I ended up taking two non-consecutive days off of work, which I'm sure didn't look weird at all.

I've been playing a lot of LEGO DC Super Villains which is cute as most LEGO games are.

This week I'm in Des Moines to see family, so there may not be any movies to post about.

Movies I've seen before are in italics.

Godzilla 2000 (1999)

Fear Street: 1994 (2021)
The Suicide Squad (2021)
Annette (2021)
Aquaman (2018)

sol_se and I are back on our Godzilla bullsh**t, working through the Millennium series. Godzilla 2000 is a perfectly serviceable entry with no great highs or lows.

I really liked Fear Street: 1994 and look forward to completing the trilogy eventually.

The Suicide Squad is a ton of fun. I'm really glad that Warner is committed to doing hybrid releases through the end of the year, because it's nice to watch these new movies at home sometimes. Margot Robbie is a delight as Harley Quinn as usual. King Shark is deadly and adorable. Be warned, this movie earns its R rating.

Annette. Where to start with Annette. I just felt like Sparks (the musicians who wrote the story and the music) were just screwing with me the whole time. It's a musical where everyone just states what they are feeling and doing in the most banal terms possible. There's some other strangeness that I won't spoil, but yeah. I was never bored, but I think I'm angry at the movie? I hope there's some artistic conceit I'm missing and the movie is secretly brilliant.

Aquaman is stupid fun and there's not much more to say about it.

Finished playing through The Outer Worlds. Poked at a couple other games before settling on Dragon Age: Inquisition again. I think. The Hinterlands are trying my patience a little.

Went to the comic book shop and swapped opinions about Black Widow and Loki. It's nice to get out and be social in limited quantities.

Here's the movie list:

Gunpowder Milkshake (2021)
Rifftrax: Pressure Point

Gunpowder Milkshake is delightful and fun and somewhat inventive.

Pressure Point is from a low budget film production company in Delaware of all places. It's very bad and is basically the same plot as Radical Jack, another Rifftraxed movie from the same people.

I think I've petered out on Mass Effect. While I still have a couple of different playthroughs I can do, I've been playing these games for a month straight. I've switched to Outer Worlds as a breather game, especially as there is DLC I haven't played.

Finally socialized for the first time in over a year, going over to airawyn's place for a small gathering. It was a lot of fun and I didn't forget how to talk to people! I think.

Here's the very short movie list:

Fate of the Furious (2017)

I'm all caught up on Fast and Furious movies that are out on digital disc. I still need to see F9, though.

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.

I had a vacation March 12-20, but when I came back, work was a trash fire, so we're doing a double this week.

Movies I've seen before are in italics

Rifftrax Live: Night of the Living Dead
Freaky (2020)
Godzilla: Final Wars (2004)
La Dolce Vita (1960)
Vampyres (1974)
8 1/2 (1963)
Leprechaun (1993)
Leprechaun 2 (1994)
Leprechaun 3 (1995)
Juliet of the Spirits (1965)
Toby Dammit (1968)
Zach Snyder's Justice League (2021)
Godzilla vs. Megalon (1973)

Rifftrax Live: Octaman
Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla (1974)
Rifftrax: Catwomen of the Moon
Rifftrax: Honor and Glory

I liked Freaky a lot, although I had less trouble buying Vince Vaughn as a teenage girl than I did as a slasher-style killer.

I hit a stopping point in the Fellini box set. I worry that I spent money on a box set for a director that ultimately isn't for me. Don't get me wrong, I liked La Dolce Vita up until the last vignette and I still love 8 1/2. I just don't think the set is bringing me the joy that, ironically, the Ingmar Bergman set did.

Vampyres is a lesbian vampire film that desperately needs a plot. sol_se and I kept waiting for the plot to kick in. Eventually we realized it just wasn't going to happen and we resigned ourselves to finishing the movie.

On St. Patrick's Day, I remembered that I had a triple feature of Leprechaun movies. They are quite bad. We decided that Warwick Davis is actually playing three separate leprechauns with three separate sets of rules, perhaps in three separate continuities. Of the three, the second one is probably the "best", although it has some rapey subtext, so I can't recommend it. So basically don't do what I've done.

We watched all of Zach Snyder's four-hour cut of Justice League more-or-less in one sitting. I probably like it better than the theatrical release, although I have objections to some of Snyder's decisions, most of them centered around Superman. Snyder does not understand the character on any level.

You may have noticed a lot of Rifftrax. I just put in for a subscription to Rifftrax Friends, which is their streaming service. Yeah, everybody has a streaming service these days. They just have so much of their catalogue on there, it made more sense than waiting for stuff to pop up on Pluto or Amazon Prime.