Why did the Mad Titan Thanos (Josh Brolin – W., Sicario) need to grab hold of the power of the six Infinity Stones to destroy the universe? I think it’s important to understand what causes a villain to do certain actions rather than just to have a bad guy. The stronger the villain’s arc and the more we sympathize with them on any level, the more we understand and appreciate the underlying of who they are. In Avengers: Infinity War (directed by Anthony Russo and Joe Russo), we have a powerful bad guy motivated by a tortured past and willing to destroy all the good guys in the universe to atone for it. After the planet Titan is no longer inhabited, he is not allowed to prevent things from destroying it; he thinks he will prevent it. Instead, he lost his planet and everyone on it. Vowing not to let something like that happen again, he makes it his mission to balance the universe by completely wiping out half of it. But to do so, he’ll need all six of the Infinity Stones that will power his Infinity Gauntlet, allowing him to bend time, space, energy, and the laws of physics and reality.
Category Archives: Tom Hiddleston
Kong: Skull Island (2017)
Kong: Skull Island was definitely my most anticipated movie in the first quarter of 2017. Granted, the first three months of the year aren’t usually known for producing the year’s best films. And while Kong: Skull Island won’t be up for any end of year honors and won’t end up on my year’s top ten list (unless this year is God awful for movies), I found it to be a very engaging, exciting, and, if it’s even possible, original. While it wasn’t nearly perfect, this movie was awesome. As excited as I was to see it when I originally saw the trailer, I wasn’t feeling it the day of my viewing. Even with a Rotten Tomatoes score of 79%, I still felt like I would be disappointed. Since seeing it in the theater, I haven’t seen the most recent King Kong movie (the 2005 one starring Naomi Watts and Adrien Brody). I remember liking it a lot. But I don’t remember many of the details. I do remember it being extremely long. It honestly felt like it should have been two movies, and I think that’s why I haven’t watched it since, even though there has been a copy of the DVD sitting on my bookshelf for the last decade. Kong: Skull Island was certainly not a sequel or a prequel, and it didn’t feel completely like a reboot to me either. Sure, there have been other King Kong movies about a group of unknowns visiting Skull Island, but either this one had a different twist than the others, or I wasn’t paying enough attention (which is entirely possible). Still, this movie had a sense of freshness in it that I didn’t suspect. That, plus its visuals, sound, lack of dull/unimportant moments, and relatively short length (118 minutes), allows me to fully endorse this movie as one you should try to see in the theater. Plus, this movie was not created in 3D when it very well could have been. This is a definite plus.
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Crimson Peak (2015)
Guillermo del Toro. Some people love the movies he has directed. Some people don’t love them. I think I am starting to land in the second group. I know he found his early cult following with movies like Hellboy and Hellboy II while also receiving critical accolades for films like The Orphanage and Pan’s Labyrinth. For me, his movies aren’t must-see (I’ve had Pan’s Labyrinth on my list of movies to watch for years, but each time I think I might want to watch it, I put something else on instead). Hellboy and The Orphanage were both okay, but del Toro is no early M Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, Signs). While Crimson Peak has had mostly positive reviews (69% on Rotten Tomatoes), it hasn’t hit home with audiences. Its marketing campaign has hurt its inability to categorize it as humor, mystery, suspense, romance, or drama. This movie attracted del Toro’s best-ever cast ensemble (Mia Wasikowska, Jessica Chastain, Charlie Hunnam, Tom Hiddleston). Still, with an estimated budget of $50 million and only half of that amount accumulated in revenue from the first two weekends, Crimson Peak might barely break even. This movie is by no means great. It was an okay watch, but my life certainly would not have been altered if I had not seen it. I absolutely will never watch this movie again. It certainly is not a horror film, so even though the previews look scary and categorized as horror, you’re not going to be scared. If you like del Toro’s other movies, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed by this one. If you’ve never seen one of his movies before (other than maybe Pacific Rim), I’d suggest watching either The Orphanage or Pan’s Labyrinth at home and base your decision on your fondness of either of those movies.
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Thor (2011)
I don’t know enough about the Thor story coming in, so there were parts of this movie when I wasn’t as confused as I was surprised. I saw Thor after seeing Captain America (even though Thor was released a few months ago). I liked the World War II storyline of Captain America. I also liked the mythology storyline of Thor. However, I was not a fan of the back and forth between and present day. I know that many probably liked this aspect of the movie, but I was so engrossed with the movie’s first 15 minutes that I didn’t want to leave this story to enter “the realm” of the present day.