“I know that’s your camera, sir, but technically, that’s my film.”

I am a sincere JJ Abrams fan and consider myself someone fond of his many quirks as a director. He has a peculiar way of filming scenes that feels both brazenly artistic and a little slapdash. His blocking isn’t particularly striking but the camera moves with so much ion that it’s hard not to be won over by a blockbuster behaving in such a way. It’s like they’re self…

“I told you it was in here.”

A massive step up from the quaint but satisfying original. They reach beyond frivolous thrills and make a valiant attempt to be thoughtful and land every emotional beat they need to. It’s a rush that speaks to the joy of finally finding your calling. Takes the idea of found family to another level by giving so many dragons a unique personality. The animation is spectacular and uses the medium for what it’s meant…

“This message will self destruct in 5 seconds.”

A film that’s probably bad yet retains a measure of likability for the audaciousness of its final stunt. Large swaths of this movie are absolutely useless, with a maddening frequency of clips we’ve seen before. I had this same issue with Matrix Resurrections and I don’t know why filmmakers think it’s cool to just insert shit from previous movies. It’s bad enough to do it, but Final Reckoning pushes far beyond the…

“Some people are born to play music.”

As someone from Mississippi this was a trip since so much of the state still resembles the burden depicted in this film. I grew up traveling to see family and was always thrown back by the archaic circumstances people have to live through. Generations of black people forced to live under the thumb of slavery-with-more-steps since the country eagerly turned their back on them while still demanding the product the region can produce.…