Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw (2019)

The Low-Down: Sometimes, you build a cinematic universe by design (hopefully). Other times, you build it almost by accident. When The Fast And The Furious was released way back in 2001, no one could have foreseen it spawning a box-office-busting franchise that has since raked in more than $5 billion over eight films. Deciding to create this spin-off focusing on two of the franchise’s newest and most charismatic additions – the titular Hobbs and Shaw – must have been a no-brainer. Unfortunately, this film feels like a literal no-brainer too, its weak, cluttered script mostly failing to support its inexplicably talented cast.

The Story: If you’ve never watched a single Fast & Furious film (like this reviewer), you won’t be too lost. It’s fairly easy to pick up the threads of the spiky rivalry between American federal agent Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) and British assassin-with-a-past Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham). Their mutual loathing takes a back-seat when both men end up on the same mission: chasing down a potentially world-destroying super-virus embedded in Deckard’s sister, MI6 agent Hattie Shaw (Vanessa Kirby). Hot on their heels is the cybernetically enhanced Brixton Lore (Idris Elba), who’s hellbent on securing the super-virus for his sinister employers.

The Good: When deployed effectively, Johnson and Statham are marvels of charisma and comic timing – well able to steal scenes, if not entire films, with snappy, snarky ease. On occasion, their electric charm and chemistry flare to life during Hobbs & Shaw, but it doesn’t happen often enough to save the film from its weak script and haphazard editing. That said, there’s some joy to be had in watching Hobbs & Shaw’s outrageously good supporting cast, which includes top-notch character actors like Helen Mirren and Eddie Marsan. Elba, for his part, acquits himself fairly well as a rampaging cyborg with a broken soul hidden somewhere beneath his menace and machinery.

The Not-So-Good: Unfortunately, the film never really lives up to the potential of its cast. The screenplay by Chris Morgan and Drew Pearce is frustratingly flabby. It’s the kind of script in which a strong female character is only as strong as the film needs her to be – Kirby tries her best, but is given next to nothing to flesh out the role of Hattie. Hobbs & Shaw also fails to help its titular double act move from the sidelines into the spotlight. Their incredibly juvenile playground bickering and bantering becomes wearisome after a while, making it harder to buy into the film’s attempts to delve into their histories and families. In grand Fast & Furious tradition, the action sequences are big and bonkers, bouncing from London to Moscow and even Samoa – but, shorn of effective character development, they also feel empty and soulless, strung together to pad out a running time that’s already far too long.

Lock It Down: If you’re familiar with Leitch’s recent filmography, you won’t be surprised by an extended cameo in Hobbs & Shaw that proves to be one of the film’s highlights. It’s the kind of blithely cheeky stuff that Leitch has proven he can pull off well – he juggled heart and humour to great effect in Deadpool 2. But Hobbs & Shaw never quite knows what it wants to be – silly or earnest, dumb or dark – and winds up being neither and nothing.

Recommended? Only if you’re a Fast & Furious devotee, or a diehard fan of Johnson and/or Statham. Otherwise, Hobbs & Shaw is a muddled mess that will sorely test your patience and tolerance for poorly-written, testosterone-fuelled shenanigans.

The Lion King (2019)

 

The Low-Down: For the past decade, Disney has dedicated an immense amount of resources to translating its classic animated films into live-action blockbusters – with varying degrees of success. This new incarnation of The Lion King is unusual because it is, in itself, another kind of animated film: all its creatures, great and small, are computer-generated to look photo-real. The technical wizardry on display is undoubtedly impressive. But the final film winds up undermining its own existence – what is the point of re-making something that evidently works so much better with traditional hand-drawn animation?

The Story: If you’ve seen the original 1994 film, there’ll be no surprises here. We are introduced to the adorable Simba (voiced by JD McCrary as a cub, before ageing into Donald Glover), the little prince who will one day lead his pride as a king. But even the best-laid succession plans crumble into dust when Simba’s sinister uncle, Scar (Chiwetel Ejiofor), plots against reigning king Mufasa (James Earl Jones). After tragedy strikes, Simba is forced to build a new life for himself – even though his true destiny lies far closer to home.

The Good: There’s no denying that the cutting-edge technology used to bring Simba’s pridelands to life is really quite remarkable. It’s photo-real in a way that probably wasn’t possible even a few years ago, and you’d be forgiven for thinking you’ve stumbled onto a sublimely shot nature documentary if you watch this film without the sound on. That’s not advisable, however, as director Jon Favreau clearly put some effort into engineering a new soundscape for the film. Elton John’s score is beautifully refreshed, mixed with a fresh energy and rhythm that work very well (even though the new songs – Beyonce’s Spirit and John’s end-credits number, Never Too Late – aren’t particularly memorable). The new voice cast is mostly very appealing. Glover never quite manages to slip under Simba’s skin, but Ejiofor deliciously unearths several shades of evil as Scar, and John Oliver is a hoot as fluttery hornbill advisor Zazu.

The Not-So-Good: The biggest problem with this film is that its best feature also happens to be its worst. This new kind of photo-real animation looks great, but it somehow manages to appear life-like while lacking any actual life. As it turns out, hyper-realistic lions can’t emote or talk like humans, so it borders on the ridiculous (and unnerving) to have them do just that. Moments that broke your heart in the original 1994 film might make you giggle 25 years later. It’s unfortunate, too, that Favreau’s film hews so closely to its predecessor’s script and story beats. With that crucial spark of life – or soul, as it were – already missing from these lions, you’ll only become more aware of the weaknesses that have always been a part of Simba’s rather patchy emotional trajectory. (Chiefly: does he actually learn anything? Guilt and grief alone do not a character’s growth make.)

Comic Relief: Favreau’s film almost slavishly follows its predecessor, except it allows comedians Billy Eichner and Seth Rogen a little room to riff as Timon (meerkat) and Pumbaa (warthog) respectively. Together, they provide some of the film’s funniest – as well as its most annoying – moments. In one instance, they make an inspired reference to another classic Disney movie that’s a surefire crowd-pleaser, even though its cheeky meta-textuality adds to the film’s tonal woes.

Recommended? Not particularly. This Lion King is more misfire than masterpiece.

 

Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019)

The Low-Down: There’s a lot riding on the slim, young shoulders of everyone’s friendly neighbourhood Spider-Man. Far From Home is the first film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) since the recent double-whammy of Avengers movies changed the status quo forever. Where does the most successful superhero franchise in the world go after this? Can non-legacy superheroes – like Spider-Man, Black Panther, Captain Marvel etc – carry on where Iron Man left off? Is the MCU running out of steam? It’s a big burden for a relatively smaller film in the franchise to carry. But Far From Home does so very well by zeroing in on what has successfully fuelled the MCU thus far: prizing character development above all to tell a story that’s as emotional as it is entertaining.

The Story: Peter Parker (Tom Holland) is trying to find his bearings in an unsettled world. He, along with half his school-mates, has suddenly reappeared on Earth – unaged and not at all dead – five years after the Snap. His mentor, Tony Stark, haunts him in the form of video tributes and street art. There’s something strange going on between Aunt May (Marisa Tomei) and Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau), Tony’s Head of Security. Amidst the uncertainty, all Peter wants is to get back to normal: to enjoy his school trip to Europe, and to let MJ (Zendaya) know how he really feels about her. But world-saving duties wait for no young man. Suddenly, Peter is roped in by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) to do battle alongside Quentin Beck a.k.a. Mysterio (Jake Gyllenhaal), taking down rogue Elementals that have already ravaged one world and are hellbent on destroying another.

The Good: At its best, Far From Home impressively blends the awkward comedy of a coming-of-age romantic drama with country-hopping superhero action thrills. It’s a delight to watch Peter use his superhuman skills as Spider-Man to navigate his way through hormonal messes of his own making – often in the same scene. This is as intriguing a narrative direction as the MCU has ever taken: using a lighter, more humorous lens to examine the aftermath of Endgame’s darker, considerably more mature themes. At the same time, Far From Home finds a rather ingenious way to quietly become one of the MCU’s most political films. (More on this later.) It’s worth noting, too, that, in a franchise filled with sublime casting coups, Holland continues to prove himself to be one of its very best. He dances nimbly through Peter’s high-school misadventures, while still tapping into the heartbroken, traumatised core of his character.

The Not-So-Good: With the action focused so squarely on Peter, his friends – especially his love interest – invariably suffer. Jacob Batalon is as goofily charming as ever as Ned, Peter’s best friend, but he might as well have the words ‘comic relief’ tattooed across his forehead. Zendaya’s sparky, sarcastic MJ – while still an interesting twist on a classic character – comes dangerously close to being a damsel in distress. And, while Jon Watts’ direction is more zippy and confident than it was on Homecoming, he doesn’t always land or weave narrative beats together very effectively. As a result, the film occasionally sags when it should soar.

One of Life’s Great Mysterios: What is Gyllenhaal – indie movie darling and theatre thespian – doing in an MCU movie? It might seem like one of life’s great mysteries… but all will soon come clear once you realise just what drew him to the part of Quentin Beck. Fans of the comics will know that there’s far more to the character than what we saw in the trailers, but nothing will prepare them for how brilliantly he’s been reinvented for the MCU. Essentially, this is a gift of a role for the prodigiously gifted Gyllenhaal – allowing him to play every shade of hero (including a few notes of uncanny similarity to Robert Downey Jr’s Tony Stark), while also indulging his more whimsical, theatrical side. In retrospect, it’s easy to see how Gyllenhaal must have been drawn to the grim relevance of Quentin’s storyline to the world in which we live today. Just as Black Panther examined race and Captain Marvel explored toxic masculinity, Far From Home asks audiences to think about the concepts of truth and reality – at a time when both are very much under threat.

Fan Fare: Marvel has trained us all well – never leave the theatre before the credits stop rolling, for fear of missing a funny moment or a narrative nugget that hints at future films and storylines. This reaches a new level of necessity with Far From Home. Each mindblowing scene – one midway through and one at the very end of the credits – is vital to knowing (or, at least, guessing) where the MCU is going next. Also, watch out for one of Tony Stark’s beloved A.I. acronyms: it will apply, in a subversively clever way, to more than one character in the film, drawing laughs in one instance, and eliciting a deep sense of foreboding in another.

Recommended? Absolutely. There might be a few growing pains here and there, but Marvel has hit another home run – grappling effectively and emotionally with its immediate past, while raising the storytelling stakes for the future.

Toy Story 4 (2019)

The Low-Down: 24 years ago, Pixar’s Toy Story quite literally changed the face of animation as we know it. The film presented an entirely new way of telling a story, bringing characters to life via CGI – pixels over pencils, so to speak. At the same time, Toy Story set a new high standard for storytelling in film, proving conclusively that animated movies aren’t just for kids. In the intervening decades, the franchise has even made a strong case in favour of sequels – demonstrating that they’re not necessarily soulless cash-grabs. Toy Story 4 is very much a part of that grand tradition. This is smart, soulful, sublime film-making: somehow entertaining and profound all at once.

The Story: Sheriff Woody (voiced by Tom Hanks) is trying his best to adjust to life with Bonnie (Madeleine McGraw) – the little girl who inherited Andy’s beloved childhood toys at the end of Toy Story 3. Even though he’s forgotten more often than not, Woody remains intensely focused on Bonnie and her happiness. This means going into full babysitter/bodyguard mode when Bonnie creates Forky (Tony Hale), a spork with twists of wire for hands and clumsy wooden popsicle sticks for feet. As Woody tries to keep the trash-oriented Forky safe, he’s swept into an accidental adventure – one in which he meets old friends and learns new truths about who he is and who he has yet to be.

The Great: Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Toy Story 4 is the fact that it feels like the natural, necessary final chapter of a story told in four parts. There’s no way that any of this could have been planned when Pixar first introduced us to Woody in 1995, but the progression in both narrative and character development feels utterly organic. Woody has spent the last three films grappling with his existential fear of being lost, forgotten or replaced, from his first meeting with the brash Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) to the day Andy outgrew him and went away to college. This film challenges Woody – and his audiences – to think hard about second chances, about changing how you look at yourself, about finding and embracing a new purpose in life. As such, Toy Story 4 might be the most philosophical movie you’ll see this year, in the best possible way.

The Not-So-Great: There actually isn’t all that much to complain about. The plot machinations can feel a little clunky at times, but Stephany Folsom and Andrew Stanton weave so much joy and humour into their screenplay that the film still zips along. As this is very much Woody’s movie, fan-favourite legacy characters like Buzz and Jessie (Joan Cusack) inevitably end up taking a back-seat. Even then, however, they each still get moments to shine. You might find yourself both thoroughly amused and mildly annoyed by the antics of Ducky (Keagan Michael-Key) and Bunny (Jordan Peele), a symbiotic pair of new characters who were clearly inserted into proceedings for comic relief.

Forking Funny: Give it up for Forky, surely the best new animated character of the year. Voiced with a bewildered tenderness by Hale, Forky is a delight – a walking, talking identity crisis created out of one little girl’s love and imagination. Even better? With his magnetic attraction to all nearby trash-cans, Forky is a fandom meme just waiting to happen. A close runner-up is daredevil stuntman Duke Caboom, who reportedly owes his ridiculously charming posing and personality to current internet darling Keanu Reeves’ commitment to the role. Toy Story 4 even manages to make its main antagonist, Gabby Gabby (Christina Hendricks), both terrifying and endearing – although there are fewer shades of grey when it comes to her ventriloquist-doll minions, led by the determinedly creepy Benson.

Cowboy Blues: Ultimately, Toy Story 4 belongs to Woody, and rightfully so. He is this franchise’s Captain America, in more ways than one. This film pays loving tribute to Woody’s big heart and unwavering, self-effacing loyalty, even as it shakes up his life and world-view when he encounters old friend and possible paramour Bo Peep (Annie Potts) again. (Bo, by the way, is now super-cool and as far away from a fragile damsel-in-distress as anyone can be.) Woody’s decisions and revelations about himself will make you weep with the most complex and bittersweet of emotions. There is joy and sorrow here, hope and heartbreak, final farewells and new beginnings, often in the same moment. In other words, it’s the stuff of life itself, and it’s glorious.

Credits Where Credits Are Due: You’ll definitely want to stay throughout the credits of the film, which are peppered with closing scenes that are essential to tying up the overarching narrative. At the very end, you’ll even be rewarded with a happy ending for one of Toy Story 4’s most minor of characters.

Recommended? In every possible way. Toy Story 4 is a masterpiece of film-making, story-telling and animation. Delightful and devastating in equal measure, it might well be the silliest and most soul-stirring film you’ll see this year.

X-Men: Dark Phoenix (2019)

The Low-Down: In the age of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and the Avengers, it can be hard to forget that the X-Men were actually here first. The hyper-kinetic, gloriously operatic X-Men (2000) made blockbuster superhero movies cool again – plucking several of Marvel Comics’ best characters out of cult comic books and launching them into the mainstream. It’s a shame that such an iconic franchise is ending with a whimper rather than a bang. X-Men: Dark Phoenix is the final installment in the series – because it has to be, now that Fox is merging with Disney/Marvel. But the film does itself no favours in revisiting a storyline that was already told, albeit rather poorly, in The Last Stand (2006).

The Story: We’ve already met the ridiculously powerful cosmic force that is the Phoenix: it latched onto Famke Janssen’s Jean Grey over a decade ago, and decimated a bunch of fan-favourite characters in its fiery wake. This time around, the Phoenix finds a host in Sophie Turner’s younger Jean Grey, unlocking past trauma and present angst as it burns through the childhood defenses put in place in Jean’s mind by Professor Charles Xavier (James McAvoy). As Jean goes on the run, her former allies rush to find her – some set on protecting her, others on eliminating the threat she poses to their safety and loved ones. But can they save her from Vuk (Jessica Chastain), the ice-cold leader of an alien race hellbent on claiming the Phoenix’s power for herself?

The Good: There’s actually a decent amount of good seeded throughout Dark Phoenix. Most intriguing of all is the film’s darker take on Xavier – he’s usually portrayed as an unequivocally good (and therefore slightly boring) character, devoted to his young charges and leading the fight for a better, more unbiased world. Paired with a fascinating, almost petulant performance from McAvoy, Dark Phoenix reminds us that, sometimes, the road to Hell on Earth is paved with good intentions. Long-time X-Men writer Simon Kinberg makes his directorial debut, and proves more than equal to the task of whipping up fantastically thrilling action sequences. He peppers the film with plenty of lovely imagery and aesthetic touches: from Jean’s hair taking on a life of its own when she’s in Phoenix mode, to Quicksilver (Evan Peters) speed-climbing a whirlwind of debris.

The Not-So-Good: It’s hard to shake the feeling that there isn’t much reason for this film to exist, other than giving Kinberg the opportunity to take a second stab at the same story. (He co-wrote The Last Stand, to eternal fan derision.) Dark Phoenix edges closer to the classic Chris Claremont storyline in the comics, but it never quite fulfils its own potential. The Xavier subplot doesn’t get anywhere near the true depth or darkness it deserves. Chastain is brilliant casting, but for no real reason. If the screenplay had supported her better, Chastain could have transformed Vuk into a properly sympathetic antagonist; instead, she’s stuck in the key of one-dimensional supervillain. We get a peek at Genosha, a mutant safe haven under the governance of Erik Lensherr/Magneto (Michael Fassbender) – but we don’t linger there.

Phoenix Rising: Turner isn’t given much to do other than glower and fret, but she does it all well enough. The trouble is Jean Grey as a character. In all her incarnations, including in the comics, she gains immeasurable power, but loses all agency. She seems strong, but is actually a frustratingly passive protagonist. That’s compounded here by literally everyone around her constantly telling her what to do – from Charles, Erik and the annoyingly maternal Raven Darkholme (Jennifer Lawrence), to her well-meaning boyfriend, Scott Summers (Tye Sheridan), and the relentless Vuk. Is Jean supposed to master her emotions, to repress her powers, to stay quiet? Or is she supposed to unleash them, to revel in them, to metaphorically shout about her remarkable abilities? It’s a conundrum that exists in the source material – and this film makes a strong case for retiring Claremont’s Dark Phoenix for good.

Recommended? If you’ve ever loved the X-Men, you’ll probably want to say goodbye to this incarnation of these beloved characters before they’re resurrected in the MCU. But this is a decidedly middling installment in the franchise – not as dreadful as Apocalypse, but nowhere near the giddy heights of X-Men or Logan.

Godzilla II: King Of The Monsters (2019)

The Low-Down: With Marvel raking in the cash and plaudits after creating the world’s most epic cinematic universe, every studio that can thread movies together – however tenuously – is hopping on the bandwagon. And so we have Godzilla II: King Of The Monsters: the third installment in Legendary Pictures’ MonsterVerse, following Godzilla (2014) and Kong: Skull Island (2017). It’s easily the most ambitious film yet, uniting several classic critters straight out of Godzilla lore and finding pretty much any excuse to have them fight one another. The final result is both bold and bonkers – good and bad, often in the very same moment.

The Story: Monsters break stuff, including people. It’s a fact of life that the broken Russell family must deal with after Godzilla’s epic battle leaves downtown San Francisco in ruins. Grieving and newly sober, Mark (Kyle Chandler) stalks wolf packs in another part of the world. Emma (Vera Farmiga), his ex-wife, continues to work on the Orca, a machine they created together that can emit soundwaves capable of calming or infuriating Godzilla-scale monsters. Madison (Millie Bobby Brown), their precocious daughter, is caught in between – especially when Emma’s decision to use the Orca sets off a chain of monstrous events that could lead to the end of the world as we know it.

The Good: The concept at the heart of Godzilla II, quite frankly, is off-the-wall wacky – so bold and audacious and weird that you have to give director/co-screenwriter Michael Dougherty some credit for effort, even if his execution of it is somewhat lacklustre. This is no mere story of monsters raining mayhem down upon mankind. Instead, the film moves its mythology quite firmly into the realm of faith; Godzilla, the film suggests, is as much god as monster. It’s actually quite remarkable to see a mainstream blockbuster movie embrace – rather than shy away from – religious iconography, folding in theologies and environmental philosophies from Greek myth to Thanos. As such, Godzilla and his arch-nemesis, King Ghidorah (a three-headed Hydra-esque dragon beast), aren’t just having their version of a bar-room brawl – their earth-shaking clash is a battle for the survival of humanity.

The Not-So-Good: It’s a shame that the film as a whole can’t keep up with its high-concept ideas. The writing ranges from inspired to insipid, with character motivations dancing ridiculously back and forth – dictated mostly by the rather demented plot. As a director, Dougherty exhibited some skill with subversive comedy in cult horror flick Krampus, but very little of that is evident here. It’s not just about sacrificing soul for scale – Dougherty occasionally struggles with telling such a massive story in visual terms. Some of the film’s action sequences are so choppy as to be downright confusing. It doesn’t help that Dougherty’s preferred aesthetic tends towards the grey and grim, which makes it even harder to figure out just what is going on while monsters are duking it out in frustratingly murky lighting.

The Monster Mash: The first Godzilla film in the franchise suffered for shoving its titular monster into the background, having him play second fiddle to human characters who weren’t all that well-written to begin with. Godzilla II tries to rectify that, somewhat, by flinging so many monsters at the screen that you’d be almost glad to get back to the human drama after a while. Apart from Godzilla and Ghidorah, fans will be glad to see old-school Toho favourites like Mothra and Rodan in action too. (If they could actually see them, that is. Seriously – the monsters are beautifully rendered, but the bruise-toned lighting does them no favours.)

God(zilla)-Level Casting: If Dougherty learned one thing from his predecessor, Gareth Edwards, it’s the importance of casting a bunch of top-notch character actors in an otherwise barmy creature feature. Veteran performers like Oscar nominee Farmiga, West Wing alumnus Whitford and Charles Dance (that’s Tywin Lannister to you) reel off awkward exposition and pseudo-scientific claptrap (“bio-acoustics”, “the Oxygen Destroyer”) like it’s actual real human dialogue. It’s quite remarkable to see Friday Night Lights’ Coach Eric Taylor in action anti-hero mode, but Chandler – just as Bryan Cranston did in the 2014 film – brings an everyman weight to a character whose narrative arc is muddled, to say the least. The MVP here, though, is Brown. She brings to Madison the same soulful blend of toughness and tenderness that made her such a breakout star in Netflix’s Stranger Things.

Recommended? It depends. Godzilla II is a hot mess… but it’s a fascinating hot mess, and surprisingly fun to watch and even think about.

Aladdin (2019)

The Low-Down: For the past decade, Disney has been mining its treasure trove of animated classics for live-action remake fodder. Thus far, the results have been charming enough, though none of them has made a definitive case for or against telling the same story in a different medium. Aladdin has the rather dubious distinction of tilting the debate in favour of leaving well enough alone. Notwithstanding a few welcome sparks of colour and reinvention, this remake will struggle to convince anyone that it needed to exist. In fact, it provides concrete proof that – however good, however photo-real modern special effects have become – there are some things that just work better when animated.

The Story: You know the drill – Aladdin (Mena Massoud) is a street rat with a heart of gold, picking pockets to stay alive in the bustling markets of Agrabah. He’s recruited by Jafar (Marwan Kenzari) – nefarious, ambitious vizier to the Sultan (Navid Negahban) – to steal a magic lamp from the Cave of Wonders. Aladdin’s life takes a turn for the weird and wonderful when he rubs said lamp, freeing an all-powerful Genie (Will Smith) who grants him three wishes. With the Genie’s help, Aladdin makes his bid for the heart of Princess Jasmine (Naomi Scott). But romance falls by the wayside when Jafar sets his evil plans into motion.

The Good: There are some welcome efforts to update elements of Aladdin’s story to better reflect the world in which we live today. In the 1992 original, it was always frustrating that a princess with the intelligence and independent spirit of Jasmine had to find a husband to rule Agrabah. This remake doesn’t derail the romance, but it does make time to return Jasmine her agency – making clear that she’s the one in the relationship with all the (political) power. It’s a shame that Speechless, the new song she’s been given to explore her inner turmoil, feels so out-of-place in both the film and the score. The tune is disposable, presumably fished out of composer Alan Menken’s bottom drawer, with pop anthem lyrics by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul that are frustratingly generic. But hey – effort appreciated.

The Not-So-Good: Unfortunately, the rest of Aladdin never quite lives up to the spectacular  heights of the original film. It’s decently made, for the most part, and the action sequences are gratifying to watch. In live action, Aladdin is something of a parkour practitioner, the camera chasing after him on his gravity-defying sprints through the streets of Agrabah. But the magic is curiously gone, bled out of scenes that should crackle with joy and emotion, like Prince Ali and A Whole New World. Apart from a couple of goofy moments that feel charmingly improvised, you won’t be able to spot director Guy Ritchie’s chaotic comic streak in the film at all. Almost all of its best bits – specifically the friendship between Aladdin and the Genie – are lifted, beat for beat, from its predecessor.

I (Don’t Want To) Dream Of Genie: Robin Williams’ Genie is one of Disney’s towering achievements – his every motion, facial expression and quicksilver transformation like lighting captured in a bottle, literally and figuratively. It’s truly one of the most sublime marriages of actor and animation ever: Robin Williams is the Genie, and the Genie is Robin Williams. It’s actually unfair to expect anyone to fill Williams’ enormous shoes, even someone like Smith, who has bucketloads of natural charisma of his own. Here, he’s not only hamstrung by having to give a performance already perfected by someone else – he’s saddled with unfortunate character design (that gigantic, puffed-up torso) and occasionally ropey CGI. As a result, Smith’s Genie becomes the stuff of nightmares. It should come as no surprise that Smith is most effective in the scenes when he isn’t big and blue. The opposite can be said of Jafar, who was made all the more sinister by his distinctively arch appearance in the animated film – something Kenzari can’t possibly hope to approximate as a real human person. At least the film’s animal companions (Abu, Rajah and Iago) are wonderfully rendered, which gives one hope for Disney’s next live-action remake, The Lion King.

Recommended? Not particularly. Aladdin tries, quite hard, but doesn’t make a convincing argument for its own existence – and occasionally threatens to ruin your childhood.

Pokémon Detective Pikachu

The Low-Down: There really is no better time for Hollywood to release its first live-action Pokémon movie. Generations of children – who are now adults with spending power – have grown up dreaming of becoming Pokémon trainers. Since their creation in the mid-1990s, the (mostly) adorable creatures known as Pokémon (‘pocket monsters’) have captured hearts and imaginations all over the world – through video-games, animated television shows, movies and more. The advent of Pokémon Go in 2016 has taken the franchise into the global mainstream, boosting its name recognition even among those who couldn’t have differentiated between a Bulbasaur and a Charmander just a few years ago. Fortunately, Detective Pikachu doesn’t come across as just a cynical cash-grab – it will delight its devoted fan base, but is also smart and charming enough to appeal to a wider audience.

The Story: Tim Goodman (Justice Smith) has lived a life as far away from his childhood dream of becoming a Pokémon trainer as you can get. Working quietly in the insurance industry, he refuses to even choose a Pokémon as his companion. One day, he receives a fateful call that brings him to Ryme City: a metropolis created by brilliant industrialist Howard Clifford (Bill Nighy), where humans and Pokémon live and work in harmony. Tim’s estranged father has gone missing, and the only clue he has left behind is Detective Pikachu (Ryan Reynolds) – whose clever insights and snarky observations can only be understood by Tim.

The Good: Detective Pikachu is a remarkably canny adaptation of Pokémon lore and legend. Fans will have a ton of fun (and might need multiple viewings) to spot all the Pokémon wandering in and out of frame – from dozing Slakoths to swooping Pidgeots, grieving Cubones and beyond. You might find yourself experiencing a sense of visceral joy at seeing these critters come to life, quite literally, and interact with actual human beings – not just on the page, or via pixels. Happily, though, the film doesn’t simply rely on fan service and affection to power through. There’s a welcome wit and warmth to much of its writing that’s impossible to resist, especially when it comes to the film’s titular electric-yellow hero – an adorable ball of energy that literally (and metaphorically) lights up the screen.

The Not-So-Good: If you’re a Pokémon neophyte, you might find yourself quite confused by audience reactions to Detective Pikachu, which don’t always match what’s happening on screen. You’ll still be able to follow the narrative fairly easily, but you’ll be lost when audience members freak out at the many Easter eggs and callbacks to decades of Pokémon canon. The film’s plotting also loses its footing towards the end, when the motivations of its main antagonist and the truth about Tim’s mysterious connection with Detective Pikachu become clear. At this point, it feels as if director Rob Letterman and his screenwriting team came up with the ending they wanted, and then reverse-engineered the rest of the film to make it work.

MVP (Most Valuable Pokémon): The answer is obviously Pikachu – a blend of brilliant character design and charismatic voice/facial-capture work by Reynolds. But one of the greatest joys of Detective Pikachu is that it doesn’t simply provide a showcase for Pikachu, already one of the most beloved of all Pokémon. Psyduck – a frazzled duck perpetually on the verge of combusting from stress – walks a fine line between hilarious and helpful. Even Mr. Mime, easily one of the weirdest and creepiest Pokémon ever created, gets a moment to shine – and in the kind of scene that’s so blissfully weird and silly that you can’t help but appreciate what the filmmakers are trying to do, even if they don’t always succeed.

Recommended? Yes. Detective Pikachu could have raked in the cash through brand loyalty alone. But the film is evidently the product of a great deal of love and care. Flawed as it is, this thoughtful re-imagining of the Pokémon franchise is fun, silly and charming in lots of the right ways.

Avengers: Endgame (2019)

The Low-Down: Statistically, the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has achieved a great deal: over 11 years and 21 films, it has introduced dozens of relatively obscure characters into mainstream pop culture. More importantly, however, the franchise has proven that long-form storytelling can work in a cinematic context – as long as you balance plot with heart and humour, prizing character development over spectacle. That’s no small feat, and it’s even more remarkable that a movie with the gargantuan scale and ambition of Avengers: Endgame doesn’t fall apart beneath the weight of an unwieldy script or great expectations. In fact, this is the MCU’s crowning achievement: a heartfelt love letter to the Avengers, their stories, the actors who play them, and to the fans.

The Story: That damn Snap, eh? At the end of Avengers: Infinity War, Thanos wiped out half of the galaxy’s population with a snap of his Infinity-Stone-enhanced fingers. After bearing witness to teammates and loved ones vanishing in swirls of dust and ash, the remaining Avengers struggle to live with the crippling grief and guilt of surviving the Snap… and of failing to prevent it. Some characters spiral into darkness; others are frozen in place – a few even manage to move on. But hope is rekindled when Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) returns from the mysterious Quantum Realm, where the usual laws of physics, space and time do not apply…

The Great: Endgame is a storytelling triumph – not only does it bring together and pay off plots and ideas that were seeded over a decade ago, it builds solid, powerful, heartrendingly emotional narrative arcs for almost all of the original Avengers. Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) must grapple with their pasts to figure out their futures, while Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) and Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner) find themselves literally fighting to save their families. Thor (Chris Hemsworth) and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) might provide much of the film’s comic relief, but both characters are also gifted with grace notes, growth and moments of true peace.

The Super-Great: The ability to juggle and create space for multiple perspectives and storylines in one film has been honed to a fine art by directors Anthony and Joe Russo and screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely. But their narrative strategy feels virtuosic in Endgame, paired as it is with an ingenious plot device that allows the film to truly acknowledge the staggering depth and breadth of its own history. Suddenly, the emotional and narrative stakes are raised, as beloved characters are forced to re-examine their lives, stories and priorities. You might find yourself in tears and in stitches, frequently in the same scene, and this happens throughout the film – a testament to the Russo Brothers’ genius and their skills at anchoring even the most outlandish of storylines in humour and humanity.

The Not-So-Great: This is emphatically not a film for casual viewers – there is no entry point, no easing in, no exposition, to help you understand what the heck is going on if you haven’t watched most of the preceding films in the MCU. There are also a few logical fallacies and plotholes scattered throughout Endgame that will puzzle you the more you think about them – from the wobbly rules governing time travel to the fractured way in which the too-conveniently hyper-powered Carol Danvers (Brie Larson) pops in and out of the story.

Stan Service: This film, above all others in the MCU, feels like a heartfelt tribute to the very concept of Marvel itself, finding numerous ways to reward and delight true-blue fans. Naturally, it includes Stan Lee’s final appearance in the MCU, while folding in a host of other cameos and callbacks that reinforce the interconnectedness of the entire franchise – of all the stories that have been told before, especially the movie that started it all (Iron Man in 2008). There are even a couple of brilliant nods to comics lore, largely centred around the character of Captain America, that feel like the Russo Brothers are deliberately righting a few wrongs where some of Marvel Comics’ more controversial plot twists are concerned. (See: Nick Spencer’s run on Captain America: Steve Rogers.)

Cast-Iron MVP: Casting outside of the box has always been one of the MCU’s core strengths, with Oscar winners/nominees and character actors regularly popping up to play heroes and villains alike. That canny casting strategy pays off in spades in Endgame – especially when certain characters have relatively limited screen time but manage to make it count anyway. The undisputed stars of the movie, however, are the Avengers who started it all. Hemsworth continues to brilliantly dance along the knife-edge between comedy and pathos, while Ruffalo radiates charm and intelligence through ever-improving CGI as Banner and his not-so-mean, green alter ego: The Hulk. Johansson and Renner are given more to do in this film than ever before, and their combined efforts will shred your soul to pieces. Evans brings great warmth and strength to his stoic role, making it perfectly legitimate for you to weep and whoop for a man who’s – somewhat ridiculously – wrapped in an American flag. Above all, this double-whammy of Avengers films belongs, most fittingly, to Downey Jr. He still effortlessly injects Tony with snark and swagger, but also beautifully conveys every shade and layer of his character’s hard-won growth and maturity – giving us all the proof that we have never needed that Tony Stark has a heart.

Recommended? In every imaginable way. Endgame sets the bar as high as it can possibly go for superhero epics that balance enormous scale and jaw-dropping ambition with actual substance and genuine emotion. It’s the blockbuster movie event of our lifetimes, for very good reason – and it’s worth every minute you’ve invested in the MCU since 2008.

Hellboy (2019)

The Low-Down: Hellboy, a cult comic creation dreamt up by Mike Mignola, is a fascinating meditation on the eternal ‘nature vs. nurture’ debate: can a demon child rebel against the blood that flows through his veins and choose his own fate? The movie-going public was first introduced to the existential crisis that is Hellboy in 2004 by visionary director Guillermo del Toro, whose gothic sensibilities and love of the ugly misfit were a perfect fit for the source material. 15 years and a couple of jettisoned productions later, the third Hellboy film – a del-Toro-free reboot, rather than a sequel – is finally thundering into cinemas, and will have you wondering if it was worth all that time and effort.

The Story: Hellboy (David Harbour) – under the guidance of his adoptive father, Trevor (Ian McShane) – is hunting down monsters for the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense (BPRD) when destiny comes a-calling. Nimue (Milla Jovovich), a dastardly sorceress of world-destroying power, is set to break free from her several prisons so that she can turn the world of men into a haven for monsters. Accompanied by living ouija board Alice Monaghan (Sasha Lane) and grumpy BPRD agent Ben Daimio (Daniel Dae Kim), Hellboy must decide if he will help or hinder Nimue as she sets the apocalypse in motion.

The Good: This new incarnation of Hellboy is fierce and unapologetic in everything it does – from its shiveringly awful monsters to its explosive moments of mayhem and carnage. If that’s your kind of thing, you’ll enjoy what director Neil Marshall, best known for cult horror flicks like The Descent and Dog Soldiers, is going for here. He leans heavily into the ‘creature’ aspect of ‘creature feature’, particularly in nightmarish scenes featuring Nimue regaining her body (think Frankenstein, with an added cringe factor) and unholy mess of a witch Baba Yaga collapsing and contorting her way across the screen.

The Not-So-Good: Unfortunately, the film is a mess in pretty much every other way, teetering between brilliant, batshit and bad – often in the same moment. Part of that is due to the strangely uneven special effects and prosthetics, which range from eye-popping to laughable. But it’s in Andrew Cosby’s desperately plot-obsessed screenplay too, which contains some great, fun ideas but constantly undercuts itself with painfully banal dialogue and minimal character development. It’s a very peculiar experience to be simultaneously fascinated by and disappointed in a scene or character, and that keeps happening throughout Marshall’s film.

Safe Harbour? You’d never know it beneath the unwieldy prosthetics, but Hellboy is played – this time around – by one of the breakout stars of Netflix’s Stranger Things. It’s a shame that you can barely see what Harbour is bringing to the character and the performance; his hangdog charm and ability to emote is buried under layers of red make-up and a stubbornly fake chin. He looks great in still photographs, but often appears clunky and clumsy in motion. Script-wise, Harbour isn’t given much to do, beyond playing catch with the next plot point and battle sequence. As a result, his Hellboy winds up as the least interesting character in a film actually named after him.

Running The Good Race If nothing else, Hellboy has a lesson to teach Hollywood and casting agents the world over about whitewashing and the importance of representation. Ed Skrein was originally cast as Ben Daimio, but voluntarily withdrew from the project when he realised that the character was of Japanese origin. It’s still annoying that Asians from different countries are interchangeable in Hollywood terms – Kim is of Korean descent – but, hey, baby steps are better than nothing. At least Kim acquits himself quite well in a complex role, although his British accent is wobbly at best.

Recommended? It’s a toss-up. There are enough good ideas and visual flair for Hellboy to be worth a watch, but it’s also sorely missing the crucial ingredients that made del Toro’s films take flight: heart and soul.