The Ghost of Yotsuya Review

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It’s time to look at a well known foreign horror film and unfortunately this one was pretty bad. I was expecting some decent entertainment and all but in the end it takes way too long for the ghost to show up. It turns out to be more of a messed up drama for most of the film and the villains stay really annoying throughout. It’s always one of the risks you run when you have a film built around a bunch of villains. You’re waiting for justice but in a film like this it will be a long time coming.

The movie starts with a guy named Iemon wanting to marry Oiwa. He had a bit of a deal with her father but the guy changed his mind and it’s easy to see why. Iemon doesn’t seem like the most put together fellow around. He has let himself go and is patrolling the streets like a homeless person. Well, ultimately he decides to murder her father and his guards. Then he makes his move on Oiwa who essentially decides to get with him as long as he avenges her father’s death. Iemon wants to keep the charade up forever but one guy, Naosuke happens to have witnessed the murder and begins his blackmail. He basically wants Oiwa’s sister as his compensation and keeps on blackmailing Iemon. The two of them continue to sink deeper into this conspiracy.

Now this is really just a problem with the old Japan type films but the honor system goes way too far the whole time. The fact that both girls are willing to marry guys they don’t love just for the vengeance angle is too much. Oiwa at least doesn’t mind Iemon all that much but the sister didn’t like Naosuke at all and still goes through with this. All of their scenes are absolutely brutal. You’re just waiting for the ghost to show up already.

Unfortunately, the ghost angle isn’t a factor until the film is nearly over. So first you have to see Iemon humiliating Oiwa over and over again as he proves to be a terrible husband and even prepares to marry another girl on the side. His love for Oiwa wasn’t even true which just makes Iemon even worse of a character. Obviously he was a villain/murderer from the start but at least if he really loved Oiwa there would be some sense of humanity left. Instead, he is just a shallow guy who gets bored quickly and then continues to inflate his body count.

He can’t stop himself from murdering more and more people and that does not help his final goals. It just gets him deeper into trouble. Not that you feel bad for him but he takes up an enormous amount of screentime. What really hurts the film is that there are no likable characters. The two girls look naive and too trusting for most of this. They are also far too passive as they just wait for the guys to take revenge for them while they stay home. It’s pretty clear that the guys are getting nowhere fast.

As for the ghost, well she is fun to have around once she finally does make a move but even then it takes her a long time to actually take down Iemon. Also, right before becoming a ghost she did end up finishing off a baby so it’s not like they were shaping her up to be a hero either. The whole film is extremely drawn out even though it technically isn’t even a very long film. Mix that in with all of the characters being pretty bad and this was a recipe for disaster.

I’m not a fan of the old time aesthetic and this certainly wouldn’t change my mind on that. You will be left shaking your head the whole time and I wouldn’t even be able to blame you. The whole honor system just doesn’t work and I want the characters to be louder and more pro active. A guy like Iemon should never have gotten as far as he did. Even at the very end of the film he puts up way more of a fight than he should have. Is this guy secretly an absolute swords master or something?

He got too much hype and too much screentime. I’m rarely going to be able to really tolerate a film centered around a super unlikable villain without either seriously amazing supporting characters or a great hero to root for that takes him out in the end. A film like this one is just too depressing and dreary the whole time. It doesn’t leave you with any hope for the characters and is just not a fun one to watch. At the end of the day it forgets about the film’s main objective which is to be a fun and enjoyable film. There is nothing like that here.

Overall, A film like Ghost of Yotsuya was really doomed to fail from the start. The core plot is already not that engaging and you would need either a good amount of humor or something light hearted to balance it out. This film is taking itself deadly serious and so that means it is necessarily going to be a rather tough watch. You need to either have a really happy ending at the ready to balance the tough journey or for the villain to start getting his just desserts at a much earlier time. If you aren’t able to do either of those things, then the film is always going to be in a rather rough spot. There isn’t really any way around that. If you want to watch an authentic horror title, check out Godzilla instead.

Overall 0/10

Blue Beetle Review

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It’s time for the big origin story for the Blue Beetle. This guy got a pretty big push in the 2000s and I dare say it worked since he has remained as a well above average character in terms of popularity. The movie works pretty well as an origin. You’d probably like for some of the characters to show a bit of urgency when things are getting real but the action scenes are on point and the special effects are really good.

The movie starts by introducing us to Jaime who just finished school and now he’s ready to get a job. Unfortunately it won’t be so easy and he finds out that his family has been through a whole lot of hardships while he was gone. He has always wanted to support them but it’s not so easy to just get rich. Well, his sister lands him a job but then gets him fired from it on basically the same day. I suppose you could say that cancels out but Jaime steps in to break up an argument between the CEO Victoria and her nice Jenny. This causes Jenny to feel bad for Jaime and offer him a job.

What Jaime doesn’t know is that Kord Industries is messing around with alien technology. Jenny wants to stop this and so she gives it to Jaime, but it ends up bonding with him as a kind of symbiote relationship. Now there is no escape for Jaime as he becomes the Blue Beetle. The alien wants to murder people and keep Jaime safe while Jaime just wants to be an ordinary dude. That will be difficult though as the whole company is after him, led by Carapax who also has alien powers thanks to the exosuit. Can Jaime defend himself?

For starters the film has pretty much everything you’d like to see in a movie. It’s got a quick pace, good action scenes, fun characters, and some good humor. I pretty much knew it would be a pretty good film early on. That said, it’s also fair to say that the film plays it pretty safe and so it wasn’t going to be a great film from early on as well. It’s going with the basics as opposed to trying to really wow you. Nothing wrong with that, but in a way I feel like that’s also what hurt it at the box office. It wasn’t really seen as a “must watch”.

Jaime is a decent main character. He cares about his family and likes being a hero. He’s certainly not going to be going around murdering anyone or anything like that. So he is someone that you can count on. That being said, he can also be a little slow on the ball. He starts crashing out when he finds out that it will be difficult to remove the scarab but it’s a cool alien armor that gives him powers. Why would you want to ditch it? Far as I’m concerned that is a net positive.

Then when the company attacks his family, I think he should have been a little outraged. Instead he takes it all very casually and as a result his family is further injured and it all feels very preventable. I get wanting to be careful not to really hurt the humans too badly of course but when they are after the family then you should really be gearing up to fight back right? That just feels logical to me at the very least.

So all in all he’s good, but not a great character. He is fun enough to keep the film going though and does beat most of the other family members. They can generally be a little bit too annoying to him. They mean well like with Milagro getting him the job but of course getting him fired was really rough because of how unnecessary the whole thing was. I did like Rudy though. He’s the big conspiracy nut of the family who goes around acting crazy and embarrassing at all times.

Unlike the others it really works because that’s a big part of his character. He will never accept the obvious and will do whatever he can to resist the government. It is his complete focus in life and what keeps him going. So his jokes always tended to land. The weakest family member would definitely be the grandma though. The film tries way too hard with her and all of her big moments tend to fall flat.

As far as Jenny goes, the romance feels a bit forced here. I don’t see how it all worked out with her and Jaime considering they barely knew each other. Also there was a ton of plot armor with Jaime going out for a drive and bumping into her so quickly while she was being chased by all the gunmen. Like sure that’s probably not going to be a very likely event in most cases. I’ll give her credit for standing up to corporate though and as a character she was pretty solid. She had a lot of willpower to stand up to all that danger.

Then there is the company’s muscle, Carapax. He makes for a pretty decent villain but I would say he is a better villain than character. My main problem with this guy is they wait real long to try and make him sympathetic and honestly it doesn’t work. He spends most of the film trying to murder a kid. I’m not exactly going to be feeling too bad for him. His origin story is rough as they squeezed in multiple sob stories into one event but he still did end up being a bad guy in the present. His final scene was also really weak and didn’t feel necessary.

There’s not a whole lot to say about Victoria. She’s your average CEO type main villain. Yes, Lex Luthor has always been an example of one who works but he’s often the exception. Most of these villains just come across as really generic and that’s basically what happened here. She’s not bad but you won’t remember her for very long. Meanwhile the action scenes are pretty fun. We never really get to see Blue Beetle completely cut loose so that would be in a sequel but you can already see how he would be a total threat in combat. He just has so many options for good attack patterns here.

I also enjoyed the scarab. Generally he’s always been a really fun character and this one was no exception. The music is also not bad. I wouldn’t call it the next Guardians of the Galaxy or anything but the soundtrack worked well within the film. I will say that the big cliffhanger to the film is more on the weak side though. It’s not terrible but it’s also not particularly compelling unless you are a really huge fan of a certain character. Personally I like this guy quite a bit and even then I wasn’t particularly hyped. It just needed a little something more.

Overall, Blue Beetle is a pretty good film. While some may take my calling it a basic film to be a bit of an insult, I would say it’s just that the film was focusing on nailing the fundamentals. They managed to pull this off which isn’t always easy. The movie has very few real negatives and the most important thing is that it will go by really quickly. For example not all of the jokes land in the film, but it is generally funnier than it isn’t and there are enough jokes where you know they will land most of them. At no point does the film start to really drag on or anything like that. Instead you will be enjoying the action and the fun throughout. I’m sure the sequel would have been really good too.

Overall 7/10

God Eater 3 Review

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It has been a little while since I played the second God Eater but now it is time to finally wrap things up with the third one. I would say this one may be the most cinematic in terms of consistent cutscenes although it is a good deal shorter than the first two games. There is a bit of a post game here but of course the first two had longer post games as well so that’s something to consider. You can get this one for a really good price nowadays which is also nice for the value. If you enjoyed the first two God Eater titles then I bet you will enjoy this one as well.

The game starts off by showing us that humanity is still on the loosing end against the Aragami. They have seized control of most of the planet by this point and the few who can fight back are now treated as slaves by humanity. Why create a caste system when things are so helpless right now? Well, that’s just how toxic humanity is as a whole. They continue to make it easy to root for the aragami when it counts. We follow two God Eaters who manage to escape their captivity during a mission and are taken in by a much more humane group. They aim to help out and gradually get the funds to lead a peaceful life.

It won’t be easy though, the government owns most of what remains of humanity and god eaters are explicitly treated as second class citizens. It’s not as if the heroes can just walk outside either. Most of the world is covered in a fog that is completely poisonous. To get around that, most people live in various bases but of course those are owned by the government as well. Meeting up with a friendly crew was definitely a stroke of good luck. They even meet a humanoid aragami who looks like a little girl. She befriends the characters but everyone wants to murder her so that’s going to be another tricky thing to deal with.

The story itself is pretty fun even if I have some doubts on the logic of it. If you only have around 1000 God Eaters left for humanity and they are the only ones able to fight off the monsters, why would you treat them like slaves? Seems to me like they could easily revolt and finish the extinction of humanity. It’s also hard to see how we got to this point after the events of the first two games. It sems like there was a decently large time skip as the only big returning character from the first two games is the original humanoid aragami. He even goes by a new name now and nobody recognizes him so a lot of time must have gone on for that to have happened.

The story also does go in circles a bit with how many times the villains try to convince the heroes to hand over the little girl. So I can see some faults with the story but overall I was engaged. Just as important is the gameplay of course and fortunately I can say that it was very good. It’s taking a much simpler approach than the first two games. This one almost feels more like an arcade game in that sense. Gone are all of the different god burst abilities and they have de-emphasized the elemental boosts here. In the last games it was very important to switch up your weapon both for element as well as weapon type based on the enemy. Sometimes you would want a sword and sometimes a hammer.

It was based on if you needed striking power, piercing power, and I forget the name of the third one. Well, in this game you can forget about all of that. Just pick one weapon and focus on it until you’ve gone really far. I picked a buster blade from the start and that carried me all the way through to the end. I never switched weapons and just kept upgrading this one the whole way through. That was the best way to go and I have no complaints.

I imagine it would make more of a difference in post game so it’s not like the mechanics have been removed. They’ve simply been de-emphasized which is a big difference. Beyond that, the rest is as you remember it. The game is a 3D slasher where you have to defeat all of the key monsters in each level in order to move forward. The main story has around 70 or so levels in it. You’re given 30-60 minutes to complete each level but most of them should only take around 5 minutes or so. The final levels take a bit longer but even then it’s not by much. So you will end up beating the game in no time compared to the others.

The gun seems a lot weaker in this one so personally I’d say to stick to the sword. The gun is maybe okay at bet for aerial enemies where you will be missing a whole lot. Then it’s worth breaking out the gun. Otherwise, stick to the sword and trust me you won’t regret that. My personal tip is to try and keep your burst mode on at all times even if it just means level 1. That 10% boost really ends up adding up before you know it.

The graphics are pretty good as you’d expect. The PS4 is able to render the cutscenes well and there are a number of full on cinematics outside of the main gameplay cutscenes. The soundtrack is also pretty good with a solid variety of tunes to enjoy. Less lyrical songs than the second game but the ones that we do get definitely hit pretty hard. In general I would also say that the battle osts are good. The menus and various layouts are also handled really well. The game has polished them throughout the years and this one didn’t take a backseat or anything like that.

Overall, God Eater 3 is pretty fun. If you enjoy 3D combat then you have to enjoy this one because the action is basically nonstop. For that reason the gameplay is infinitely important because if you are the type of person to get bored of the same gameplay for too long then this won’t be for you. There are very few bits of variety within the game as you will literally be defeating the same enemies over and over and over in the levels. I just really love the hack and slash gameplay so for me that was a real blast. It all comes down to if you enjoy the style or not. I’d definitely be hyped for a 4th game if they ever did it, hopefully we would actually get a real ending this time though instead of humanity’s endless fight against the Aragami.

Overall 7/10

Messiah of Evil Review

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It’s time for a zombie type of film and unfortunately I can assure you that it is not one of the good ones. There is no real escape for the heroes and while the film maintains a rather spooky atmosphere throughout, it never ends up taking advantage of this. What could have been a really intense cerebral horror film quickly becomes just another slasher to have to contend with. That is unfortunate but not entirely unexpected.

The film starts with a girl named Arletty deciding to look for her father. He left her a note saying not to do this as well as a whole book of notes but she doesn’t have time to read them in depth. When she arrives in town, the place is rather odd. One of the travelers at the gas station seemed rather off and then the town itself is fairly empty. There is an eccentric guy named Thom who is surrounded by girls and lives a life of luxury but it all seems rather empty. Arletty wants to continue on her mission but it does seem like the longer she stays here, the greater her risk of death will be.

Naturally she should have listened to her father’s note telling her not to follow him. That would have ended things right away and surely he wouldn’t have just sent her that notice for no reason right? She also should have read the whole book right away and planned for the worst. Now it’s not like there is a whole lot she could have done against the crazy zombies that would end up appearing but at least she would have been pretty well prepared. Instead she doesn’t really have a plan and always ends up being at a disadvantage.

She’s also a bit too trusting with letting Thom and his friends stay over right away. She doesn’t even know these people and odds are that they were crazy. Even by the end of the film Arletty is forced to take on more of a spectator role here as she can only wait until the inevitable happens. It’s always more fun when the protagonist can actually do a lot of stuff but in this case you could say that she was just a participant in a conspiracy that was much bigger than her. She wasn’t exactly the central focus this time.

Then we have Thom who is a bit of a space case. He tries to be calm and collected at all times but it can feel like a mask. He is quick to subtly threaten one of the girls when he feels like she has been too rude. Thom does well in the fighting near the end but ultimately it wasn’t really enough to turn the tides.

The characters are battling what is effectively an endless horde of monsters after all. Take one down and a few more will take the original’s place. It’s not like the main characters got a debriefing on this either so they’re going into the situation cold. The zombies are all cannibals, so the deaths are particularly gruesome. The film is going for max edge here and that’s really where you knew the film couldn’t come back from. It’s why I’m generally not a big zombie fan, it will usually lead to these kind of events which is hard to write around.

Since the heroes don’t really stand a chance, it also runs into the issue of the whole thing feeling futile. When the characters literally have no possible way to win, it is harder to get engaged into what is happening. If the film kept the threat vague then it might be able to survive on the atmosphere alone, but throw everything else in and you’re not likely going to come back from that.

The film has the cops show up at one point which made for an interesting addition, but unfortunately they are dispatched quickly. The way it was done was also unfortunate because it underscored that you could be turned into a zombie without being bit previously. I interpreted it as the red moon being able to transform anyone who is caught in its rays but of course then that makes things even more unfair. The villains also have a supernatural leader who has intense abilities of his own. That really doesn’t help the case for the heroes.

So the film ends up feeling rather mean spirited with the heroes having no chance and you just slowly watch as they end up dying. There’s not a lot of fun to be had with a premise like that and the film should have tried becoming an action title instead. At the very least, it does serve as a reminder that zombie films are not often going to be very good. If you see that as a genre then you know that you’re probably doomed.

Considering how dreary the film was overall, I’m surprised the ending didn’t have a little more pop. By the end of the film, we know that humanity is going to be destroyed but it’s handled in a very quiet way. I would have preferred that the invasion begins and that’s how the film ends. You may as well have things end in an exciting way like that right? It would certainly make the ending more exciting and memorable at least.

Overall, Messiah of Evil is definitely a film I’d stay far away from. There are no real positive moments to offset all the negatives here. The characters are pretty bad and the film just gets way too gruesome the whole time. It sets the tone early with the gas station murder. If the main characters could have done more damage and set this up as a more even fight then that could have helped. Have the zombies be traditionally slow or something. By allowing them to move at normal speeds like a human, it just makes them completely unstoppable. I don’t see how anybody is supposed to fight off powerful creatures like that.

Overall 0/10

Baron Blood Review

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It’s time for a movie that you could tell was going to go off the rails almost immediately. The characters are pretty bad and the whole film is one of the biggest compilations of self inflicted wounds that I have seen in a very long time. Definitely not going to go down as one of the next big horror films and I can see why nobody talks about this one. The baron is not a winner.

The film starts off with a guy named Peter deciding to visit his relatives. He wants a break from the usual routine of school work and what better way than by learning about the legend of Baron Blood? This guy was an ancestor of Peter’s after all. It doesn’t matter that the Baron was known to be an incredibly evil man. Peter is curious to know more about him. So when Peter learns about a spell that could summon the Baron back to life, he doesn’t hesitate to use it. Everyone warns him about this but he doesn’t care! After using the spell, mysterious things begin to happen. People begin to get murdered but surely this isn’t because of what Peter did right? There was another spell to destroy the Baron once more but due to a lot of carelessness, it ends up being burned. Is there any way to stop the Baron?

I think the biggest problem right away with Peter is that he has virtually no remorse for what he’s done. People are literally being murdered in gruesome ways and he’s still interested in how the spell worked. He continues to act fascinated and excited by what is going on even after the negative effects have been well under way. That doesn’t sound like a good character to me. In fact, that sounds like a pretty bad one. He’s more focused on seducing Eva and getting more scientific experience under his belt than saving the day.

For that reason, he was definitely never going to rank. I would also say Eva takes some guilt here for going along with this. Peter may be crazy but she doesn’t have to follow his lead. She could have just said no instead of letting herself get seduced immediately and going against her better judgment. It certainly didn’t go very well for her, that’s for sure. She was a big believer in the supernatural events going on so that’s even more reason why she should have taken a step back there.

Then we have Karl who isn’t as bad but he probably could have taken a harder stance in telling Peter to knock off his interest in the occult. I just can’t put a lot of blame on him because these are all adults so you have to trust in some common sense. Karl went about his life as normal and then once he found out about the threat, he got to work. He certainly felt more prepared than the other two and could at least talk with the cops without sounding crazy while the other two would phrase things in the craziest possible ways.

It’s a tried and true trope of the characters talking to the cops about monsters and actually thinking they will believe it. No shot, and I can’t even blame the cop there. It is a tough tale to swallow. As for the Baron, yeah he doesn’t have a ton of character or anything like that. He likes torturing people, that’s about the extent of personality that he has. He goes around wrecking everyone as much as possible. I guess he also seems to like Eva quite a bit so he has that trait as well which doesn’t really help matters.

You won’t be remembering this guy for very long. I suppose he is at least smart enough to be able to use a disguise and trick the heroes but that doesn’t take a whole lot of skill here tbh. Just about anyone would be able to pull the wool over these fighters! Even aside from the characters, the film had a bunch of issues though. For starters, I found it to be way too mean spirited. Since this guy’s whole thing is torture, he goes around torturing everyone.

All of the deaths are pretty brutal and the film comes across as rather mean spirited There isn’t much of a story beyond the carnage and even though the film’s runtime is fairly short, this will feel like a rather long experience. The movie actually could have been a bit better if the baron had pretended that he’d turned over a new leaf or something. That would have been far more interesting and then you would have an excuse for less violence in the meantime.

I suppose I’ll give the film credit for having some fairly good effects here. Everything is very practical and that can be a lost art at times. Meanwhile the script is fun enough with everyone talking all proper. It doesn’t make up for the writing of course as that is still a lost cause overall but at least that is a silver lining.

Overall, Baron Blood is definitely a film that I would advise you to avoid. In a way it almost feels like the original blueprint to a classic slasher film. The whole film is about the kills and the heroes being unable to do anything here as even they are captured and outmaneuvered. There aren’t any bright spots to raise the film up from the lower levels and you can do better with even the average horror film. Now that’s saying something since the whole genre tends to be on the lower side. That’s just how bad this film was. You can absolutely pull off a jerk main character but in that case I need a more satisfying ending for him. It felt like this guy wasn’t intended to be written like an antagonist, even though he absolutely was one. Never forget that the entire murder spree was 100% his fault. The Baron had been trapped by an immortal spell to suffer forever thanks to a witch and Peter ruined it just for kicks.

Overall 1/10

Hellboy: Blood and Iron Review

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Time for another Hellboy adventure. This time we’re throwing in vampires so Hellboy will have to be careful on this one. It’s definitely more intense than the last film but still has a fun charm to it. It does double down a bit with the flashbacks though and the film spends way too much time going backwards there. I think they should have done it all at the start, maybe cut a scene or two in order to keep the viewers in the dark and that would have definitely helped the pacing right from the start.

The film starts off with Trevor, a priest, and a group of soldiers heading into the deep reaches of the forest to destroy the vampire Erzsebet who has been kidnapping and murdering many people in order to stay young and beautiful. Nearly the whole squad is murdered but they successfully defeat her. Unfortunately in the present, Trevor can feel that she has returned. When a guy named Oliver asks Hellboy’s group to see if his mansion is haunted, Trevor quickly says that he will bring the whole A team. This is a little concerning to the rest of the group as Trevor hasn’t been onto the field in years but he refuses to give them any details. So now they will have to figure out what is going on by themselves. Will this really work out?

First off I do have to blame Trevor for a lot of this. He really had no reason to be keeping secrets from Hellboy. He should have told him everything right from the start. Hellboy can take care of himself, but that’s not really the point. As a field leader you need to be putting your guys in the best possible position to be safe and accounted for. Keeping valuable info away is not doing that. Trevor seems to think he can hold his own here with the holy water that he has but the guy ultimately has to hope that he is really lucky.

He is still doing better than the priest though. Lupescu looks terrible in this film as he cracked before the fights had even begun. I don’t get why he was so nervous, it’s like his faith was paper thin without even being tested. I suppose that was the point but it certainly came at his expense. Even by the end I never got around to liking him. As far as I’m concerned, he really got himself into all of these messes and could have saved a lot of lives if he had just manned up when it counted.

Hellboy looks good as always though. Even when he finds out that Trevor is keeping secrets from him, Hellboy doesn’t take it super personally or start panicking. No, he just keeps going about his business and doing his part to help out. That’s why he is a real hero. This time he is in for a fairly painful adventure as well since he is stabbed on multiple occasions and is basically used as a punching bag the whole time. He is almost never in the lead during this film.

That doesn’t stop him from still having a lot of confidence and getting in good burns though. That’s exactly the way that he rolls. Liz gets a lot more to do here than last time as she takes down a group of enemies with her flame abilities. Honestly she probably should have helped more in the climax. At one point she uses her fire and the villain uses it to start burning the others but then they should just get out of the way.

It’s possible that her powers would have had no effect but I would have liked to have seen her using them in action for a longer period of time to really prove that. As for Abe, the poor guy mostly just gets beaten up the whole time. He even gets kidnapped by a pair of old witches so he had a really bad time here. At this point I wonder if perhaps he just shouldn’t be out in the field with the others. Staying at home providing tactical support would probably be best.

As for the villains, Erzsebet gets most of the screentime here. She is fairly powerful and only tends to lose because of her incredible overconfidence. Tackling someone out the window when you’re allergic to sunlight is always going to backfire. She also falls for the holy water trick more than once. A decent villain all things considered but yeah if she was even decently smart then the heroes would have probably been taken down.

The final boss Hecate is a bit more impressive. She doesn’t get to have as much screentime but is quite powerful and gives Hellboy a tough time. Hecate was mentioned since near the beginning but otherwise would almost feel out of nowhere with how she shows up in her true form for a fight. I always like ending a film with a big battle though so that worked for me. I don’t see her ending up as one of the more memorable characters but she handled her role well enough.

The film does have the usual vampire blood drinking but at least not a ton of it. The film is noticeably more violent than the other Hellboy titles but I wouldn’t say it is to a crazy degree. The biggest negative here is still how much you won’t care about what was going on with the soldiers and the vampires in the flashback scenes. Instead of drip feeding this and playing the scenes backwards, they should have gotten it all over with right away. If you ask me, that would have been a much better way to go. Otherwise you need a crazy payoff to explain why the flashbacks had to be spread out like this and I wouldn’t say there is any twist on such a massive level.

The movie is at its best when the characters are all having a good time and messing with each other. All of them were super skeptical about the haunted house which made for good dialogue around the board. At the same time they were professional enough to bring in the equipment and actually check so that was good. The group really needs one more power hitter to fight alongside Hellboy though. Liz has the power but she’s a long range type. We need a brawler who can fight. Otherwise Hellboy is basically by himself like when Abe got shoved aside with ease against one of the minions during the hallway battle. It’s probably hard for the lead to concentrate when he constantly has to save everybody else.

Overall, Hellboy delivers with another good adventure here. It does feel like a bit of a step down from the first two but not by too much. We still got a lot of action and the villains weren’t bad. The pacing gets hurt at times though and it’s not quite as crazy as the first two. That’s another byproduct of the lore part with the vampires. Just let us get right ahead to the story already! That would have definitely pushed the title to the next level. Still, I would have been hyped for more of these adventures to be animated. Maybe at some point they would fight a villain group that mirrors Hellboy’s team. If you’ve seen the first two films then you should check this one out as well.

Overall 6/10

Hellboy: Sword of Storms Review

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Hellboy is back with an animated adventure! Now this is a film that I had not seen before so that made it extra fresh. The movie is not particularly long so everything has to happen at double speed here. I liked the really frantic pacing and there was a lot of action to be had. If you’re a big fan of the supporting cast then this may not rank quite as highly for you though as it is very much a Hellboy only adventure. The other characters just don’t get to do nearly as much.

The film starts off with a pretty fun action scene as Hellboy gets to be thrown around for a while before launching his comeback. Liz and Abe also run in to help a bit but I hope you enjoyed their scene a lot because after this they are thrown into a meaningless subplot never to do much more from there. It’s too bad because in this version Liz seems to be a lot more fun than in the main film. She is very sarcastic and more confident in herself. Her flame abilities may not be 100% mastered but she has pretty decent control over them. Also they seem stronger, or maybe Hellboy’s just a bit weaker since he doesn’t seem to have complete immunity against the flames anymore.

The real plot starts here though. Sakai sloppily allows himself to be controlled by an ancient spirit so Hellboy and the gang are called in. He is assisted by Kate and Russell on this one but Hellboy is quickly taken into another dimension thanks to he mythical sword. He has to find a way out and these spirits sure like talking. Hellboy will have to get past all of them but can he pull this off?

One thing you will notice right away is how done with the whole situation Hellboy is. He’s quite sarcastic and has a fun sense of humor with how jaded he is. That’s the biggest strength of the film in general. The characters all have a lot of great lines and the banter is particularly fun here. Hellboy’s incredibly deadpan and why not right? He’s been around for a very long time and so nothing particularly surprises him anymore. Spirits of lightning and thunder? Ghost possessions? Giant monsters? Yeah he’s seen all of that before so that is why he is able to stay extremely calm the whole time. I can respect that.

The first thing I do have to admit is that I didn’t really care about the ghost substory here. yeah it was all tragic and everything but (and this is an issue the sequel has as well) I just want to stick to the present here. Anytime we have to learn more about what happened with the sword, it’s just a bit dull. Not super dull since like I mentioned the pacing is pretty fast, but it’s still not as good as the present. I want to see Hellboy and the others running around. Maybe use the extra time to extend the fight Liz and Abe had with the water creature and actually give us a decisive victory. It did make for a fun gag near the end of the film but they could have probably deserved a bit more here.

The fight scenes were pretty good all around. The animation was very colorful and bright although I thought it was a bit rough at times. I was really surprised to learn that it was an actual anime company behind this. Maybe they were told to rough up the edges a bit to look more like an American production That sounds a little crazy but hey you never know right? It was still good on the whole though and in animation you can have a little more fun with the fights than in live action. It’s why everyone looks stronger here.

Yes, technically Hellboy spends more time being thrown around in this version but he does get up after every hit so you have to give him that one. While Kate and Russell never end up being the most interesting characters, I do appreciate the fil trying to give the organization more to do. After all this is apparently an organization with a lot of members who have connections across the planet. It would make sense that Hellboy would be paired up with different members from time to time as opposed to the same 3 in every adventure.

So my only complaint would be to make the lore a bit more interesting. Specifically I’m talking about the flashback that sets up the ghost with unfinished business since I really enjoy the modern day lore. Maybe just use a different setting? The feudal times are almost always going to be inherently less interesting than the present. Maybe have the villains come from the underworld or something. That would catch your attention right away. Or you could just hint at some kind of past and be as dismissive about it as Hellboy is dismissive of the characters. Could be a good parallel but ultimately it’s not like there is much concrete advice to give here. Either a backstory will be interesting or it won’t be. Since this film succeeded and was a lot of fun anyway, perhaps it wasn’t too much of a big deal.

Overall, This was a pretty fun film. I would have liked it to have been a bit longer since it could have given us more fight scenes and such but it still accomplishes all of the main goals. It works perfectly well as a stand alone adventure and honestly as a kid I could totally picture it being a sequel to the live action film. There are some obvious continuity issues but as a kid I would probably overlook them while enjoying the adventure. It does serve as further evidence that the Hellboy verse is one that can absolutely fit a lot of stories into it. You could do so many adventures of Hellboy fighting different supernatural threats. So far none of the reboots seem to work but hopefully one day it becomes a big hit.

Overall 7/10

Hellboy Review

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It’s definitely been a long while since I’ve seen his one. The original Hellboy film was definitely a fun one and it’s the kind of random superhero film that you don’t see too much of. It kind of just throws you into a pretty big universe of characters and demons running around without trying to smooth it over with the general audience. You either like what they are going for right away or you don’t. There isn’t a whole lot of in between there and that works for me.

The film starts off during World War II with the Nazis trying to open some kind of portal to summon demons. The heroes stop them but find that a small demon has already gone through. He seems harmless enough and so they take him in. The demon is dubbed Hellboy and many years later, has become one of the best fighters in the BPRD. He is essentially immortal or at least has a long life as well as natural super strength and defenses. It’s good to have him on the side of the heroes although there are skeptics that think he should not be there. Some just don’t trust demons.

Well, that is where John comes in. He’s been transferred to help out at this unit as well as be Hellboy’s sidekick. Hellboy isn’t thrilled about this and gets even more upset when Tom appears to begin getting a crush on Liz, the girl that Hellboy likes. Now we have a bit of a rivalry when there isn’t time for one. The Nazi who fell into the portal has been revived along with his main two associates. They intend to continue their plans and Hellboy may be the only person on the planet who can stop them. Is he up to the task?

Now the subplot with Hellboy being upset at John is probably meant in part to be a bit irrational but I actually found myself being on his side. John did see to be trying to make a play while Liz was distracted by her never ending grief and so it was good that Hellboy was there to (literally) throw a rock into those plans. Ultimately it did mean he was away from the base when the villains arrived, but I’m not confident that he would have arrived in time anyway.

Hellboy is a solid lead, someone who is always ready for danger. He definitely doesn’t fear any kind of a threat of challenge and has a lot of confidence in his abilities. Perhaps his confidence does actually outweigh his abilities at times but I will always take that over being underconfident. Hellboy is one of those old school fighters who does a lot of solid posturing while winning the fight. He even has a giant gun that is useless 99% of the time but he still brings it to every mission to fire off a few shots.

Liz is a character who is rather tragic because her flame abilities are incredibly powerful but she has next to no mastery over them. They can go off at any point and often destroy tons of civilians when these outbursts happen. I give the film props for not shying away from that. There’s no quick mention about how everyone evacuated at the last second. No, she’s brought whole buildings down and lots of people have died which is why she is worried now. Definitely very valid.

In a way it does feel like the agency could have handled the situation a lot better instead of just leaving her to her own devices. Ah well, I look forward to seeing her in a more confident state in the sequel. We also have Abe helping the others as the resident mental specialist of the group. Unfortunately he really can’t fight very well so any action scene inevitably leads to him getting absolutely crushed. He was really not prepared for these fighters. Seems like a nice enough guy but you could basically write him out of the film.

As for John, he’s okay. The guy isn’t the most helpful but he does try his best. I do think he was fishy around Liz but other than that he is a decent member to the group. He doesn’t act completely shocked about every little twist which I’m glad about since some humans really overplay their hand in these films. Even if you never knew that demons existed for example, as an FBI agent you should be able to bluff pretty well.

The villains were surprisingly solid here. Kroenen is an experienced assassin who fights with a short blade at all times. He takes out quite a number of fighters in this film and what makes him scary is how he essentially cannot die. He is functionally immortal and will just keep on getting back up over and over again. A super soldier who does not tire, yes that is a fantastic premise for a villain.

Then we have the Sammael creature which also has a hard time dying. It gives Hellboy a really tough fight here. Technically Hellboy tends to always be the underdog in these fights but his endurance keeps him alive long enough to mount a comeback. I liked the design for the creature. Rasputin is a little more on the generic side. Nothing particularly wrong with him but he really has a hard time standing out. He also didn’t plan things out well in the end to put it mildly. The girl who was helping him never really got a role either.

That leads us to the best character in the film, Tom. Tom is one of those guys who just can’t stand demons. There are no exceptions for him and of course that means he doesn’t like Hellboy either. He takes a lot of shots at the demon and makes his voice known. Although this does result in Tom having to run away with his tail between his legs on multiple occasions. He can talk as tough as he wants after all but at the end of the day he is still just a human. He ends up burying the hatchet with Hellboy later on though.

The effects for the film have aged well and I also enjoyed the fights. They could be rather lengthy at times and the pacing is always quick. The film has the characters dealing a lot of damage to each other but never goes too far or feels particularly graphic. For the most part it’s your standard action film kind of action right here.

Overall, Hellboy is a fun film. It’s the kind of movie that ends before you really know it. It has no concrete weaknesses and keeps on moving forward with a very balanced approach. I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a fun action film and the universe around it is fun enough where you may even be tempted to pick up a few of the comics. The romance can be a bit on the weaker side as there isn’t much time to develop it, but we’ll see how the sequel handles that. It’ll be difficult for the next villains to pass this group.

Overall 7/10

Hades Review

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Hades is one of those games that was super well known so I’ve been meaning to get it for a little while. I’m not always the biggest fan of rogue type games but I do love survival titles against endless hordes. Additionally, I feel like I have gotten a lot softer towards the genre as of late because all of the rogue titles end up being really good. The overall quality for a title like this will come down to how quick you can pick up a new run or not. If you’re losing hours and hours of work then I’m not going to be too thrilled, but this game masters the edge of how long it should be.

The game follows the son of Hades as he wants to know more about himself. He is not allowed to leave the underworld and Hades sees to this personally. What secrets lie beyond the borders of death? Our hero is determined to find this out and along the way he may even learn the truth of what happened to his mother. The gods of Olympus pledge their support and offer different powers along the way but what ulterior motives do they have There are a lot of mysteries to uncover here but when you’re immortal without much else to do…time is always on your side.

Immediately one of the most impressive things about Hades is the sheer volume of content. These rogue games can sometimes be annoying because you will question why you are putting in all of this effort. The Justice League mobile game for example was fun and I stuck with it for around 3 months but after a point there was no real content left. For Hades that isn’t a problem. There are easily 50+ hours worth of content here between maxing out all of the god bonds to complete their subplots, getting the true ending, maxing out your database files, unlocking all weapons, etc.

I completed the game 10 times to unlock the base ending and I can tell that I’ve only scratched the surface here. I only managed to max one character by the end of this and beast the game with only 1 weapon. I don’t see myself going for the platinum anytime soon just because of how long it would take to do that but I do like how all of the trophies are reasonable ones. The game isn’t asking you to do anything crazy. Really you’re just asked to play the game a whole lot and try out every mechanic. Even if you don’t plan to go for it all, I do advise trying out each weapon to see which one ends up being your favorite.

Of course, all this content would mean nothing if the gameplay was poor. So fortunately it is excellent. Your movement is very crisp and all of the weapons are good ones to have. The game has an overhead view and then you use your 3 powers to get past the enemies and make it to the end. Each playthrough has 4 areas and around 50-60 rooms total. At first it will probably take around an hour to clear the game, then near the end each run will be more like 20 minutes. I’ve heard people can do it even quicker but even with a maxed out mirror I couldn’t get under 20 minutes so they must be insanely good at it.

The game really values repetition as you learn all of the enemy movements and attack patterns. Focus on learning those since it is crucial that you dodge a lot. You want to deal a lot of damage of course but your health can go down deceptively quick. At the end of each room you get to choose a power up. Some help your attack power directly while others will help speed or other aspects of your character. Choose your ability carefully and then you will be fine. Even if you do lose, the game is so much fun that you won’t mind.

By the time I won 10 runs, I had already lost 27. So I can assure you that it is a process. Now I have enough passive abilities where I can confidently win with the spear on every run but so far I am still having trouble winning with any other weapon. For hat I suppose I just have to keep on grinding and eventually I can win there too.

Also I give the game a thumbs up for all the voice acting. Yeah, you’d expect voice acting for a PS5 game but there are just so many lines here that it still ends up being impressive. Each main character has over 100 lines of dialogue as you go through their normal routines as well as bond dialogue. I am probably even underplaying it for a bunch of them. This is clearly a game where the developers wanted to give you a complete product without worrying about dlc.

Meanwhile the graphics are really good. Even with all of the action on screen the game didn’t lag once. The individual animations are all clear as well so you know what is happening throughout. Now there are times where you might have multiple abilities that can be hard to distinguish in the moment but that is the price of being overpowered. I consider it to be a good balance. The soundtrack is also super good. There were quite a few great tunes in here that really fit the atmosphere of the game.

I don’t have any real issues with the game. I felt like everything was accounted for here and all of the gameplay elements were polished. It deserved all of the game of the year attention it was getting and then some. I’ve heard that the sequel’s gameplay is even better which sounds really impressive. I definitely look forward to seeing how good that one is.

Overall, Hades is an extremely satisfying game. It has enough difficulty to give even the most seasoned of gamers a difficult time, while also having a lot of difficulty options to allow for newer gamers to have a good time as well. That is why it is a very inviting experience since I can easily recommend it to anyone. The game’s very intuitive and there are no shortage of helpful references included within. Everyone will have their own style of how to approach the game. When starting out I recommend finding out your preferred way to play rather than going online to copy a winning strategy. Trust me, it will feel more satisfying that way.

Overall 9/10

Bunnicula: The Vampire Rabbit Review

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I was never really familiar with Bunnicula up til now. I know all about Dracula but since when wee bunnies also vampires? It was news to me but hey I was still eager to see what was going to happen here. It’s a pretty fun intro film and definitely sets the stage for what this part of the franchise would be like. The mini film is pretty fun and so I could see myself enjoying the whole show.

The film starts off with the nearby plant having a lot of strange issues recently. The latest one nearly murdered two employees so they shut it down. Two kids find a mysterious bunny nearby and so they bring it home. Chester the cat believes that the bunny is the cause of all the danger. That he’s some kind of vampire draining the life out of everything. It would explain why lately there are various fruits that have been losing their color. Almost like something is draining the juice from them. Harold is not so convinced and thinks that Chester is stretching things a bit too far.

Of course the evidence becomes hard to dispute later on as Bunnicula gets tougher and tougher. He is even able to use his supernatural abilities to take on several wolves. This bunny knows how to fight well but the powers take a lot out of him so he naps a lot. I was still glad to get a good action scene in here though. That was definitely a lot of fun and is a preview of how the shenanigans would go in an ongoing show.

The animation was also pretty good. It’s a really retro style that feels super authentic. The characters are always panicking and at the same time the voice acting helps to complement that as well. It’s a really upbeat kind of film and while it is aimed at younger viewers, the writing is solid so it works for anyone. It’s exactly the kind of fun animated film you like to see. The pacing is good as well with how short it is.

Harold is definitely my favorite character here. I always tend to have a soft spot for the skeptical characters. Why should he believe that there is something supernatural going on here right? It just doesn’t track for him and it takes a long time to change that. What I also appreciate is just how confident he is about this. There is no doubt in his mind that he is correct and that’s how a good character ought to be.

Meanwhile Chester is fun as well. The cat does his best to point out what is really going on here, no matter how insistent Harold is. That makes for a good contrast/foil between the two characters. Bunnicula in comparison doesn’t really have any character. That’s what you get when you’re sleeping for so long I suppose. That would probably be the one thing that could hold the series back. The titular character being the least interesting one is a little tricky.

The owner of the animals was surprisingly fun. When the town mob came over demanding that he hand over Bunnicula, he just called them out for being crazy. He was clearly done with the whole situation before it even happened and it makes sense since he lost his job recently thanks to the plant issues. He’s not exactly in a jolly mood and I don’t think anybody else would be either. The mob completely underestimated this guy and only got close because Harold and Chester took that time to run off with Bunnicula right in front of them.

If anything, what this film probably needed was either an antagonist or some really over eager animal catcher. It would help sell the long term appeal of the series as there would now be an obstacle that Bunnicula has to try and get around. Without that, the film will end up feeling too stand alone. It’s a bit hard to picture exactly how the show would play out here other than to have Bunnicula doing dracula type stuff the whole time.

Maybe the banter between Harold and Chester would be enough to see the adventure through. Perhaps Bunnicula continually frames them for random mischievous stuff around the house and then they have to solve it before anyone else finds out. The owner is definitely someone who is rather sharp so I could see him being tough to overcome. One wrong move and he will be right on top of them.

Overall, This was a fun special. It goes pretty fast with the solid writing and pacing. I liked the characters well enough and the only thing it seems to be missing is a long term hook. That’s ultimately not the film’s concern though. I can recommend this to anyone looking for a good time. The plot is easily accessible to anyone and has a fairly light tone throughout. Next time you see a vegetable losing its color, you’ll know what has been going on.

Overall 7/10