Tag Archives: Vampires

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

Vampire Knight: Memories Review

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Vampire Knight was never one of my favorite manga titles. Trust me, it just wasn’t all that good but at least it wasn’t boring. Memories is basically what you get if you decide to take a rather underwhelming cast, remove all of the interesting characters, and then do a ton of world building and politics. The end result is that you don’t really care what is going on. Throw in a bunch of time jumps all over the place and it makes the whole thing feel even worse. Yuki’s inaction also means that the romance is absolutely terrible and all over the place. You will not be feeling satisfied by the time you finish this series.

The series jumps across a bunch of time periods but for the most part it’s in the future. Kaname was sealed and his heart was lost so he was in suspended animation for 1000 years. When he awakens, he now has complete amnesia and so his two daughters gradually tell him more and more about what went on. Additionally he also starts to get some memories of his own. Whatever happened to Yuki, the queen of the vampires? They had kids together but Kaname never got to spend time with them before and at this point they’ve been around for ages. Of course when you’re immortal it all gets to be rather relative. The world appears to have gone the way Yuki hoped, with coexistence between humans and vampires. Perhaps this is a good future.

A lot of the themes within the series have one main connection which is that vampires and humans will always have a tough time connecting. For example there’s a guy named Hanabusa who ends up liking one of the heroines but of course she never ages while he does. At first it looks like things could work out well enough but then in 20 years it’s a different situation. The way the vampires look at relationships also ends up being really different as a result.

In effect, they’ll humor the humans and have fun with them but it’s just not the same. How can you have true love when a human will only last around 80 years and you still have 4000 years to go? The whole relationship will just be the blink of an eye. That kind of time also does a whole lot of damage to their very emotions. To a point it gets impossible to read the vampires and that’s also why a lot of humans fear them. How do you interact with a being that has existed for hundreds of years before you and who will continue to exist afterwards? There is also the power difference as they can crush you with a single motion.

Fortunately Yuki and the human principal did a whole lot to reduce tensions between the two. Unfortunately things still happen as humans have underground fighting arenas and terrorism attacks that continue to happen. Vampires are strong but not unbeatable so there are casualties from time to time. It can be tough to always have to hold back and take the high road when you can feel the bloodlust coming in from the other side. The vampires do well on this but the humans will definitely try your patience.

In theory the plot that is supposed to tug on your emotional heartstrings is the plot with Kaname. He has to come to terms with the fact that Yuki had to live without him for a long while and so of course that meant turning to Zero. The only problem is that he doesn’t really care. He was always okay with Zero taking a secondary spot because while the guy lived much longer than a normal human, he still wasn’t going to be as immortal as a pureblood vampire. This idea of sharing Yuki was just ridiculous though. It makes all 3 characters look really bad.

Kaname got a really raw deal to be sure. The whole thing absolutely sucked for him as he missed out on the best parts of his life. He may have helped achieve peace and make a better future but the sacrifice was definitely far too great. You just can’t find much solace in that at all. The guy feels like an empty husk of a character as well compared to the original series. Although it feels like every vampire is like this here so perhaps it is just the inevitable end. There’s just something depressing about being a vampire here.

Likewise for Yuki, she definitely looks bad here as well. She really needed to pick a guy. Kaname or Zero but leading them both on and having fun was never an option. The hard truth is that even if you’re going to be alive for over 1000 years, you can only pick one person. There cannot be any rebounds. That’s not going to be a good idea in the long run and I’m certainly not going to be able to support it. It was nice to get the occasional action scene for her but this was super rare.

Meanwhile the same negatives apply to Zero as well. When you’re happy being second fiddle then you don’t have a whole lot of self respect. Even if he got to be with Yuki for a while when Kaname was gone, she still had kids with him. Zero was always the backup guy and was completely out of luck. In a vampire series, it’s rare for the human to actually get picked and this one was no exception. Zero always had some cool powers and skills with the gun but in this series he looked pretty bad.

There’s something to be said about how the vampires always end up getting tempted into the taboo as well. One of them falls for her sibling, another falls for her father, etc. I think a lot of it has to do with the immortality part as it completely messes with their emotional regulation and feelings of right and wrong. It just doesn’t make for a very compelling plot and means that all of the characters will be annoying at best and completely unlikable at worst. There isn’t much of a happy middle to be found here. You still want them to survive and defeat the terrorists but it does limit how much you could like any of the characters.

Also as a vampire series you can still expect there to be a lot of blood draining as always. In this series it may as well be a kiss with how the characters really get into it. The vampires are never able to fully control their urges and most of the time the humans are egging them on as well. Now there is a full toxic relationship. No other way to get around that.

As far as the artwork goes, it’s not terrible. I would put it under average though. It’s got a very old school Shojo look which means that a lot of the characters are easily to mess up. The pages can get cluttered really quickly as well and any action scene quickly becomes near unreadable. As long as you read through the series slowly you will be fine, but it’s certainly not very streamlined. The series actually made it over 50 chapters so you’ve got a good amount of content here. Factor in how each chapter will take you a little while and you’re totally set.

If you do enjoy the series, I doubt it will feel too short. Memories covers a lot of events within that time-frame. While the flashbacks and flash forwards mainly drove me out of the story, I imagine they will have the opposite effect on a mega fan. There is a lot of world building here after all. It’s the kind of series that would probably end up being a whole lot better in anime form which tends to make scenes more dynamic. That can fix some of the boring elements but it will have time fixing the poor characters.

Now his review has seemed pretty negative….but I’m about to double down. This is the kind of Shojo that people assume they are all like. I wasn’t the biggest fan of Shojo back in the day but I’ve read a lot of good ones since then. They can be a lot of fun with well written romances and a lot of light hearted moments. I will admit that a romantic drama will always be hard to pull off but a romantic comedy can usually be a lot of fun. The first problem is that this series decided to go full on drama and the second problem is that none of the romances are properly built up.

Yes this goes back to the main characters being vampires again but the series could have still had a good romance if it really wanted to. I don’t think this had to be an impossible endeavor at all. Ai for example could have been a good new main character if the series hadn’t given her odd romantic subplots and also kept switching to other characters. It’s why most series pick an actual main character and then develop supporting ones.

Going for an ensemble cast is going to be more of a risk if you aren’t ready for it and I can tell you that this series was absolutely not ready for the challenge. Also, there can’t be any stakes for the various stories that take place in the past because we know the main characters are okay in the present. Not that this is an action thriller story or anything like that but there are still some attacks and thriller elements so why spoil the ending right in chapter 1? The amount of questionable choices here will have your mind spinning the whole time.

Finally, I would say what keeps this series from being an interesting intellectual thriller like Liar Game or Kingdom Hearts is that there are no interesting concepts to debate. For example the vampire stuff I talked about earlier. Their lack of emotions and how they view romance is tragic but also completely negative. There isn’t really a debate on how this could be a good thing or a way to solve the problem. It’s why this series can be as complex as it wants, it still won’t generate any real discussion. I wish the series had focused more on a war between humans and vampires because at least that is always a fun thing to talk about.

The closest we get to that is a few characters asking if the current dynamic is really a good thing but it never ends up being a central focus. It would change the whole series but this one should have dropped the romance tag entirely and just focused on the politics. If it did that and had a human MC and a vampire, then we could have filled the series with ethical debates which would have been infinitely more interesting. You would have to make the humans be less overtly evil though as that defeats any remote chance of making this an actual debate. It’s just not going to work when it’s so one sided.


Overall, Vampire Knight: Memories is a pretty bad series. Vampires have never been my thing so throwing in a spinoff to a series I was already not a fan of? That was not going to be a recipe for success. It lasted a lot longer than I expected it to be but it never ended up being all that good. On occasion you would get a good chapter like Yuki infiltrating a terrorist stronghold to fight them or Zero getting an action scene but most of the series is just pure melodrama. If the series had been completely chronological then it probably would have been better but even then I admit that it probably would not have been great. I expect that there still would have been issues left and right. If you’re a mega fan of the original Vampire Knight then you should check this one out, but otherwise you will definitely want to skip this one. The only disclaimer I’ll give on the series behalf is that with a story like this, it can sometimes be better read as a marathon. If you do that maybe you’ll find the series to be more enjoyable but at the same time a great story is great no matter how you read it.

Overall 2/10

Seraph of the End: Guren Ichinose: Catastrophe at Sixteen Review

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It’s time for one of the edgiest grim dark manga titles of all time. Each chapter tries to keep on one upping itself for a while there. You already know that things won’t end well based on how the main series plays out but the author wants to really show you that absolutely nothing good would happen to Guren. He ends up going through trauma after trauma for the whole series. Definitely one of those titles that had potential but got way too distracted the whole time.

The story follows Guren who is part of the Ichinose family which is considerably under the Hiragi family. Basically they exist to be convenient tools and slaves to be used as needed. Guren doesn’t like this setup and wants to rebel but unfortunately doesn’t have the power to do so. Any attempt ends up with his friends getting tortured and murdered. So he is eventually tamed but his friend Mahiru goes a different path. After years of being tortured forever and ever, she gains the abilities of demons and vampires and breaks free. She has now set the planet on a course for destruction and Guren might be the only one who can stop her. Does he even want to stop her though?

As always you are not rooting for Guren to save the planet here because there is nothing to save. The series makes it absolutely abundantly clear that humanity is extremely evil to an absurd degree. Slavery is completely legal here and the political power of the top brass is so good that they can execute people in the streets as a whim. Almost every member of the main characters are tortured at some point and this seems like a frequent occurrence. You then have random demons abusing the humans and going all Sword Art Online on them. They commit violence of every kind and so again…why should humanity be saved?

This series is even darker than Attack on Titan which takes a whole lot of skill and effort because that series is near the top. Just thinking about how far this goes will make you crazy. I guess the other aspect of this is about how they show how hopeless the world is. It’s one thing for this to be the case currently but then it’s even worse when you know that things won’t get any better. So there are a few factions here. You have the humans and if they win, then the torture and slavery will continue. They are the status quo after all and will continue with the human experimentations forever. The “Heroes” won’t come to help you because they work for the establishment and have hostages to consider.

Then you have the vampires who intend to keep the humans alive as cattle so they can keep on drinking blood forever. Humanity will survive but it won’t be of much use because your quality of life will be absolutely horrible. It won’t be a life worth living. The angels mostly just watch in amusement but will blow up the world if they feel like it. Mahiru meanwhile is also going to end the world so at least in those situations it will all end right away. Finally the demons just want the humans to give into their base desires and cause chaos so you can imagine what a terrible world that would be. So yeah, we just need the planet to go boom already.

Now I will give the series this, the art is very good. It looks a whole lot like the main series and there is a lot of attention to detail on the fights. The action is always easy to follow so it doesn’t get convoluted or anything like that. The art style also does well in keeping up the atmosphere of dread. The series does actually have a solid atmosphere, it would just have needed a whole lot of restraint for the rest of the content instead of going absolutely looney tunes on the whole thing. That would have really made a world of difference.

When it comes to the characters, I can’t say that I liked most of them. Again, most of them are caught up in the cruelty of the world with no way to fight back. It doesn’t inspire a lot of hope within you to see that they’re all just government stooges the whole time. Take Guren for example. He talks a really good game but he’s always getting absolutely dominated by every other character in the series. He has to let them pound away at him because he’s forbidden from fighting back most of the time.

He’s allowed to murder other henchmen but that’s about it. He even has to work for the guy who brutally murders his father and a bunch of his attendants. Guren is forced to do that guys every bidding and even has to kneel. The amount of disrespect he goes through is really something and after a point it’s better to just make a move and die in the process instead of living with that. So that’s why I didn’t like Guren. At the end of the day he played it way too safe and did not make a big difference in the world.

Sayuri is one of his main attendants and I’ll be less harsh on her and the rest of his followers. All of the social pressures on Guren are magnified even more on someone like her who is considered deposable by everyone. She also doesn’t have the power levels needed to fight back. I appreciate that she can stay optimistic throughout all of this but her character arc is definitely tragic. Shigure and Mito are basically the same in that regard.

Shinya at least gets to troll Guren a lot so I appreciate that. He’s one of those guys who is also serious but really has to mask it or of course he will be punished as well. Definitely not a lot of good options for the guy. He was loyal though and for Guren every ally is important in this impossible fight. Norito doesn’t get as big a role as he seems to be in the main series but he was another great ally.

One of the biggest players here is Kureto. He’s the head of the Hiragi clan and one of the most powerful players among the human race. Even he has his betters and so he also puts up with some disrespect but there aren’t many. He also intend to betray these people eventually. It might make sense for him to treat his subordinates a little better as a result but this guy likes the cruelty as well. Ultimately it’s not like he has ever been anywhere close to Mahiru in power and the guy is jealous but you can’t feel all that bad for him.

A character I feel bad for is Shinoa who basically grew up in hell the whole time. Mahiru shielded her as best she could but this still wasn’t 100%. It’s clear that Shinoa is already broken inside by the time this series starts and considering that she’s just a kid, that’s real tragic. The most sympathetic character here is Mahiru though. All she wanted was to be a normal girl in love and ultimately that wasn’t in the cards. At every turn she is attacked by every faction in the book. It’s no wonder that she would join the dark side here. The only way to end this cycle of violence appears to be to destroy the world.

After all when every faction is evil, how would you go about peacefully solving this? It’s just not going to happen and so manipulating everyone to speed up the end of the world seems like the best bet. It’s also really impressive just how powerful she is. I dare say the romance dynamic with her and Guren is actually really interesting as a result. I do think it’s fairly one sided though as she really liked him while Guren seems to be the type who will just manipulate her when convenient. Not the way you really have a healthy dynamic but anytime Mahiru appeared, things would be interesting.

I can also give the manga some credit there, it is an interesting story. It’s not very often that you have this many factions running around and the series balances them well. Likeability aside, there is at least no dull moments in this series. The characters and story continue to move forward as they are thrown into more and more predicaments. The long climax that leads up to the ending is also really exciting. It’s a good reminder that you can create a lot of tension even when you know exactly how the prequel will end.

Why it had to be so extra dark and gritty is a question that will haunt us all for years to come. Even the main series can get depressing but never to this extent. Throw in all of the other issues like random fanservice and this one really fell into every issue possible. It definitely keeps this from being a fun read. Somewhere buried wayyyy deep into the manga is a wholesome school story that would have been a lot of fun. Just Guren and the gang hanging out like normal friends.

We get small glimpses of this like when Guren and his friends played video games before the big climax. Of course even then I’m not sure that the writing would have been up to the task. With all the talk about desires and such, most conversations tended to go down that dicey direction and it showed just how the author was never able to have normal dialogue. It felt like the series had to constantly go down a suggestive path which wasn’t a good idea in the slightest. I’d usually put in suggestions on how to improve the series but in this case that would pretty much mean a complete change to many parts of the premise, situations, etc. It would be a completely different story by the time I was done with it. Perhaps that would be for the best though.

At least we do get some nice cameos and easter eggs for the main series. Yuichiro and Mikaela get some brief appearances where they already appear jaded with the world. One of the top vampires shows up to remind the heroes just how many orders of magnitudes stronger Vampires are than demons. Just as a gentle reminder that there is really no hope of ever surpassing them. You have to let the humans down gently after all and that’s certainly one way to do it. Not like the series wasn’t already twisting the knife on this…

Overall, This is definitely one of those series that you will want to avoid. Stick to your head canon on what happened prior to the main series. Between what is stated and the context clues, you can more or less understand what happened anyway. I’s pretty neat to see the characters in a normal world going to school and stuff but at the same time it’s not like they are able to do this for very long before everything starts to go sideways. So if you’re reading for that then it won’t matter much anyway.

Overall 1/10

Millennium Snow Review

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It’s time for a romance series that I had definitely never heard of before. It’s got vampires in it so you already know that the series is setting off some alarm bells for me. Well, in the end it wasn’t that bad but I don’t think there is really much to it. The characters never end up being all that great and it gets really rushed by the end. There was definitely a lot more they could have done with the concept.

The series starts by introducing us to Chiyuki who is very sickly. In fact she is close to death and just barely survives thanks to being bit by a vampire named Toya. He didn’t want to do this since he doesn’t believe in biting people or draining blood but it was an emergency. So now he watches over her to make sure that she doesn’t die too quick and then he will head off to another location. Chiyuki now wants him to fully convert her into a vampire so she can live for 1000 years and finally have good health. Can she convince him to drain her though?

You can probably already guess that I’m not a big fan of that part of the plot. I actually think it’s impressive that Toya refuses to drain anybody and he just allows himself to always be in a weakened state. He’s kept a strong will about this and so it’s too bad that Chiyuki is trying to crack him here. In a way you could say the series is sort of using this as a metaphor and either way it doesn’t make for a great romance plot here. Yeah Chiyuki likes Toya but how much of that is because her life is depending on this? She will only be able to live a long and healthy life if she is turned into a vampire. It’s not a great dynamic there but at least the series does avoid any rebounds this way.

Still, the romance didn’t really work out for me. Then we have the art which is a little on the rougher side. I won’t say that it’s bad or anything like that but it could stand to be smoother or more streamlined. It’s not as good as the average manga is what I would say there. Mix that in with the main character cast already being underwhelming and you can see how this is not a title that would end up competing with the heavy hitters. I can see why it isn’t very well known.

The best character here is probably Kaede even though she showed up fairly late in the adventure. She has always been a very lonely girl who had no friends and this leads to her raising up an animal spirit. Unfortunately she didn’t realize that the words she was feeding it weren’t really doing any good but the fact that she cared about the creature is the important thing. She didn’t get to contribute much to the story but it was always good to see her in the last chapters after she made her debut.

As the main heroine, I would say that Chiyuki stands out a bit for being more unique compared to how you would expect her to be. After all the whole trying to have the main guy make a move is already a bit different and she’s the aggressive one trying to pressure Toya instead of the other way around. I tend to like confident characters so in most cases this would have been an instant win but since in this case it was like her pressuring him into something that he just didn’t want to do, she ended up losing points instead.

As for Toya, he’s not that great either because of his generally low levels of confidence and how he just doesn’t use his abilities well. He has a tough time in multiple situations and you have to remember that he can stop time and do all sorts of cool stuff. So it feels like he is playing the matchup wrong and holding himself back which are massive mistakes to be made here. His rival Ariyoshi’s not much better. This guy is a wolf so he also has some superhuman abilities but at the same time his big weakness is really that he is a big flirt. So he is more outgoing and tough but but the flirty nature holds him back quite a lot. He has a fairly intense backstory and you feel bad for him but he definitely didn’t handle things well.

He’s still better than Kei though. Kei is Chiyuki’s overprotective cousin who gets really extreme like when he locks her in a room. The guy is meant to be sympathetic but he goes way too far so that just is not an option by the end. You’re just rooting for his downfall the whole time. Fortunately he doesn’t appear much but the guy is super petty. Another villain without much screentime is Luis. He shows up near the very end of the series and I feel like there wasn’t much point to his whole character. There’s just no time left in the story for him and when he shows up he is sickly as well so he is quickly written out anyway. It was to add a little danger but the whole thing felt rather force and everyone treated him too well. I don’t care that he’s on his deathbed, he was attacking the main heroine so he’s got to go. It’s not that complicated.

I did like Toya’s attendant Yami though. He was a loyal friend who was always ready to help even if Toya isn’t the easiest guy to work for. Yami may act like a kid most of the time but if anything it feels like he is probably more mature most of the time. So I definitely give him a lot of credit. That about wraps it up for the characters. That’s probably a good thing since we’ve only got 4 volumes to deal with and more characters would mean that things are even more scattered.

Ultimately the series’ weakness is really that it did not get to excel at anything. If any aspect could have been really solid then that would have helped the whole series out but it didn’t really have anything like that. For example there aren’t really any funny gags or comedic characters to help carry the slice of life stuff. Generally I would consider this to be more of a drama. There are a lot of big facial expressions and the series is generally light hearted but I wouldn’t say that it’s very funny. Some good humor would have gone a long way here too so that’s really a shame.

Overall, Millennium Snow is a little below average I’d say. It’s not really a manga that I would spend much time thinking about later on, nor do I think it’ll get a re read at any point in the future. The characters are weak and the art doesn’t help to save it. If you’re looking for a title where there are vampires but not a lot of blood sucking then at least it beats the average there but nah in the end I would have to give this one a thumbs down. It should have either focused a bit more on the romance without throwing in a bunch of side characters and a random villain or it should have just doubled down on action. In the end there just wasn’t much time to do anything and it felt like the series was really lacking direction.

Overall 4/10

Bram Stoker’s Dracula Review

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Uh oh it’s time for another Dracula film. By now you know that most of these Dracula movies are pretty bad. I think part of the problem is that there just isn’t a whole lot that you can do with this vampire. Blood sucking will always be annoying at best and rather gross at worst. Then mix that in with the main characters being generally inept and you aren’t going to be in for a good time. By now the story is also rather stale so yeah it loses on all fronts.

The film starts with Jonathan heading over to meet Dracula on some real estate business as usual. He ignores all of the red flags because his family really needs the money. Unfortunately this proves to be a fatal error as he is attacked by Dracula’s vampire wives. Unlike other Dracula incarnations who command respect, he has to actually physically stop them here since they took a bit to actually listen to his orders. They get their win shortly afterwards but not before Dracula heads out to take down Jonathan’s fiancé as well as her friend. Can anybody stop this guy?

Of course not! What do you think this is??? I mean sure he’ll be taken down eventually but not before he causes a lot of chaos. That’s always the annoying thing about these films. You have to slowly watch him do some blood draining and take the heroes down before anybody is actually able to stop him. That’s where it just gets annoying the whole time and the scenes take forever. The film also squeezes in some fanservice here. Lets just say that the scene is played up quite a bit and Dracula is doing some unnecessary stuff during the biting.

There are no coincidences here and so the film is going extra hard in making everyone look bad. I would say even among Dracula movies this one is particularly weak. There is really no reason to watch it. The movie gets excessively violent, the fanservice is poor, and there are no great characters. Even Dracula as I mentioned doesn’t get the usual amount of respect you would think. He doesn’t look very imposing, if anything he seems confused at times. You feel like the heroes could take him down if they would move a bit quicker.

There’s at least one scene where Van Helsing has the cross at the ready but throws it away so Dracula gets the upper hand. Yeah he had a hostage at the ready but that’s when you charge forward. Naturally Dracula continues going about his business once the cross is away so the heroes earned nothing there. It’s why the hostage dilemma can be difficult of course since it is often a lose-lose situation but it was particularly annoying here.

Jonathan is particularly awful though. Early on he has the chance to destroy Dracula when he goes up to the coffin but he hesitates for some bizarre reason which gives the henchman enough time to take him out. Next time you have the lord of darkness in your sights you really need to finish the job. Like what are you even doing by that point? You have to lock in and take care of business. It’s the only way forward.

There’s not much to say about Lucy and Mina here. They basically exist to get wrecked by Dracula the whole time as they can’t muster up any willpower. Arthur is also annoying because of course he falls asleep on the job and is generally unhelpful until the end. He may have some enthusiasm but he is lacking in overall skills and ability which are just as important. Without those he ends up just being lost in the grand scheme of things which isn’t helpful to anyone.

Van Helsing at least knows what he is doing. Again he doesn’t always handle the situation well but I give him some points for the attempts. Without him the heroes wouldn’t be doing much of anything. He’s just going through the motions for the most part though, I prefer the adaptions where he is a little crazier and willing to go to extreme method to stop Dracula. Lets see this guy cut loose and everything you know? That would be way better.

Not that there was ever any chance for this film to be good though. Lets just face it, it was always going to be a pretty bad movie and there’s no real way to avoid that. It’s not impossible to make a good Dracula movie, in fact it’s been done a few times. You have to try really hard though because you are starting at a disadvantage and I didn’t feel that the film did a particularly good job here. There are also so many Dracula films that I feel as the writer you need to at least try and differentiate yourself a bit. This one didn’t really do that at all.

At least the film’s not super long so I can say that about it. Is that really the only positive? Well…yeah. I mean what other good things are there to say about this one? The characters are annoying and Dracula doesn’t make for a good villains. All of the characters are supremely annoying so you are just shaking your head the whole time. Dracula also needs a better motivation. He’s basically draining all of these girls because he wants romance or just enjoys the power? One of them reminds him of his wife but he must not have loved her a ton if he’s rebounding like this. He comes across as a desperate guy who isn’t even remotely likable and I can’t stress enough how bad that makes him look. That’s one of the worst kinds of motivations that a villain can have.

Overall, This was a pretty bad Dracula movie. It falls into all of the usual issues around a vampire film like this without having any hook to keep you interested. Maybe throw us some big fights showing off Dracula’s super abilities or have some kind of government plot. Maybe have the army try to take him down? Things like that could at least give you something to sink your teeth into instead of effectively watching the same movie again. To be honest it’s unlikely it would give the film many more points but every little bit helps. Definitely avoid this film as much as possible.

Overall 1/10

30 Days of Night Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

So what’ve we got here? Vampires? Check! Ultra violence? Check! Horror movie??? Check! Yeah this is a recipe for disaster and I’m here to report that the movie holds absolutely nothing back. It’s going for the Gold Trophy in overall edge and violence and absolutely earns it without any real competition. There’s not much positive to say about this movie so strap in folks because we’re going for a ride!

The story takes place in Alaska right before the ominous 30 days of no sunlight. Most people head out to wherever they live during these times while the rest prepare to brave the cold as they always do. These guys have been able to survive in these temperatures for ages and are confident they can pull it off again but things change when a mysterious guy shows up and causes trouble. The heroes lock him up but it’s unclear how he even got here. Also he says his crew is coming by soon to take everyone out. See it turns out the vampires are real and they are descending on the town to murder everyone. The heroes will have to hold them off for 30 days….yeah this won’t be easy.

Now there are some interesting things you can do with a plot like this. The concept of a survival film of the heroes using the terrain to their advantage and trying to survive is quite sound. But…it doesn’t work against vampires. See this movie should have either gone with normal humans as the enemy or creatures. I’ll explain. Lets say World War III happened and a bunch of enemy soldiers came into Alaska to murder everyone. It makes sense that the heroes would have the advantage with the cold and hiding in the houses. Likewise if you’re fighting a bunch of creatures you can also set up traps and such.

None of this applies to vampires because they all have super strength, speed, and endurance. You can’t really set traps for them when they can smell you from a whiles away and hear every little sound. When they attack the humans there isn’t even really a fight because they just tear them to shreds immediately. The whole survival aspect quickly becomes moot because the humans just get slaughtered each and every time. I felt like the film threw away the most interesting angle by making the enemies vampires.

Instead a good portion of the film is the heroes just hiding in a balcony as different characters get impatient and are eaten one after another. There are so many scenes where someone just gets attacked by a group of vampires, over and over again. The most annoying scene had to be when one of the older guys just had enough so he runs outside which forces others to go after him and then things go badly for the various characters. You’re putting everyone at risk when you do selfish stuff like that. There’s no way that would ever be worth it but in the moment the character just doesn’t care.

The film tries to throw in a quick romance subplot with Eben and Stella who had been going through a rough patch but this situation forces them to have to be together for a while and potentially get past their issues. It doesn’t really have much of a purpose in the film and there’s no real time for it anyway. I’d say I just wanted to get back to the action but in a way I guess this beats those parts.

See, the film is trying to be as violent as possible so the vampires biting people is actually a lot more explicit and dragged out than normal. I already don’t like blood sucking and this is more like Werewolves with how they chomp on the humans. They even toy with/torture some of the humans before murdering them. There’s certainly a whole lot of blood throughout the film so this isn’t for the faint of heart. We do get a true fight scene near the end which was a nice change of pace. Even this one couldn’t resist a Mortal Kombat type finishing move but at least we did have true combat for a second there. The victor makes no sense given the power gap but hey the movie had to end at some point. I would have just written in some kind of extra weakness or an additional advantage that the human would have to shake things up. Now that would have been a good move.

Outside of everyone being murdered the film also adds in other dark themes like choosing to murder your friends and family or let them get eaten alive. Obviously it’s a lose-lose situation at that point but the idea is you’re basically pressured into a decision there. It’s always a rough one to have to watch. Then we also have the classic animal violence here as some animals are destroyed quite violently. Yeah there’s a story reason for this but it’s still an awful moment all around that should have been cut out.

The film won’t even let heroes get a painless death. One guy has the bright idea to blow himself up and a whole building rather than letting the vampires eat him. I completely get it too because that makes a lot of sense…then he ends up surviving the explosion. The character was shocked and I was as well. Like seriously guys? Naturally that gives the vampires time to gloat and then finish him off. The whole point was for him to avoid that so the film felt extra mean spirited there. There is no reason the character should have survived that, just give him the dignity of a quick death. That should have been on the table for him.

That’s just the tone of the film though. It’s not enough to slaughter the humans but it always has to be done with such ferocity and hopelessness for the humans. The vampire designs are intense I’ll give them that. You would absolutely feel intimidated to see one out in the wild because aside from the stats they just look really scary. The film delivers on that part and the atmosphere is definitely really intense.

I would even go as far as to say that the very beginning of the first act isn’t super bad. Before the animals die which is still very early in the film I’ll grant you that much. But we see everyone leaving and know that something is approaching. It’s a very ominous start but ultimately the film overplayed its hand of making the enemies basically invincible next to the main characters and that was the end of the game. All you need to even the odds is make it so that they are not bullet proof. One or two bullets can destroy them. Do that and suddenly we’re looking at a movie where the humans have a real chance and things can get interesting.

Overall, If you want to see a bunch of vampires slaughtering a bunch of defenseless humans then this is the film to check out. It reminds me a lot of pre arc Attack on Titan but at least there they had some semblance of a chance. The humans here can’t do much since guns don’t really help do anything other than buy time. The vampires are too powerful and also there are just too many of them. They really needed some kind of extra weakness to make this a lot closer. Something that would actually make this a very valid hunter vs prey type movie. Ultimately the movie isn’t able to make this premise work and is relentlessly brutal. Definitely skip it!

Overall 0/10

Rabid Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

There are some movies where right from the jump you know it’s going to be a miss and this is one of those. You’ll be shaking your head the whole time here because this vampire type film just isn’t it. The world doesn’t handle the threat very well and the whole film is going for grim violence the whole time. It’s basically a B grade slasher film but in all the wrong ways.

The movie starts with Rose and Hart driving down the road at massive speeds. They are defying destiny to try and make them crash and sure enough they run off the road and do in fact crash. Hart has a lot of broken bones but he’s mainly okay while the same cannot be said for Rose. She is taken to a nearby hospital where they run a very experimental surgery on her. Basically their justification was that she was not going to last otherwise but the head also needed quick results because funding wasn’t going well. Unfortunately while the surgery was a success, it came at a great cost.

See, by mistake the surgery gave Rose a giant stinger in her armpit which she could now use to destroy everyone in her way. She no longer has a taste for real food and only seeks to consume the living. Whoever she drains becomes a zombie and this infection continues to spread. Basically she is patient zero and the only silver lining of this is that she keeps some semblance of free will while everyone else becomes mindless zombies. She’s always hungry now too so she bumps a lot of people off and then afterwards it is unclear just how much she knows about it. See, she knows enough that she wants to always get away from her friends to murder a stranger instead but then seems to have headaches and isn’t totally sure of herself. It’s almost like a split personality but that may be giving her too much credit and she was just trying to make the whole situation look like that.

Regardless that is basically the entire plot in a nutshell. Rose goes around murdering everybody and nobody can figure out how to stop her because nobody even knows that she is the one doing it. She always waits until only her victim is in the room and then she makes her move. Whether it’s a poor girl just trying to have a refreshing swim or a doctor who leans in too close, Rose takes them all down. Often times the people she’s destroying aren’t even bad people which is the most tragic part like the truck driver who was just trying to help out. They all meet rather gruesome ends before the adventure concludes.

The movie is rather unrelenting in that respect. There is always something sinister or dark happening at all times and so the viewer can’t catch a break. There is no time for lighthearted banter or any really happy scenes to be honest. Instead we just see the world descending into chaos. They also squeeze in some animal violence of course as Rose goes after a cow or a horse. I forget which but of course she can’t control her hunger again and this is why she has to be considered as one of the main antagonists here. In the end she could not control her abilities at all and that was a big problem.

She also makes some very bad mistakes like at the end deciding to prove her innocence by trying a blood transfusion with someone. It’s great to test out a theory but she didn’t have any kind of safety precautions and so it’s really as if she just blew herself up. There was never going to be a positive outcome from all of that and that was the problem here. It just makes for a really dark ending and ends the film on a super sour note. Not that the film had any hope left by this point mind you but at least having a decent ending would have been nice. Instead the film is doubling down on making everything as tragic as possible which is definitely unfortunate. Not what you want to see from a title like this.

Hart also has almost no point in this film. Rose may as well have been driving by herself in the intro. He barely appears until midway where he runs in to call her a monster and runs off. By the time he cools down it’s already too late for Rose. Rose’s roommate did a better job of being there for her and even then she was doomed from the jump. In this film nobody is really safe and all you can do is make a run for it or you will probably be devoured next. Now is there anything I can say in favor of the film?

Unfortunately no, but I can at least say that the concept of having a stinger in your armpit is unique. Not even sure if I would say it’s unique in a good way but it’s a premise I had never thought of before and will probably never think about again. It’s just so weird but that’s the kind of idea that can make you rich if it’s handled right. This one just wasn’t and the film gets lost in the sauce really quick.

What the film should have done was to focus on the world at large a bit more and how they were handling it. Of course one governor just said they should shoot the infected while a lot of other people were panicking but focusing on the government a lot could have been fun. Lets see what they think about all of this. Sure, the virus is spreading fast but the zombies are really slow right now so you don’t figure that they should be a big threat at any rate. Just take them out and all it a day. I want to see a zombie invasion film from the start of when it was happening for once and how the government handles it. I think there is a whole lot of possibility there. Perhaps it will be negated by all the blood sucking and zombie eating but maybe it could pull this premise off.

Overall, Rapid is a film to stay away from without a doubt. The whole time you’re watching it you will be realizing that there are much better films to check out. Nobody has heard of this film for a good reason. It’s just not that good and certainly ahs not aged well either. This is not the kind of film you would ever rewatch either and so in the end what that means is that you will be shaking your head here the whole time. I don’t know where I would start in trying to tell someone how to do a good remake of this one so instead I’ll just say that the whole premise is probably doomed and you shouldn’t even attempt to make a movie like this.

Overall 0/10

Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

Hansel & Gretel is definitely a very classic story that I’m sure just about everyone has heard of at one point or another. Doing a modern action film based on that premise could be a lot of fun. So on one hand they do succeed in adding a ton of action and it has a very Resident Evil/Underworld feel to it. Everyone’s wearing leather jackets and there is a lot of loud music as everyone just starts attacking. I always like the vibe but the film also decides to be quite over the top violent the whole time which ends up weakening it entirely. It’s a shame since otherwise I think this could have ended up being a whole lot of fun but instead it ends up being rather underwhelming.

The movie starts off with the origin story as Hansel and Gretel are abandoned by their father and a witch invites them to her house. For a long while she has them captured but eventually they destroy her and escape. They then decide to become witch hunters and are very good at it. They’ve slain so many over the years it’s almost like they are superhuman or something. Hansel’s one weakness is that he has magical diabetes so he has to take a shot every few hours or else he can’t move. One day they save an innocent civilian from being executed by a bunch of crazy townsfolk and prepare to stop the true enemy Muriel. The tough part about this is that she is one of the strongest witches in existence. Defeating her will not be easy by any stretch of the imagination.

It is hard to picture how the heroes lasted this long against the witches though because they just aren’t very impressive in a fight. Sure they have the gun and the crossbow not to mention that magical bolts don’t affect them directly (Strange isn’t it?) but that’s it. They still only have human level stats so you’d think the witches could overwhelm them with speed or manipulating the environment to choke them or something. They don’t end up doing any of that and every time they are defeated you have to shake your head a bit.

This gets even more drastic once Muriel steps in because she’s much stronger as I mentioned before. She moves so fast that it’s like she is teleporting and her energy blasts have a wide range to them. I get that she can’t use her mind control on the heroes but there are still so many ways to beat them. This is definitely an example of a movie where they made the difference between the heroes and villains way too drastic. You always gotta keep it at least a bit equal or the plot armor starts to show off too much. At least Muriel does make for a decently good villain though. She has a very concrete goal and takes steps to achieve it. Her plan wasn’t even bad so she put in a whole lot of work here.

Then we have Mina as the girl who was nearly executed. She gets a fairly big role in the film but ultimately ends up being very underwhelming. For the first half I actually just thought she was going to be a really powerful villain that the heroes had to worry about but as the film went on you started to realize that this might not be in the cards. She’s a character whose concept is a lot cooler than the execution. You got the feeling that she could end up being really cool but then the climax happens and that was it.

Likewise there is a white witch in the flashback who looks really bad. Basically like in Final Fantasy a white witch has healing powers while the dark witches use your classic attack spells. The problem is that the white witches are such pacifists that they literally refuse to lift up a hand to fight back even when they are being absolutely crushed. Not a good look if you ask me. There has to be a point where you are going to defend yourself because if you just let people murder you like that then I’m not going to like the character. It’s as simple as that.

Now there is a sidekick character named Ben who wants to help the main duo but he’s just annoying. For starters he lost any single shred of decency he might have had when he tries to take advantage of Gretel while she was asleep. I mean that’s case closed in one fell swoop. You just don’t come back from a blow like that, no shot! He mainly just exists to be the comic relief and doesn’t add anything to the film so you could absolutely cut him out and nothing would really change.

The heroes run into a troll named Edward later on who is nice enough. He helps out Gretel quite a bit which is always good and he means well. He may not be the smartest character out there but he knows enough to be of help when it counts. The guy has the physical strength needed to win almost any one on one fight and he seems like he would be a very loyal ally to have around so there’s no problem with him watching your back.

Then we have Hansel who is a good main character. He has quite the grudge against witches but who wouldn’t in his position right? The witch basically ruined his life and he will never be fully better again so after that it is really hard to forget such a moment. He can fight well which is the important part and is always looking out for Gretel. Likewise Gretel has Hansel’s back and they make a good team. She’s very confident and is always ready to press on in the fight. Their sibling dynamic worked well and isn’t one you see very often in the movies so that was fun. It’s why you could cut out Ben and just keep the dynamic duo banter intact.

Of course the film still has to squeeze in some romance which is why Mina steps in. This whole plot is very rushed and there just isn’t time for romance when you’re trying to take down witches. Lives are at stake and they also have to watch out for the corrupt townsfolk who are everywhere. So instead of pairing up and all of that maybe they should be focused on winning the fight ahead of them. That would have made way more sense at least and it could give them time to develop as friends instead. Yeah the romance should have been cut out.

As mentioned earlier the violence also could have been toned down a whole lot. Characters are being blown up and sliced and diced left and right. The film also goes for some downright gross imagery at different points as well like with Muriel forcing some guys to eat a bunch of bugs. Like did we really need to go there? Sure it shows how superior she is as a mage but cmon now. Then the film has to get edgy with all the townsfolk being brutes who go after Gretel at one point. The film is trying to be as extreme as possible at all moments and it works against the film.

Overall, Hansel & Gretel had some nice potential here. I liked some of the twists and the whole action angle was nice. I do think it could have ended up being a good film if it just showed some restraint. Instead it didn’t show any though and that’s what hurts the film a whole lot. There is no real replay value here and you’ll be cringing a whole lot. It’s time for another hard reboot to this series. You can still keep the witch hunter angle but the whole direction just needs to be changed. Hey, if you do that then you could have a winner on your side but in the meantime you should absolutely skip this one. At least the soundtrack is really good though.

Overall 2/10

Morbius Review

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Morbius is one of those films that seemed doomed on arrival. Nobody really cared all that much about the character so why would a whole film about him do good? It’s also vampire themed which was tapped out decades ago. The only thing that put this film on the map were the memes and unfortunately it’s safe to say that the memes are better than the actual film. I wanted to hear someone yell “It’s morbin time!” in the film at least once. Ah well, at least the second after credits scene is hilarious and one of the funniest ones you’ll ever see. It’s a serious scene that is funnier than most of the humor based ones so the film has that going for it.

The movie starts by introducing us to Morbius and his friend Milo who were both born with a very rare blood disease. They can barely even walk and their bodies will continue to deteriorate until they die very young. They also have nonstop pain that hits them during every waking moment so their lives are quite tough. Morbius is determined to develop a cure though. Many years pass and Morbius is really close but the only solution appears to be involving bats and he will have to break a lot of laws to pull this off. Morbius succeeds but at a heavy cost. He is now a vampire and must drink blood in order to survive. Fake blood also won’t suffice for very long so soon he will need to feed on humans. Can Morbius resist the urge and find a cure for the cure or is he doomed? One thing’s for sure, he has no catchphrase to fall back on and save his life.

Lets talk about some of the stuff that doesn’t work here. Right off the bat you can bet that the blood stuff is a non starter here. You always have Morbius drinking blood and everything because that’s how he is able to exist. We don’t really see the blood but it’s nevertheless quite gross to see him drinking out of the bags and always gagging afterwards. Blood is just not a good drink to have at the ready and it’s a disadvantage of the vampire genre.

Then you also have this really awful song/dance sequence for Milo. Oh man it could have at least been semi decent if the song wasn’t so bad but it was one of the worst songs I’ve seen in a film in quite a while. The film couldn’t afford to have a scene like that because it was already skating on thin ice. I also just didn’t like Milo in this film. The guy gets too emotional too quickly and never thinks anything through rationally. He’s the kind of guy who seems okay for a minute there but very quickly you realize that any amount of power would quickly corrupt him. This guy is not hero material.

As for Morbius, the guy was running experiments on animals which is a really rough way to start his character arc. Experimenting on animals is never okay and so that’s an easy way to get me not to root for the character. He’s also just not my kind of lead for the most part as he lacks confidence and isn’t ready to just get in there and start landing hits. There are some brief moments where he gets real confidence and starts to be a real main character but those moments rarely last. At least based on the after credits scene he is finally back to being a confident leader so if they stick with that for any sequels then that will be an improvement.

The real standout character here was actually Al. So in a subplot that doesn’t go anywhere you have these two cops, Simon and Al. They are basically following Morbius around and trying to get to the bottom of the situation. What I liked about Al a lot was how he was able to quickly see through everyone’s lies. For one reason or another everyone he talked to would always lie to his face. So Al tends to give sarcastic remarks back to let them know that he knew they were lying and t was a nice dynamic. I was glad that he didn’t just play dumb there. This guy was quick on the uptake and I think giving him more scenes would have been nice.

Then you have the serious member Simon. He gets a quick chase scene with Morbius and holds him at gun point so this guy is very impressive. I really think the cops had a solid dynamic so it’s a shame that they couldn’t have done more. As it is, you could cut them out of the film and nothing would really change. They may give some set up for a sequel film but at the end of the day that doesn’t have much baring on this one.

The main heroine here is Martine and she’s a solid character. You just wish the film didn’t have to throw her into a romance right away. It doesn’t add anything to the film and the romance is just so weak. You don’t see why this started at all because they had a good working relationship going and you don’t want to wreck that by having both characters start getting emotional. It’s always best to keep it professional and that would have been a good idea. At least this way Morbius has an extra loyal ally at all times. Martine does well in staying strong under pressure.

Finally you have Emil who was the mentor type figure in the film which means that the death flags around him were absolutely massive. It’s very rare for the character to not get absolutely wrecked in a film like this. At least he talks tough and seems to be in the know. There’s not a whole lot he could have really done differently here.

One positive thing I can say about the film is that the effects are really good. Personally I liked the energy trails that Morbius would leave behind him during fights. The action scenes really hold up quite well. Morbius is also surprisingly powerful so he would definitely be able to hold his own against other Marvel heroes. His only weakness would be the time limit without drinking blood so he’ll need to find a fix for that. So at least the movie does have a little glimmer of hope there.

The sequel just needs to focus more on the action and less on the vampire elements. It also needs a fresh villain here, someone with a different power set so you can have more imaginative battles. I would have my hopes quite low for a sequel but I am sure that you can still pull it off with the proper writers and a good story. You don’t even need to rely on guest stars although they certainly would not hurt.

Also, one of the main conflicts here felt a little forced in how it happens. It reminded me a lot of the Amazing Spider-Man 2. So keep in mind that with this condition you are constantly in a lot of pain and so if there’s a way to end that pain then you’re most likely going to take it. I felt like Morbius had 0 empathy at this point and handled the situation in the worst way possible. At least offer some hope about a real cure coming soon but otherwise it does appear to everyone like Morbius was thinking “I got mine!” and leaving it at that.

It doesn’t excuse the villain from going crazy immediately but you can definitely see how it happened. The whole situation may not have been avoidable but it’s hard to say and would definitely have gone differently at the very least otherwise. It’s not that hard to have at least been a little tactful but of course that’s not Morbius’ strength.

The film doesn’t really have many fun scenes either. Like you’re never laughing except for after the credits and most of the film is just rather dreary. I would say the premise was fine but the execution was just bad. Still, if you do watch the film then stick around for the after credits scenes. I actually liked both of them which is rare since when you have two, usually one of them will be sub par as a result. Fortunately that was not the case this time.

Overall, Morbius is basically as bad as everyone said it was. The film just didn’t even feel like it was trying. The vampire stuff is pretty bad but even the normal scenes tend to be okay at best. I liked Morbius beating up some thugs and stealing their base but for every scene like that you have 5 lab scenes of him either drinking blood or getting hit with needles. The movie needed a completely different approach. Ironically the memes actually laid the groundwork for this so the sequel should embrace them and then the film could be good. Perhaps it would feel a bit like pandering but if executed right then we’d really be in business.

Overall 3/10

Nosferatu Review

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It’s time for a silent movie and I have to say that those can definitely be tricky. Now what do I mean by that? Well, here’s the score. A silent movie has access to almost none of the things I really like about movies. Solid dialogue, great sound effects, etc. That’s all gone here and so the movie’s a bit of a chore to get through and ends up being dragged on for a whole lot. This is one of the few films that gets a lot score not because the film is awful but because it is dreadfully boring. Has to be one of the least entertaining films I’ve seen in a while.

The movie starts off with Thomas getting ready to head out because he has found someone to buy the house next to him. This will be the rich Count Orlok who is not very well liked by the locals. Thomas isn’t scared but weird things begin to happen at the castle like when Orlok tries to drink his blood. Is this guy just very quirky or is he an actual danger? Thomas isn’t sure and isn’t really the smartest character in the film. His wife Ellen may need to be the one to help out but even if she has visions, what can she actually do about them?

From the start the movie just couldn’t grab my attention. The music isn’t very interesting. It’s pretty much one main track that plays for the whole movie and just goes into different phases to shake things up. It’s not a theme that has particularly aged well in any respect and is just too low key. Perhaps it beats not having any music at all but it really could have been so much better. I won’t say much about the visuals because it’s all so old though.

Additionally, I thought Count Orlok’s design was actually not that bad. It’s aged pretty decently. What hasn’t aged decently is how all of the other characters also look sinister at times. I don’t think this was intentional but Ellen and even Thomas fall into that a bit. Thomas looks half crazy and doesn’t seem to understand the situation the whole time. He is extremely slow on the uptake. You’d think Orlok trying to suck up his blood when he cut his thumb would have been enough, but no not quite. It takes more than that to really get to Thomas and he should have tried to escape sooner. He put himself in the worst possible place and it shows. By the end things work out but I wouldn’t say due to any great contributions by Thomas. He was just along for the ride half the time.

If he was a more interesting main character that could have helped the film a great deal. Then you have Ellen as the heroine who is nice enough. Her strength of will may not have been amazing here but I’ll chalk that up as being more impressive for Orlok rather than being a shot against her. Something tells me that no character in this film would have done great in that moment. As for Orlok, he definitely needs to have a better handle on his strengths and weaknesses. If he did then he probably would have done a whole lot better in this film. As it is, I wouldn’t say he did awful but there’s really no reason why he shouldn’t defeat everyone. The weapons in this time were not super advanced nor were there security cameras so if he played things well he could keep winning for all of eternity.

The ending is definitely not a particularly happy one even with Orlok gone. Ultimately humanity lost this round big time. It was interesting how there was a whole plot about how the town thought a plague was going around initially. Now that’s an element that could be a little interesting so naturally the film doesn’t have too much time for it. Becoming a vampire is like a plague in a sense and getting bit by one can seem like that too. Now you start to go into zombie territory if this was to continue too much but it’s a different take for sure.

Ultimately Orlok never felt like a huge threat to me but it would be difficult for the film to pull that off without any talking out loud. I watch anime subbed sometimes so I can’t say that’s a big issue but the big issue here really comes down to you not being able to get in on the action. Reading is all well and good but without a soundtrack you don’t have a chance at an emotional appeal. Without true dialogue you don’t get a lot of depth. Without solid effects you are left wanting a whole lot more than what you got.

Part of why the film is scored so low is it’s hard for me to know where to even start to try and improve this one. Particularly if I try within the confines of a silent film and the limitations it would have had at the time. Similar to how I don’t think I would be nearly as big a video game fan as I am now if I grew up back in the day, I don’t think I would have been a big fan of the cinema in the silent era. It’s just hard to see how you can make these films all that interesting.

It’s probably early to judge a whole genre/style of film off of one installment but that’s how discouraging this one was. I suppose the first step is to either have no music if it was going to sound like this or to find a way to have some better tracks in there. Either one would help things a great deal. Throw in a better story with no vampires and that can help as well. I’ve never been a vampire fan and I wouldn’t say this did anything to change my mind.

Overall, Nosferatu is a movie that feels like it’s 3 hours long. It really drags and drags as you wait for something to happen but it never does. Even the climax is really low key if you think about it. There was no climactic fight or even a chance for the cops to throw in a bunch of guns and take this guy down. The ending is almost a bit sudden if you think about it and doesn’t make Orlok look great. I suppose that’s just the way it had to be but yeah that’s a thumbs down from me. Stay far away from this film. While it doesn’t have the long string of negatives you would expect a 2 star movie to have, it has one of the big ones which is just that it’s really boring the whole time.

Overall 2/10