Short, and yet...

I like games I can just zen out to, your Powerwashers, your Viscera Cleanup Detail, so I picked up WereCleaner and decided to see if it was that kind of game.

You are a cleaner, yes, but you are also a werewolf, and if someone sees you, you kill them! ... and then have to clean up the bodies (continued employment!). The cleaning is basic, spray water, vacuum trash, and bag animals. But...

It's isometric. Just something about isometric controls just straight up annoys me. I just want to go up or left, not hold down up&left! And the screen is really close up. When a big mechanic is "avoid people" (No Kill is an extra challenge per level), you need to be able to see when people are close, but you can't. Just all of a sudden someone walks in on you, and you kill and have to deal with the body. I got things to do, I would avoid them, but it is more luck than design.

The levels are short, just go to a few places, and clean up, so you can race through it quite quickly. And given the number of stars is based on how quick you are, speed is important. But then we hit the last level. At least, I assume it is the last level. I gave it several tries, but failed constantly, to the point where I'm thinking if you succeed, it will be more luck than anything else.

So I gave it a go, clocked some cheevos more or less incidentally, and... uninstalled it without finishing. And short of this blog post, I plan no more thoughts on it. Well, maybe watch an LP to see the ending, but no interest in playing it myself.

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Legslong

This is one of them big horror movies, it seems, and amazingly isn't from A24.

Lee Harker is an agent with the FBI, and ends up joining the group looking for Longlegs, a supposed killer that has already claimed several families. She has rather an unusual connection with the case, and it seems like there is more connections with her past than she remembers.

I do wonder if the main reason this has some reknown is because it has Nicholas Cage attached to it. He's a producer, and is in it as the Longlegger himself, albeit in a fair bit of latex on his face, but it is clearly still him, and for people wanting a loud performance from him, he does give it. However, he's not the main focus, Maika Monroe has that job. She is... fine? Blair Underwood does a good agent too. I feel like I should know Alicia Witt from something, but not sure what.

This is a long walk of a movie [sigh, no doubt puns will occur] but it doesn't go anywhere.

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Outside In 2

I'm getting really confused about these movies... wait, is that an emotion?

Riley goes to Hockey Camp, but also experiences puberty and so also gets new emotions. Which makes things a mess, and so we have the battle of the old emotions vs the new emotions! Who will win? Fight for Riley, fight, fight, fight!

So the Emotions control Riley, but she is also her own person and does her own thing? And the emotions feel emotions too? I really can't keep track of what this movie is trying to have us understand. And there are Imaginations? And mind police creatures? The analogy of people inside your head controlling you only goes so far and it fell off a cliff for me in this movie.

There are still some good bits in here, but I'm going to place a lot of the heavy lifting for that on the music. I definitely noticed it during the more emotional (in the usual Pixar sense) scenes. And I'm not saying they didn't work, just that I could tell what was going on.

Voices... everyone is fine. I have no idea how many people came back from the first movie, but they seem the same? And the art style is consistent, so that's good. (Probably helps that this is a closer sequel than some have been... looking at you, Incredibles!)

It's fine, but... I'm just not tracking everything properly here.

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Twosters

Wow, this is such an original movie.

Addy likes to chase tornadoes/ride horses/climb cliffs/defuse bombs, but a disasterious moment kills her friends. Years later, she is pulled back to chase tornadoes/hunt tigers/fly jets/jump stunts, and can she get back her mojo?

Yep, I realise that is so incredibly generic a description, but this is so generic a movie. It really could have been any other hundreds of movies, just that this one features tornadoes and a hunky guy with a western accent that heals her heart.

From a production point, this is fine. Tornadoes look real enough, people have trouble driving around in them, people being sucked into tornadoes look funny and totally real.

No doubt this was made because of money, as I can't think of any other reason for it to exist.

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/ | | | \ Wombulus

So this is more of an actual sequel to Alien than the rest of the franchise... read on for if that is a good or bad thing.

Life sucks on a company planet, so when a space ship is nearby with the gear to get out of there, you'd be a fool to pass up on that opportunity, and these teens (no, they are not teens, but-) are no fools. However, you wouldn't believe this, on the ship are some Xenomorph stuff, and, guess what, this gives rise to an Alien that presents a threat they have to deal with.

Okay, so no doubt someone will say "Always has been" but this is basically "Teens visit a Horror House". Exact same vibes, and many of the same plot points! Complete with "you did this to yourselves" and "why are you doing that?" This has space stuff painted over it, and a Giger monster, but still...

But this is also the first movie again. Space ship, alien creature, running around a lot of corridors, and bits reminiscent of the previous movies, this is exactly the sort of sequel that is the first movie again, complete with quotes that are said because characters said them in earlier movies. This is exactly the sort of sequel we would normally get to a movie, where it is the same thing again, which shows up how much they mixed it up for the other movies in this franchise.

The cast is fine, although the character of Andy is coded a neuro-divergent I'll leave to others to say if that is a good thing or not. However, on the production side, this is one damn dark movie. There are lots of lingering shots of "look at this" but dang if I could see what they wanted me to see. And the dialogue got crushed in a lot of places, I was wanting subtitles just to follow what was going on!

This could have been a good movie, but given the range of what we've seen, this feels like "just another movie" and not something special.

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Bbbbad Bbboys: Ride or DON'T

I do wonder how much this movie is just Martin and Will wanting to hang out together.

After Mike's wedding, Marcus gets a vision that a movie is about to happen... and then they find out their old boss was dirty. Clearly, that is rubbish, so time to go on the run to find out what really is going on and...

This movie feels very long. I was half-way through it and already felt I had been watching it for ages. This is just under two hours, but I'm fairly sure a good (bad?) thirty minutes could be chopped out without anything missing. Mainly excuses for set pieces for "comedy" action, with a big stretch to get there for many of them.

This feels a lot like a sequel to BB3... although it only feels like it, I can't say for sure, 'cos I haven't seen the other movies since ages, so went in purely on vibes, and this movie just has so many characters I'm sure we're supposed to care about because we already know them. Nope, remember them not at all. And hey, the two male leads have grown up male children so that... there can be action pieces of guys fights a bunch of people without having to pretend that Martin or Will could do that.

This movie doesn't feel like we needed it. Will there be a BB5? Possibly, the next time Martin and Will want to share a project again.

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Despic Him Foor

Basically... a total waste of a movie.

Hey, what if Gru has to pretend to be a normal person, wouldn't that be funny? How about Lucy (I had to look her name up, 'cos I didn't remember it) had to be a normal person, wouldn't that be funny? What if the minions were super-beings, I bet that is a great source of comedy! Oh, and give Gru a kid! Everyone loves it when Gru has a baby to deal with. And a random heist scene with a random person. And a bad guy to randomly cut to for a while before defeating... Yeah, that's a movie!

This is just a random collection of scenes they put together to... fill a 90 minute runtime? I guess? It is not good, it has no cohesion, just random nothingness. Will Farrell is wasted. Stephen Colbert is barely a cameo. Joey King is in this and that might mean more if I could remember what else she's done. But, hey, John DiMaggio for a few seconds!

Could you tell I didn't like this movie? It probably made lots of money, and there will be billions more, and minions and everything (they attempted to do the minions again with cockroaches, but fortunately they put as much time into that concept as they did the rest of the movie, i.e. sod all)... but this isn't something anyone should bother with.

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Shush! Part One!

John Krasinski was less involved in this, and it kinda shows. But I will give away straight up: the cat survives.

Samira is just trying to survive (I think she has cancer? The movie probably makes this clear, but I didn't pick up on it) although she hasn't got many days left. When aliens arrive she decides to go get pizza, and ain't nothing going to stop her.

This movie... could have been anything really. Some disaster happens, and Samira has to survive the new situation. But it could have been any disaster, random aliens, zombies, whatever the infected from Omega Man were, whatever, and this would have been exactly the same. Even though the schtick of these creatures are they hear everything, that same thing has been done with zombies more than once.

Which isn't to say the core is a bad story. Lupita Nyong'o does a great job as Samira, Joseph Quinn does all right as Eric, but there's nothing here to stand out because the whole story isn't standing out.

There can be a billion of these, but I damn well hope the next one has an actual relevant point!

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!Mac!Gruber!

Another Lonely Island related movie! Wow, these are stacking up! Although this isn't featuring the LI crew as much.

Small confession: I did think this was a made up movie that other people referred to in order to refer to a movie that wouldn't get them in trouble for mentioning. So I was more than a little surprised to actually watch it.

This is very much 80s style "retired action hero is brough back for another mission" and this just leans heavily into that, not trying to be anything else. However... the big problem here is the comedy. The comedy is very much "hey, wouldn't it be weird if he did this? Action heroes don't do that!" and that's about the extent of it. It may have more than one note, but it repeats those notes over and over again.

The lead is Will Forte and ... he is the lead of this movie. I know nothing about him. I barely know more about the other male lead Ryan Phillipe. But hey, I did know Kristen Wiig. And we also get Val Kilmer and Powers Boothe! The action is a lot more than the previous movie, with a lot of explosions and guns and other action, and even celery. But it's all in service of the comedy.

Shame that this is real, really.

Hear the Lonely Island (and Seth Meyers) talk about it here.

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Hottie Roddie

The Lonely Island has a podcast, and during the episodes they talk about the movie they did. Hot Rod. Wait, they did a movie?

Rod has extreme father issues, and deals with it by trying to become a stunt man like his father was. Only, he's just a kid, really, in a small town, so he is barely able to ride into a pool, no chance of over it. But his step-father has a heart problem, so he has to stunt harder than ever to raise money to cure him... so he can kick his step-father's ass!

When your step-father is played by Ian McShane, yeah, he's a hard case that could kick your arse any time. So there are some big names here...

But really, this is the Saturday Night Live cast playing almost every major role. Aside from Andy Sandberg in the main role, with Jorma Taccone as his brother, we have Danny McBride, Bill Hader, Will Arnett, Chris Parnell, and no doubt many others I don't know. At least Isla Fisher is new as the love interest.

While it is a small town movie, it is still a human interest story. Rod is relatable as a stupid kid that is trying to do something in the world, and having a step-father not being evil is a step up in the movie world.

The production is light weight, but then this was put together quite quickly and done very much on the cheap and in between seasons. Still, well done!

You can hear the Lonely Island (with Seth Meyers) talk about it here. Part 1 and Part 2.

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