Geeky Watcher

The year 2008 was a high point for both Marvel and DC. With the release of The Dark Knight , the sequel to Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins, it   would put comic book movies in a totally different light and proved that they can be much deeper on different levels. But for Marvel, they would have similar success in forming their own film studio to produce films centering around the characters they still have the rights to, and the film that would set the Marvel Cinematic Universe in motion is Iron Man . While not an A-list superhero, Iron Man's popularity would soar into the mainstream thanks to this movie and Rober Downey Jr.'s performance. Tony Stark is a self-described "genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist" who specializes in making powerful weapons. However, he gets in trouble when he's captured by a terrorist group known as the Ten Rings who force him to build his latest weapon, the Jericho Missile. Although he got wounded in the ambush, an ele...

The X-Men are back, but sadly not Bryan Singer, in what is considered to be one of the worst movies in the franchise: X-Men The Last Stand . In the director's chair, we have Brett Ratner who directed the Rush Hour movies and has angered fans with this movie. However, do I think it's as bad as people claimed it to be? Well, while I think it is mildly flawed, I felt there were some very cool elements that stood out as well as a couple of new things. A medical lab has created a "cure" to suppress the gene that makes mutants what they are. This causes a rift between mutants across the nation on whether it is ethical or not when it seems like it is not used on them voluntarily. Magneto forms an even larger brotherhood with mutants who are against the cure, intending to crush the ones responsible for it. Meanwhile Jean Grey, who sacrificed herself in the last movie, returns but a lot different. A powerful, darker side to her has been released known as the Phoenix. This i...

"Mutants. Since the discovery of their existence, they have been regarded with fear, suspicion, often hatred. Across the planet, debate rages. Are mutants the next link in the evolutionary chain or simply a new species of humanity fighting for their share of the world? Either way, it is a historical fact: Sharing the world has never been humanity's defining attribute. " The X-Men return, along with director Bryan Singer, in the sequel X2 . While the first film gave us a lot of set-up with characters and conflicts, this one takes everything in new directions in a very good way. We get new mutants, new antagonists, and much more character development. We start with a very cool sequence of some mysterious mutant attempting to assassinate the President by teleporting. That mutant was Nightcrawler (Alan Cumming) who was brainwashed by Colonel William Stryker, (Brian Cox) originally a religious bigot who despises mutants, who in the movie is a scientist with a connection t...

I've talked briefly about how far Marvel came with their movies. The first movies that were based on their comic characters included Howard the Duck , The Punisher , Captain America with Matt Salinger, and the unreleased Fantastic Four film by Roger Corman. And all of them were not so praised like Richard Donner's Superman or Tim Burton's Batman . However, at the turn of the 21st century, 20th Century Fox gave us a movie based on Marvel's popular team of mutants, the X-Men. This, along with Blade , would be the start of Marvel's rise to successful blockbusters. Mutants are people with powerful abilities who are oppressed by the human population. There are some who use their powers to save people and they are Professor Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and his team of X-Men which include Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), Cyclops (James Marsden), and Storm (Halle Berry). Then there's Magneto (Ian McKellen) who believes mutants are superior to humans and uses his met...

SPOILERS AHEAD Just a year after the release of The Force Awakens , Disney/Lucasfilm gave us Rogue One, a prequel/spin-off that centers around the actual mission by the Rebel Alliance to steal the plans to the Death Star, which would jump start the events of A New Hope . I will say that I liked the idea of seeing this, even though the trailers didn't impress me that much. But I enjoyed The Force Awakens a lot and had faith in this new film, despite news of reshoots that make fans a little nervous. Anyway, I went to see it last month and I can give you my thoughts with one word: meh. Now before you strike me down with your lightsaber, I want to clarify that I respect all fans of this movie. Before going in to see it, I had a feeling that people would be split over this movie, judging from what some of my friends thought of it. Some of them really liked it, others didn't find it all that engaging. And I really hate to be in the latter group. Firstly, I didn't find t...

Lion , oddly enough, is based on a book entitled, "A Long Way Home," about the true story of how an Indian boy named Saroo (Sunny Pawar as a child, Dev Patel as an adult) became lost, faced some hardships in West Bengal, gets adopted by an Australian couple (Nicole Kidman and David Wenham), and attempts to find the family he lost about 20 years ago. This story has a similar set-up to Slumdog Millionaire which also starred Dev Patel, only his character's story is told in chronological order and there's no game show segment anywhere. First off, I'll say that I like this kind of heartfelt story when it is from the perspective of a foreign character, real or fiction. Another great example I can think of is one of my favorite books, "The Kite Runner," where an Afghan man seeks redemption from his childhood friend. I just find something very inspiring about a person from another country going through rough times and overcoming obstacles to find happines...