First, I have a wound of my left hand that makes typing bit o f a bitch, so I’m sorry about all the typos that will sneak in.
I admit that I am not the biggest moviebuff out there, but I admit that 2015 was a year that I went to see a lot more movies that what I usually do. There were some good movies, and some movies that really overstayed its welcome. 2016 looks like a year when adaptations and sequels will hit the silver screen with a revenge. This year has also been called something like Year of the Nerds when it comes to the movies or the like, and I do see where that come from.
Going through some lists of upcoming movies sort of tell me that I’m not going to visit the theatre as much this year. A lot of million dollar blockbuster movies range from comic book movies to modern book adaptations. Remakes and sequels as far as eye can see. A lot of these movies are something that have no real reason to be made outside brand recognition or because they want to heat up some old franchise. The coldest turkey in the bunch in this field is the Ghostbusters. I still have to ask myself how in the hell are they going to make a better movie than one of the best comedies of the 1980’s? How Ghostbusters became to be is a slight legend on itself, and it was a culmination of many factors coming together just right, both in right and wrong. While I’m not ready to shoot the movie down just yet, it’s not looking good.
On the comic book front we have eight goddamn comic book movies. These comic book adaptations are our Western movies without any doubt, and it just might be that all the TV-series and movies we get out of Marvel and DC characters may end up burning people. The hardcore comic lovers will stay with them until the boom’s dead, but I have to say I’m pretty much fed up with it. Avengers 2 was the worst movie of the bunch for me, concentrating far too much on the fight’s flashiness in similar manner how Pacific Rim did, and Ultron’s design and plot made little to no sense. Deadpool, Batman Vs. Superman, Captain America; Avengers 2.5, X-Men: Apocalypse, goddamn Suicide Squad, Gambit movie with Channing Tatum as the lead and Doctor Strange all feel more or less already visited. There’s Daredevil Season 2 in there somewhere and some other shows, but I honestly am dropping my interests on these all of the previous movies have offered very little anything new. I admit that Doctor Strange might be worth checking out, but seeing how Cumberbatch acts like Cumberbatch in everything he has been in, my expectations are low. We are reaching a saturation point, and some are already guessing this year might break the comic book movie boom.
Adaptations ahoy, we’re getting a sequel to the Snow White movie we got some time ago in form of The Huntsman. Much like the upcoming Jungle Book and Tarzan remakes/re-adaptations, nobody really asked for these. I’m sure the Snow White movie has its fans, but much like Avatar, nobody remembers or talks about it. The Marvel movies already made their impact on popular culture, yet I see none of these making. That Tarzan movie also feels like it’s a prequel to that 90’s Tarzan show. Finding Dory most likely will be just like most of Pixar’s sequels and be forgotten fast. They’re also rebooting Friday the 13th. Again.
I have to admit that I’ve yet to see the first Bay’s Turtles movies, even if I had all the intentions of doing so for some time. The trailer for the second movie is… well, it’s like what I would’ve expected to see done during the 90’s, after somebody had snorted too much cocaine and had millions of dollars in their hands. The trailer itself incorporates what are essentially toy designs, takes itself pretty damn seriously but doesn’t forget that the 80’s cartoon’s vibe. It feels stupidly fun and I hate myself for saying it, but you can like dumb things. Everybody has their own scratch that fixes that itch.
I don’t like Angry Birds, but I do admire how much money they made at one point. Now they’re more or less becoming forgotten with Rovio making less and less money on their games and merchandise. The Angry Bird movie should have come out year or two ago when the boom was it biggest. Perhaps this will revitalise the franchise to some degree. Warcraft is getting a movie too, which is coming out at a time when the MMO is experiencing loss in players.
Most video game adaptations have been more or less awful, with Mortal Kombat still being one of the better ones, but the problem with adapting a game to the silver screen is that it’s a game. You can’t adapt gameplay and its contents, they’re unique to the medium. Mario cartoons tried this with showing the world with some makeshift footage from a game-like perspective, but rarely any of the stories were anything to write home about. The movie adaptations of games suffer from this same thing, and Mortal Kombat did right to stick with doing what movies do best and expand on the game’s world. Warcaft has an expansive story that could be adapted, but how do you adapt a strategy game to the silver screen? Most likely they’ll concentrate on one race only and pick the biggest points from the storyline, and make the battles to showcase some very remote resemblance whatever was in the game.
I guess what I’m getting at is that this year is missing a lot of originality. Just to use the 80’s as an example, we got 1982 that was one of the best year in sci-fi and fantasy movies. Poltergeist, E.T., Tron and The Dark Crystal are examples of movies that can stand on their own, and expanding that to adaptations we have Blade Runner, which strays pretty damn far from the novel. You have The Thing, both a remake and an adaptation and still manages to do its own thing, even thou reviews of the time didn’t regard much of it. Then you have Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, which isn’t just the best Trek movie out there but is also one of the best Sci-fi movies out there. Star Trek Into Darkness is not even a shadow of Trek II, and I have no real hopes for either the upcoming Star Trek series (2017) and Star Trek Beyond.
Movies need desperately more movies that are unique to its medium like Flight of the Navigator that have no pre-existing base, less comic book movies with almost a century worth of material to adapt from.
Aaltomies 