Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015) - Movie Review

Of any film that I’ve seen this year, along with the few that are still scheduled for the rest of the month, this is easily the one I was looking forward to the least. Partly because, all year, this film has been built up like a cinematic Second Coming and the advertising for it has been beyond obnoxious, both officially and through word-of-mouth. But also partly because I fall right in the middle in terms of my opinion on the Star Wars films.

I don’t love the original films: They’re still (mostly) good and Empire has definitely earned its place in sci-fi canon, but I don’t see them being quite as good as the rest of the world does. However, I also don’t hate the prequels: They definitely have their issues but, in terms of action and even some of the more dramatic moments, these all have their good points that have been widely ignored by history. Hell, as much hate that has been thrown at Jar-Jar Binks over the years, I still maintain that C-3PO is far more irritating and, as a racial stereotype, he pales in comparison to the wise old sage with squinty eyes that speaks in broken English that the world seems to kindly disregard. With all this in mind, I’m not exactly the best person to be seeing this movie; if I wasn’t obligated to watch everything that shows at my local, I probably would have just ignored this entirely. However, since I wouldn’t be doing my job with looking at easily the biggest release of the year, here I am.

Strange Magic (2015) - Movie Review

When Disney absorbed LucasFilms into its gargantuan mass, sci-fi fan boys the world over let out an echoing sigh of relief. For reasons I’ll get into when I finally get around to the latest Star Wars film, I was not one of them. However, when the company changed hands, there was a project that was still in-development under George Lucas. It was a pet project of his, something he wanted to make that his daughters could watch; what Star Wars was to 12-year-old boys, this would be to 12-year-old girls. Words from the man himself, in case his lack of common sense wasn't already well known. This is something he had been working on since around the time the prequels were first being developed, going through different hands to finally realise Lucas’ vision. Since this vision includes the words ‘romance’ ‘musical’ and ‘based on the works of Shakespeare’, I can hardly wait to see the sudden realisation that just because LucasFilms changed hands, that doesn’t mean that they are immune from making failures. So, in preparation for what will be the inevitable let-down of galactic proportions in a week or so, let’s take a look at the first release from the ‘legendary’ studio post-Disney.