Transformers (Dark of The Moon): Bigger Badder Enemies

Back in 2011 I joined my friend Paul’s movie review site and one of my first review for him was for the third Transformers movie, which I had seen just before. Might have been the same day, may be not. I don’t remember. Its been a while. At the time, I really enjoyed the movie, though it did have some disappointing moments. But the fun was key, that is always the key.

Since then, I’ve seen the movie quite a few times on television, and since writing that review, I’ve gained a much better perspective on things. And I’ve learned to be more critical of things as well. You could even say that I’ve grown as a reviewer since those early days. As Paul’s site is now pretty much defunct, I’m going to start reposting all my reviews here on the blog so that they are better… preserved. This review is by old-me, so keep that in mind!

Frozen: The Siblings Ascendant

So by now, I’m sure that most people have heard of Disney’s latest animated venture, Frozen, which has ended up smashing quite a few records, and has set some new challenges for Hollywood to follow. The movie has been both a critical and commercial success, whether we talk in its home North American territories or globally. All through the last three months, it has been the talk of much discussion pretty much everywhere. Myself, I wasn’t even aware of the movie until quite recently. I’m usually not all that big on animated movies these days, mostly because they’ve just fallen off my radar of late. But then I started hearing from social media friends about Idina Menzel’s track “Let It Go” from the movie and the portrayal of sibling relationships in the movie. And I was interested.

I saw the movie a little over two weeks ago, in 3D. Given how long the movie came out, I feel quite fortunate that I managed to get such a late viewing of it here in Dubai, but I suppose that speaks for the incredible success of the movie in the first place. I went in with some moderately high expectations, nothing particularly specific, but expecting a similar kind of wonder that I’ve felt on watching Disney’s classics from the 80s and 90s. And you know what? I came away amazed and ecstatic, brimming with energy verve to talk about it. For my money’s worth, it was one of the best movies of 2013, and I gave it place of honour as the best movie of the year, even above Pacific Rim (review), which I just loved.

Marvel Knights: X-Men #3 (Comics Review)

The previous two issues of Marvel Knights: X-Men have been surprisingly good. As someone who was a bit jaded with the X-books following last year’s Battle of the Atom crossover, this new (mini) series proved to be a breath of fresh air in almost all respects and the creative team of Brahm Revel and Cristiane Peter did some really good work on both these issues. They introduced the characters well and gave them a compelling mystery to sink their teeth into, something that could resonate with the reader alongside some of the more compelling X-Men stories.

But sadly, the third issue, released this week, proves to be a bit of a bummer. After the awesomeness of the previous two issues, we got a very disappointing issue this week. And its not so much as the art as the writing that is problematic here. The X-Men don’t exactly act in character and the revealed powers of Darla grow steadily more messy, in both story and art. I’m not sure really. I kind of enjoyed the story here, but I was also put off by it in several places. Perhaps that’s why I found it so disappointing.