the m0vie blog

New Escapist Column! On the Unfulfilled Promise of “Into the Spider-Verse”…

Posted on June 4, 2023 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist this evening. With the premiere of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, it seemed like a good opportunity to consider the legacy of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse five years after it was originally released.

The influence of Into the Spider-Verse can be keenly felt on animated films like The Bad Guys and Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. However, it’s strange that the movie has had no real impact on comic book adaptations. Despite early adventurous comic book adaptations like Hulk, Sin City or Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, the modern comic book blockbuster has demonstrated a lack of visual experimentation that feels very much like a betrayal of the source material. What’s the point in making a comic book movie if it can’t be as visually inventive?

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: animation, blockbuster, Comics, epic, films, live action, Movies, spider man, spider-man: across the spider-verse, spider-man: into the spider-verse, spider-verse, superhero storytelling, superheroes, visual style | 1 Comment »

326. Child’s Play 2 (#—)

Posted on June 3, 2023 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn, Darren Mooney and Charlene Lydon, this week joined by special guest Diamanda Hagan, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released every second Saturday at 6pm GMT, with the occasional bonus episode between them.

This week, John Lafia’s Child’s Play 2.

Following a series of unexplained traumatic events, Andy Barclay has been taken into foster care, hoping to put the nightmare of “Chucky” behind him. Unfortunately, the Play Pal Corporation has other ideas. Desperate to put rumours about their Good Guy Dolls to rest, the company decides to reconstruct the doll at the centre of that horrific incident. Naturally, the doll takes on a life of its own, and Chucky resumes his fixation on the young victim who got away.

At time of recording, it was not ranked on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

Continue reading →

Filed under: The 250 | Tagged: andy barclay, Brad Dourif, charlene lydon, charles lee ray, child's play, child's play 2, chucky, diamanda hagan, don mancini, horror, john lafia, roger ebert, sequel, slasher | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On “Across the Spider-Verse” as a Superhero Empowerment Fantasy…

Posted on June 2, 2023 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, it seemed like a good opportunity to delve into what the movie is about, particularly its relationship to other recent superhero movies.

After all, what is the point of superhero movies? What are they about? What purpose do they serve? In recent years, the superhero genre has come to be shaped by the language of militarism and law enforcement, treating superheroes as cops and soldiers who just happen to wear masks. Across the Spider-Verse is a film largely about grappling with the legacy of that trend, in which the central villains are “an elite strike team” of “all the best Spider-People” whose job it is to maintain the status quo, no matter how many innocent people suffer to maintain the established order.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: canon, continuity, cops, in the frame, into the spider-verse, law enforcement, miles morales, militarism, policing, spider-man: across the spider-verse, status quo, the escapist | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On How “Arkham City” Uses the Language of Video Games to Make the Player Feel Like Batman…

Posted on June 1, 2023 by Darren

I published a new piece at The Escapist earleir this week. As part of a Patreon goal, I will be playing through the video game of The Last of Us for the website, but to warm up, I decided to take up playing some video games that I remember from my own childhood: the Arkham games.

Replaying Batman: Arkham City, I was taken at how well the game uses the narrative structures unique to video games to immerse the player in the world and the psychology of the Caped Crusader, beyond what is possible in comics, film or television. The game places the player in an artifical countdown, and gives them sets of competing objectives, forcing them to decide what to prioritise and how best to respond to the immediate crisis as the situation keeps escalating around them. It’s an approach that manages to make Gotham feel like a real and living place, with the Dark Knight caught in the middle of it.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Comics | Tagged: arkham city, batman, batman: arkham city, comic books, level design, open world, rocksteady, sandbox, the escapist, video game design, video games | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On the Myths and Lies of “Barry”…

Posted on May 31, 2023 by Darren

We’re launching a new column at The Escapist, called Out of Focus. It will publish every Wednesday, and the plan is to use it to look at some film and television that would maybe fall outside the remit of In the Frame, more marginal titles or objects of cult interest. With the end of Barry this week, it seemed like a good opportunity to take a look the show’s final season.

Barry is a show about Hollywood, but it is also a show about America. It is a show about mythmaking and self-delusion, about the stories that people tell themselves to feel better and about the stories that are told about people to make everybody else feel better. It’s a black comedy about a hitman who becomes an actor, but over the course of its four seasons it evolved into something decidedly more complex and compelling. Like Succession, it is a show that speaks perfectly to the current moment, holding a mirror to a nation in crisis.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Television | Tagged: america, american history, Barry, Bill Hader, delusions, fantasies, hbo, hollywood, lies, myths, out of focus, prestige television, Season finale, wow | Leave a comment »

New Podcast! The Recap – “Succession and Barry Are Masterclasses in Series Finales…”

Posted on May 30, 2023 by Darren

We’re thrilled to be launching a weekly multimedia podcast at The Escapist, called The Recap. I’m hoping to be a regular fixture of it, stremaing live every Tuesday evening. This is kinda cool, because we’re helping relaunch the magazine’s film content – so if you can throw a subscription our way, it would mean a lot.

This week, with the ending of Succession, Barry and Ted Lasso, it seemed like a good opportunity to ruminate on what it means to actually end a long-running series. What is is that makes a finale compelling and effective?

Filed under: Television | Tagged: ambiguity, Barry, conclusions, endings, finale, season finales, storytelling, Succession, ted lasso, the escapist, the recap | Leave a comment »

New Escapist Column! On “Into the Spider-Verse” as a Postmodern Superhero Remix…

Posted on May 29, 2023 by Darren

I published a new In the Frame piece at The Escapist this evening. With the release of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse this weekend, it seems like as good an opportunity as any to take a look back at Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

Into the Spider-Verse is arguably the best superhero movie of the previous decade. A large part of the film’s appeal is that it is a superhero movie built around the understanding that its audience has seen other superhero movies and understands the classic beats of the superhero origin story. As such, it can speed them up and slow them down, iterate over them and subvert them, using the audience’s familiarity to create a postmodern meditation on the very idea of Spider-Man.

You can read the piece here, or click the picture below.

Filed under: Movies | Tagged: Conventions, in the frame, meaning, memes, memetic, Narrative, pop culture, postmodern, rhythm, sony, spider man, spider-verse, storytelling, tropes, viral | Leave a comment »

336. Jeepers Creepers: Reborn (-#37)

Posted on May 27, 2023 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, this week joined by special guests Joey Keogh and Billie Jean Doheny, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released every second Saturday at 6pm GMT, with the occasional bonus episode between them.

This week, Timo Vuorensola’s Jeepers Creepers: Reborn.

Twenty-three years after its last feeding frenzy, the mysterious “Creeper” has emerged from its rest, and it hungers. Finding itself drawn to a horror convention in Louisiana, the Creeper plans to unleash a nightmare all of its own upon the unsuspecting cosplayers.

At time of recording, it was ranked 37th on the list of the worst movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

Continue reading →

Filed under: The Bottom 100, This Just In | Tagged: #metoo, billie jean doheny, hollywood, horror, ip, jeepers creeper, jeepers creepers: reborn, joey keogh, me too, nathan winters, podcast, reboot, sequel, sexual assault, slasher, The 250, The Bottom 100, the creeper, Timo Vuorensola, victor salva | Leave a comment »

325. Child’s Play (#—)

Posted on May 20, 2023 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn, Darren Mooney and Charlene Lydon, this week joined by special guest Bren Murphy, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released every second Saturday at 6pm GMT, with the occasional bonus episode between them.

This week, Tom Holland’s Child’s Play.

Young Andy Barclay just wants one thing for his birthday: a Good Guy Doll. However, the coveted toy is outside his mother’s price range. Luckily, fate brings a discount doll into her hands, but things quickly become complicated. Andy finds himself at the centre of a series of mysterious deaths and is convinced that his beloved companion has taken on a life of his own, inheriting the spirit of the serial killer Charles Lee Ray, better known as “Chucky.”

At time of recording, it was not ranked on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.

Continue reading →

Filed under: The 250 | Tagged: Brad Dourif, charlene lydon, child's play, consumerism, don mancini, horror, imdb, killer dolls, mayhem, murder, podcast, slasher, The 250, Tom Holland | Leave a comment »

335. Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3 (#135)

Posted on May 13, 2023 by Darren

Hosted by Andrew Quinn and Darren Mooney, this week joined by special guests Graham Day and Luke Dunne, The 250 is a (mostly) weekly trip through some of the best (and worst) movies ever made, as voted for by Internet Movie Database Users. New episodes are released every second Saturday at 6pm GMT, with the occasional bonus episode between them.

This week, James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 3.

A shocking and unprovoked attack on the community of Knowhere leaves Rocket fighting for his life. His old friends, the Guardians of the Galaxy, embark on a mission to save his life. In doing so, they find themselves journeying back into a past that he has never discussed and heading into conflict with a mysterious figure known as the High Evolutionary.

At time of recording, it was ranked 135th on the list of the best movies of all time on the Internet Movie Database.