Starting the Year off positively.
At the risk of sounding repetitive, saying that a lot has happened since my previous post would be an extreme understatement.
These delays have been something I’ve strived to reduce but even moving beyond the personal life changes I’ve undergone in the year prior to the global pandemic that has actively overturned the industry I’ve geared my entire adult life and adolescence to write about, nothing has been smooth.
There’s certainly a lot to say about what’s happened in such an unprecedented year and much to meditate on with regards to moving forward but while I’m ready to finally speak up about it all, I previously made the promise that my next post following a glib assessment on the state of theaters and the film industry wouldn’t be so dour.
I have no intention of giving 2021 bonus points for not being the year that we just wrapped but I’m also over the moping stage of the world we lost and since I’m not even bothering with a top 10 list this year, the start of the year pick me up will have to come from elsewhere.
With that in mind and in no particular hierarchy, here’s a variety of media I discovered last year that helped make the dim hellscape of 2020 just a little bit brighter.
The following works aren’t necessarily all 2020 debuts, nor are they necessarily all salient to the modern pop culture landscape but in struggling to get to the next day across the Coronavirus particle infested year, these are the blips of art I’ve discovered that I’ll hold with eternal gratitude for making things more bearable.
The state of my immediate future in this craft notwithstanding, I would be remiss as both a critic and a writer that spent the last few months commentating on the viability of cinema’s future in digital release models, if I didn’t bring up 2 of the most high profile releases of the year taking advantage of that fact.
“Wonder Woman 1984” is a gangly, uneven, mess of a film that runs a tad too long for its own good and feels tied together more by less than eloquently executed indulgence in misaligned and simplistic ideas than the admirable effort to normalize sincerity in mainstream storytelling that Patty Jenkins is clearly aiming for.
And I love it in all of its inarguably imperfect glory.
Gal Gadot’s dramatic range in a more demanding storyline may still be up for debate but her charisma and presence go a long way to hold together a messy story that’s falling apart at the seams but has the ambition to think outside of the box in ways that comic book movies have only recently dared to even attempt and have yet to fully crack.
For all of its flaws, its a movie that recognizes the star of the show is its titular character more than said character’s abilities, unfolds a journey that feels more personal in its stakes than epic and resolves with a climax pitting character and ideology against one another in a contest of will and heart rather than ask how hard and creatively can opposing forces punch each other.
It’s polarizing nature is well truly earned; you’ll certainly not hear me jumping at the chance to change minds as the movie is an uneven mess from top to bottom that only really starts coming together thematically in its final act of runtime in desperate need of a trim.
That said, I’ll take a hot daring mess over safe, shallow, and insecure happily. For all those reasons, I have an undying admiration of “Wonder Woman 1984” for willing to go where no superhero movie has gone before, even if it fails to complete said journey in one piece.
By contrast to my mix of mildly positively tinted confusion regarding that film, “Soul” was a movie I did not have to think twice about loving.
Pixar has inarguably earned their reputations as a studio of master storytellers in cinematic language but they’ve stumbled more than enough to prove that they’re not infallible. As such, I find these days that they need a product firing on all cylinders to remind me of that magic that seems to captivate so many audiences based on the prestige of their legacy.
When they hit however, they hit hard, and true to form, director Pete Docter manages to craft a human story more compelling than actual live action dramas before the cartoon buddy comedy of 2 wayward souls learning about the meaning of life by walking in each other’s shoes settles in.
After it takes off, I was reminded of every reason why I fell in love with storytelling in an hour and a half that flies by so fast my biggest regret in watching it is that I can never experience it again for the first time.
Joe’s infectious passion for music and the culture that feeds it, 22’s gradual realization of life’s wonders in places big and small, and their brief time together serving as a reminder that your passions are a part of you but not necessarily what defines your sense of being hit more than a little close to home in a year that destroyed what little consistency I managed to maintain in my life across this decade.
It’s a special film that I would have loved to watch on a big screen but perhaps held more meaning to watch in my bedroom as I wound down a night of work on my day job.
Rounding out cinematic experiences, It’s hard to gauge how successful “The Old Guard” was on Netflix’s fairly vague metrics but I can only imagine that if it were allowed a big screen release rather than being a streaming service’s original production, it would have put Gina Prince-Blythewood’s on the map, or at the very least, far more deservedly visible than she currently is.
Director of the charming “Beyond the Lights,” and helping to set the tone of the underrated “Cloak and Dagger” with early episode direction, Prince-Blythewood’s ability to milk the storytelling potential of her concept is unparalleled and nowhere else is that more gloriously tested and proven than with her first action blockbuster following a group of immortal warriors struggling to adapt to modern civilization while under the pursuit of a pharmaceutical company selfishly seeking to understand their gifts at the cost of their own well being.
“The Old Guard” is unapologetically meditative of the gift and curse life everlasting would be, granting a group of very humanized warriors the opportunity to shape civilization for the long term benefits of all mankind at the cost of themselves, having to accept millennia of natural and unnatural deaths of all those around them for the greater good of a world that will never recognize their contributions due to necessary secrecy and while the group certainly shares a kinship in the burden they share, their love for one another doesn’t mean they necessarily agree.
The drama that can only be bred out of conflict both polarizing yet left to develop and prepared to play out over a functional eternity provides a fascinating and welcome aspect of character study rarely seen in fiction featuring immortals but only serves as the tip of the iceberg for a movie that displays an admirable degree of restraint enough to tell a real story but still looks gorgeously demanding of a big screen presentation in its atmospherically engrossing cinematography and genuinely impressive fight choreography that this movie’s bigger budgeted kin should take note of.
Add in one of the best romantic monologues of all time and an ending that lays out more to come without copping out of the satisfaction of its own narrative and the end result is a movie that may have benefited from a nonexistent summer release slate by garnering more potential attention than it would have received in an otherwise buried season.
Debuting strong and held together by heart, humor, drama, strong action, and a round of excellent performances, “The Old Guard” is the best “Highlander” sequel never made that I didn’t know I wanted.
In between major indie releases, coming off of an ill-timed, overly long, and unfortunately delayed “Sonic the Hedgehog” story arc, and at a time where Feige’s influence is set to transition into Marvel operations as its new normal while DC just... sort of... imploded... the comic book scene was pretty weird this year and that’s before even factoring the 2-ish month gap where they were just flat out unavailable.
It was a year of diamonds in the rough atop new developing habits.
I’ve made it no secret that Ghost Rider is one of my favorite superheroes of all time. While I have a fondness for the entire mythology of the Spirits of Vengeance of the Marvel Universe, I find Johnny Blaze specifically to be one of the setting’s most fascinating characters.
Watching a young, naive, hopeful hot shot carnie stunt rider gradually grow into an old cynical, borderline nihilistic curmudgeon forced to relive the same mistake he made when he was young and stupid because the universe (editorial) can’t decide if he can be allowed to retire in peace is not a particularly feel good tale but whether it was Marvel’s intention or not, it is regularly perversely fascinating and compelling in all of the best ways.
Picking up from the last adventure Johnny reluctantly participated in that result in him being abandoned by Doctor Strange to be left in Hell (yes, the actual Hell), writer Ed Brisson seemingly takes the poor man to the final logical conclusion of his journey; reigning as King of Hell, no longer the bounty hunter of Inferno but promoting himself to jailer and warden of a demon prison plane of existence.
Like John Wick pissed to be pulled back into the game, the man has finally snapped and gleefully embraced his lot in life, dragging demons bag to hell from Earth for torturing in a way that slides so deeply into anti-hero territory he stops just shy of being a protagonist villain and only his equally washed up but coping more poorly fellow rider and brother Dan Ketch can help pull him back from the precipice and perhaps uncover a new purpose in life in the process.
“Ghost Rider” as a neo-western by way of “Devil May Cry” meets “Supernatural” is a turn for this book that I never thought I needed but despite being cut criminally short, this may be the best Johnny Blaze-centric Ghost Rider run that I’ve read in almost 15 years and easily the best use of Danny since bringing him back from his own 90s book’s finale period.
Time will tell if DC will arise from the other side of such a thorough restructuring in a form viable for continued operations but if it means an editorial staff that doesn’t want to needlessly murder and torture Wally West and Dick Grayson, I’m all for it.
In the meantime, what better a showcase for their will to survive editorial incompetence and AT&T bullshit than the hero that runs on overcoming fear and adversity.
With Brian “The Butcher of Invested continuity” Bendis taking over and torpedoing nearly everything great about Peter Tomasi’s Superman and the decision to make a statement on mental health by making the beloved recently returned Wally West a depressed manslaughterer willing to add to a massacre of a body count to avert accountability for actions equally deplorable as they are nonsensical, DC’s mainline titles have been off my radar for the better part of a year.
Imagine my surprise amidst all of the crisis debates and multiverse hijinks that a new Green Lantern would be stealing the show of the entire fictional setting.
Written by science fiction author N.K. Jemisin with art by Naomi Campbell, “Far Sector” follows human Green Lantern Jo Mullein, stationed on a graveyard position at the edge of Corps jurisdiction in the multi-species populated City Enduring.
The City Enduring has maintained the illusion of a strenuously peaceful utopia amongst its several species and cultures that threatens to unravel and come undone as its first crime in centuries, a murder, goes public.
Carrying the outsider stigma of being a non-native and intergalactic law enforcement, Jo has to navigate the eccentricities of her jurisdiction’s cultures and political game to uncover the murder and unravel a conspiracy behind the crime that threatens to tear its community apart.
“Far Sector” takes Green Lantern back to the roots of its Silver Age concept as an intergalactic cop drama but leans further into the idea with a hard science fiction lean than perhaps any other crack at the concept ever done.
The web of intrigue Jo fights and investigates to unravel tackles issues of xenophobia, sociopolitical bias, moral justification, and political corruption in ways so fully formed that I would occasionally forget that I wasn’t reading the best modern indie spy thriller never written.
Timely themes of tribalist conflicts in an ever expanding society aside, Jemisin excellent writing is wonderfully complemented by Campbell’s outright incredible art work, infusing Afro-futurist undertones with and unabashed and well articulated cosmic Silver Age aesthetic. This may be the best looking depiction of the DC cosmos I’ve ever laid eyes upon.
Issues are still rolling out. Don’t sleep on this one.
Back when “Chilling Adventures of Sabrina” made its Netflix debut 2 years ago, I left its first season with a sense of mild satisfaction fearing an inevitable downhill spiral that seems to be endemic to television’s efforts to add modern ironic flare to Archie.
Setting aside the mixed feeling I have towards the titular source material providing the show’s interpretation, it didn’t take long for me to realize that I was trying to fill a void with a sub par substitute.
Having read “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” comics growing up, It’s a franchise near to my heart that I’ve always kept an eye on. I see a potential for a more unique kind of urban slice of life fantasy waiting to be unlocked that’s legitimately tense and wondrous but grounded in a sense of mundanity that feels perpetually endearing and relatable without becoming cynical.
Enter “Sabrina the Teenage Witch (2019)” by Kelly Thompson.
An extension of the line wide shake up that Archie has gone through over the last few years, Thompson has delivered a light, fun, and consistently diverting teen comedy about Sabrina trying to balance the demands of her place in the world as a witch with the life she chooses with her mortal relationships.
Structured as a string of serialized mini-series, it’s contemporary without being trashy, light without being fluff, and genuinely the most endearing take on the character and concept I’ve enjoyed in roughly 2 decades.
The slim pickings of comic book pick ups I’ve had to come to terms with this year have driven me into the arms of the manga industry for the first time since I was a teenager and I frankly wouldn’t have it any other way.
The crown jewell of my finds is “Dragon Goes House Hunting,” which is literally exactly what the title implies.
In an MMO RPG-esque setting, Letty is a Level 52 Red Dragon that sucks. Really really sucks. The below image should illustrate that point sufficiently.
Kicked out of his nest by his Father for failing to protect its eggs from raiding adventurers, Letty sets off on a journey with the advisory of master elven architect Dearia to find a new place to call home that can accommodate his needs; that of a near endgame level dangerous dungeon boss of massive size that just wants to bask in the calm of domestic splendor.
I didn’t know that I needed a fantasy series about a dragon accidentally creating a top tier MMO dungeon or looking for a landlord willing to accommodate multiple tenants after said dragon’s decision to adopt a baby mythical creature but it never lets up being as genuinely charming and heartwarming as it is hilarious.
I’ll keep my praise of “The Mandalorian” a bit more concise as I don’t have much to truly add to the conversation that everybody else hasn’t already hit on.
That said, I can’t ignore that 10 months post-Rise of Skywalker, after I’d basically written the franchise off, I felt more emotional resonance 20 seconds of Din Djarin staring at his adoptive son, a green puppet with light animatronics, with his own eyes than 5 movies intended to revitalize the Star Wars brand across the back end of the decade.
More than any other entry of the series in audio visual media since the Disney purchase, the setting feels real, alive and breathing and the unique perspective of Din’s journey makes for a better articulated tale that unfolds via characters that only grow richer in a galaxy of stakes that feel genuinely organic.
While I still have some trepidation regarding the future of “Star Wars” on television, not the least of which stems from them seeming to go all in on the model for the foreseeable future, it serves as a humbling reminder that there’s a “Star Wars” story that exists for everybody and a handful of disappointing films should be analyzed but is far from a harbinger of doom for the franchise often touted.
The second high profile adaptation of Philip Pullman’s fantasy novel series of the same name, I was excited to see how BBC and HBO tackled Lyra’s journey of transdimensional trekking, conflict between academic purity and religious dogma, and political intrigue and have been thus far impressed in spades.
It’s not without its hiccups born from adaptation sickness, making the occasionally sincere tone of the young adult narrative feel oddly out of place in certain heavier moments but the unique blend of tones, genres, and atmospheres mixed together through multiple unique perspectives of rich characters at every angle of the conflict.
It was the first thing I blasted through after getting my HBO Max subscritption and I await its coming third season with bated breath.
I wasn’t crazy about the “Sonic the Hedgehog” movie.
It’s not without merit, I respect it as a piece of passable kids entertainment, and I accept that I’m apparently in the minority for believing that had they not revamped its titular character’s design and left literally everything else in the final cut as presented untouched, we’d be denigrating it as the modern day “Super Mario Bros.” at worst and blowing it off as another soulless Hollywood product by committee at best.
Having said that, it’s hype still put me in a mood to enjoy a good Sonic game, which in turn pit my laziness regarding digging out and hooking up old consoles against my stubborn refusal to feed the game industry’s willingness to prey on convenience at the sacrifice of ownership by purchasing a game I already own for an internet connected device.
Fortunately, I didn’t have to settle on indulging either option.
“Freedom Planet” is a 2014 indie 2D platformer developed from the early plans of a Sonic the Hedgehog fan game that blends the fast paced action, vibrant visual palate, and frenetic Saturday morning cartoon-esque storytelling of the source of its inspiration into a polished package that’s not exactly innovative but is infectiously confident in the kind of experience it delivers on.
It’s story is light and irreverent but consistent and anchored by endearing characters with charming personalities and the stages have a nice variety to them with length that can occasionally drag but skates in just before overstaying its welcome and incentive to replay with different characters for unique experiences that feed into different play styles.
“Freedom Planet” is available on all current gaming platforms, sans Xbox, and a sequel is currently in the works.
At face value, "Subnautica" is a masterful survival game that thoroughly tests the patience, analytical faculties, and innovation of the player as they progress from struggling to stay alive to preparing their exit in the face of danger from mysterious forces in addition to the alien flora and fauna.
Like the majestic planet of its setting however, it's true beauty lies beneath its wonderfully crafted surfaces.
Beyond the drive of surviving the perils of the aquatic wilds, a narrative starts to build subtly in the background of "Subnautica" that presses the virtues and romantic nobility of scientific expedition, the excitement of the unknown, and even a reflection upon the nature of life itself and beauty of mortality with the introduction of certain characters that become unexpected players in the story.
It's a beautiful adventure that will scare, inspire you, and in my case, even bring you to tears by the time it's over in a stark reminder that the power of video games as an artistic medium is derived not from the challenge generated in response to player actions but by how much investment the game can muster from the player to deliver a genuine emotional response.
As someone with little interest in survivalism or nature, and is a hardcore aquaphobe that never learned how to formally swim and is afraid of the dark, I had to force myself through "Subnautica" from start to finish and it was worth every second because the things I felt that weren't existential dread are the kind of things that few pieces of art have instilled within me across nearly 3 full decades of life.
...
So there you have it. Whatever the dumpster fires of 2020 burned, I'd relive them all again to be introduced to these gems once more for the first time.
Join me next time for some cleaning house involving a lot of real talk about Crit. Hit's future.
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