One Good Point (Movie) - Get Out

IT'S HORROR WEEK!

Historically I haven't been much of a horror movie kind of guy. It's a little bit of an oddity, because Jurassic Park and Jaws definitely draw on horror elements, and they're two of my all-time favorite movies. But then I watched The Ring at some point, and I was like, why on earth would someone choose to do this to themselves?

For a while it was just monster movies, like Cloverfield (good) or Deep Blue Sea (decent). And then earlier this year I gave a shot to Anaconda (so, so bad). But Get Out has been a movie that seemed to cross into the mainstream to such an extent that it demanded being watched. Granted, some might say the same about the movie IT, but I'm in no rush to see that film. "Underground ghost clown" isn't the basis for anything fun I want to see.

My cousin Nick has been recommending it for years, and I finally caved in and watched it. And it's just fantastic. The main character feels so incredibly realistic, especially his relationship with his friend, fleshed out almost exclusively via phone calls. And look, I'm by no means an expert on the topic. But this feels genuinely like a movie written by Black writers, with Black characters in mind. So often you find Black characters in movies or shows that feel aggressively neutral, or painted as downright caricatures. By contrast, this movie felt so purely human and realistic.

The reveal is great, the characters are great, and the culmination is great. There's one cheesy line towards the end, which I won't spoil, in case you haven't seen the movie. But the rest of it is just an absolute treasure, and has got me ready to watch more Jordan Peele films ASAP.

If you haven't watched Get Out, you've got to click here ASAP and find out where you can stream it, and watch it. Now.

One Good Point (Movie) - Unbreakable

No, not Kimmy Schmidt. This is the M. Night Shyamalan film from 2000 starring Bruce Willis (hey, like I promised!) and Samuel L. Jackson. It's the first of a three-part "trilogy" that includes two more movies on my horizon: Split and Glass.

So how was the first entry in this saga? Well, let's just say that if I hadn't received such inspirational reviews of the second and third films, this might have been where my journey stopped.

The beginning of the movie is actually really well done. It introduces us to Willis' character, David Dunn, showing us that he's got some charm, that he's having marital trouble, and then sets off the story by putting him in a catastrophic train wreck as the sole survivor. But after that, Dunn becomes almost completely uninteresting and uncharismatic. Willis plays the role very similar to his role in The Sixth Sense, but that character was supposed to be a man literally haunted by the events of his life. This character should have some kind of personality. And I say that as someone who loves Captain America, admittedly one of the less flamboyant heroes. You gotta give me something.

Jackson's portrayal of Elijah Price is much more interesting, but that's how it goes with antagonists, right? That's how you knew he was the bad guy: he was eminently more watchable and compelling than Willis.

I think ultimately this movie suffered from the success of The Sixth Sense. It seems like Shyamalan "learned" too much from that movie, and employed character work and cinematography that wasn't quite right for this movie. But I trust the recommendations I've received enough that I'll give Split and Glass a shot.

One last thing. Just before the end credits, the movie does a freeze-frame and text-based post-script. "David Dunn led authorities to... Elijah Price is now..." etc. In a fictional, serious movie, this feels completely out of place. It makes sense in Remember The Titans, because you want to know the real world "whatever happened to..." about a number of characters. And it makes sense in like Animal House, because Animal House is an unserious movie. In this film, a serious dramatic but fictional story, it just feels strange. One more oddity in a movie full of less-than-exceptional quirks.

Wondering if I'm way off base? You can check out Unbreakable on your own! Click here to check out where you can stream it today on JustWatch.

One Good Point (Movie) - Looper

I'm generally a Bruce Willis fan. Die Hard was one of the first R-rated action movies I ever saw, and Die Hard: With a Vengeance was the first R-rated movie I ever saw in theaters. And there'll be another Bruce Willis movie in this feed shortly, so stay tuned!

Willis isn't quite the protagonist in this movie, though; that distinction goes to Joseph Gordon-Levitt, who plays the younger version of Willis' character. The two characters are dealing with the consequences of a life of crime and time travel, and naturally are both cooperative and combative at different points in the movie. They both do a great job of acting, while some of the supporting roles (Emily Blunt and Jeff Daniels specifically) are a bit less impressive.

The story is fairly straightforward, which is a positive in a time-travel movie; that shit can get weird in a hurry. That said, the story just didn't grab me the way I hoped that it would. It's a fine little suspense film, with a rewarding enough ending, but lacking in any of the big dramatic moments that makes a movie really sing for me. It kind of feels like the movie had a premise they liked, and they sort of tried to jam a full-sized story on top of it, and the fit is a little imperfect. Not bad, just not great... which feels like the story behind many of the films I've watched this year, but hey, that's how it goes, right? Most stuff is okay, some stuff is great, some stuff is terrible.

You're welcome, I just explained life.

If you'd like to watch Looper yourself but aren't sure what timeline you're in, I can't help you. But if you just need to know where it's streaming, click here to check out its entry on JustWatch!

One Good Point (Movie) - Sleepy Hollow

So for those of you who know me, you know I don't have a big horror background. I'm not into jump-scares at all; that's a sensation I'm perfectly happy to leave behind. But there are thrilling movies that appeal to me; Jurassic Park and Jaws are two of my all-time favorite films, and thrill and danger are core to both of those movies.

Sleepy Hollow offers some of the same sorts of vibes, albeit with a supernatural bend. You've got a strong cast of skilled actors playing lots of interesting characters, almost all of whom have secrets to hide. Johnny Depp is very entertaining, as always, and he plays the role of a skittish-yet-overconfident investigator to perfection. And though I'm generally not into supernatural horror, I enjoyed how they stretched it as long as they could to keep you unsure if it was truly a ghost story.

Overall it was a fun watch, one I'll definitely be happy to revisit from time to time, when I'm in a spooky mood but don't want to watch something new. Sleepy Hollow gets my Halloween seal of approval!

If you'd like to watch Sleepy Hollow but you don't know where you can stream it, have I got a deal for you! Click here to check out JustWatch, and they'll tell you what streaming/rental services have this movie!

One Good Point (Show) - Fallout, Season 1

It's kind of remarkable what happened in the span of a year. Last year, Bethesda released the long-awaited title Starfield, a new world by the creators of Morrowind, Skyrim, and (of most relevance here) Fallout. Just recently, the Borderlands movie came out, and was by all accounts a colossal failure (I haven't seen it yet).

And yet in between, a show about a video game world, an expansion of the lore from a Bethesda product came out, and it was fantastic.

I've only played the very beginning of the very first Fallout game, the old tactical isometric game from a million years ago, and then about an hour of Fallout 3 at my friend's house. Other than that, my exposure to Fallout has been exclusively through internet videos and memes, but even with that limited awareness, the show absolutely popped.

The characters are robust and dynamic, and the world is full of personality, danger, and excitement. Walton Goggins is tremendous as always, but maybe the strongest performance is by Ella Purnell, our optimistic and adventurous protagonist; we meet most of the surface world through her point of view, learning as we go along. The third protagonist is played by Aaron Moten, and he took the longest time for me to come around to. But by the end, he's as entertaining as any of them. Adding in some secondary characters played by Chris Parnell, Michael Emerson, Michael Rapaport, and many others, there's really entertainment around every turn.

The season of television asked a lot of questions, gave a lot of answers, and left enough unresolved that you absolutely must have a second season. And it will! Amazon announced that the show will be renewed for at least one more season, and I'm looking forward to more.

Fallout is an Amazon show, but just in case you might have other options down the line, here's a direct link to the show's entry on JustWatch!

One Good Point (Show) - Invincible, Season 2 Part 2

If you were worried that Invincible didn't have enough characters and storylines going on, don't worry. The delayed second half of season two offered even more complexity, with even more characters getting into even more hijinks. Was it good?

It was... okay.

I would say there are too many characters and happenings for my taste; the wide spread of content means that you might go a full episode or longer between story beats for a particular character. The finale's focus on Angstrom Levy, a character we'd seen for maybe 4 minutes all season, is the most glaring example of this. If you boiled the show down to the Viltrumites (who get shortchanged this season for the most part), two or three secondary characters, and a "monster of the week," I think you'd have a stronger show.

The other side of my frustration with this show comes from the delay. Season 1 debuted in March of 2021. Season two didn't release until the summer of 2023, and only the first four episodes were released; the last four didn't come down until March of 2024. That is simply too long a delay to preserve excitement, and especially frustrating to have such a delay inside the season. The show lost all momentum from Part 1 to Part 2.

Hopefully future seasons don't have such a delay, and are not split. The show suffered a lot because of it.

To find out where you can watch Invincible (all at the same time), click here to check its entry on JustWatch!

One Good Point (Show) - Echo, Season 1

Echo was a show I didn't really think we needed before I watched it, and then I watched it, and I still feel the same way. Story-wise, it serves to tie a little bit of content together between the old Daredevil show (which was phenomenal) and the upcoming series Daredevil: Born Again. I say that without knowing what the new show will be about, but it'll be about Kingpin, and that's the most interesting part of Echo.

But the action is often drawn out and also unbelievable, and the characters just aren't that compelling. Even Kingpin's character feels a little bit restrained. But we do get a glimpse of what might be to come in his future MCU presence, and that's reason for optimism.

My biggest frustration with Echo is that compelling. But when a show isn't very good and it's got a female or minority lead (or both, in this case), the conversation gets skewed by people's reactions to that fact. Sexist folks will say, "Marvel's focus on wokeness is ruining the MCU!" Anti-sexist people will praise the show for its wokeness, without acknowledging its flaws. And the public at large is left with a not-that-great show that people care way too much about.

Echo wasn't that great. It's not the end of the MCU, and it's not because it focused on a girl. Agatha All Along's success is hopefully proving the latter point.

I wouldn't exactly recommend it, but if you want to watch Echo on a streaming service, you can click here to go to JustWatch and find out where you can do that.