Movie Review: X-Men: Days of Future Past

The X-Men aside from Wolverine all suck. They’re a ragtag group of heroes that aren’t good enough for their own individual movies and can’t even make a decent film together. Reports have said that Hugh Jackman wants Wolverine to be included in the Avengers. I can’t blame him. The rest of these want-to-be’s are holding him down. Given that, my expectations weren’t very high. I went to see it for you guys.

We’ve convinced ourselves for years that it couldn’t get worse than X-Men: Last Stand only to be smacked in the face with a declaration from Bryan Singer: “I’m better than Brett Ratner. He can’t do anything better than me. I bet I can make a worse movie.” Singer does just that, putting award-winning talent on the screen and giving them a script that was written by someone with no brain matter. Fan-favorite Hugh Jackman does nothing fun as Wolverine for the movie’s entire two-hour and ten minute running time. He’s the one we care about people! We don’t care about any of the other guys. They’re all bottom feeders compared to Wolverine and you just took your main character and all of the fun, enjoyment and action that he provides out of the lineup. That’s like the Minnesota Vikings benching Adrian Peterson! You just don’t do that!

We’ve got time traveling and all of the common complications that come with it but it’s okay because Singer decided to just throw those under the rug. Why would you do that? I mean, I think it’s already pretty lame that this is trying to be a remake of X-Men: First Class. Magneto wants to kill the humans, Professor Xavier wants to protect them, Mystique still hasn’t made up her mind after forever. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, disappointing action scene with miraculous character changes, roll credits.

The only entertainment I got out of this was from two of the newcomers, Evan Peters as Quicksilver and Fan Bingbing as Blink. The action through the teleportation portals was really impressive as were the special effects used with Quicksilver but neither of them were in the movie that long because we had to make room for more bickering between all of our one-dimensional characters in the past that no one wants to see for the sixth time.

The acting isn’t lousy but there’s no one I really care about here. I’m sick of Magneto acting like he’s the ruler of the world. I’m tired of Mystique never making up her mind and being stupid. I’m tired of Professor Xavier being a useless pacifist and I’m tired of Storm in general in these movies. I’m tired of these people and the more I watch them the more I hate everyone that’s not named Wolverine or Beast. These don’t even feel like sequels, they just feel like remakes of the same film and no character has made any progress as a person since the last time we saw them. There’s no character development, no likability, no consistency, nothing.

That’s a real problem when your dialogue-to-action ratio is 80-20. If you’re going to make the majority of your film dialogue, don’t make misleading trailers that clearly promote something else. The only thing happening here is the advancement of the plot and it was already a loosely knit plot to begin with before you add the shaky dialogue. Given all of this, I don’t feel like I’m being unfair about this movie or any of the X-Men films for that matter. They’re not vivid or potent products. They’re just…meh.

This one they wanted to get out of the “meh” and I can appreciate that but this was just not the pitch to use if you were trying to get out of the doghouse. This was more of a pitch to use if you were trying to get into the outhouse.

Once again, if you’re new to my blog,  I’ve always ranked movies on a scale of 0-100 (I don’t know why, I just always have). Here’s the grading scale.

 90-100  It’s a great movie and definitely one worth buying. (Godzilla, Secretariat, Prisoners, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Captain America: The Winter Soldier)

80-89   It was a pretty good movie and definitely one worth seeing, but it doesn’t quite scratch my top ten percentile. (The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Young Guns, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, Spider-Man 3, Divergent)

70-79   It’s okay but I’ve seen better. It has its moments, but it has its flaws, too. (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, 300, Flyboys, Dawn of the Dead, Captain America: The First Avenger)

60-69   It’s got plenty wrong with it but I still got enjoyment out of this one. (Speed, Godzilla(1998), The Incredible Hulk, Disaster Movie, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story)

50-59   This movie isn’t intolerable but it’s not blowing my mind either. I’m trying really hard to get some sort of enjoyment out of this. (The Starving Games, You’re Next, Thor, Full Metal Jacket, Alien Resurrection)

40-49   This movie is just mediocre. It’s not doing anything other than the bare minimal, so morbidly boring that sometimes I’m actually angry I watched this. (A Haunted House, 300: Rise of an Empire, Cowboys and Aliens, Serendipity, Alien)

30-39   Definitely worse than mediocre, the 30′s ironically define the 1930′s, full of depression, lack of accomplishments, poverty and just so dumb. (Stonados, Redemption, Pride and Prejudice, The Contract)

20-29   What did I just watch? Cliches, stupidity, nothingness, did I mention stupidity? Just…wow. (Thor: The Dark World, The Sum of All Fears)

0-19      Watching this movie resulted in one or more of the following: seizure, loss of brain cells, falling asleep/unconsciousness, feel you wasted your time/day, accomplished nothing for you, left the movie knowing less about it then you did going into it, constantly asking yourself why you came to see this movie, or near-death experience. In short, staring at a wall was just as entertaining as watching this movie. This movie deserved a sticker or a label that said, “WARNING: EXTREME AMOUNT OF SUCKAGE.” (Open Grave, Alien 3, Dark Fury, Midnight Cowboy)

My score for X-Men: Days of Future Past: 27.

Similar to The Amazing Spider-Man 2, X-Men: Days of Future Past promised fans an action feature and instead gave fans something entirely different. While The Amazing Spider-Man 2 gave us an enthralling romance, X-Men: Days of Future Past gave us boring dialogue, an overly complicated plot and lightweight characters to make audiences care far less for an X-Men film than previously thought humanly possible.

Movie Review: Stonados

And you thought Sharknado was bad. Well think again because you haven’t seen bad until you’ve seen Stonados. It’s exactly what you think it is, stones in a tornado that ravage the city of Boston to no end, terrorizing the minds of its citizens with obvious green screen that’s not even trying to be real, terrible special effects, squeamish and blank faces, stonados that get evaporated by black holes and tasteless acting. With a movie this bad, I didn’t know if I could handle the task of reviewing it alone so I called Robin…I mean, uh, Chris from theofficialgrump.wordpress.com to help me out. It’s a bonus brother edition!

Chris: I’ll save you! Citizens of WordsofWisTIM, I have come to save you from this natural disaster.

Tim: It’s not going to be easy because we’re covered in a torrential downpour of stupid. I don’t feel like anyone in this film is trying or maybe the script is just so good at making everyone look like an incompetent fool that no one can look smart reading these lines. There are so many fallacies and faults and the production crew never runs out of ideas of how to make this movie worse.

Chris: Half of these people, after saying their lines, seem to stay there a little longer then they need to as if to say, “Did I say that right?” Multiple times a character would occasionally say “I don’t know what’s going on.” I laughed and said “neither do we.”

Tim: This film also does one of the worst possible things in film. It reuses shots again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again. That’s 18 times!!! WHO DOES THAT?! Of those 18 shots, they picked out five to use a third time!!! The same shot three times!!! However, this film knew it could do better, so they took one of those five shots they used a third time and used it a fourth time. THE….. SAME….. SHOT….. FOUR …..FREAKING ….. TIMES….. WHAT IS GOING ON?????!!!!! THIS IS CINEMATIC HELL!!!

Chris: It was incredibly stupid that they used the same stonado effect so many times.

Tim: The film spends at least a tenth of its running time reminding us we’re in Boston by placing Boston Bruins paraphernalia everywhere and innumerable shots of seagulls and water over rocks because we got to remind everyone it’s Boston for the five billionth time.

Chris: The Ford logo and the Heinz in Heinz Field were removed because this film was so bad.

Tim: Never have I been so ashamed to have scenes of the city of Pittsburgh in a movie. There’s so much in this that no one cares about. It’s one of those movies where your reaction to at least half of what is being said leaves you with a reaction like this. It’s so nonsensical and ludicrous that’s it’s just not funny aside from a very few instances. The two main characters haven’t seen each other in two years….DON’T CARE! The term “waterspouts” is in every five lines of dialogue! The kids never pick up their phones!! EVER!!! Why even have phones?! Why does this exist??!! Why?!

Once again, if you’re new to my blog,  I’ve always ranked movies on a scale of 0-100 (I don’t know why, I just always have). Here’s the grading scale.

 90-100  It’s a great movie and definitely one worth buying. (Godzilla, Secretariat, Prisoners, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Captain America: The Winter Soldier)

80-89   It was a pretty good movie and definitely one worth seeing, but it doesn’t quite scratch my top ten percentile. (The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Young Guns, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, Spider-Man 3, Divergent)

70-79   It’s okay but I’ve seen better. It has its moments, but it has its flaws, too. (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, 300, Flyboys, Dawn of the Dead, Captain America: The First Avenger)

60-69   It’s got plenty wrong with it but I still got enjoyment out of this one. (Speed, Godzilla(1998), The Incredible Hulk, Disaster Movie, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story)

50-59   This movie isn’t intolerable but it’s not blowing my mind either. I’m trying really hard to get some sort of enjoyment out of this. (The Starving Games, You’re Next, Thor, Full Metal Jacket, Alien Resurrection)

40-49   This movie is just mediocre. It’s not doing anything other than the bare minimal, so morbidly boring that sometimes I’m actually angry I watched this. (A Haunted House, 300: Rise of an Empire, Cowboys and Aliens, Serendipity, Alien)

30-39   Definitely worse than mediocre, the 30′s ironically define the 1930′s, full of depression, lack of accomplishments, poverty and just so dumb. (Redemption, Pride and Prejudice, The Contract )

20-29   What did I just watch? Cliches, stupidity, nothingness, did I mention stupidity? Just…wow. (Thor: The Dark World, The Sum of All Fears)

0-19      Watching this movie resulted in one or more of the following: seizure, loss of brain cells, falling asleep/unconsciousness, feel you wasted your time/day, accomplished nothing for you, left the movie knowing less about it then you did going into it, constantly asking yourself why you came to see this movie, or near-death experience. In short, staring at a wall was just as entertaining as watching this movie. This movie deserved a sticker or a label that said, “WARNING: EXTREME AMOUNT OF SUCKAGE.” (Open Grave, Alien 3, Dark Fury, Midnight Cowboy)

My score for Stonados: 30.

Stonados might have gotten a 30 and slightly edged itself out of the 20’s but barely so. The only reason that’s the case is because I had a little fun and laughs with this but there’s still no doubt this movie is egregious and I could have lived my life without ever having seen this.

*SPOILER ALERT* IF YOU DON’T WANT THE MOVIE SPOILED, STOP READING!!!

*SPOILER’S EDITION*

Tim: There’s a guy at the lighthouse. Why is he in this movie?! All he does is look out the window through his freaking binoculars and we see the same exact thing every time!!! Later when stones are falling from the sky, Jackson, the son, decides to hide behind the most indestructible object known to man: a WOODEN BENCH. ARE YOU KIDDING ME?! YOU DON’T EVEN DESERVE TO LIVE!!! YOU’RE TOO FREAKING STUPID, YOU IDIOT!

Chris: Me agree. There were other scenes where people were hiding behind stupid things that couldn’t do anything which made no sense but I still laughed at it.

Tim: Lee is reporting another incident of a stonado when the cameraman pans to the side and tapes a girl getting smashed by a rock. Lee simply steps back into the frame and continues to reports like nothing happened. This gets put on television. WHAT?! THIS WOULD NEVER HAPPEN!!! Gosh, this is brain cell-destroying trash.

Chris: This had to be the funniest scene of the entire movie for me. Just shows that news people want attention and nothing else. The camera man must be a total idiot, too. “Instead of stopping the video and try to help this person or leave, let’s instead keep filming and pretend nothing happened.” BRILLIANT! I also liked how the rocks seemed to be mutated beings. For the first half hour of the movie, rocks didn’t explode in the movie. “I have an idea, let’s make them explode and refuse to explain it!” said the director, and so they decide to explode 10 seconds after impact. Then they decide to have them explode only when you touch them. There is no word in the English dictionary that describes how stupid this sequence is.

Another unexplained thing. Joe, our main character who doomed his entire career in one movie, gets random calls from people informing him of what is happening. I have a question? WHO…THE HECK….CALLED THEM O.O

Movie Review: Speed

I would like to once again apologize for not posting anything but I shouldn’t be doing any blog maintenance now for a long, long time. So, to show my true and sincere apologies, I subjected myself to a Keanu Reeves movie. THE HORROR!!!

Reeves is just so bad in everything I ever see him in, but I sadly have to admit something. For the first time since the beginning of time, an unforeseen spectacle occurred in 1994 when Speed hit theaters: Keanu Reeves actually acted for once.

It hurts me to say it. Writing those words and having to admit that I said them causes me to feel rather nauseous. Keanu Reeves’ stoic face and robotic personality manages to manufacture an adequate characterization here of police officer Jack Traven that somehow, some way, maintains interest in audiences. I don’t know what happened here. Did Reeves meet with a god-like master with the wish that he/she would teach him the ways of the Ak-tor? Did he have some sort of epiphany that gave him some new, unlimited motivation? Like I said, I don’t know what happened here but good for you, Keanu.

At the same time, Jack Traven isn’t an original character but that’s poor character writing, not acting. He’s just another stereotype in a long list of stereotypical characters that everyone has seen too many times. I don’t hate the guy but I don’t really feel a bond with the character, a bond of connection and genuine concern. He’s still entertaining, (can’t believe I’m talking about Keanu Reeves) he’s just not a stellar character.

Sandra Bullock plays our supporting actress alongside Reeves and you can tell there’s either a lack of script or this is really early in these two’s careers because again, not getting any creativity or uniqueness from this character. Is it the script, is it the actors? I don’t know but what I do know is that there’s a plate on the table and instead of getting a savory Filet Mignon from Longhorn Steakhouse, I somehow wound up with a grilled chicken sandwich. It’s not bad, it’s just not enthusiastic or overly satisfying for my wanting appetite. I want more and I’m not getting more than contentment on my plate with no spices, caviar or dessert treats.

So we got poor script writing holding this film back and then we have Dennis Hopper as our main villain. He’s not scary. He doesn’t show any extreme psychopathic traits or hostile demeanor. He’s simply not memorable or worthy of as much screen time as he gets here. I’m sorry but you’re just not cutting it, man. Hopper is just a boring villain here. His emotions seem forced which takes away from the overall product and me trying to insert myself into the film.

Finally, we have plot holes and a lot of them, holes that could easily have been navigated around with some simple steering wheel manipulation and decent eyesight. They’re dumb and could have been easily removed with some basic editing but thankfully don’t interfere with my entertainment for the most part, though it does hurt the film’s overall score. Edit your work, people!

Once again, if you’re new to my blog,  I’ve always ranked movies on a scale of 0-100 (I don’t know why, I just always have). Here’s the grading scale.

 90-100  It’s a great movie and definitely one worth buying. (Godzilla, Secretariat, Prisoners, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Captain America: The Winter Soldier)

80-89   It was a pretty good movie and definitely one worth seeing, but it doesn’t quite scratch my top ten percentile. (The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Young Guns, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, Spider-Man 3, Divergent)

70-79   It’s okay but I’ve seen better. It has its moments, but it has its flaws, too. (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, 300, Flyboys, Dawn of the Dead, Captain America: The First Avenger)

60-69   It’s got plenty wrong with it but I still got enjoyment out of this one. (Godzilla(1998), The Incredible Hulk, Disaster Movie, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, The Long Kiss Goodnight)

50-59   This movie isn’t intolerable but it’s not blowing my mind either. I’m trying really hard to get some sort of enjoyment out of this. (The Starving Games, You’re Next, Thor, Full Metal Jacket, Alien Resurrection)

40-49   This movie is just mediocre. It’s not doing anything other than the bare minimal, so morbidly boring that sometimes I’m actually angry I watched this. (A Haunted House, 300: Rise of an Empire, Cowboys and Aliens, Serendipity, Alien)

30-39   Definitely worse than mediocre, the 30′s ironically define the 1930′s, full of depression, lack of accomplishments, poverty and just so dumb. (Redemption, Pride and Prejudice, The Contract )

20-29   What did I just watch? Cliches, stupidity, nothingness, did I mention stupidity? Just…wow. (Thor: The Dark World, The Sum of All Fears)

0-19      Watching this movie resulted in one or more of the following: seizure, loss of brain cells, falling asleep/unconsciousness, feel you wasted your time/day, accomplished nothing for you, left the movie knowing less about it then you did going into it, constantly asking yourself why you came to see this movie, or near-death experience. In short, staring at a wall was just as entertaining as watching this movie. This movie deserved a sticker or a label that said, “WARNING: EXTREME AMOUNT OF SUCKAGE.” (Open Grave, Alien 3, Dark Fury, Midnight Cowboy)

My score for Speed: 64.

Speed may feature a bus full of plot holes but it’s still entertaining, especially since we don’t have any of this or this. That second clip looks so bad I think I actually want to watch that now. Anyway, Speed may feature one of Keanu Reeves’ best roles but the duo of him and Bullock still leave much to be desired and that’s without adding the disappointing Hopper. I was getting bored near the end because this film didn’t know when to end.

*SPOILER ALERT* IF YOU DON’T WANT THE MOVIE SPOILED, STOP READING!!!

*SPOILER’S EDITION*

In reality, this movie would have ended about 20 times had it not been for the insistence on extending this movie past its welcome. Among the plenty of plot holes:

Why doesn’t Jack shoot the tires of the bus before it reaches 50 mph? If the bus never reaches 50 mph then the bomb can’t be set and no one dies.

The bus smashes through signs and the sides of cars early on. Clearly not going 50 mph during all that.

Captain McMahon directs Traven to take a freeway only to find out later it’s not finished. Why did no one on the force know this freeway wasn’t finished? Not one person had a friend working on this project or watches the news?

The bus does not make that 50 ft jump. Rationale: the laws of physics!!!

When the bus enters the airport, the tires are punctured by a spike strip set up by security and then proceeds to drive on them for the next 20 minutes. That does not happen!!!

Our villain, Payne, doesn’t ask for the ransom money until Traven has kept the bus alive for more than an hour. How does that work exactly? What if Traven hadn’t kept those people alive? What’s the backup plan here? Just keep rigging up buses until someone succeeds? Didn’t think this out very well.

Payne is furious when his money gets destroyed in the subway car so he climbs on the roof to fight Traven, throwing right hooks while still clutching the detonator to the bomb in that same hand. Don’t think that would work. Sounds like a sure explosion to me.

Movie Review: Godzilla

To start things off, I was thinking about my reviews last week and I decided to change my grading scale. I feel it will make my reviews more helpful, specific and accurate to you guys. I’ve also gone back through all my reviews, again, and adjusted my scores to the new scale, which is why I haven’t posting anything over the last week and a half. In short, new scale, better reviews, and Tim’s happy. I apologize for the switch but I really do think it will make a difference.

Moving on, Godzilla. If you haven’t seen the trailer yet, shame on you. If you have, congratulations. You’re part of the general populace. You know what the general populace hasn’t seen in a very long time? A good Godzilla movie. It’s been a while. We all grew up with the Toho films and every American adaptation has nose-dived into the pavement. I didn’t hate the 1998 Godzilla film with Matthew Broderick, which was more of a corny comedy than an action film but it wasn’t what people were looking for. People want to see chaotic destruction, monsters punching other monsters in the face and people running and screaming for their lives.

With all that said, not since The Avengers have I seen a film with so much pressure to succeed. We already knew this movie was going to make tons of money at the box office. That’s a given. Everyone wants to see a Godzilla movie. I’m talking about succeeding in terms of giving the U.S of A. the monster movie that we’ve been waiting for for quite a while now. All the critics have been waiting for this and I’m sure they all brought their magnifying glasses to nitpick at every little thing this movie did wrong, just waiting for this movie to misstep or lose its balance, anything that would allow them to put this movie on the chopping block.

I didn’t go in with that approach but my expectations were high because I was just as anxious for this movie to come out as everyone else. I wanted to see Godzilla blow things up and make whole cities look like sandcastles.

The big question: Was the wait worth it? Cue Jeopardy music and drum roll please.

Yes, yes it was. Despite a relatively inexperienced cast and a rookie director in Gareth Edwards, Godzilla still manages to thrill audiences with its visuals and special effects as well as some passable acting from newcomers Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Elizabeth Olsen. They’re making us feel like we’re there, displaying some emotions, showing us what it feels like to be in that situation, living within a couple of miles, even a couple of feet from the king of all monsters.

Bryan Cranston and Ken Watanabe don’t get a lot of screen time in this film but they make their presence felt time and time again. As with most Godzilla movies, the plot involves a lot of actors in front of the camera for the majority of the screen time, which once again I don’t think is what people were looking for when they went to see this. Can someone just make a two-hour film where more than 50% of the film involves Godzilla in rage mode? Please? That would be really cool. With that said, I’m not displeased with this movie in the slightest because the story we’re given aside from the monster battles is compelling. When you watched Godzilla movies as a kid, you probably didn’t care about the characters we were presented with and the human story line. You just wanted to see Godzilla blow things up. I still want to see Godzilla blow things up here but I actually care about the movie as a whole, not just the parts where I get to see Godzilla. It’s a full product where I get to enjoy every bit of it. I’m not saying the Toho films weren’t revolutionary or entertaining, but I don’t think it’s unfair to say the characters weren’t all that meaningful in those films. Here, the characters meant something. Instead of watching half a monster movie and half a borefest like Pacific Rim, I ended up getting half a monster movie with some coordinated, relevant subplots to keep me interested until Godzilla came out from behind the curtain again.

Once again, if you’re new to my blog,  I’ve always ranked movies on a scale of 0-100 (I don’t know why, I just always have). Here’s the grading scale.

 90-100  It’s a great movie and definitely one worth buying. (Spider-Man 2, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Prisoners, Secretariat)

80-89   It was a pretty good movie and definitely one worth seeing, but it doesn’t quite scratch my top ten percentile. (Divergent, Spider-Man 3, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, Young Guns, The Amazing Spider-Man 2)

70-79   It’s okay but I’ve seen better. It has its moments, but it has its flaws, too. (Captain America: The First Avenger, Dawn of the Dead, Flyboys, 300, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs)

60-69   It’s got plenty wrong with it but I still got enjoyment out of this one. (The Long Kiss Goodnight, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, Disaster Movie, The Incredible Hulk, Godzilla(1998) )

50-59   This movie isn’t intolerable but it’s not blowing my mind either. I’m trying really hard to get some sort of enjoyment out of this. (Alien Resurrection, Full Metal Jacket, Thor, You’re Next, The Starving Games)

40-49   This movie is just mediocre. It’s not doing anything other than the bare minimal, so morbidly boring that sometimes I’m actually angry I watched this. (Alien, Serendipity, Cowboys and Aliens, 300: Rise of an Empire, A Haunted House)

30-39   Definitely worse than mediocre, the 30’s ironically define the 1930’s, full of depression, lack of accomplishments, poverty and just so dumb. (The Contract, Pride and Prejudice, Redemption)

20-29   What did I just watch? Cliches, stupidity, nothingness, did I mention stupidity? Just…wow. (The Sum of All Fears, Thor: The Dark World)

0-19      Watching this movie resulted in one or more of the following: seizure, loss of brain cells, falling asleep/unconsciousness, feel you wasted your time/day, accomplished nothing for you, left the movie knowing less about it then you did going into it, constantly asking yourself why you came to see this movie, or near-death experience. In short, staring at a wall was just as entertaining as watching this movie. This movie deserved a sticker or a label that said, “WARNING: EXTREME AMOUNT OF SUCKAGE.” (Midnight Cowboy, Dark Fury, Alien 3, Open Grave)

My score for Godzilla: 93.

While the pressure for this film to succeed seemed infinite, a successful American Godzilla movie has finally been made. Godzilla may not be perfect but it’s a huge improvement from the memories of the past and is definitely a must-see and must-buy on its way to becoming one of the biggest box office hits of the summer.

Movie Review: The Amazing Spider-Man 2

The summer movie reviewing begins and with it comes The Amazing Spider-Man 2. If you read my review of The Amazing Spider-Man, you know I ain’t a big fan of the reboot because this is the more cocky, irresponsible Spider-Man as opposed to the more humble, moral one in the original series. This new Spider-Man isn’t the one I’ve become such a huge fan of. I also feel like it was too soon for a reboot and my feelings proved to be warranted after watching the first one because it was the same backstory that I had just watched in the original series a decade ago. With me on my review of the sequel is my brother, Chris, who can be found over at theofficialgrump.wordpress.com. It’s a bonus brother edition!

Chris: I don’t like you.

Thank you for inviting me. I’m looking forward to doing reviews this summer with you.

Tim: Andrew Garfield is still in the lead role as our friendly neighborhood Spider-Man but he’s not as irritable or agitating in this one. Yeah, he totally lied to Gwen’s dying father which makes him a total sleazebag but he shows some genuine guilt over the whole thing. It didn’t seem believable to me at first but I have to admit I think Garfield is starting to grow on me… a little.

Garfield and the script do more than color in the lines, giving us more than just a sneak peek of true character and personality and gifting us a person with highs and lows just like the rest of us. It’s better for character connection and for me giving a care in the world than giving me the one-dimensional cocky teenager routine we’ve all seen too many times.

Chris: He had a better performance in this one than he did in the previous one and he learns more about his past here.

Tim: Emma Stone is the man or rather the perfectionist in this film. While Garfield has clearly learned from his acting experiences, Stone has been around Hollywood more than a few times and knows what it takes to make a role come alive. I can’t say I’ve seen her in anything aside from Zombieland and Gangster Squad but I don’t need to in order to say she’s clearly got a head on her shoulders. It’s still not as good a characterization as Dunst did with Mary Jane in the original series but Stone’s performance is not far from it. There’s some true emotion and weight to this character and while she was one of the few highlights in the first, she’s one of the many here.

Chris: She had an easier time with her characterization than Garfield. Her role made it feel like you were looking at Gwen, not Emma.

Tim: The romance between them is complicated, the way I like it to be although it burns inside sometimes. Occasionally, there was a little too much in terms of the emotional roller coaster but it all worked out in the end so I won’t complain. There isn’t really anything negative to say about it which is a good thing because this romance became the focal point of the story rather than the conflict between Spider-Man and Electro, which I do think is a little unfair because I think the trailers made it look like this was going to be an action-bonanza and it wasn’t. I didn’t mind it though and coming from an action-obsessed critic like myself you know that’s saying something.

Chris: I think the romance worked well. If you were going in expecting to see a Captain America: Winter Soldier-type film, that’s not what you’re going to get.

Tim: The heavily anticipated unveiling of Electro ended in quite the disappointment for me. Jamie Foxx doesn’t get enough screen time or character buildup before he turns into the shocking villain (see what I did there?) which leaves me confused as to what his motives are. He starts off as a huge Spider-Man fan who doesn’t have any friends and gets degraded a lot everywhere he goes. He just wants to be noticed for once and I understand where he’s coming from but killing people isn’t going to get people to notice you; it’s going to get people to run away from you, which will only make you feel like more of a freak.

Chris: In the trailer, they showed him as if he was always a bad guy and in the movie they make him out to be almost mentally disturbed. I felt his action scenes were very short and a lot of his dialogue was said under his breath which made it hard to understand sometimes. I like Jamie Foxx as an actor but I feel he struggled in the role because of the lack of writing.

Tim: Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan) isn’t as refined a character as he was in the originals and also doesn’t have a lot of face time. As I said earlier, it’s all about the romance, which is well-done, but where are our villains? This guy is Harry Osborn 90% of the movie along with maybe a whole five minutes of the Green Goblin! You have that sinking feel? That’s the feeling of disappointment and the acknowledgement that this is not Spider-Man’s super battle.

Chris: The trailers give you all of the action scenes of the Green Goblin and the Rhino. He’s a very different Harry Osborn than he was in the Tobey Maguire series. Also, RAGE MODE ACTIVATED!!! Why were action scenes from the Matrix thrown in here where everything was in slow motion and dodging bullets and electricity and more bullets?!

Tim: The action scenes were still cool but there was a lot of slow motion when had it happened in real-time it would have been so much more adrenaline-filled and lifelike. I’m not sure I’d go so far as distaste but I expected more.

Once again, if you’re new to my blog,  I’ve always ranked movies on a scale of 0-100 (I don’t know why, I just always have). Here’s the grading scale.

 90-100  It’s a great movie and definitely one worth buying. (Spider-Man 2, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Prisoners, Secretariat)

80-89   It was a pretty good movie and definitely one worth seeing, but it doesn’t quite scratch my top ten percentile. (Non-Stop, Divergent, Spider-Man 3, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, Young Guns)

70-79   It’s okay but I’ve seen better. It has its moments, but it has its flaws, too. (Captain America: The First Avenger, Dawn of the Dead, Flyboys, 300, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs)

60-69   It’s got plenty wrong with it but I still got enjoyment out of this one. (The Long Kiss Goodnight, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, Disaster Movie, The Incredible Hulk, Godzilla(1998) )

50-59   This movie isn’t intolerable but it’s not blowing my mind either. I’m trying really hard to get some sort of enjoyment out of this. (Alien Resurrection, Full Metal Jacket, Thor, You’re Next, The Starving Games)

40-49   This movie is just mediocre. It’s not doing anything other than the bare minimal, so morbidly boring that sometimes I’m actually angry I watched this. (Alien, Serendipity, Cowboys and Aliens, 300: Rise of an Empire, A Haunted House)

30-39   Definitely worse than mediocre, the 30’s ironically define the 1930’s, full of depression, lack of accomplishments, poverty and just so dumb. (The Contract, Pride and Prejudice, Redemption)

20-29   What did I just watch? Cliches, stupidity, nothingness, did I mention stupidity? Just…wow. (The Sum of All Fears, Thor: The Dark World)

0-19      Watching this movie resulted in one or more of the following: seizure, loss of brain cells, falling asleep/unconsciousness, feel you wasted your time/day, accomplished nothing for you, left the movie knowing less about it then you did going into it, constantly asking yourself why you came to see this movie, or near-death experience. In short, staring at a wall was just as entertaining as watching this movie. This movie deserved a sticker or a label that said, “WARNING: EXTREME AMOUNT OF SUCKAGE.” (Midnight Cowboy, Dark Fury, Alien 3, Open Grave)

My score for The Amazing Spider-Man 2: 82.

There’s little doubt you’ll come out of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 surprised, but enjoyment is still to be had in this film, especially with it being as thought-provoking as it is. It’s just not the kind of enjoyment you were expecting. For all the Iron Man 3 haters out there who complained because it didn’t follow the comics, this is the superhero movie for you because it’s very accurate to the comics. It’s definitely a huge improvement from where it started and I will be looking forward to what direction director Marc Webb decides to take with the third one.

*SPOILER ALERT* IF YOU DON’T WANT THE MOVIE SPOILED, STOP READING!!!

*SPOILER’S EDITION*

Tim: If you got the “follow the comics” hint, you know that Gwen Stacy dies at the end of this movie. It leaves a bitter taste in your mouth and it saddens you but if you know more than a little about Spider-Man then you know this was inevitable. Can you imagine the uproar that would have occurred if Sony decided to make the two live happily ever after? Would I have been outraged if that had been the case? Certainly not but there’s no doubt The Amazing Spider-Man 2 would have been the new Iron Man 3 for comic diehards had that been the case and then I would have heard the same stupid, short-sighted argument from these people for another six months instead of hearing about all the great things this movie was able to accomplish despite all the great things it also missed. In conclusion, it didn’t ruin the movie for me, although it is disheartening.

Chris: I felt this was going to come and it rather frustrated me. If you watch most Marvel, D.C. , or any superhero movie, there is always a romance involved in it, a romantic story that captures our hearts and make us care. The fact they basically threw it out at the end made me quite annoyed. I understand it shows that Spider-Man has feelings but every movie usually has a romance and wondering if there will even be one in the next movie will be interesting.

Tim: This doesn’t involve a major plot point but it is something I would like to discuss nonetheless because it’s so stupid. Two planes are flying towards the airport in New York City when Electro knocks the power out which eliminates the traffic control towers, leaving the airplanes flying blind. One of the route trackers on one of the planes calculates that the planes will crash in four minutes and one of the pilots tells this attendant to start the timer. Then, the power is restored about 15 seconds before the planes were to crash and they miss each other by inches, including the pilots turning their planes to avoid each other in three seconds. I’m sorry, but really?! That does not happen. If you know you’re going to crash in four minutes, why wouldn’t you change your path when there was a minute left or something? Go up, go down or move left or right, just do anything but keep going straight, you idiots! How did no one on either of these planes think of this? Weren’t they considering what they were going to do if the power didn’t come back on?! Were they content with playing chicken with another plane and refusing to move, electing to explode into smithreens when a simple turn of the wheel or change in elevation would have caused the avoidance of certain death? How dumb is that?!

Chris: I was really glad to see that Denzel Washington helped out with the planes (-_-). I did find this part incredibly dumb, too, and I laughed as soon as I saw it thinking, “Well, I’ve seen this about a 100 times.” I understand it’s Hollywood but watching bombs being defused and planes near missing with like 2 seconds left gets annoying.

Movie Review: Godzilla (1998)

The new Godzilla film is coming out today and I’m planning to see it tomorrow. Everyone’s going back and watching the 90’s film for old-times sake and to remember how bad that movie was. Plenty of bloggers have written reviews and an honest trailer has been made of the film, which does a fair and humorous 4:23 analysis of the film that I would suggest you watch. I decided to join in the fun yesterday and throw it in for a watch.

When I was younger, I loved this movie. This was my jam visually. When I started reading all of the harsh criticism about this film, I didn’t understand. I thought everyone loved this movie but I was young, naive and not an avid film critic so my illusion of reality can be forgiven, I suppose.

Within the first half hour, I can already see what people are talking about.  There’s a bunch of scene changes from the South Pacific to Ukraine to Tahiti to the east coast and then we finally get New York City. It’s not all stuff that could be cut because I suppose it does add something to the film but it’s all expositional dialogue and all the characters are robots talking. CAN…WE…MOVE…ON…ALREADY….PLEASE!!! It takes forever and it’s so boring.

Our main character, Dr. Niko Tatopoulos (Matthew Broderick), is at the forefront of the Godzilla investigation and as I mentioned above, no character development, all expositional dialogue with a side of boring. However, it’s okay because director Ronald Emmerich is going to take the camera and point it at a TV station in New York where Audrey Timmons works with her best friend Lucy and Lucy’s husband, Victor, who also goes by “Animal.” We get Timmons (Maria Pitillo) complaining at work and Tatopoulos gets on television since he’s part of the research team tracking Godzilla and Timmons is like, “Oh my gosh, that’s my college sweetheart!” Well, that’s just great. That means I get to watch more of Timmons. So whiny, needy and other things that I don’t care for.

Once we get past the expositional dialogue clinic that Emmerich decided to give audiences free of charge (thank God), the film is infused with some life but it’s more like the energy of a flopping fish than the life of Godzilla destroys all monsters (does anyone else remember this game besides me?). It’s still slow but at least it’s entertaining. The dialogue is corny, the love story is lame and we have a lot of talentless actors that keep getting screen time. Doug Savant as Sergeant O’Neal is terrible and Timmons won a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Supporting Actress for this role and deservedly so. Her character is dumb to begin with and her portrayal is even dumber. Why does Tatopoulos put up with this chick?

Godzilla looks more like a giant raptor than Godzilla and when I really think about it, this movie feels like it’s trying to be a metropolitan Jurassic Park more than it’s trying to be a Godzilla movie.

There are some bright points here and there in this film though. Kevin Dunn is fun to watch as are Animal (Hank Azaria) and French Secret Service agent Roache (Jean Reno). Most of the comedic lines come through these three and it also feels like they’re the only ones that know this script shouldn’t be taken seriously, something the rest of the crew should have gone along with.

The action scenes are well done for the most part. I especially enjoyed the helicopter pursuits where the audience is given a first-person view out of the cockpit. It was something I hadn’t seen before and I felt like I was a part of the experience. At the same time, Godzilla isn’t really destroying anything in this movie. The ratio of destruction caused by the military compared to Godzilla is probably 3:1 and what everyone wants to see when they view a Godzilla movie is the king of all monsters bulldozing cities to the ground with ease, not the military blowing up every national landmark in the city.

Once again, if you’re new to my blog,  I’ve always ranked movies on a scale of 0-100 (I don’t know why, I just always have). Here’s the grading scale.

 90-100  It’s a great movie and definitely one worth buying. (Spider-Man 2, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Prisoners, Secretariat)

80-89   It was a pretty good movie and definitely one worth seeing, but it doesn’t quite scratch my top ten percentile. (Non-Stop, Divergent, Spider-Man 3, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2, Young Guns)

70-79   It’s okay but I’ve seen better. It has its moments, but it has its flaws, too. (Captain America: The First Avenger, Dawn of the Dead, Flyboys, 300, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs)

60-69   It’s got plenty wrong with it but I still got enjoyment out of this one. (Pacific Rim, The Long Kiss Goodnight, Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story, Disaster Movie, The Incredible Hulk)

50-59   This movie isn’t intolerable but it’s not blowing my mind either. I’m trying really hard to get some sort of enjoyment out of this. (Alien Resurrection, Full Metal Jacket, Thor, You’re Next, The Starving Games)

40-49   This movie is just mediocre. It’s not doing anything other than the bare minimal, so morbidly boring that sometimes I’m actually angry I watched this. (Alien, Serendipity, Cowboys and Aliens, 300: Rise of an Empire, A Haunted House)

30-39   Definitely worse than mediocre, the 30’s ironically define the 1930’s, full of depression, lack of accomplishments, poverty and just so dumb. (The Contract, Pride and Prejudice, Redemption)

20-29   What did I just watch? Cliches, stupidity, nothingness, did I mention stupidity? Just…wow. (The Sum of All Fears, Thor: The Dark World)

0-19      Watching this movie resulted in one or more of the following: seizure, loss of brain cells, falling asleep/unconsciousness, feel you wasted your time/day, accomplished nothing for you, left the movie knowing less about it then you did going into it, constantly asking yourself why you came to see this movie, or near-death experience. In short, staring at a wall was just as entertaining as watching this movie. This movie deserved a sticker or a label that said, “WARNING: EXTREME AMOUNT OF SUCKAGE.” (Midnight Cowboy, Dark Fury, Alien 3, Open Grave)

My score for Godzilla: 64.

As a 90’s movie, expect Godzilla to be a salad of plot holes and lots of cheesy dressing on top along with a casserole of actors that are trying too hard and actors that shouldn’t have bothered trying in the first place. With all that said, the second half of this film makes it at least a decent flick even if all you can talk about afterwards is how terrible it is.

2013-2014 Penguins Season Recap

The Pittsburgh Penguins fell short once again this year, but this one hurt more than some of the past ones. After leading the New York Rangers 3-1 and heading back to Pittsburgh and the Consol Energy Center for a chance to clinch, the Penguins lost three straight and lost a chance at reaching the Eastern Conference Finals for the second straight year. It’s the second time the team has blown a 3-1 series lead in the last four postseasons and they’ve lost to a lower-seeded opponent for five consecutive years since winning the Cup in 2009.

My roommate Jon sent me links to two different articles, one by Sean Conboy of pittsburghmagazine.com and an article by the Pittsburgh Tribune saying that the firing of Bylsma is probable according to inside sources.

The article I want to talk about is Mr. Conboy’s. Now if you read through his article, he mentions some pretty good points and in my opinion, those points alone make it worth reading, but other things he says are preposterous and just stupid. I kid you not, Conboy says, word-for-word, “This team wanted to go home.”

Are you kidding me?! He throws some stats out there, mentioning how many shots the Rangers blocked compared to the Penguins.

Did the Pens play the best hockey they could play? No, I’ve seen them play better, but if you watched Tuesday’s game, something I don’t believe Mr. Conboy did, you would know that had the Pens been playing someone aside from the New York Rangers, chances are they would have scored at least three goals (and that’s including if that team blocked just as many shots as the Rangers did on Tuesday) which would have given the Pens a 3-2 win.

There is one main reason why the Pens lost and it’s not because the death of Martin St. Louis’ mother pumped up the New York Rangers to such a level that they became an All-Star team. It felt like every five minutes NBC was throwing that down my throat. I’m not trying to be insensitive. I feel sorry for St. Louis but enough is enough. Every time a goal was scored, they had to somehow attribute it to St. Louis’ mother. Every shot he took or pass he made was suddenly worthy of an instant replay and immediate analysis. It was ridiculous. The NBC broadcasting crew should have just come to work in full Rangers garb because it would have been less irritating and underhanded then the broadcasting I had to listen to.

It’s not because the Pens’ defense was terrible, although that certainly paid a large contribution. The Pens might have only allowed 20 shots on net but the Rangers had plenty of scoring chances off of those shots because of poor defense. Watch the game 7 recap and you’ll see quite easily that the great Matt Niskanen, who had one of the best defensive seasons in the league this year, leading the league in plus-minus, made one of the most basic mistakes in the game of hockey. Rather than take notice that the Rangers were on a 4-on-2, Niskanen decided to charge puckhandler Derek Dorsett, leaving rookie Olli Maatta all alone on a 3-on-1, an easy goal-scoring situation for any team, which the Rangers capitalized on. Then, on a Rangers powerplay, the Pens frontmen, Brian Gibbons and Brandon Sutter, went on the offensive on the penalty kill, which gave the Rangers the chance at the fast break. If you watch the play, you’ll see the Pens spin around looking for the puck while the Rangers barrage Fleury until the puck hits the twine. They’re two plays that took only a few seconds but it only takes one second to score a goal.

However, that’s not the main reason the Pens lost. Only two words are needed to fill in that blank: Henrik Lundqvist.

Henrik Lundqvist is always in the upper echelon of the league’s netminders and in my opinion has already secured a spot in Toronto. He has set nearly every goaltending record for the Rangers and is a finalist for the Vezina Trophy practically every year.

I hate the Rangers with a burning passion. I hate every one of the guys that suits up for the team except for Henrik Lundqvist because he is an athlete that deserves respect. He does not quit or give up, he excels, he’s consistent and he’s a humble guy. So even though I was seething in anger watching Lundqvist make save after save after ridiculous save against the Penguins, I knew I was witnessing something special.

If you read Mr. Conboy’s piece, he will tell you to “go back and watch all five New York Rangers form a human shield  in front of Henrik Lundqvist for the entirety of Game 7.”

The Rangers have always been a shot-blocking team, so for Conboy to act like this is a never-before-seen phenomenon is simply unreasonable. Perhaps Conboy forgot about the 36 shots that “shield” didn’t block.

If you watch those 36 shots head to the net and 35 of them be stopped by a desperate, flopping Lundqvist, you’ll notice there was nothing second-rate about the Penguins offense in that game. It wasn’t the type of perfection we usually see from them, but it was still impressive. No matter what they did, they could not get that rubber across that goal line again. It felt like I was watching the great Patrick Roy in game 3 of the 1986 Eastern Conference Finals, one of the greatest goaltending performances in NHL history.

This is for sure: change is on it’s way to Pittsburgh this offseason. The other thing for sure? The Montreal Canadiens will have my full support as they try to beat the Rangers.

Donald Sterling: Stop Talking

Sadly, the first post of the second year is a rather negative one, but this is a story that I have avoided for far too long and I can just no longer keep my mouth shut about it.

For those who don’t know, Donald Sterling is the owner of an NBA franchise, the Los Angeles Clippers. On April 25, a recording of Sterling making racist comments to a female friend was released by TMZ, causing shock and anger throughout the league and country. Since then, Sterling has been fined $2.5 million and has received a lifetime ban from the NBA and the NBA owners are expected to force Sterling to sell the Clippers, permanently removing him from the NBA scene.

Sterling had an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper yesterday, apologizing for his racist comments and claiming he’s not a racist, while talking about how Magic Johnson has done nothing for the community and how some African-Americans “don’t want to help anybody.”

In fact, Sterling went so far as to say, “Is he an example for children?”, referencing Johnson’s AIDS diagnosis, but Sterling wouldn’t stop there because he apparently left any semblance of morality, integrity, and religious sentiment at the door. “Magic Johnson is irrelevant in this state.”

At another point, Sterling said, “Big Magic Johnson, what has he done?”

Cooper responded by saying, “Well, he’s a business person…”

Sterling interrupted with one of the most insensitive things I’ve ever heard on national television: “He’s got AIDS.”

Are you kidding me?! Who do you think you are?! You call this apologizing?!

“What kind of guy goes to every city, has sex with every girl, then he catches HIV? Is that someone we want to respect and tell our kids about? I think he should be ashamed of himself. I think he should go into the background. But what does he do for the black people? He doesn’t do anything…He does nothing. It’s all talk.”

“I don’t talk about people for one thing, ever.”

Ummm, no Mr. Sterling, that’s incorrect, as we can see by the above statements. You talk about people a lot, just like everyone else. Sounds like you’re the one who thinks you’re holy, not Magic Johnson.

He’s one of the most ignorant people I’ve ever seen. He apologizes one second and then some racist, insensitive piece of crap comes out of his mouth the next. How can you apologize when you’re doing the exact thing you’re apologizing for on national television? This is even worse than the recording. We have your face, you in the flesh and blood, on camera of your own accord, and you’re still being a racist. I think Mr. Sterling is the only man in America who thinks he isn’t a racist. You can see the disgust on Anderson Cooper’s face during this interview.

Mr. Sterling, stop talking. It will do you a whole lot of good if you hire a press secretary to represent you and do the talking for you because you don’t seem capable of grasping what you can/should say and what you can’t/shouldn’t say. Stop talking, because the public doesn’t want to listen to you anymore either.

Magic Johnson isn’t the one who should be ashamed and go into the background. That person is you, Mr. Sterling.

Year One of WordsofWisTIM

On May 13, 2013, I started WordsofWisTIM to further my journalistic talent and to share my knowledge, wisTIM and opinions with others. 2,845 views, 69 followers, 149 posts and 1,267 tags later, WordsofWisTIM lives on and continues to prosper, thrive and grow in so many ways just as I feel I’ve grown in this last year. I read through my posts, all 149 of them, when I was making my Tim’s Favs page and I could really see the difference between how I was writing then and how I’m writing now. It’s been a blast and I’m happy that I gave it a go.

Most Views

In a day: 64, May 5, 2014

In a week: 203, week of May 5, 2014

In a month: 434, April 2014

Then again, WordsofWisTIM wouldn’t mean anything if it weren’t for my readers

Because a writer’s thoughts, words and aspirations are quite meager

If no one’s taking them in on the other side.

My words are like a tide.

There are a lot of waves out there. I know, I’ve been.

I have to hope the extra punch, extra heart and extra feeling that I put in

Knocks the air outta your lungs, makes an impact

Makes a difference and paints an abstract

Because that’s what I want to be.

I want to be “something that concentrates itself in the essential qualities

Of anything more extensive or more general, or of several things.”

I need to hope my writings ring.

I have a goal in mind.

It’s a goal that I did find.

“Existing in thought or as an idea but not having a physical or concrete existence.”

That doesn’t mean I’m looking for magnificence.

It means that when my time here is done

I want to be able to say that I did more than have fun.

I want to be able to say I made my mark

That I had a profound, significant and stark

Effect on somebody

And not nobody

That my presence here

Meant something dear

And that I won’t fade

Like a masquerade.

I want my words to be sublime

Make you think, this guy’s worth my time

That I’m able to elevate myself above the rest

Not to say I’m better or that I’m the best

But to say I’m worth listening to, worth reading, worth understanding and worth knowing.

I’m young and still growing

But I know what I want.

Many are still on the hunt.

Some want fame or riches. Mine is to be missed.

My want is purpose.

It’s simple and complex

Because purpose perplexes.

It’s both solid and flexible

And yet at times it feels unattainable

But if you keep trying

Keep striving

Keep walking

Keep talking

Keep feeling

And keep believing

I think you’re bound to find it some day.

You can’t just take your insecurities and doubts and throw them away.

It’s a game of hide-and-seek and you’re on the seek.

Don’t let the frustration and seemingly hopeless situation get your hopes bleak.

Just keep looking for what you want most

Because just when you’re about to give up the most

You’ll fall upon it after all your miserable strife

And that will be the happiest and most reassuring moment of your life.

In conclusion, thanks for sticking with me and reading. It matters.

So far, I’ve written 93 movie reviews. Below are the movies strong enough to climb to the top ten and the garbage that splattered onto the worst of the worst list up to this point.

Here’s to another great year!

The Top Ten

1. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King: 98

2. Miracle: 97

3. Spider-Man 2: 96

4. The Green Mile: 96

5. Prisoners: 96

6. 42: 96

7. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers: 95

8. Mission Impossible III: 95

9. Spider-Man: 95

10. Iron Man 3: 95

The Worst of the Worst

10. A Haunted House: 40

9. The Contract: 37

8. Redemption: 35

7. Pride and Prejudice: 34

6. Thor: The Dark World: 29

5. The Sum of All Fears: 22

4. Midnight Cowboy: 15

3. Dark Fury: 13

2. Open Grave: 10

1. Alien 3: 5

2014 NFL Draft Highlights

The 2014 NFL Draft has just concluded and just like with every draft, there were some great picks, some good picks, and some picks that were examples of unfathomable stupidity. I’m here to let you know the difference. I’m not a college football fan but I do some draft prep myself. I don’t make a mock draft but I know what teams need and what players are capable of filling the holes. This is just a brief overview from me. After this, the NFL is on break for me until I write my divisional previews. So without further ado, the 2014 NFL Draft Highlights from yours truly.

Round 1

The picks I loved:

Pick 5: OLB Khalil Mack to Raiders

The Raiders sure up a defense that has seen some major additions this year with Mack, who will join LaMarr Woodley and Justin Tuck.

Pick 9: OLB Anthony Barr to Vikings

The loss of Jared Allen will be eased with Barr’s arrival.

Pick 17: ILB C.J. Mosley to Ravens

Mosley is already being looked upon as Ray Lewis Jr. Time will tell if he can live up to the hype.

Pick 21: S Ha Ha Clinton-Dix to Packers

The Packers defense struggles every year so drafting Clinton-Dix was a fantastic idea. Very pleased with this.

The picks I hated:

Pick 3: QB Blake Bortles to Jaguars

I’ve read reports that say Bortles will be the backup to Henne for the first year anyway, so this was a waste of a draft pick. Even if Bortles plays phenomenal in later years, I think other changes needed to be made before drafting a quarterback.

Pick 4: WR Sammy Watkins to Bills

The Bills gave up way too much for Watkins and once again continue to ignore the fact that the defense is the problem with this team and that ILB Kiko Alonso can’t do everything by himself. Drafting Mack was the only option for this team and I’m sure Alonso and Mack would have been a great 1-2 punch. Instead, the Bills get Watkins, give up a ton of draft picks to do so, and will still fail to get out of the cellar of the AFC despite it being such a weak conference right now. They also traded away Stevie Johnson for a conditional fourth round pick this year, underselling his value. Johnson isn’t a great receiver but he was still the number one receiver on this team and the Bills looked all too desperate to get rid of him when they sent him to San Francisco. I just don’t know what the Bills’ management thinks every year: “Ok guys, how are we going to screw ourselves over this year?”

Pick 10: TE Eric Ebron to Lions

They just signed Pettigrew to a deal so I don’t know why they would use their first round pick on a tight end, especially when their secondary is begging for help.

Pick 32: QB Teddy Bridgewater to Vikings

If I were the Vikings, I would have drafted everywhere else and looked to draft Petty, Mariota or Winston in next year’s draft because concerns still linger for Bridgewater.

Round 2

The picks I loved:

Pick 7: WR Marqise Lee to Jaguars

Justin Blackmon is on his way out of the NFL so drafting Lee was a great decision. It’ll make life for Bortles much easier if he ever gets on the field.

Pick 14: DE Stephon Tuitt to Steelers

A lot of people had Tuitt going in the first round so the Steelers were very fortunate they got a chance at him in the second round. He will sure up a barren d-line.

Pick 16: DT Timmy Jernigan to Ravens

Ngata has been dealing with injuries the last few seasons and the d-line is getting up there in years. Jernigan’s ferocious physicality will be welcomed.

The picks I hated:

Pick 4: QB Derek Carr to Raiders

It feels like the Raiders draft a quarterback every year and it’s never a franchise quarterback. They got Matt McGloin from Penn State, Tyler Wilson from Nebraska and now Carr. Let’s work on the defense and get a replacement for McFadden guys since you let Jennings go.

Pick 23: RB Jeremy Hill to Bengals

Let’s draft a receiver to help A.J. Green. No takers?

Pick 30: QB Jimmy Garoppolo to Patriots

I just find myself scratching my head with this one. Don’t they have Tom Brady and hasn’t Ryan Mallett been there for a couple of years? How about a TE because Gronkowski isn’t coming back anytime soon.

Round 3

The picks I loved:

Pick 11: RB Tre Mason to Rams

The Rams’ backfield now includes Zac Stacy, Daryl Richardson, Benny Cunningham and Mason. Sounds pretty solid to me.

The picks I hated:

Pick 5: RB Charles Sims to Buccaneers

Doug Martin, Mike James and Bobby Rainey all showed they were more than capable of a starting job. If you have three starters in your backfield, do you really need a fourth?

Round 4

The picks I loved:

Pick 3: Devonta Freeman to Falcons

The Florida State junior should provide some versatility to a Falcons backfield that has been lackluster as of late.

Pick 18: WR Martavis Bryant to Steelers

I’m looking forward to Bryant coming to Pittsburgh. Hopefully he will pan out along with Markus Wheaton to give Ben someone to throw to aside from Antonio Brown.

Pick 24: RB DeAnthony Thomas to Chiefs

Jamaal Charles can’t do it all by himself so Thomas will be a nice addition to this team.

Pick 35: QB Tom Savage to Texans

I’ve heard both good and bad about this guy. I’m interested to see if Savage gets the head job over Fitzpatrick.

The picks I hated:

Pick 33: DB Nevin Lawson

The only reason I didn’t like this pick is because it reminded me that it took the Lions this long to finally draft a DB in a distraught secondary that was getting beat left and right all last season.

Round 5

The picks I loved:

Pick 23: QB Aaron Murray to Chiefs

I was surprised he was still on the board this late. It will be good to have someone to learn under Alex Smith.

The picks I hated:

Pick 24: QB AJ McCarron to Bengals 

I lied about this one. I didn’t actually hate the Bengals drafting McCarron. I just hated it that the Bengals waited until the 7th round to get a receiver when Dalton to Green seems to be the only aerial combo this team has.

Round 6

The picks I loved:

Pick 2: QB Zach Mettenberger to Titans

He could easily overtake Locker in a few years.

Pick 28: RB Tyler Gaffney to Panthers

The Panthers need receivers, but Gaffney is a solid addition to the backfield.

Pick 37: QB Tajh Boyd to Jets

I couldn’t believe that Boyd dropped this far. I thought he’d get picked in the fourth at the latest. If you watched the 2012 Chick-fil-a bowl between Clemson and LSU, you know Boyd can take a hit. He’s still got plenty to learn but I think he has some serious potential.

Round 7

The picks I loved and hated:

Pick 34: DE Michael Sam to Rams

I had no problems with the pick itself. What I had a problem with was this: How does someone as talented as Michael Sam remain on the board until round 7? That doesn’t happen. Period. There’s one reason and one reason only why he still was: Michael Sam is gay. Plenty of people say the NFL is ready for a gay athlete but NFL executives didn’t seem to feel the same way on draft day as they let the talent go undrafted round after round after round after round after round after round. I’m pretty angry about that because Sam wasn’t being rated as an athlete. He was being rated as a homosexual and that’s not right.

 

And there you have it. Watch for my division previews in the fall!