Mike Ryan

There’s a lot going on in Creed II, more than a movie featuring Ivan Drago really ever needed to have. But at its core, Creed II is about family.

For me (no, I didn’t have to pay for it, so keep that in mind), it felt legitimately fun to watch. It wasn’t quite the feeling you get in a theater, but it just felt good to watch a new huge would-have-been-a-blockbuster movie, even at home.

Bumblebee is a total delight.

I’ll admit, the sequel to Wonka looks pretty good! The plot of this movie leaves off exactly where you probably assumed this movie would start, but for some reason didn’t. And like I said earlier, Timothée Chalamet plays Willy Wonka with a lot of charm and I bet it’s not easy to play someone who is all-knowing, possibly supernatural, but is also not very smart at times.

Like in the other two movies, Bill and Ted are both just so nice that it’s impossible not to start rooting for them.

The relationship between Carell, Fishburne, and Cranston feels genuine. It’s weird, they really don’t click at first – like, I suspect, a lot of people wouldn’t after having not seen each other in 30 some years – but by the end these three very different people have a bond. And it culminates with a pretty heartbreaking scene.

I think the Swift we have ten years from now will make a much more fascinating subject. What we see now feels more like the very beginning of her story. And there’s just not enough here yet at this starting point to sustain a feature-length documentary.

By sheer willpower alone Majors makes Magazine Dreams something to behold. This movie exists as a vessel in which to watch Jonathan Majors act his ass off.

What’s smart about Frozen II is, instead of trying to just recapture its past glory, it decides to be interesting. And when making a sequel to a cultural phenomenon, “being interesting” seems both pretty rare and the best we can hope for.

Yes, Captain Marvel is an origin story, but it’s handled in such a unique way that it doesn’t always feel like an origin story.

James Gunn bets big that you love each and every one of these Guardians. It’s a movie about friendship and the love these characters have for each other and risking everything to help the people you love. Without that bond to these characters, this movie doesn’t work. It’s still a funny movie with some cool action scenes and a lot of nonsense going on, all glued together by this really powerful emotional core.

Sanders plays Bigger Thomas in such a unique, interesting way that I couldn’t help but be enthralled by his life. Unfortunately, the plot points in Wright’s novel, of all things, betray him.

This is Jake Gyllenhaal’s show.

Sicario: Day of the Soldado is an intense, at times morally ambiguous, and gritty thriller that will leave you wanting more. And, now, Benicio del Toro finally has a franchise of his own.

The result is a truly suspenseful film with a powerful, emotional ending. Again, it’s one of Shyamalan’s best.

The biggest problem is this is a movie that doesn’t quite realize that McEnroe is the star. When LaBeouf is on-screen as McEnroe, the movie works. But the film desperately wants you to love Björn Borg.

This isn’t a situation where Donald Glover shows up and is so good he saves the movie. And don’t get me wrong, Glover is great, but it’s at this point in the movie that everything gets better. This is the part where the movie finally knows what it should have been all along: a rootin’ tootin’ heist movie and not an origin story.

It never gets convoluted or caught up in itself like movies with meta-sounding titles sometimes tend to do. It’s a ’90s style, R-rated action movie that just keeps moving, with very little fat, and delivers some true applause moments.

Blue Beetle kind of encapsulates what is good and stale about these movies right now all in one package.

Honestly, it’s kind of remarkable what Marvel let Raimi get away with, but all that doesn’t really kick in until maybe an hour into the movie, and it becomes a much better movie once that happens.

Wonder Woman 1984 is pure sugar. There’s little nutritional value. But we all deserve dessert right now.

For the first time ever, I cared about Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett. And for the first time, yes, I hope some more Bad Boys come for me. Whatcha gonna do? Well, I’d watch them! Happily, for once.

Joker is a movie that thinks it has a lot to say and fancies itself The Social Commentary Of Our Time, but in reality it’s a mishmash of Hot Button Social Issues without anything interesting to say at all. So, in that respect, it’s the perfect movie for 2019. Joker is our comeuppance.

It Chapter Two is about redemption and the Losers coming together again to learn how strong they all are together. And the actors make it work. But the biggest problem is IT, because IT can be everything and IT can be nothing. IT has no real rules or motivations, or rhyme or reason, for literally anything he does.

As long as these movies keep their earnest, fun, ’90s action movie tone, there is no ridiculous plot point these movies could come up with I wouldn’t believe. By this point they’ve earned that. They are family.

An American Pickle is more interesting than laugh-out-loud hilarious. It’s introspective, without at all seeming that way.

Clooney wants to direct actors who aren’t himself, which I’m sure is why we spend so much time with the crew of the spaceship. But if Clooney weren’t directing, that director would have probably realized that the story thrives in those small moments with Clooney. It’s almost like the director George Clooney is the actor George Clooney’s worst enemy.

This is a very fun movie . . . but Indy’s arc is poignant and also sad.