Zaki Hasan

Two decades after its predecessor, Disney’s “Freakier Friday” plunges back into “legacy sequel” waters — where nostalgia keeps storylines afloat and originality barely treads water.

Den of Thieves 2: Pantera is neither better nor worse than the sleeper-hit crime caper that preceded it. Like the original, it’s too long and threatens to become overwhelmed by its own web of underworld intricacies. Nonetheless, with appealing chemistry between stars Gerard Butler and O'Shea Jackson Jr., and a suitably tense third-act heist sequence, it rewards the goodwill the original has built up since its 2018 release.

Part of what made the prior two “Sonic the Hedgehog” movies work was their playful, controlled scope that still provided engaging, serious storylines. By contrast, the third and latest installation overwhelms with so many explosions and colorful sky beams that instead of pulling the audience in, it has the opposite effect.

Tolkien’s fantasy world is always worth revisiting, and that makes “The War of the Rohirrim” worthy of watching even if it ultimately doesn’t amount to much once you look past the obvious visual panache.

Despicable Me 4 is co-written by Mike White (“Migration”) and has a bit more wit and heart — not to mention a few more laughs — than the recent entries in the “Despicable” series.

There’s a lot in Scream VI to satisfy longtime fans, but it still feels like a step down from the last one.

Despite game performances by a slew of returning cast members, it doesn’t justify its existence as anything other than a mercenary attempt by Paramount+ to cash in on audience nostalgia for familiar faces.

Taken together, “X” and “Pearl” make for a compelling double-feature showcasing blood-spattered homages to different eras of film.

“The Legend of Hank” offers a few hints of the wit and wisdom of its predecessor but is mostly content to coast through a familiar story on the accumulated charm of its star-studded cast of voice actors.

If anything, the fun character dynamics laid out in the first two acts make it all the more disappointing when the final third tips over into noisy excess. But on balance, this ends up being a small complaint.

While the latest “Texas Chainsaw” installment dropped on Netflix a few weeks ago, “X” owes so much in style and tone to the 1974 slasher classic it feels like more of a legitimate heir than the film bearing its name.

Sure, some of the window dressing and plot peculiarities are different this time, but there are no real surprises.

While not without charm, the biggest factors working against Army of Thieves are a confused hybrid of horror and heist genre stories and an approach making it unclear which audience – other than the most ardent of Zack Snyder fans – it’s aimed at.

Blood Brothers explores compelling, often heart-wrenching moments; and if there’s a flaw, it’s in how little time the film devotes to the aftermath of that tragic rift.