Yes, No, Maybe So: "Sonic the Hedgehog"

by Tony Ruggio

One of these days big Hollywood will get a video-game adaptation right. Judging from Sonic’s teaser trailer, one that has sent Twitter into a frothing hate-frenzy and earned more dislikes than likes on Youtube, November 8, 2019 will not be that day. I don’t know a thing about the Sonic the Hedgehog games though I vaguely remember playing them once or twice as a child. Until this week I had no idea the character had a discernible fanbase. That being said, there’s something oddly intriguing about a project so ill-advised.

Let's do the Yes, No, or Maybe So treatment after the jump...

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GLAAD Nominees, Iceman, and Professor Marston

by Nathaniel R

This just in. The GLAAD nominations for portrayals of the LGBT community are out. This is a different group than the critics group that I vote with (the one from lgbt entertainment journalists) and their focus is less on quality -- or it has been in the past -- than on battling homophobia and fighting for inclusion. Their full name gives you their raison d'etre history: the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation. They've made significant blunders in their years (supporting I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry would still rankle if anyone still remembered the film) but let's not hold that against them since we love that their purview is so wide (music, comic books, everything) and their purpose admirable.

The film nominees go like so...

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Resident Evil: A Bloody Valentine

By Salim Garami

What's good?

We're already one week into October and so that means a lot of us are in the middle of binging our favorite Halloween watches or trying out some new ones. Personally, I'm revisiting the long-time zombie science fiction action franchise Resident Evil, based on Capcom's survival horror games that made up my childhood and starring the brilliant Milla Jovovich as apocalypstic ass-kicker Alice (self-promotion moment: it's more than likely I'm going to be writing about the series on Motorbreath within the month) and I have a bit of an observation about the concept of the character that I think might at least amuse the Actressexuals among this site's audience...

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Is a Good Video Game Movie Possible?

Robert here. There has been a flurry of video game movie news this week. On Monday it was announced that new Spider-Man (or Spider-Boy, as it were) Tom Holland had been cast as a young Nathan Drake in the long gestating Uncharted movie.

We also got news that the Resident Evil film series which ended just this spring already on the reboot track. Not just a reboot but they're threatening an entire second hexalogy. (Does Resident Evil need 12 films?)  Meanwhile, the latest Tomb Raider reboot staring Oscar winner Alicia Vikander is trucking right along towards its March 2018 bow.

Movies based on video games have long been a profitable cash grab for studios, but they have a reputation for being bad to abysmal quality wise. Does this latest trio of features have any hope...

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Review: Assassin's Creed

by Eric Blume

A movie doesn’t necessarily have to make sense to succeed.  Many of us are still mystified by the red pill and the blue pill and The Matrix but that film has such force and style that subtleties of plot were insignificant.  Assassin’s Creed makes less than zero sense, and mere mortals could not possibly explain the plot  It has something to do with the Spanish Inquisition, a descendant of an elite group of assassins, evil scientists, and the acquisition of the Apple of Eden, since the Holy Grail and Ark of the Covenant have been claimed elsewhere in better movies.

The confusing mechanics of this potboiler wouldn’t matter much if the film delivered on action sequences, compelling characters, or overall tension.  Unfortunately director Justin Kerzel seems overwhelmed by the entire enterprise, and buckles under the seriousness of the effort. This is saying a lot, because last year Kerzel directed MacBeth, and his great lead actors from that film, Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard, are back on this picture...

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