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laredlaf
Reviews
Peter Pan & Wendy (2023)
Tinkering with Pan can be a BIG Mistake!
The quite malicious bombing of this movie is just a little disgusting. Think of all the people who acted in the movie. All those kids who you have just savaged with quite unjust negatives. All the crew who did their best to make something that you could enjoy. But, NO, you had to get your swords out and KILL PETER PAN! You are nothing better than HOOKS!
I will grant you that this is not the best Pan ever, but it is certainly not the worst, either. The problem is that when you make changes to something that people hold dear to themselves, you risk alienating the very people that you are trying to entertain. Disney has made an unfortunate habit of doing this repeatedly in the last decade or so.
If you want to make a movie, make it something totally new. That way you don't upset the people who make your studio popular, and they won't bomb your product!
The kids were fine. Jude Law was fine. The supporting cast were okay. The story, where it stayed with the original object of Barrie's work, was just okay. The effects were marginal. The songs should have been left out. I gave this a 7 because if it lacked anything, it was the heart of a child at the helm, but it was not a wreck, and it certainly deserved better than the miserable reception it was given.
A word of a advice, Disney Studio. DO NOT MAKE ANOTHER PETER PAN MOVIE UNTIL YOU REMEMBER WHAT IT IS TO BE A CHILD!
Dear Edward (2023)
How do you survive the unimaginable?
To anybody that has not suffered a loss like Edward, and the families of the people who died in the crash have suffered, that loss is unimaginable. This amazing TV show gently crashes you into their tragedies.
There is no excitement. No rampaging CGI. No battles that aren't fought within the minds and souls of the characters, or within damaged families. There is just the story of survival, and the slow building of hope and love from the ruins of all their pre-crash lives. It is done in baby steps, and that would appear to be because the people who write, act and direct this series care about what they are creating. This is thoughtful, wonderful creation, letting us grow a little inside the stories being told. The actors are all given lines that are not trite or cheap, or full of artifice. They are delivered with feeling and depth.
I am not generally blown away by the sort of shows that are being created in this new world of shallow drama, mocking comedy and relentless violence and action. This show has, so far, blown me away. It tells a meaningful story, and that seems to be a rare bird in our world.
Lost (2004)
Throw the dice to pick the plot for the episode.
I tried to watch this series 18 years ago, because my son was so into it. I tried, and failed, to see it through his eyes. Recently, he asked me to give it another try. He is working his way through the entire series again. For the third time! I watched 5 episodes and I have to say nothing has changed. It leaves me stone cold.
Maybe it isn't a dice they throw. Perhaps they used a dart board, or several perhaps. One for characters, one for plot, one for settings and another for random items to just throw into the mix. Whatever means they chose for targeting, the result is that an infinite number of possibilities become available. It doesn't even take a particularly talented director to cobble them all together into an episode outline for an equally average scriptwriter to hang words upon.
It has to have been a deliberate plan from the outset to create the 'Lost' universe in this manner. It's all the genres mixed into a horrible melange. Some sci-fi, some fantasy, a little horror, a little bit of romance, even stuff you might find in one of the gossip magazines. The problem is, from my perspective, that no character acts like a real person.
I'm willing to say that the fault is mine, except for one thing. David Lynch did this same thing with 'Twin Peaks' and, even before that there was the original series of 'The Prisoner' (not the one about a jail for women). Red herrings and false leads galore, so that you never really know what's going on.
Sorry son. Six out of ten from me.