Tag Archives: marvel

Iron Lion

22 January 2025 By in Movies Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Kraven the Hunter: Kraven (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) goes on a lion hunt led by his overbearing and unsympathetic widowed father (Russell Crowe). During the hunt, Kraven is fatally mauled by an almost mythic lion but is saved by a potion, mixed with some of the lion’s blood, given to him by a future voodoo priestess, Calypso. The serum grants Kraven superhuman strength, speed, and senses, which he uses to hunt criminals, poachers, and other enhanced baddies.

Kraven could have been a better film. It’s a 95-minute movie crammed into 127 minutes. The most serious flaws are the CGI effects, the ending, and an excess of unnecessary drama. The subpar CGI disrupts the immersion in an action-heavy movie, while the ending focuses too much on setting up sequels and spinoffs, detracting from the action scenes. Resolving his father issues would have served as a fitting end to the movie, but the writers were likely beholden or burdened by the suits on the business end of the studio lot.

Genre: Action—Adventure—Drama–Thriller

Directed by: J.C. Chandor

Screenplay by: Richard Wenk, Art Marcum, Matt Holloway

Music by: Benjamin Wallfisch, Evgueni Galperine, Sacha Galperine

Cast: Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Ariana DeBose, Russell Crowe

Film Location: Iceland, London, Scotland

ElsBob: 5.5/10

IMDb: 5.4/10

Rotten Tomatoes Critics: 16%

Rotten Tomatoes Popcornmeter: 74%

Metacritic Metascore: 35%

Metacritic User Score: 4.5/10

Theaters: 13 December 2024

Runtime: 127 minutes

Budget: $110-130 million

Box Office: $59.5 million

Source: Rotten Tomatoes, IMDb, Metacritic. Graphic: Kraven the Hunter Trailer, copyright Sony.

Don’t Stop Me Now

8 January 2025 By in Movies Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , Leave a comment

Venom: The Last Dance: Eddie (Tom Hardy) and Venom (Tom Hardy), together again, possibly for the last time, battle Symbiotes from Venom’s home planet of Klyntar. Supervillain Knull has sent the Symbiotes to collect Eddie and Venom’s Codex. The Codex will free Knull from his prison, originally created by the Symbiotes long ago. Now, they will help to release him. It’s complicated.

Tom Hardy and his symbiotic, parasitic alter-ego, Venom, make the movie worthwhile. Everything else feels like underemployed extras earning points for existing, about as entertaining as toothpaste attempting an exit from a spray bottle, except for Martin (Rhys Ifans). Martin was a fun diversion.

As with the first two movies, it is worthwhile sitting through the credits. Somewhere between the listing of Executive Producers, Producers, Producers of Second Worth, Producers of Wind, and the Second Gaffer from the Last Good Gaffer, there is a hint of what can be, unburdened by what has been—although Hardy has said maybe not never again, so what can be, may have to be burdened by what has been.

Trivia: “Don’t Stop Me Now”by Queen is played while Venom infests a horse and gallops, with Eddie riding on top, at incredible speed, to get to Area 51.

Genre: Action—Adventure–Comedy—Fantasy—Sci-Fi–Thriller

Directed by: Kelly Marcel

Screenplay by: Tom Hardy, Kelly Marcel

Music by: Dan Deacon

Cast: Tom Hardy, Rhys Ifans

Film Location: Cartagena, Spain

ElsBob: 6.0/10

IMDb: 6.0/10

Rotten Tomatoes Critics: 41%

Rotten Tomatoes Popcornmeter: 81%

Metacritic Metascore: 41%

Metacritic User Score: 5.9/10

Theaters: 21 October 2024

Runtime: 109 minutes

Budget: $120 million

Box Office: $476.4 million

Source: Screen Rant, Rotten Tomatoes, IMDb, Metacritic. Graphic: Venom: The Last Dance Trailer, copyright Columbia Pictures/Sony Pictures.

Come and Get Your Love:

30 December 2024 By in Music Tags: , , , , , , , , Leave a comment



In the opening credits of the 2014 Marvel movie Guardians of the Galaxy, Peter Quill, aka Star-Lord (Chris Pratt), pops his Awesome Mix Vol. 1 into his Sony TPS-L2 Walkman, first released in 1979, and begins to dance and lip-sync on Morag, scooping up a lizard to use as a mic while grooving to the words of Redbone’s “Come and Get Your Love.”

In the 2017 sequel, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, during the opening credits, Baby Groot reprises the dancing role while the rest of the Guardians battle a big and nasty monster, with ELO’s “Mr. Blue Sky” blasting in the background.

“Come and Get Your Love,” originally titled “Hail” and released in 1974, was Redbone’s most successful song, reaching #5 on the Billboard Hot 100 and going Gold in the U.S. and Platinum in the U.K. The song was included on the Guardians of the Galaxy soundtrack, which reached #1 on the Billboard 200 for 2 weeks in August 2014.

Trivia: Beginning around the 3:15 mark in the video, the phrase “mehohta naa hekotahestotse” is written above a picture of the band members. While I’m not entirely sure of the language and its translation, it appears to be Cheyenne, meaning “I am happy to meet you.”

Source: Come and Get Your Love, RedboneVEVO by Juan E Bedolla, 2019.