Tag: Movies & Television

Dose Wicked, Wicked Bwack Wowduhs

On May 30, 2023

In Action, Animation, Fiction, Horror, Movies & Television, NSFW, Urban Fantasy, Weeb Shit, Yoshiaki Kawajiri

Warning: This review contains mild spoilers and discusses rape and sexual assault.

Let me tell you a tale. In the summer of 2015, instead of going home for vacation, I stayed on my college campus to work at the library. It was fun, a great time all around. I was a model employee, and given my bibliophile nature, I was effectively a kid with the keys to the candy store. Literally. As part of my duties I was given the library keys and could come and go as I pleased. And while I took that summer to check out as many books as I could, I also took the time to work my way through various DVD’s that had caught my eye, one of which was a seemingly innocuous film called Wicked City.

When I popped the DVD into my laptop, I confess my expectations were simply of action, synth-music, and not much else. But what I got was my first proper exposure to adult anime, and signaled the start of my journey into unrepentant degeneracy. It’s been a long time since that first fateful viewing though, and I couldn’t help but wonder recently if my opinion on Wicked City would change, now that I am an older, wiser, and kinkier fellow. Would it still hold up? Or would I be embarrassed at my younger self for having ever liked the film as much as I did?

Spoilers: I had less discerning tastes when I was young and inexperienced.

Yes, Madam? No Sir!

By Mark

On May 17, 2023

In Action, Comedy, Corey Yuen, Fiction, Movies & Television, Project Shenmue

Like the team of Oracle and Bone Studios, as part of my education on 80s Hong Kong, I set about watching as many relevant films from that time period as I could. One such film was Yes, Madam!, an iconic work of cinema which directly inspired two characters in Project Shenmue, and which, even if you’ve never seen the full film, you’ve seen images from at least.

The iconic shot of Michelle Yeoh and Cynthia Rothrock, two massive stars in their own right, standing side by side as they prepare for an epic fight scene, is one that you’ve probably seen floating around the internet at some point in your life. And it’s easy to assume from that shot that Yes, Madam! is a buddy cop movie, a wunza plot where two badass gals kick some butt and do awesome, girl power shenanigans. This was Yeoh’s first lead role, and Rothrock’s first role ever, and the fact that they team up to kick ass seems like it would be awesome. That’s what the film is billed as: Michelle Yeoh and Cynthia Rothrock kick ass.

The problem is that that’s not what the movie actually is.

It’s The Shining… IN SPACE!!!

By Mark

On May 5, 2023

In Filmmakers, Horror, Movies & Television, Paul W. S. Anderson, Science Fiction

If there’s one blog that has inspired my site more than any other, it’s the Fake Geek Boy Press. No, really. When Malcolm asked me what I wanted my website to look like, I basically just said this but with my own signature color scheme. It’s always great when you find a critic whose tastes are similar to your own, because if there’s some media you’re interested in, finding their thoughts on the matter is a good indicator of how well you’ll like or dislike it yourself.

Unfortunately, this similarity in taste also means that, more often than not, you both have basically the same things to say about the same works. Several times, going back to my Youtube and Fantastic Fiction days, I’ve found some work that I’m excited to talk about, only to find that the Fake Geek Boy Arthur has already said everything I want to say about it, and said it far better than I ever could. Obviously, there have still been plenty of works where I’ve had my own unique things to say, but when I started on what I like to call the “Sam Neill is frightened by horrors beyond the ken of mortal man” trilogy, I found myself with very little to say concerning its first two installments (Possession and In the Mouth of Madness) that Arthur hadn’t already said beyond “Oh those cosmic terrors give him such a fright!”

But when at last I came to the third and final installment of the trilogy, I found to my pleasant surprise that there was actually a whole lot I had to say which Arthur didn’t really go into. So that’s what I’m gonna do here.

Two misjudged movies

By Mark

On April 29, 2023

In Annabel Jankel, Comedy, Fiction, Filmmakers, Mike Judge, Movies & Television, Rocky Morton, Science Fiction

Hi everyone. I’m doing this partly to test out titling, and see how well that works, and partly to tell you all about two films I recently watched.

Super Mario Bros. (1993)

For years, Super Mario Bros. has been something of a bad joke, arguably the start of the “video game movie curse” that every video game adaptation has tried to avoid. And even despite gathering a cult following, the virulent distaste towards the movie expressed by stars Bob Hoskins and Dennis Hopper provides ample ammunition for the people who hate this movie, and believe me, people loathe this movie.

What do I think? Honestly… I unironically love this film? I went in thinking that it was going to be so-bad-it’s-good, but after finishing it I was genuinely confused as to why the movie got so much hate when it first came out. Like, sure it’s not the most accurate adaptation of the games, but let’s be honest, the first Mario game with a story deeper than “collect these things” wouldn’t come out for another three years after this movie, and the central conceit of Mario and Luigi being Brooklyn plumbers sent to another dimension was commonly accepted lore at the time. As for Daisy, given how pretty much all her backstory, even to this day, comes from a single Game Boy game, there’s nothing to say that she isn’t a cyberpunk princess in the games. Indeed, I think this is the very first piece of Mario media to establish Luigi and Daisy as love interests, with them being suitably adorable and sweet.