allnewsuperfake Reviews

Don't Worry Darling (I) (2022)

Too long

[5/10 · 25 January 2024]

You can smell the solution of the movie from the start, so much so that I actually thought it had to be something way more intricate and surprising.

But no, this is just what it seems to be from the very first moment, and it's not outstanding at anything except maybe the soundtrack. Everything is just this little bit too long for what little it has to show and tell. Every dialogue could lose a line, it's stirring the pot without ever getting it to cook. Just like this review which should have ended after the first line, but thanks to what science has actually accomplished we now have to keep up with the bot's chattiness.

Doctor Who: The Star Beast (2023) Season Unknown, Episode Unknown

Makes me feel too young and too old at the same time

[5/10 · 27 November 2023]

There is no middle ground in this one - it's either wonderful and inspired, or cheap nostalgia bait and pandering. Sometimes I found myself taken aback from the action, and sometimes I felt like I was watching a kid's show. Sometimes I thought, thank god it's back, and then, only minutes later: Be careful what you wish for.

The new theme song is like someone runs three songs at once and completely forgot that he still wanted to mix the whole thing. Then again, the sound effects are great, a clear improvement even though they were never bad.

The acting of the old guard was great, while the new faces... well, they knew their lines.

And we have a new expert for everything time lord right next to the doctor, River Song and the Master - a teenager who knew of her heritage for all of 30 seconds . And one day writers will remember ways to empower their characters without turning them into single-issue space Jesus , but today was not that day.

Gen V: God U. (2023) Season 1, Episode 1

Finally a sci-fi series about Yound Adults!

[10 October 2023]

I'm so glad that there is finally a series out there that shows us young adults in school, with all their terrible problems and the hard choices they have to make. Can you believe that a woman who needs a knife to cut her wrists so that she can use her blood as a knife has to fight to become a A-grade-superhero celebrity? Well, here is her story.

I have no doubt that the creators of the original IP are sitting at home and wonder: Why didn't I think of this? Why did I make the one true success story with superheroes since End Game by doing something different if I could have just used archetypes involved in story lines that feel like meme formats at this point and create something entirely forgettable?

I wonder if someone is going to fall in love?! Or maybe even have to potential boyfriens, like, in a triangle?! And will we ever see anybody doing actual, you know, school stuff, like reading? Can't wait!

American Horror Story: Rockabye (2023) Season 12, Episode 2

Not human

[5/10 · 4 October 2023]

I actually liked the setup of the last episode, and I've always enjoyed Emma Roberts perfomances; it's nice to see her doing a more serious part for once, and she is absolutely able to take the lead.

It was a fantastic idea to set up the main antagonist as her best friend, even though it's a little too obvious that she is some sort of shape shifter alien. With all the surgical alterations and the ridiculous amount of makeup she looks like her own computer animation. The delivery of her lines is perfectly creepy; she is almost convincing as a human, but something is just a little bit off.

The people who are dissing the actress will look pretty stupid once she laid her eggs in the now once again unoccupied womb.

The Bear: Pop (2023) Season 2, Episode 5

A reminder what I did not miss in the first season....

[6/10 · 24 August 2023]

.... "will they won't they". I didn't even notice that is wasn't there until now where it starts to crawl into every scene.

Yes, I forgot, it is the law, you have to crowbar at the very least one romance with a forced triangle into your plot or you are not allowed to go air, so here it is.

Don't get me wrong, the acting, the soundtrack and the writing are still pretty great, but the intimacy of the setting, the brutal bare visuals, the breathtaking energy that pulled you away, are slowly, but inevitably fading. Weirdly enough also thanks to the the sort of intimacy that I could have done without. And it's way too convenient, and convenience, also known as the plot fairy, was yet another thing that I did not miss. You know, like an internship in Denmark - or school starting right on time when the renovations begin - while they can't get a plumber at the same time.

The Last of Us (2023– )

10/10 for the zombie show, but a plot would have been nice

[8/10 · 29 July 2023]

... and the rest is technically superb, with a cast hitting it out of the park, and everyone behind the camera creating a masterpiece - with one exception. The plot is just not there.

The writing itself is certainly fine, but the overall story is missing. I've been told it was supposed to be about zombies, and when it was, it was great, especially the outbreak in the 1st episode, or the scientist at the start of the 2nd. But from there on out it kind of fades into the background.

I've been told it's about a man learning how to love again, which is weird, because I'm pretty sure he isn't just looking for his brother because he got bored. I also don't think he's with his female companion for her looks.

Does he learn to overcome his loss? Not at all. Is it deep and compelling drama? Well, everyone is miserable, and they stay that way, with the exception of the couple in episode 3, which had a theme, character development and even the newfound ability to love, and that's why it's stuck between the following episodes like a brick in a sandcastle. A great sandcastle, don't touch it, you'll make a lot of people angry, but also... there's not really anything inside.

And then, all of a sudden, you are in a mall for a whole episode, and spent 45 minutes outside of the already shaky plot. The finale, the climax, gets something like 10 minutes. It's a little sad given the talent on display. You gave me so much, why not *everything*?

Wednesday (2022– )

Finally an actual story!

[9/10 · 25 November 2022]

Told from the start to the end, not 2 episodes of story and 6 episodes of flashbacks and backstories, not drawn out, not artifically stretched and convoluted, just a story with lovable characters, mixing the Addams lore with a huge chunk of Harry Potter and another one right from the old vampire slayer Buffy.

I normally hate high school drama and the endless parade of 25-30 year old "teenagers" that have completely taken over every genre I used to like, so I'm positively surprised by this, especially since I've grown to fear overblown marketed series, but not just Burton and Elfman and the all-star ensemble deliver, but pretty much everyone on the set and behind it.

Is it the bestest thing ever? Well, the bestest thing in this category for a while at least. It's funny, full of little twists, a little scary, quite mysterious and never really what you would expect, which is exactly what you'd expect from something with the Addams name.

1899 (2022)

For 10 minutes the Matrix was the greates movie of all times...

[1/10 · 24 November 2022]

.. and it's been almost 25 years, several sequels, including the inevitable reboot that tried to be smart about it - and failed- , and a neverending stream of series, comics, books and movies trying to recreate those 10 minutes over and over again.

We've seen spaceships and weird towns and towns that were actually spaceships, we've seen people stuck in dreams, games, simulations, alway-always-always resulting in that moment where the scales fall from their eyes and it's all just a facade for something else, and sometimes it even made sense.

So now we can add an old ship to the list of things that turn out to be the matrix, and just like the original it shouldn't have taken more than half an hour to get there, and certainly not 8 full episodes to tell a yet to be determined part of the whole story.

It's a shame, really. The setup, from the ship to the costumes to the characters to the journey they are taking, with the language barriers and their little big secrets and lies, would have made for a nice ghost ship story, and while that certainly isn't a new plot vehicle, the great acting and talented crew would have turned it into good entertainment.

If! Whoever wrote this didn't try to make it bigger and more shiny. And had an interesting general idea, but probably no time to really work it out, so we have to stay around for them to figure it out while writing a script that has no respect for anyone's time and an "ending" that uses an old formula, but in this case doesn't really answer any questions or solves the mystery.

1899: The Boy (2022) Season 1, Episode 2

Paced like a documentary....

[5/10 · 24 November 2022]

...and while it manages to be extremly unsubtle it also fails to get to the point.

The big reveals are unsurprising, there are long scenes that should have ended on the cutting floor. People are having the weirdest dialogues that only the viewer can understand because he's got subtitles, and often even those don't help.

The soundtrack swings and misses constantly, but makes sure it is heard at all times, even when the ambience would have delivered a far better background.

Somewhere between long shots of people opening and closing doors, walking down corridors and staring at things all that was missing was a children's song so that we really, really get that a certain symbol connects all the dots of this big mystery... that unfortunately starts to lose my interest. It's a shame, because everything but the actual plot and the soundtrack is on point. Great scenario, nice shots, good performances, but so far it's all promising something way better than what we get.

House of the Dragon: The Lord of the Tides (2022) Season 1, Episode 8

A triumph for everyone involved

[10/10 · 30 October 2022]

Constantine is getting a lot of praise for his performance, and rightly so. Everyone gave their best in this episode, and the result is remarkable. I was holding my breath half of the time, because the dialogue was sharper than any sword, every word counted, every pause could be followed by a sentence that would burn down a realm.

Every scene had that certain gravitas that made the first four seasons of GoT so special. The weight of power, responsibilty, duty, and how feeble the people are that carry it - and are shown for one last time how to do it by a dying man, who has never looked stronger as a king than in this episode.

And what a job CGI and the makeup department did on him, gruesome, every inch a baqoque painting of decay and the cruelness of nature and time. It was hard to watch him, but you couldn't look away for a second.

American Horror Story: Black Out (2022) Season 11, Episode 4

Well, it's AHS, but with a really small h

[5/10 · 27 October 2022]

While the show is circling around itself, admiring it's setpieces and occasionally showering them in flickering lights, the story is not really moving anywhere, while the characters and their respective actors do their best to escape the black hole of the writing. But even the human drama that normally is the second pillar of every season is just gushing towards nothing in particular, only to fall in on itself - people falling in out of love in mere minutes, people seemingly dying only to be ok in the next scene, and the irony of having the only death of a named character happening offscreen followed by a long rant about nobody noticing that he was dead.

Over all of this looms a weird mixture of prophecy, science and conspiracies about someone trying to murder all gay men in the city, but so far that has still to be explored beyond shooting an island full of deer and taking bloodsamples while some weirdo woman has been promising everyone in the subway that it is coming, but... well, it takes it's time.

Normally a season of AHS lives of it's premise, and it takes you a few episodes to see how it wastes away and all that's left is the potential. Here you don't even really have that going for it. I mean - there's a lot of eyecandy, and if you love the 80s, you'll get them from every direction, but the horror is more or less absent except for the occasional bad guy under a stroboscopic light holding a weapon.

American Horror Story: Thank You For Your Service (2022) Season 11, Episode 2

Unfocused

[4/10 · 27 October 2022]

For 10 seasons AHS took place in limited spaces - a house, a small town, underground - and focused completely on the main cast. Here we are in a metropolis of millions, and the cast is stuck in crowds most of the times, loud parties, dark bunkers, large halls full of dancing, socialising people in colorful costumes or intimidating leather.

So far they have a hard time getting through all the noise, and so does the central story - that seems to deal with a serial killer (or more than one) who may or may not be supernatural, and the uncooperative behavior of the police force that unfortunately was all too real at that time.

Some of the new arrivals, especially Russel Tovey, manage to shine through, but the usually fantastic acting that saved some of the older seasons sees some real dips in quality as well. The AHS-veterans pull through as one would suspect.

But so far the plot is just bumbling around and gets interrupted by a second horror - one that wasn't supernatural at all and makes any serial killer look puny. I'm not even totally sure it's about the rise of HIV, and the fact that in this episode it gets mixed up with a vintage conspiracy theory doesn't help. It has barely any connection to the already foggy and wobbly mystery at the center, and I can't say that I'm too excited looking forward to yet another murder spree while the world we are watching is literally coming to an end in a crushing wave of death and self-imposed monogamy.

As usual every department outside of the writing office is doing a great job, bringing the 80s to life - even though there's pretty much only one body type present, and everyone looks like they are carrying around whatever they found in the fruit baskets on the set in their front pockets, from plums to bananas.

Costumes, hair, make-up, but also everyone behind the cameras did what they could; it's unfortunate that their hard work seems a little wasted so far. The writing is also not bad, it just has no grip on the story, and so far there hasn't been a single big moment of any kind. Which could mean that this all just very meta and we are actually watching AHS , once again, trying to kill itself. This time it might get the job done.

She-Hulk: Attorney at Law (2022)

Nothing nowhere not at all

[4/10 · 13 October 2022]

This is a show that has yet to figure out what it wants to be - besides 20 minutes of content that so far has only succeded in creating social media outrage, which was probably the whole point.

It's a little akward watching the show congratulating itself for being the hot new thing while it's message, presentation and strawmen characters are stuck in the 90s. At first I was hoping for that moment where the curtain gets pulled away and it's all meant to be ironic.

Somewhere around epidosde 4 I began to understand that this joke was on me. Somehow Disney got me to watch Ally McBeal, only with cringy dialogue, no actual plot, and it's not very compelling protagonist rebelling against the patriarchy the way a teenager rebels against his parents - by completely defining herself based on the system and the values she's trying to overcome. And yeah, she's green sometimes.

The sad part is that the cast, especially the main actress, could do so much more here. If you forget the CGI and some really bad editing, the problem here is pretty much only the writing that would give fan fiction a bad name.

Eternals (2021)

A feast for the eyes, but lacking a consistent narrative and vision

[5/10 · 22 January 2022]

The problem of "Eternals" is it's core message.

For billions of years, over thousands of planets, these weirdly human synthetic service bots in fancy costumes served their masters as some kind of planetary imune system to faithfully breed new Celestials.

And here we are, on Earth, and we are so super special, so immensly impressive, that even though it means that the cycle of all live comes to an end, seeing your adopted kid grow up is somehow more important. For a synthetic, programmed entity that shouldn't even be on that planet anymore since it was deviant-free for hundreds of years.

The writing is losing itself in really huge ideas and giant concepts that are ten numbers too big to push the actual narrative. It's a little sad since the visuals and the design are excellent, the acting is absolutely aceptable, it's just that in a all-of-time-and-space-spanning story the characters and their stories are bound to seem inconsequential.

If they had just cut back on the scale and focus a little more, this could have been a nice, forgettable superhero pop corn movie. But putting the universe on hold for a Bollywood career? That was a little bit too much for the good old suspension of disbelieve.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021)

Rural Highschool Reenactment

[3/10 · 7 January 2022]

... with a big budget. Whoever wrote this was certainly trying hard to catch the spirit (ha!) of the original while having to be as inclusive and family friendly as possible, so that the franchise can be butchered and scattered over at least a trilogy and two TV spinnoffs.

There are small moments where the source material manages to fight itself to the surface only to be buried under the seemingly unavoidable load of highschool drama. I was too exhausted and bored to enjoy the better second half. Could we have adults playing the main characters outside of documentaries again? Could we leave the cheesy scripted love stories to the Bacholors and Big Brother Houses? I promise, I'll even buy toys.

Superman & Lois: The Perks of Not Being a Wallflower (2021) Season 1, Episode 3

Let's not get too excited

[27 December 2021]

So Superman is rescuing people from a bridge that decided to collapse, somehow, defying gravity, time and logic in any way possible in the process, and since that was very exciting we are just leaving him to himself and instead have ourselves some high school drama, with the girl that does not want to be cheerleader and the boy who shouldn't play football

And yes, that certainly wasn't that exciting, so let's watch Lois Lane having her first day at the local smalltown newspaper, and boom, the Purlitzer stories literally come through the front door 12 seconds later, and that was very exciting, so let's have some more family drama about the girl that does not want to talk to her mom and the boy that doesn't tell his dad that he played football,

.... and shouldn't they all be farming, now that they are having a farm that they inherited so that they could rescue said farm? Why is no one farming? I really need some farming action here.

I guess because they are busy getting almost murdered like Lois since all of that wasn't very exciting, and she gets saved by Superman - I think there's something going on here because you never see her husband in the same room - and that was all very exciting, so we go back to the daughter who now is talking to her mom and the son who is now telling his father about playing football.

And sincce that wasn't very exicting we are going to a cliffhanger that is about the actual story, I guess?

But I can't wait for more Highschool football stories with occasional Superman cameos, maybe there will even be some hand holding (giggle) between the ex-cheerleader and the now-Football player and they will rant and whine in the same monotone voice to their very understanding parents who are going to look very concerned and nod a lot, and if that isn't everything you ever wanted from a superhero series you really shouldn't be watching this.

Superman & Lois: Pilot (2021) Season 1, Episode 1

Comforting

[27 December 2021]

I didn't expect to like this or to find it remarkable in any way. But I didn't dislike it, and it did exactly what it set out to do: Being as unchallenging and comfortable as possible.

Cast and crew do their job, even though the effects are certainly nothing to write home about; Hoechlin brings an unexpected goofy charme to the most uninteresting man in the world while facing terrible problems like a son that does listen to the rock music and plays the video games.

Why can't he be more like the other very blonde, bright-eyed son that plays the football and talks to the girls?

God certainly tests our heroes in this world that is so perfect otherwise because everyone is NORMAL, and that's all everybody wasnts to be. Where nobody has low income or troubles at their job and the worst that can happen to your family is puberty and having to balance your schedule to find time for your loved ones while looking after 8 billion people. Are we going to talk about the problems with nuclear technology and it having meltdowns after preventing one? No, because this is like a warm bath to sink into and relax.

And I can't really fault Superman and Lois for that; it's what I always disliked about the Man of the everlasting Status Quo in the first place.

It goes down smooth like cream, won't challenge you, won't make you think, and there is the usual range of attractive people of all ages to swoon over, with a little colour, but not too much, and.60 minutes of plot can be summarized in 5 sentences.

So if you have time to waste - like me right now - this won't hurt. And that's enough, I guess. It's a well-made show, with all the depth and thrill of a cat GIF, and sometimes you need a cat GIF in your life.

American Horror Story: Forbidden Fruit (2018) Season 8, Episode 3

Broke the spell

[25 December 2021]

I am a sucker for fanservice, LGBT-representation and male nudity, but if it's only used to cover up a mess, it's wasting my time - and makes me feel kind of dirty afterwards for indulging in my lower instincts. I can have that experience a lot faster and more effective by diving into the endless stream of porn out there.

Which is one of the many great themes the past three episodes touched and threw away without building on it - they weren't even trying. AHS has been many things over the years, but it has never felt cheap. And as far as the crew is concerned, the sets, the costumes, the makeup, the camera, it's still great, but too much talent has been replaced by abs and tropes, and the writing is just creating big moments loosely cobbled together with jump scares, shock value and big guest appearances from better seasons, culminating in big twists and climactic scenes that are just hanging in a vacuum of nonexisting plot, with borderline no wordlbuilding and absolutely no character development.

It's amazing how you can kill of your whole cast over the course of 10 minutes - suck on that, red wedding - and replace it with characters from better times, and it feels just as inconsequential as every other moment so far. If this wasn't AHS, I would give it the benefit of a doubt, but I've seen this before.

American Horror Stories: Game Over (2021) Season 1, Episode 7

Cruel

[3/10 · 23 December 2021]

This feels like a joke that was played on the people on the set, and than they forgot that it was never supposed to go public. I didn't laugh, though.

On some level I can understand that everyone who was involved in the first season of AHS somehow wanted to get rid of the endless fan requests to somehow go back there, but why dig it up again in the first place? We all know that the main reason for all the nostalgia is the steady decline of the original series - this was not the solution, even though it's really, really dead now.

Chapelwaite (2021–2023)

Sometimes you can check all the boxes...

[5/10 · 16 November 2021]

... have all the right keywords and tags, have plotlines for every focus group and actors to swoon over for every relevant marketing group, even some big names, a great crew, and that's when you figure out that in a storytelling medium, you need a story.

A story that wants to be told, not just some drivel that is embarassing for the short story, where it took a few names and that was it, and the sequel that it wants to cash in on -already!. When you manage to put someone like Heyerdahl in a villain costume and it is just pure cringe you certainly created something unique, but not what you were going for.

Kevin Can F**k Himself (2021–2022)

Yes, this was never funny

[8/10 · 9 November 2021]

... and while the gimmick of taking the typical cast of a 90s sitcom and wondering how long it would take for you to stop laughing and want them all dead if you had to live with them is pretty funny, I'm not sure it can be extended beyond one season. Especially since it does a very good job to make the titular Kevin and his friends unbearable, and I'm not sure I can go through one more of the "comedy" segments without forgetting that it is supposed to be terrible - just like it always was.

Locke & Key: Cliffhanger (2021) Season 2, Episode 10

Overall a satisfying second season

[7/10 · 6 November 2021]

While the qualities.remain and the series doesn't stray too far from the source material, there are a few things.keeping it from being great. It's still pretty good, though.

But there is, for example, the extended use of what I call MTV-mode, meaning music videos going on for far too long with people staring at things, walking slowly toward nothing in particular and having a sook.

There are some plot holes that are revisited only to stay open, like our heroes puzzling about the keys and and running blindly into danger when they are just one door away from the guy who started it all, great-grandfather Locke. He's instead used as the worst form of deux ex machina, who is conveniently forgotten before and after he had his moment, even though he's hanging out a stone throw away and obviously has nothing better to do. There's Sam Lesser, who is obviously still around and not completely helpless, but also gets demoted to a one-time plot vehicle.

And there are still several moments where the script is a little too obvious and people have to act out of charater to move the plot forward, or come up with ridiculous plans so that certain key moments can happen, but since the whole thing isn't too complex and heavy to begin with, it doesn't stick out too much.

Which is one of the qualities, if you are looking for entertainment - it never gets too dramatic or too sad, and while it keeps you on your feet, it's certainly nothing that you will carry around and think about for days. It brushes on some more adult theme while keeping the teenage drama in check, but it never feels out of place or like it's only happening to draw the whole thing out.

For once it's a cast full of "teenagers" that I don't hate, mainly because they chose a pretty good set of actors. Nothing is oscar-worthy, but given the cringe that I normally get from this stuff it obviously did some things right, and Ashmore.and Stanchfield are pretty good.

The overall presentation is more than solid, and everything fits neatly together. The finale battle, drawn out over more than three episodes, may have been a little much, diving into a very extensive conclusion that is certainly cute, but also overdoing it, including a long mother-son scene that doesn't make any sense. The series does this kind of hear-warming, wholesome stuff pretty good, but gets lost in it as well.

The setup for the next season however is quite promising - if you are in for more of the same. Which I am, but I can also use the break.

Locke & Key: Crown of Shadows (2020) Season 1, Episode 10

Overall a satisfying first season

[7/10 · 4 November 2021]

It's close enough to the source material to keep the entertainment value, and while it's toned down to be more family friendly and everyone is a lot more attractive and accessible, it even adds some details, characters and aspects that fit in perfectly. It gets.the fairy tale of "Locke and Key" right, and manages to resist the temptation to go too deep into the teen drama aspect, but that's a demon that seems to lurk behind every series these days, trying to worm it's way into yet another interesting setting, a destroyer of world that makes this series' antagonist pale in comparison. Some additions seem rushed, and some plot developments demand everyone to be really stupid, but it's the exception.

But, just like the whole cast, everyone does a decent job, even if that job is being evil, or being annoying, or being brooding - I was quite taken.by Darby Stenchfield peformance, who I'd never heard from before, but there were no real lows here. The CGI does the job, just like the whole technical side - most of the time it's nothing to write home about, but it's all coming together nicely and manages to find it's own style and stick with it, and that's laudable these days.

If you find yourself in need of something to bingewatch during the cold and wet season, this is comfortable, but not boring. It doesn't have any big messages and is certainly not unforgetable, but it's also not just killing time. Given the harsh, unforgiving style of the source material it's surprising how wholesome and warm it is, how positive and in love with it's characters and setting, and if you are in the mood for something like that, you could do a lot worse.

American Horror Story: The Future Perfect (2021) Season 10, Episode 10

A professionally made product to kill time

[2 November 2021]

... it's not even bad enough to be offensive in any way. Except maybe the decadence of wasting so much talent on it. There is so much to like here, except that all the technical mastery and stellar perfomances keep up your hopes that it might get better, that it could end well.

And instead you can almost see that moment when Murpy throws up his hands in the air, screaming "bored now!" and just flips over the board, kills everyone and ends the plot with several bullets to the heart. Again. And again.

And thanks to the double feature, we get two corpses of two potentially great stories shoveled into this mass grave, where the series itself has become the true horror story, and... it's not dead yet, is it?

American Horror Story: Pale (2021) Season 10, Episode 2

I don't want to jynx it...

[8/10 · 1 November 2021]

... but after struggling for several seasons AHS might finally have found the way back to it's roots... the "Horror" in "American Horror Story".

After watching very American stories of a series that fell for it's own hype so hard that I gave up on the past three seasons after a few episodes, I'm back to bingewatching an actual classic horror tale, spliced with some modern psychological horror. And while the cast is still sprinkled with people who are either there because Murphy wants to bang them or to please the fans and wasting their talent on exessive, yet completely one-note characters and appearances , they stay in the background and don't take all the air away.

And that way Lilly Rabe, Frances Conroy and, I can't believe I'm saying this, Finn Wittrock of all people get to do their thing, going through a plot that took more than a few pages from Stephen King's older works, and it delivers. My relationsship with AHS has always been that of an abused lover, so let's hope I won't regret this.