Stacy's Blog Has Got It Going On

 "I'm really sorry I called you rotund." -Sawyer "Left Behind" kicks off with Kate (Evangeline Lilly) being visited by Locke (Terry O'Quinn) who tells her he is joining the Others.  Later, she sees the Others packing up to leave and is gassed by them.  She wakes up in the jungle, handcuffed to Juliet (Elizabeth Mitchell).  The two of them make their way back to the Barracks, while being chased by the Monster, which Juliet claims to not be familiar with. Juliet blames Kate for the destruction of the submarine.  The two fight and Kate dislocates Juliet's arm, but puts it back in.  Juliet tells Kate that Jack (Matthew Fox) saw Kate and Sawyer (Josh Holloway) have sex back on Hydra Island and tells her she broke Jack's heart.  When the monster attacks again, they run into the sonic fence, which Kate refuses to cross.  Juliet reveals she had the key to the handcuffs the entire time and frees herself and activates the fence, which stops the monster.  She s

 "You can't crush a soul here.  That's what life on Earth is for." -22 Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx) is an unfulfilled music teacher who dreams of being a jazz musician.  When his soul is accidentally separated from his body, Joe has to find a way back before he misses the gig of his dreams. I want you to stop reading and go watch Soul  if you haven't.  Seriously.  Right now.  It's my favorite movie of the year and you shouldn't know anymore about it than what I've told you.  Go on.  Get out of here.  Spoilers ahead.   What Works: The animation of Soul is beautiful and I love that the animators got to create two different worlds.  They both look very different, but both are incredible.  The real world of New York City feels like I could jump through my TV screen and be there and I love the abstractness and dreamlike quality of the Great Before. Jamie Foxx gives an incredible performance as Joe.  He takes you on an existential journey and I found him incredi

 "What do you wish for?" -Max Lord 66 years after the first movie, Diana Prince (Gal Gadot) works at the Smithsonian and befriends her awkward coworker, Barbara (Kristen Wiig).  A strange stone is sent to the Smithsonian and they discover it can grant wishes.  Unfortunately, each wish comes at a price and when the stone falls into the hands of desperate businessman Max Lord (Pedro Pascal), Diana has to risk everything to get it back. What Works: The best part of Wonder Woman 1984 , is the villains.  Wiig and Pascal are both great and give us the best villains in the DCEU, hands down.  Both are pretty likable and easy to relate to.  They aren't crazy people trying to destroy the world, they are people who have had a hard time and things are finally starting to go their way and they are desperate to make sure it stays that way.  They are both very easy to relate to and I think most people would make the same decisions as them if they were in the same situation.  Both Barbar

"Who the hell's Nikki?" -Sawyer The flashbacks for "Exposé" focus on everyone's favorite characters; Nikki (Kiele Sanchez) and Paulo (Rodrigo Santoro).  Nikki is a guest star on a TV show called Exposé, which is filmed in Sydney.  She is also sleeping with the show's creator, Howard Zukerman (Jacob Witkin), who has hired Paulo as his personal chef.  The whole thing is a ruse as Paulo poisons Howard and they make it look like a heart attack so the duo can steal his 8 million dollars worth of diamonds before getting on Oceanic 815. After the crash, Nikki and Paulo mostly keep to themselves and focus on finding Nikki's bag, where the diamonds are hidden.  They end up discovering the Beechcraft and the Pearl hatch before anyone else, but have little interest in exploring them.  Paulo ends up finding the diamonds in a lagoon, but does not tell Nikki because he is afraid she will leave him if they find the diamonds.  He ends up hiding them in the Pearl sta

"Where do they keep the chainsaws here?" -Vicki Summers A group of teenagers attend a screening of a 1980's slasher movie, Camp Bloodbath,  only to find themselves trapped inside the movie.  Now they not only have to survive the movie, but they have to find a way back to the present. What Works: This movie is a deconstruction of 80's slasher movies, especially the Friday the 13th movies.  It gets pretty meta and reminds me a lot of movies like Scream, The Cabin in the Woods, and Tucker and Dale vs. Evil.  This movie does a great job of playing with classic tropes and they are all pretty hilarious.  For example, any time someone takes their clothes off, the killer shows up.  The main characters know this is the case and address it, but don't know why it's happening.  This movie is filled with moments like this and I love it. The main cast also makes a lot of decisions the audience would make.  They spend a good chunk of time just trying to escape the movie and

 "We have two giant hamsters running in a massive wheel at our secret underground lair." -Ben Linus "The Man From Tallahassee" starts off in a flashback.  John Locke (Terry O'Quinn) is suffering from severe depression when he is approached by Peter Talbot (Patrick J. Adams), whose mother is about to marry Anthony Cooper (Kevin Tighe).  Peter doesn't trust him and wants Locke to vouch for him because he gave his kidney to Cooper.  Locke claims it was an anonymous donation, but goes to see Cooper himself and tells him to call off the weeding or be exposed.  After Peter mysterious dies, Locke confronts Cooper, who maintains his innocence before shoving Locke through the window.  He falls eight stories, but survives and ends up in a wheelchair. On the Island, Locke, Kate (Evangeline Lilly), and Sayid (Naveen Andrews) wait for nightfall to approach Jack (Matthew Fox), but they don't realize Jack's house has cameras inside.  Kate and Sayid are both capture

 "You are not on the list because you are flawed.  Because you are angry, and weak, and frightened. -Mikhail Bakunin "Par Avion" starts off in a flashback.  We see the aftermath of a car crash caused by Claire (Emilie de Ravin), which results in her mother ending up in a coma.  Claire discovers the hospital bills are being paid for by an unknown 3rd party, who later turns out to be Christian Shephard (John Terry), Jack's (Matthew Fox) father.  He reveals that he is Claire's father as well.  He tries to convince Claire to take her mother off life support because it is very unlikely she will wake up.  Claire refuses and Christian leaves.  Years later, when Claire is pregnant with Aaron, she goes to see her mother and apologizes for all of the terrible things she said in the moments before the car accident. On the island, Claire notices a flock of sea birds land and she spots a scientific tag on one of them.  She recruits Sun (Yunjin Kim) and Jim (Daniel Dae Kim) to

 "An unconscious Argentinian fell through my roof." -Christian In 1899, Christian (Ewan McGregor) moves to Paris to join the Bohemian movement and gets involved in writing a play for the owner of the Moulin Rouge nightclub, Harold Zidler (Jim Broadbent).  He quickly falls in love with the star of the play, Satine (Nicole Kidman), who has unfortunately been promised to the Duke of Monroth (Richard Roxburgh), the jealous investor of the play. What Works: Back when I was in high school, I watched the first two minutes of Moulin Rouge! , and assumed it was going to be a depressing, melodramatic period piece.  That's absolutely a fair assumption if you only see the first two minutes.  Fortunately, I watched past that point in college to see the unconscious Argentinian falling through the roof and I get to see just how bonkers and insane this movie really is.  I remember my jaw dropping to the floor and staying there for the rest of the film.  This was one of the most enjoyable

It's that time again: The Snubby Awards!  For those of you who don't know, the Snubby Awards take a look at all of the Best Picture nominees from a given year and determine if the best film won or if one was snubbed.  If that's the case, they win the coveted Snubby Award! This time we'll be taking a look at the 2010 Oscars, which was an solid field and I thought all of the nominees were at least good.  The nominees were: Avatar, The Blind Side, District 9, An Education, Inglourious Basterds, Precious, A Serious Man, Up, and Up in the Air with the winner being The Hurt Locker.   Did The Hurt Locker deserve to win or did another movie get snubbed?  Let's find out! #10. A Serious Man The story of a Minnesotan, Jewish man whose life is falling apart, A Serious Man wasn't exactly enjoyable to watch and I found myself frustrated for most of the movie.  That said, I still think this is a good movie and I'm glad I watched it.  It gave me a lot to think about and I s

 "Why are we continuing to play this little game...when we all know it has moved to the next stage?" -Mikhail Bakunin "Enter 77" picks up on the beach, where the survivors have found the ping-pong table from the Hatch.  Sawyer (Josh Holloway) challenges the rest of the camp to a game.  If Sawyer wins, he gets everything from his stash back, but if he loses, he can't use any nicknames for a week.  The group puts up Hurley (Jorge Garcia) as their best player, who proceeds to demolish Sawyer and win the game. Sayid (Naveen Andrews), Kate (Evangeline Lilly), Locke (Terry O'Quinn), and Rousseau (Mira Furlan) come across a Dharma station, "The Flame", which is stationed by Mikhail (Andrew Divoff).  Sayid approaches the Flame unarmed, to not appear threatening, but Mikhail shoots him the shoulder.  Locke and Kate hold Mikhail at gunpoint, but they manages to deescalate the situation. Mikhail fixes up Sayid and claims he is the last living member of the Dh

 "I'm sorry for calling you an inanimate object.  I was upset." -Harry Waters After a job goes drastically wrong, two hitmen, Ray (Colin Farrell) and Ken (Brendan Gleeson), flee England to hide out in Bruges, Belgium.  While waiting for orders from their boss, Harry (Ralph Fiennes), on how to proceed, they spend most of their time sightseeing. If you haven't seen In Bruges , please don't read any further.  It's a great movie with a lot of fun and dark twists and turns.  So go watch it for yourself and then come back and read this review.   Spoilers ahead.  You have been warned.  What Works: The performances really carry this movie, especially Colin Farrell.  He's a young and inexperienced hitman and has no interest in sightseeing in Bruges.  He reminds me a lot of that kid we all had in our class in elementary school.  The one who can't shut up or sit still.  Ray is like that this entire movie, but now he's hit the stage where even he knows he has

 "I want my body back!" -Millie Kessler Unpopular high school student Millie (Kathryn Newton) is attacked and nearly killed by the Blissfield Butcher (Vince Vaughn).  The next day, she discovers she has switched bodies with the Butcher.  With only a few hours left to switch back, Millie has to convince her friends to help her and stop the Butcher from using her body to continue his murderous rampage. What Works: Vince Vaughn is far and away the best part of the movie.  He starts off the movie by showing us how intimidating a killer he is, but he's also hilariously good at playing a teenager girl once the body switch happens.  It's really funny and frequently creepy.  It's get uncomfortable and weird often, but it's never not entertaining and it feels like he was having a blast in the role. As I mentioned, the beginning of the movie does a great job at setting up the Butcher.  It's better than anything in any of the Friday the 13th movies.  We're introd

 "Those pants don't make you look fat." -Jin Kwon "Tricia Tanaka is Dead" starts off with a flashback to when Hurley (Jorge Garcia) was a kid, where he and his dad, David (Cheech Marin), are fixing a Camaro together.  Unfortunately, David takes off and leaves the family.  17 years later, after winning the lottery, Hurley buys Mr. Cluck's Chicken Shack.  He does a interview with Tricia Tanaka (Sung Hi Lee) before the grand opening, but a meteorite destroys the Shack and kills Tricia and her cameraman. Hurley returns home to find David has returned.  Hurley believes David just showed up for the money, but his mother, Carmen (Lillian Hurst), reveals she called him because of Hurley's insistence that there is a curse on the money and his plan to go to Australia.  David tries to remove the curse by taking him to a fortune teller, but Hurley gets her to admit that David set the whole thing up.  As Hurley prepares to leave for Australia, David admits he showed