Stacy's Blog Has Got It Going On

 "If you want to live, you need to come with me." -John Locke Season 4 of Lost starts with a flashforward.  After seeing a vision of Charlie (Dominic Monaghan) in a convenience store, Hurley (Jorge Garcia) freaks out and leads police on a high-speed chase before being arrested.  He is interrogated by Ana Lucia's (Michelle Rodriguez) old partner, Mike (Michael Cudlitz), but Hurley denies ever meeting Ana Lucia.  Hurley asks to be placed in his old mental facility.  While there, he is visited by Matthew Abaddon (Lance Reddick), who claims to be a lawyer for Oceanic, who offers him an upgrade to a better facility.  Hurley quickly realizes Abaddon is lying and gets him to leave when he asks Hurley "Are they still alive?" Later, he is visited by another vision of Charlie who tells him he has something he needs to do, but is avoiding it.  Finally, he is visited by Jack (Matthew Fox), who wants to make sure Hurley isn't going to reveal their secret.  Hurley apologi

 "Give me the goddamn kitty-cat bracelet!" -Hutch Mansell Former assassin, Hutch Mansell (Bob Odenkirk) is living a dull and repetitive life with his family.  After his house is robbed and he chooses not to intervene, Hutch caves to his thirst for action and ends up beating up the brother of a dangerous Russian mobster, Yulian Kuznetsov (Aleksei Serebryakov), who comes after Hutch with a vengeance. There will be spoilers below.  They managed to leave some of the best parts of this movie out of the trailer and they are a lot of fun.  If you like action movies, go and watch Nobody and then come back and read this review.  SPOILER ALERT! What Works: Bob Odenkirk is awesome as an action hero.  I thought watching Saul as an action hero would be fun, but I wasn't sure it would be believable.  I was wrong.  Odenkirk is fantastic, easy to root for, and is obviously having a blast.  One thing I really appreciate also separates him from other action heroes like Daniel Craig's J

 "I'm made out of sage and I am the Sage, so it works out pretty well." -Sage After Gary is kidnapped by King Poseidon (Matt Barry), SpongeBob (Tom Kenny) and Patrick (Bill Fagerbakke) embark on an epic journey to rescue the snail.  However, without SpongeBob, Bikini Bottom starts to collapse. What Works: The best part of this movie is easily the Old West sequence.  It's bizarre and surreal.  It reminded me a lot of the strangeness of the second movie, which got my hopes up for things to come, but I'll get to that.  The Old West sequence is bonkers and a lot of fun with some excellent celebrity cameos. Keanu Reeves is actually in a surprising amount of the movie.  From the trailer, I expected him to only be in one or two scenes, but he's actually a supporting character in the story.  Reeves is awesome as Sage and has some of the funniest moments in the movie. I don't mind the new animation style at all.  It gives the filmmakers the opportunity to create vi

 "I do not care for hunky boys.  Or do I?" -Psycho Goreman Siblings Mimi (Nita-Josee Hanna) and Luke (Owen Myre) discover an imprisoned alien buried alive in their backyard.  The alien, who they name Psycho Goreman (Matthew Ninaber), is a genocidal maniac and the scourge of the universe who would like nothing more than to brutally murder the kids.  Fortunately, Mimi finds the gem that can control P.G. and decides to have some fun with the alien.  However, P.G.'s return grabs the attention of more than a few extraterrestrial beings. What Works: Psycho Goreman is a movie that seems like it was made specifically for me.  It's like someone opened up my brain and took what was inside to make a movie.  It's everything I wanted it to be.  It's silly, weird, over-the-top, and completely unapologetic about it.  It's a movie that does exactly what it wants and doesn't give a frig what you think about it.  And I love it. Psycho Goreman himself is fantastic.  He&#

 "My knight in shining acne!" -Marcie After the previous movies, Carol Anne Freeling (Heather O'Rourke) is sent to live with her aunt and uncle in Chicago.  Unfortunately, Reverend Kane (Nathan Davis) is still after Carol Anne and follows her for one last showdown. What Works: The special effects are easily the best part of Poltergeist III .  There some really awesome practical effects with Kane melting and Tangina (Zelda Rubinstein) getting torn apart.  This movie focuses a lot around mirrors, so we also get some creepy shots of something appearing in a mirror, but not in the real world.  I also like the frosty look of The Other Side, which is far better than anything from the second film.  Best of all is the pool that drags several characters into it.  It looks fantastic. Tom Skerritt plays one of the leads, Carol Anne's Uncle Bruce, and does an awesome job.  Bruce is a fun and wholesome character and makes you wish he was your uncle.  He doesn't believe in any

 "Good instincts are earned by making mistakes." -Clyde Dutton Seven years after the world is overrun by monsters, Joel Dawson (Dylan O'Brien) discovers that his high school sweetheart, Aimee (Jessica Henwick), is still alive and only 80 miles away.  With limited supplies and survival knowhow, Joel leaves the safety of his bunker and embarks on a dangerous quest for love. What Works: Dylan O'Brien is an actor I've always enjoyed and he gives his best performance I've seen here.  He's extremely funny with some excellent sarcastic line delivery, but he isn't just funny.  Every so often we get some major emotional depth from him that makes Joel extremely relatable.  He just doesn't want to be alone at the end of the world.  He's an easy person to root for and a fun character to go on this journey with. The supporting cast is also great with the highlights being Michael Rooker and Arianna Greenblatt as two survivalists Joel meets in the wilderness.

 "We have to go back!" -Jack Shephard This finale picks up with Jack Shephard (Matthew Fox) on a plane about to land in Los Angeles.  He sees an obituary of an unknown person, which devastates him.  After landing, he nearly commits suicide by jumping off a bridge, but a nearby car crashes and Jack rushes over to help. It becomes clear that Jack is a mess.  He's drunk and addicted to pills.  He attends thr funeral of the unknown person, but no one else shows up.  He also calls an unknown woman multiple times, who finally agrees to meet him near the airport.  It turns out to be Kate (Evangeline Lilly), revealing that this is actually a flashforward.  Jack tells Kate he flies across the Pacific Ocean every weekend hoping the plane will crash and that they made a mistake leaving the island.  Kate drives off as he shouts, "We have to go back!" On the island, the Others invade the beach camp.  Sayid (Naveen Andrews), Bernard (Sam Anderson), and Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) ki

 "You are covered in blood and puke." -Mikey Mandy (Angela Bettis) is a drug-addicted nurse who steals organs from patients to sell them on the black market.  When her cousin, Regina (Chloe Farnworth), loses a kidney, it causes chaos for the operation and threatens to expose what Mandy has been up to.  As Mandy tries to clean up the mess, her shift becomes more and more insane as a psychotic killer breaks free and Regina tries to solve the problem on her own. What Works: 12 Hour Shift might be my favorite movie of 2020 and that's due to the characters.  I'll get into the leads further down, but even the supporting characters are phenomenal.  All of them are weird, wacky, or doofy in their own way and there isn't a weak link among them.  Dusty Warren is excellent as the lackadaisical henchmen and the nursing staff is so strong, it almost feels like this could be a pilot episode for an awesome workplace comedy.  When David Arquette playing a psychotic killer is the

 "Old people suck." -Stephen Stotch The pandemic is really wearing on Kenny as he feels he and his friends have been drifting apart.  To cheer him up, Cartman plays a mean prank on their teacher, Mrs. Nelson, which causes her to leave.  Their new teacher ends up being Mr. Garrison, who is trying to move on from being President of the United States, even if the rest of the town is not so willing to do that. Stan and Kyle are lumped in with Kenny and Cartman and are all hated for the prank.  They decide to get Mrs. Nelson to come back and teach them, but she will only do that if she can get the Covid vaccination.  The boys manage to steal a bunch of vaccines from Walgreens.  Everyone quickly finds out they have some and the boys have to flee from the desperate mob begging for a vaccine. Cartman starts getting large offers of money in exchange for the vaccine.  Kyle wants to make things right with Mrs. Nelson and give the vaccines to the teachers.  Stan wants to take the vaccine

 "We don't bother them and they don't bother us." -Aileen A group of young adults decide to go hiking on the Appalachian Trail and end up going off the marked trail.  They stumble across booby traps and a society of people that doesn't take kindly to strangers.  Do any of them have what it takes to survive? What Works: The strongest aspect of this reboot is the main protagonist, Jen (Charlotte Vega).  She starts off the movie as an extremely annoying stock, slasher movie character; the one who says killing is wrong no matter what, even in self defense, and really gets up on their high horse.  We've had this character as the main protagonist in previous Wrong Turn movies and it always drives me up the wall.  However, over the course of the movie, Jen becomes a ruthless, Rambo-like figure.  She'll do whatever it takes to survive and kill anyone who gets in her way.  That's an awesome character arc and reminds me a lot of the story of Far Cry 3 .  Vega gi

 "Rock-hard abs!" -Squidward Tentacles As Plankton (Mr. Lawrence) attempts to steal the Krabby Patty secret formula, it vanishes into thin air.  Of course, everyone blames Plankton anyway, except for SpongeBob (Tom Kenny).  As the residents of Bikini Bottom go insane due to to lack of Krabby Patties, it's up to SpongeBob and Plankton to recover the secret formula and save the town. Before reading any further, if you haven't seen Sponge Out of Water , I implore to stop what you are doing and go watch this film.  This is the most bats**t insane movie I have ever seen in my life and I don't want to spoil it for you if you haven't seen it.  So go watch this movie, enjoy the insanity, and come back and read this review.  SPOILERS AHEAD!  You've been warned. What Works: Like the previous movie, Sponge Out of Water does an excellent job of capturing the spirit of the original cartoon.  Granted, this movie dials everything up to eleven, but the characters and humo

 "I'm a Goofy Goober, yeah!" -SpongeBob SquarePants When Plankton (Mr. Lawrence) steals the crown of King Neptune (Jeffrey Tambor) and frames the theft on Mr. Krabs (Clancy Brown), it's up to SpongeBob (Tom Kenny) and Patrick (Bill Fagerbakke) to go on an epic journey to find the crown, clear Mr. Krabs' name, and stop Plankton's evil plan to take over Bikini Bottom. What Works: If you're a fan of the original SpongeBob cartoon, you will be a huge fan of this movie.  It does a great job of capturing the spirit of the show with plenty of hilarious moments.  The stakes are dialed up to 11, but beyond that it is SpongeBob SquarePants: The Movie.  You couldn't ask for much more. This movie has a bunch of live action segments that are some of the highlights of the film.  We get an opening sequence with a group of pirates on their way to see The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie and they sing the show's theme song.  We also get SpongeBob and Patrick being captu

 "It's loud." -Viola Eade Todd Hewitt (Tom Holland) lives in a village with no women, since they have all been killed off by aliens.  All of the men can also hear each other's thoughts, so it's hard to keep secrets.  This makes it difficult for Todd when he discovers a girl, Viola (Daisy Ridley), has crashed her spaceship nearby and while she can hear his thoughts, Todd can't hear hers. What Works: I was intrigued by the premise of this story.  Having all of your thoughts out in the open is very interesting and creates some unique conflict.  For most of the movie, the premise falls flat, but there are moments where it works well.  It's usually in the smaller, character driven scenes between Todd and Viola where it works best. Both Holland and Ridley do their best with what they are given.  Their characters aren't well developed, so they do their best to carry the film on their charisma and chemistry alone.  Does it work?  No.  But it's an admirable