Death Note – Netflix Original

Oh dear me. My sister messaged me not to watch it and I regret that I did not listen. It wasn’t completely bad, but it’s probably the worst movie I’ve seen in ages.

I am a fan of anime. I haven’t seen a ton of them, but the original Death Note is probably one of my favourites. The intense cat and mouse game between the two main characters is fantastic to watch and this adaptation just didn’t deliver on anything. We felt like we were watching a whole movie dedicated to emo Spiderman. I’ve never seen the live action adaptation of Dragon Ball Z, but my boyfriend said this was just as bad or even worse. This movie took everything you liked about the original and threw it out the window.

**Spoilers ahead

The Good:

This isn’t going to be a long list. Hell the only thing that really grabbed me was the death of the agents. They all jump off a building to their deaths and while gruesome I thought it was wonderfully shot. I guess I also didn’t mind Willem Dafoe as the voice of Ryuk or the darker version of the character.

The Bad:

The music was awful. I don’t usually tear apart music because most of the time it is either great or you don’t notice it. At the end when they are falling from the Ferris wheel it was incredibly off. It didn’t fit at all and just made us laugh at how ridiculous it all felt.

There are many things wrong with the portrayal of Light Yagami (Turner) in this movie, but again we had to bust out laughing at his meeting with Ryuk. For some reason they decided to make Ryuk have a crazy destructive entrance and Light scream many times like a little girl. Really though those screams were hilarious; this might have been on purpose, but that’s not why we were laughing. The screams were so out of place for our expectations. Same with his stupid freaking top hat and emo hair. I get how they used the top hat, but it was just so stupid.

The Ugly:

Light Yagami – A well respected, well dressed, rule abiding, intelligent, high school student. He has a father in the police force, a mother and little sister. He has quite the ego, but he is cold, calculating, and in control of his emotions. Everything he does is for a purpose, he doesn’t have time for fan girls or serious relationships. He cares about his family, but in the end most everyone is a pawn for him. He falls deeper and deeper into a god complex in which he thinks he can make the world a better place by using his judgement alone. He doesn’t scare easy and isn’t going to be intimidated or pushed around.
VS
Light Turner – A bullied, loser, cheating, high school student. He falls in love which a psychotic, controlling cheerleader and shares his secrets with her. Screams like a wimp and hardly keeps his emotions in check. While he says he has the same motivations as Yagami, he isn’t willing to kill people that will stop his brand of justice, like the police investigators. He plays all loosey goosey with his Death Note around his obviously not to be trusted girlfriend. He gives the game away at multiple points and we are expected to believe by the end that he’s some mastermind while he literally tells his Dad the truth…his Dad…the cop. While we are supposed to believe he was in control the whole time, it really doesn’t feel this way. Oh yeah, and like all hollywood families, one parent has to be dead.

L – L, no! What did they do to you! L is supposed to be a hyper intelligent investigator trained from a very young age. He is calm and never makes rash decisions. The main excitement in the original is the careful chess game between L and Light. Each step is calculated; traps are set and dodged and set again. You are constantly on edge to see who will out smart the other. This movie starts L out pretty well. He seems calm and focused, but quickly descends into an emotional train wreck of vigilantism and violence. I was devastated and intrigued in the original by L and his death, but in this movie I couldn’t care less about him…or really any character.

Misa – Misa was originally a Kira (Light’s super secret name) mega fan. He killed the man who murdered a loved one of hers so she is really into him. She has her own Death Note and eventually works out that Light is Kira. Love struck, hyper devoted, model, Misa does anything she can do to help Light. She is a tool for him to use and a little bit of a thorn in his side the whole time. He really has no affection for her at all and sometimes her help actually causes him problems. As a very popular model she attracts a lot of unwanted attention towards him. Misa in the movie is a angst ridden, smoking cheerleader. As soon as she is made privy to the power of the Death Note she instantly becomes completely unhinged and wants to kill anyone in their way. She tries to control Light instead of being subservient to him.

Love – There really is no love for Light in the original. He isn’t interested in Misa in the slightest, even his date with Yuri is just used to reduce suspicion. Neither of them have any control on him and they are just pawns in his grand scheme. Probably the only people who he might think twice about killing is his family. It was very disappointing to see that they had to cram a silly love story into the Netflix adaptation.

White Washing?

Yes the original is super Japanese. While I would have preferred a Japanese cast I can see why, for a movie made in the US and for a US audience that they chose to go with white people. What I didn’t like is how they turned every character into something they were not regardless of skin color and hollywoodized the story.

Watch – Sword Art Online

“WHY IS EVERYONE SO OK WITH THIS?”   That pretty much sums up how I felt at the end of watching this anime series.

PLOT

So basically in the slightly distant future VR has come along way. Our main man – Kirito is his in-game name – logs into a MMO via a headset. This thing basically paralyzes you and transfers your consciousness into the game. The game is called Sword Art Online and it’s a massively multiplayer online game. So everyone logs in and they are having a grand time until they all get teleported to the main starting city and all realize they can’t get out or log out of the system. The maker of the game descends upon them to tell them they cannot leave. If someone tries to unplug them from the outside their brain gets zapped and if they die in game that’s lights out in real life too. The only way out is to beat the game with it’s 100 levels.

FLOW

SAO is 1 season, but it felt like they crammed two seasons together and shortened them. He only about half way the season and he’s already out the game; it was extremely anti-climatic. The first episode goes fairly methodically through what is happening, but after that it just seems to jump. I felt like the whole concept of being stuck in the game and what that means could be explored so much more. Episodes have kind of random themes with characters you’ve never seen before and then they just disappear. It always seemed like there was so much going on in the world, but we didn’t get to see any of it.

ATTITUDE

At first everyone seems to have the proper reaction to being locked inside a game by a mad man and the threat of death looming at them. When people do die, they also seem to have the correct reaction, but that’s when it stops. Like people don’t take it seriously and just run around getting into “I’m going to die, because went someplace I shouldn’t” situations all the time. Sure you can’t live your life scared, but at least use some common sense. If it was me I’d make sure I’d out level anything before I go adventuring at all.

People don’t take a lot of time to think whether or not the creator is bluffing or not about the whole dying business. I kept thinking, maybe it’s all not true and it’s some sort of social experiment. There isn’t anyone or any group in the game breaking off into a faction and supporting the idea of just killing yourself in-game to get out.

Why is no one angry at this guy, Akihiko Kayaba, for locking them in here? Like no one is shaking their fist when someone dies and going damn you or anything! Your friends are dying and no one is like trying to get at this guy somehow? Hell at the end when they figure out he’s been playing along beside with them this whole time, you’d think there would be this reaction of anger and everyone would just attack or something. Nope they just have a nice duel and then Kirito has a lovely chat with him afterwards. He asks him, why he made the game and why he did what he did. Dude just says he doesn’t really remember why he did it and talks all whimsically about his dreams. Kirito’s reaction…absolutely nothing. This dude just put you all through 2 years of hell and killed thousands of people and you aren’t like pissed off and demanding answers!?

Then everyone on the outside is totally okay with more MMOs using VR and guess what someone gets the idea to use it for their own dastardly means once again – though this time with more subtlety. After that’s all settled we get this from Kirito, “MMOs were starting to die after the ALfheim Online fiasco”. Really? Really? The one where a guy almost found out how to control people’s minds shut down the VR MMO industry and not the one where thousands died?

CALM

Okay, okay, deep breath, moving on. Asides from my main beefs I have with this series as clearly and overly explained above I enjoyed watching it for the most part. It is an interesting concept. I just feel a little short changed on the experience. Like if someone said they would give you cookies n’ cream ice cream, but only gave you vanilla.

Watch – Read – Horns by Joe Hill

I had Horns by Joe Hill on my Audible wish list for a while and then I saw a it on Netflix. I didn’t even know it was made into a movie and staring Daniel Radcliffe. So I ended up watching the movie first and reading the novel second. I liked the book, but I think they did a good job on the movie. I didn’t have that, “the movie was better!” moment after finishing the book.

If you like dark humor and don’t mind swearing then this book is for you! It combines crime and fantasy into a unique story. Ignatius “Ig” Perrish has had a rough go lately with his girlfriend, Merrin, breaking up with him then getting brutally murdered, so pretty much everyone suspects him. After getting positively trashed one night he wakes to find he has horns growing out from his head. Not only that, but they seem to have the power to bring out the worst in people.

Ig goes through a journey of personal and physical transformation while on a quest to find out who really killed Merrin. He isn’t super fond of his new horns and their ever increasing power since they tend to let people speak their minds freely. Let’s not forget he isn’t exactly liked at this time in his life by anyone, even his parents. After a while though they seem to grow on him and he uses them to his advantage.

 

Watch – Saving Private Ryan

Let’s all hop on the wayback machine!

Now you may wonder how I have never seen this movie, but let’s take into consideration I was 7 when it came out and you now understand. There is no way this movie would be appropriate for any child. After watching this film I really want to go back and watch more serious movies that I missed growing up.  I’ve of course always heard about this movie and my family has always had a fondness for historic war based movies. I was in the mood for a serious movie and it’s currently on Netflix so everything came together.

This movie does not screw around. You are immediately thrown onto Omaha beach and the insane and gruesome reality of war – or what we can come close to portraying in film. This movie holds nothing back, its very gory and I don’t think it’s excessive – more like appropriate. A movie can only hope to give you a slight taste of what reality was like.

As I watched this movie I thought of my Grandpa. He recently passed and never talked about his time in the military serving in the far east. I’m always amazed by those old dudes in documentaries talking about their time in the service. I guess people deal with it in different ways. As I watched I thought about how crazy it would have been to be a part of all that. I totally understand never wanting to talk about it.

I thought that this movie also did a great job showing the human factor. People think of the German’s as the enemy – they are the bad guys. This movie shows that people are just people. Neither side wants to die -most people are just as scared and scarred regardless of their allegiance.

I was really miffed at the end of the film when the translator guy, Upham, who is supposed to be running around refilling people ammo during the last fight of the movie freaks the hell out and gets his people killed. The suspense of watching his platoon mate fight the German upstairs hand to hand while he just agonizingly slowly walks up the stairs was unbearable. I don’t usually have outbursts while watching movies, but I kept throwing my hands up and almost yelling at him to hurry the hell up and do something! I can’t really judge the man – I’ve ever been in his position, but holy crap did that scene just rile me up.

I probably don’t need to tell you this, but watch this if you haven’t. Watch it again if you have. Great movie.

Side note: I kept going, “hey, it’s that guy!”. Like who really thinks they’ll see Vin Diesel in something where he isn’t just wearing a wife beater.

Watch – Black Mirror. IT COULD HAPPEN!

I heard about this series from the Roosterteeth podcast and they sold me on trying it by saying that it reminded them of the Twilight Zone. Now I was a little young for the Twilight Zone, but I do remember the theme song and a feeling of excitement and mystery when it came on.

Black Mirror is a British television series that does not have to be viewed in order as the episodes don’t really play off of each other. In fact I started with the last episode of season 3 and am working my way backwards. Honestly the last episode is a great way to start.

I love Black Mirror because it’s sci-fi, but it seems so real. Like this could actually happen in the next 5 years – which is crazy. I think that’s why it’s such a good series. Every episode touches on some social aspect that when paired with technology goes horribly awry.

My first episode focuses on the instant liking/rating of people and it was fantastic. The rating you give people actually affect their day-to-day life. Like if out of 5 you’re only a 3.2 you can’t get a loan for a fancy house or you can’t enter certain restaurants just because people don’t like you enough.

The other episodes touch on modern warfare and mental health; social media manhunts; alternate reality gaming; your online privacy and missing loved ones.

The last one I saw was about losing someone in your life. Holy cow the rest of the episodes so far were interesting and maybe scary, but this one was just so sad. A lady moves into her boyfriends childhood home with him. The next day he leaves to return their rented vehicle and he dies somewhere along the way. Enter technology and how messed up it could be. Someone introduces her to this service that helps you re-connect with your deceased loved ones. It scrubs the public channels to analyze how they talk and act and then you can have a chat session with them. The next step is letting it have access to more sources and if you have enough videos it will even imitate their voice. At first she is disgusted by this. I can only imagine the tug-of-war going on in a situation like this. You miss them so much and want to talk to them with all your heart, but this isn’t them and you know it. She gets used to it though and eventually her fake boyfriend suggests she goes to the next level. The final step is actually getting an android type thing that talks and looks just like the dead person. Holy cow, creepy. You can just see how conflicted she is and eventually she rejects the whole robot thing, but she keeps it in her attic – unable to fully let go. Oh and did I mention he got her pregnant right before?

I have yet to get to the earliest episodes, but these ones are fantastic so far. If I were you I’d actually start at the end since I’ve heard the first few are super weird. Give it a go!

Watch – A Series Of Unfortunate Events

So I was feeling pretty awful yesterday and spent most of the day in bed, so obviously it was the perfect time to watch the new Netflix show – A Series Of Unfortunate Events.

As a younger person I did read a few of the books. Actually I read the first 4 – which is what the Netflix’s first season covers so it worked out perfectly! It has been a while though so I don’t have a fantastic recollection of them so I’m going to try to stay away from comparing them too much less I am mistaken.

First thing I noticed about this series was actually how faithful it is to the book – of what I can remember. Each book is split into two-hour long episodes and I’d say it covers the whole thing fantastically. I really liked that the intro to each pair of episodes changes with what they are about. So the first is all about their misery with Count Olaf; the second the terrible events with Uncle Monty; the third about crazy Aunt Josephine and lastly the child labour oddness at the lumber mill.

Quick explanation of the series. It follows the Baudelaire orphans after their parents perish in a fire at their home. They are then sent to live with a man they have never heard of called Count Olaf. The rest of the series revolves around them thwarting Count Olaf’s plans to steal their vast fortune which is being held until Violet, the oldest, comes of age. They  bounce around from guardian to guardian with Olaf on their heels the whole time.

I still don’t remember Count Olaf being so silly. It’s kind of why I didn’t like Jim Carey’s rendition of him. I always thought that we was more 85% menace and 15% goofy vs 50/50. I will say I didn’t mind NPH’s take on him and the more I watched the more I got over my preconceived opinions.

I quite enjoyed the child actors and Sunny is damn cute. Louis Hynes’s photo in the intro sequence reminds me a lot of Zachary Quinto when he wears glasses. The only gripe I have with the kids is how distracting it was when they used a CGI Sunny. Sunny is the baby FYI. I’m assuming since it is hard to work with a baby for various reasons they sometimes had to use a body double or a doll. It’s understandable, but they would CGI her head on and it was the only thing I could watch when it was on screen. It was toned/coloured so different then the rest of the screen, kind of glowing and then of course it didn’t move naturally.

The style, colouring and cinematography was really nice during the whole series. It’s generally pretty dark and muted with very dramatic colours popping out when there is a nice place that the orphans don’t get to go to.  I feel like sometimes I could really really tell when it was a set or a painted wall, but while I found that distracting I don’t think they tried hard to really hide it. Like it was well done, but I could still tell and by leaving it so it wasn’t super hidden I felt like it was almost a style choice on their part. Does that even make sense?

I am slightly confused about this added plot though. Here I go into trying to remember the books. In the first four at least I don’t remember anything about a secret society or these two other adults that are like super cool top secret spy people. Maybe someone can fill me in on what that is all about and if anything like that happens later in the book. Or you know, I guess I could google it…

 

Watch – Hardcore Henry

It’s late at night and you just want to watch some light hearted T.V., enter Hardcore Henry!

Oh man, I know this is rated fairly low on things like Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, but I thoroughly enjoyed myself. It’s all shot in first person of Henry himself. It very much reminds me of the ending to the DOOM movie with Dwayne Johnson, except better.

It defiantly feels like I’m watching someone play a video game. Like first person POV, cheesy villain, you’re dropped into a story which you need to figure out, shoot endless amounts of bad dudes- that are of course Russian – have a wacky sidekick and be nearly invincible.

Full of blood, gore, violence and random humor it was actually really fun to watch. I could see it getting lower scores because of the story line, but I thought over all the actual effects and whatnot were really well done.

Give it a go when you just want some rather mindless entertainment.

Watch – 3%

I was told to watch 3% in a conversation about Netflix with my cousin. It’s a TV show with just one season on Netflix so far. I’m glad he recommended it because I had seen it on the rotation a couple of times, but I’ll be honest I was  not inspired to click it by the artwork they chose to display it by. Wasn’t interested in the angry looking guy/gal glaring out at me. We watched the first episode and while I still wasn’t overly into main character, I did want to figure out where this was going.

The Scene

So this TV show from Brazil is set in what appears to the a slightly advanced technological future, but like most futuristic movies, there seems to be some weird thing that has happened that caused most of the population to have zero fashion sense and dress in rags. You have the Inland, where people live in poverty and all have dreams of one day trying to pass The Process to go the Offshore. The Inland is full of people who can’t sew, thieves, betrayal, thugs and just generally hard times. Nothing is really explained about why it is the way it is or why they can’t just go somewhere else on what appears to be a large land mass. All we know is there was a two people who took the initiative to leave and make a better life for themselves on what appears to be an island not to far off the main land mass. How they got there is never explained or why these people have so much technology and food and what not on an island. As you can see I have a couple gripes about this show. I really did enjoy it, I’m just an overly curious person and really want these questions answered. There was a system set up called The Process in which people from the Inland that are 20 years of age and have been registered can apply to. They then go through a series of tests to prove they have merit and be admitted to the Offshore. However not everyone believes in the system and The Cause is an organization wanting to bring it down.

Language

Since it is a Brazilian film it is in Portuguese, which if you don’t mind reading subtitles I would recommend watching it in the original language. However there is a dubbed version. It took us a while to get used to since the lips don’t sync up and some of the choices for the voices were…let’s say questionable.

Spoilers!

My cousins described it as a different Hunger Games, but I wouldn’t say that is completely accurate. They go through more mental tasks that may or may not drive them to behave bad in a physical way. People definitely get hurt and a few die and horrible ways for sure though. Through the show we watch the young adults work there way through the various tests, develop relationships, get back story and deal with The Cause. Michele the main character is in it to kill the man running the whole show, because she believes he killed her brother. Turns out that was a lie told to her to recruit her. She messes up in the end and accidentally kills another man and gets caught. However things work out and her and another Cause member make it through The Process and head off the the Offshore at the end of the season.

Safe Space

I really need a second season. There is far more to it then I have described above. I need to know what happens next and get far more of my questions answered.