It’s been awhile since I’ve done a blog post that was just talking about movies I have seen recently. The world sure has changed, and now with streaming being what it is, people are not as excited about going out to the movies as they used to be when now they can just wait to see it at home. But I still love the experience of going to the movie theater. It was the thing I missed the most when we were all under lockdown during the pandemic, so I don’t take it for granted when there are new movies that look interesting or are based on something I’m into. There has been a lot of discourse over whether or not these movies are actually good, and that’s fair, but here’s what I think! No major spoilers, I hope.

Let’s start with Super Mario Galaxy. I had been dreaming about an animated Mario movie since I was a kid, but when the first Super Mario Bros. Movie was announced, I was optimistic that it would be good, even though I am not a huge follower of the works of Illumination studio. I just can’t get on board with the Minions, OK? What are they, corn? They’re corn, right? Yes, they must be. Anyway, I thought the first Mario movie was over all pretty good. It was fun and had some heart to it, but I knew that there was no way it would ever have a chance of being as good as that non-existent movie I had been thinking about for my entire life. Which is fine. I accept that. Now for the sequel, they decide to jump all the way ahead to the Galaxy games, a surprising move, but not unwelcome. Super Mario Galaxy is one of my most favorite games, after all, so I was hoping the movie would give me some of those feelings I got while playing it years ago. And it did… sometimes… kind of.

When the movie starts and you see Rosalina’s Comet Observatory, it really hit me that I had spent a lot of time there while playing the game. It was a nice feeling to kick the movie off, and I had hoped there would be more moments like it. It’s true that the movie was full of recognizable characters and environments and fun Easter eggs from the Galaxy games and the rest of the series, but they crammed so much stuff into it that a lot of it just zipped right by.  The Super Mario Galaxy games presented so many memorable moments to the player that give you the feelings of the epic scope of the adventure, the massive danger of the challenges you face, the whimsical sense of exploration and discovery, and the cold, lonely melancholy of being in space. The movie doesn’t really have much of that. It often came close, but before it can really make you feel something, it’s on to the next part of the story. Even the music, as great as it was, teased me with the nostalgia of a familiar tune at the perfect scene before it yanked the rug out from underneath itself and morphed into a different piece of music, changing the vibe entirely. Overall, I’m not going to say that I hated it. It did give us a lot of Mario and the gang for our money, plus all that other stuff that wasn’t even from a Mario game, and I have to credit them for stuffing as much Nintendo as they could into the film’s run time, but what I really wanted was an occasion to breath and appreciate it.

Mortal Kombat II was a decently fun time at the movies. I liked the first in the series, but I understand how some people were disappointed because it didn’t actually feature the tournament like you’d expect, and it also focused a lot of time on a character that wasn’t even from any of the games. Well, MKII gets right to it, and pretty much gives you all the Mortal Kombat you could hope to handle. All the lore is there, and all the characters looked pretty familiar, and it was mostly very faithful, which I appreciate as a fan because we all know how it feels to be disappointed by an adaptation of something we like that isn’t faithful and doesn’t even bother to try. The movie itself isn’t that deep, but it’s Mortal Kombat, so it doesn’t need to be. There were some cool fights, but I miss the kind of fighting you’d see in martial arts movies made in the 90s, which they just don’t do anymore. I found it interesting that, even though it was a sequel, the 2 main characters the story presented were not even in the first. If there is a MKIII, I’d like to see if they would do that again, and maybe make the main characters Smoke and the younger Sub-Zero.

Finally, there’s some new Star Wars! The Mandalorian and Grogu is a fun adventure movie, and a lot of the marketing seemed to position it as being akin to the old Hollywood serials. Yeah, there was a fair bit of that, and you’d expect that kind of thing from Star Wars, but I also picked up some vibes that reminded me of those cheap sci-fi movies you’d catch on cable TV back in the day. But in a good way! Obviously I am a loyal Star Wars fan and have seen all the episodes of The Mandalorian, so I can’t speak to it in terms of it being relevant to people who have never seen either show or any of the movies before, but I’ve been hearing that people are seeing this film and enjoying it even without knowing anything about either. It bewilders me that that anybody would want to go see a movie about a show they’ve never seen, but it stands to reason that every Star Wars could be somebody’s first, and I’m happy to see that this one could potentially still work that way. So, I’m not upset about anything like unmet expectations that other people might have, as it never promised to be the next big deal in the Mandalorian story, and I never cared about it showing any grand revelations or anything like that. I saw it as a chance to get one big start-to-finish adventure with these characters on the big screen, and that’s exactly what it was. I have a feeling I’ll like it more after I watch it again in the future.

All 3 of these movie had mixed receptions from audiences, and I think that’s just the way things are these days. People are more jaded in general, and I admit that I am too, and have been for a long time, but I save my jadedness for all the other stupid stuff that happens in the world. When it comes to movies, I generally try to find something to like. In general, I liked all 3 of these movie well enough, even if my mind wasn’t blown by any of them. But I think the buzz in the air is telling me that the main event of the Summer season is going to be the Masters of the Universe movie, and I’m looking forward to seeing that one for sure.

Sayonara.