simbiat

They played it safe. The premise of the series had what it takes to scale up in its insanity similar to something like Gurren Lagann or something. It, technically, did try to do that: it started with a small group, which moved to a bigger group, then to group with gods, then to space, and even beyond. But it was not leaning into the insanity of it all as much as it could have and should have.

Even the characters selected were (mostly) minor ones from MCU, probably to reduce chances of fans saying something bad, in case something went "wrong". Which completely missed the point of the original comics (or at least those, that I read years ago). Those were insane and brutal and unapologetic in both. And it was the whole point: they picked up familiar characters and put them into conditions which often flipped their behaviors, truly asking "What if?".

In TV adaptation it's just... Meh? Yes, it's just 4 episodes, but it probably could have been 1, maybe 1 and a half and, because there was barely any impact or anything interesting. Mad Max like moment was ok (unclear how skrulls got involved, though), last mass fight was good, but everything else was underdeveloped, and mostly meaningless for the main story as result. But it's not in fashion in MCU to slow down the pace and explore deeper topics, I guess.

Which, again, was part of the appeal of the comics. It could have been seen as somewhat goofy at first sight, perhaps, but zombification there brought up serious discussion about loss and death in general. Which is not really discussed that much in MCU unless it's something like "I lost my mentor, and now I am not that motivated to fight crime". That is just a plot device, and nothing more.

Overall, it's watchable, of course, but not that impressive. I guess that may explain why I did not see that much hype about it.

I like how the origin story is shown as a retrospective documentary. Not only does it save time, but also does some world-building by establishing the relationship between the team and the city. Galactus looks somewhat good, maybe even cool. Until he sniffs a tree. That's just weird. But other than that... Totally forgettable.

This is not a bad movie, but I do not think it has any hooks in it. It does not have anything memorable. I finished watching it like 10 minutes ago, and I already am starting to forget it. It also felt padded in some places, even though it was obviously cut to be less than 2 hours. Those paddings might have worked better if this was a TV show like The Penguin, where there was a lot of intentionality behind these kind of "optional" scenes. In this movie, though...

They are kinda soulless. I'd argue everything is soulless here even. Or at least "bland". I appreciate, that in this interpretation Johnny is not just a hothead, and does show some smarts (others often forget, that he was a scientist, too), but where is the hotheadedness here, really? Where's the spark, where's the humor? They briefly touched on Reed's tendency of imagining the worse, but did not go deep enough, too.

As such, I think I like Thunderbolts more. That one knew that it's about losers trying to step up and did not try to pretend to be anything else. F4 seems lost in itself. Maybe it should have been a TV show? To have more time to explore what made F4 stand out in the first place? That is family dynamics, and how these standard routines and interactions work in a super-family. Could have been like some old cartoons or TV shows with every episode being standalone. Charmed, but super-heroes.

You may still be able to enjoy this movie for one evening, though. Just don't expect anything more.

Movie about nothing. I mean, technically, there is a plot, but it's more like a bunch of situations, that tied together, trying to survive. Which does depict life in russia quite accurately. Considering that the movie does succeed in certain level of authenticity of the atmosphere, I am not even surprised, that it just re-affirmed my reluctance to ever return to russia, even though I know, that I will have to, at some point, at least once.

I do not know if that was the intention, but to me it looked like the movie was meant to show how utterly hopeless life in russia is. How corrupt, how perverted, how up-side-down. There was no semblance of happiness anywhere, and as "the plot" progressed it became progressively worse. I believe this was meant to criticize "people with power", though, and perhaps others saw that more clearly, since the director had to kind of "pay back" for this later on with "Stena" (or so they say).

But there is a chance, that this was not even intentional. Why? Because characters are completely flat. And, yes, for the "villain" of the story that is probably fine, but for the rest?.. Not so sure. Their motivations, and their relationships are very... Strange. I get it, that we are not show their whole lives here, but that's true for most movies, and there are quite a few, that are able to better explain what drives the characters. The most obvious here is Lilya, because there was nothing prompting her to get involved with Dmitrii. At least, nothing that was shown to us.

Are we supposed to imagine? To guess? That's certainly an approach, but I do not think it works that well here. Or maybe I just forgot what it's like living in russia, since at the time of writing I have not been there for 4 years? Maybe if I watched it, while I was still there, I would have appreciated constant alcohol consumption on the screen a bit more, and understand the "philosophy" better? As is, I just did not get any emotions from the movie, so consider it a waste of my time.