Mike_Devine

As the Marvel Retread Parade carries on, we see longstanding IP continuing to get a makeover in 2025's 'The Fantastic Four: First Steps.'

After a few tries to make the fab 4 happen for a new generation, Disney is hoping the third time is the charm with this seemingly random crew of Pedro Pascal, Vanessa Kirby, Ebon Moss-Bachrach and Joseph Quinn. There is next to no chemistry between these actors in these roles, regardless of how many one-liners are thrown into the script. Pascal and Kirby are good actors in their own right, but it just doesn't work in this retro-futuristic NYC.

Aside from the cast, the plot itself is fairly vanilla, so maybe it's unfair to place so much blame on the talent given their source material is generic at best. Sure, the villain (Galactus) is sort of formidable, but he's no Thanos. And yes, some of the CGI is okay, but it's not first-rate. So perhaps it's fine that some of Marvel's B-team superheroes get a B-movie treatment...but we as viewers probably still deserve better.

The core issue with 'Four' is it just feels ordinary. It seems that 'Avengers: Endgame' really spelled the end of Marvel's glory days, and now all we have left are scraps and reboots. Maybe it's time we put this universe in the back of the freezer until our appetite resets.

Kathryn Bigelow has made a name for herself in directing films the fit squarely in the military thriller subgenre, typically centered around specific missions or situations that resonate with audiences given their ties to real-world issues. While most of these movies have been set abroad or on the battlefield, 2025's 'A House of Dynamite' brings things much closer to home - literally, our homeland.

What makes 'Dynamite' unique is the way it's filmed. By being able to peel back the onion to see how different parties are experiencing the same harrowing onscreen events, we get to understand the characters' backgrounds, motives and factors that influence their decision making. On point here is an all-star cast - from Rebecca Ferguson and Idris Elba to Jason Clarke and Greta Lee - everyone here pulls their weight and delivers a performance that breathes authenticity into their roles. Seeing how everyone's behavior and demeanor evolves (or more appropriately, devolves) as reality sets in is also a fascinating glimpse into the human mind and our natural instincts.

Everything here is carefully crafted, including the camerawork and cinematography, to make the pressure cooker of an event feel as close to real as possible. The score by Volker Bertelmann only heightens the intensity of the situation, bringing the prospect of a nuclear threat even closer to home.

While some may question the accuracy of 'Dynamite' when compared to how the U. S. government and military would respond to a real-life rogue attack, it's interesting to consider what this could look like with the hope that this stays exactly where it belongs - in the cinematic world.

Twenty-two years after Steven Speilberg's original blockbuster hit theaters and a decade after Colin Treverrow revived the franchise, we experience a new generation of dino hunters in 'Jurassic World: Rebirth' at the hand of Gareth Edwards.

As we've seen with previous installments of the 'Jurassic' cinematic universe, they generally have jaw-dropping special effects but can be hit or miss depending on the script, cast and screenwriting. Here, we're introduced to newcomers to the franchise but familiar faces nonetheless, with ScarJo taking the helm as a swashbuckling agent for hire on a mission to provide cover for a greedy pharma exec as he commands a crew of mercenaries to extract DNA from mutated dinos so his company can make a lot of money by developing a cardiometabolic drug. Okay.

The plot is as good as you're gonna get in a film like this given all the lore that precedes it across six films, but that doesn't make it great. While Johansson is joined by the likes of Mahershala Ali, Jonathan Bailey and Rupert Friend, they are not much of a match for the uglysauruses they run into down on the forbidden equatorial island they ransack.

Sure, the special effects are above average, as is Alexandre Desplat's original soundtrack (although it doesn't hold a candle to John Williams'). Still, this doesn't make up for what seems like a complete and utter retread of something we've seen more than a few times by now. Yes, this outing gets points for trying to return to the roots of the original trilogy vs. The "off the rails" ending to the 'World' franchise. But in doing so, it just ends up feeling pointless.

Edwards is a great director, but sometimes studios should learn when it's time to just lets some of their IP fade into the sunset.