sarahelizabethparker

I just watched this with my parents for Christmas. I'm giving it 3 stars because my dad somehow managed to sit through the whole thing without leaving. If it had been any worse he would've left. But this is bad. So so bad. 3 stars is generous. The whole time we were either sitting there saying "we are so bored" or saying "this is so dumb"

What happened?! Who wrote this?! The first movie was SO good. It was magical. Refreshing. New. Rewatchable. Inspiring.

This sequel however, was the complete opposite. An absolute SLOG to get through. Almost nothing in this movie worked. Romance was stale. Humor unfunny. Villains laughable. Stunt work terrible. Writing cliche and predictable. Plot holes galore.

This sequel definitely felt like a DCEU movie. While they waited to release this in theaters...COULDN'T THEY HAVE TAKEN THE TIME TO WORK ON THE CGI SOME MORE? God this CGI was a mess. The battle between Wonder Woman and Cheetah was hard to watch.

Patty Jenkins really blew it on this one. The first one must have been just luck because she completely wasted 4 talented actors and a huge budget on this.

The only positives I have for this are:

• Gal Gadot
• Chris Pine
• Pedro Pascal
• Kristen Wiig
• the underlying themes
• SOME of the costuming

The negatives:

• Dialogue (so horrendously bad)
• characterization
• SO PREDICTABLE
• cheesy
• unfunny
• CGI
• stunt work
• music (sorry Hans Zimmer but this soundtrack was LAZY yikes)
• bad pacing
• too long
• too many villains (they should have cut cheetah or made her the main villain)

Ugh this movie is aggravating. DO NOT WASTE YOUR TIME. Just watch the first movie again or watch something else entirely.

This movie was HILARIOUS at times with all of the "baby girls," unrealistic plot, and Laura's sudden acceptance of being kidnapped.

I will say though....this movie was shot well and had a good film score. So, effort was made at least. The main actors were hot so there's also that.

I mean...it's better than Fifty Shades of Grey. Is that a high bar though? Probably not. Is this movie good? Probably not. Would I watch a sequel? Heck yeah, for the laughs.

You'll enjoy it if you like so-bad-it's-funny movies and/or erotica.

I'm giving this show a VERY GENEROUS 8/10. For efficiency, let me break this show down to the elements:

ACTING: I think all of the actors did a wonderful job in this. It was very easy to root for all of the main characters, and Ji-Hyun Jun played an unconventional female lead very well, even if the writing did lean very heavily on the typical "manic-pixie-dreamgirl" trope. But zero hate towards all of the actors. They did a good job. My one harp would be towards the two leads, as their chemistry was good (don't get me wrong) but it wasn't as good as it could've been. They didn't have that raw, sexual energy (for a lack of a better term). Either way, their chemistry didn't heavily impact my view of the show.

DIRECTING: Not much to say here. Great job. Good visuals. AMAZING underwater scenes.

MUSIC: Again, some amazing music. I've downloaded most of the songs from the soundtrack.

WRITING: Like most kdramas, *sigh*, this is where most of my critiques come from. Can no kdrama stick a landing? The show just DRAGGED on and on. I felt like characters had the same conversations over and over again. And yet, with all that time, the writers couldn't find time to develop the sideship (Tae Oh and Shi Ah) more? They had like 5 scenes and were suddenly engaged OFF SCREEN?!

The first 10 or so episodes were strong, don't get me wrong. But it felt like the writing was too thin to stretch out over a span of 20 episodes. If everyone in this show's lives are repeating over and over again, why can't we see other "reincarnations"? Why just the one Joseon period one?

Also, there were MANY plot holes in this that were hard to overlook. The writers needed to establish consistent rules for mermaids. It was never clear what exactly their lifespans were, HOW they were born (since Cheong didn't have parents) and even the rules of them being able to stay on land? Cheong says MANY times that she can stay on land only if she is with the one she loves. Otherwise her heart fails. YET her heart continues to fail even after Cheong and Joon Jae were telling everyone they were boyfriend/girlfriend? I don't want to spoil too much...but the last 2 episodes were very frustrating for me in terms of writing and characters making nonsensical decisions.

All in all, the show gets a kind 8/10 stars, mostly because I enjoyed the first half of the show so much and that iconic "disgusting s***" line. But, I definitely watched the last 5 episodes in fast forward.