A_kind_of_Nick Reviews

The Invitation (II) (2022)

A boring watching experience with an unlikable protagonist

[3/10 · 29 May 2024]

I'm always very disappointed when a film with great potential turns out to be a bad-written story with a bunch of clichés.

Basically, we can summarize things like this: Evie Alexander is the "heroine" of the story because she's a strong, black woman. She doesn't really have any redeeming qualities: she's stuck in a job she doesn't like, she makes pottery without really seeming to have any talent in it, she seems to be constantly late, she jumps on the first attractive rich man that she sees and agrees to marry him in less than 48 hours... We're supposed to like her, but I just couldn't. She's the type of heroine who "simply knows better", drenched in self-righteousness. And of course, she can triumph over 4 vampires and a bunch of other antagonists thanks to her gumption. -_-

I appreciate what they tried to do with the whole Bram Stocker's Dracula thing, but it was a miss for me. The lore is flimsy and unstable at best, the characters don't act like actual human beings, the story is uninteresting... Frankly, I regret watching this movie.

American Born Chinese (2023)

A Very Confusing Show

[4/10 · 29 May 2023]

I'm neither American nor Chinese, so everything about this show is "foreign" to me. That is usually a good thing; it allows me to travel, explore other cultures, discover different customs, etc.

In this case, Chinese folklore and mythology are heavily present, yet almost nothing is explained about them. Gods? Demons (which for some reason were animals before)? Heaven? Great sage? Jade Emperor? Princess Iron Fan? Those terms and names are thrown around constantly but never explained or contextualized.

The story also doesn't make a low of sense. They know there's a rebellion going on in heaven, but they still let a young monkey descend on Earth with a weapon of unknown power. For ancient gods and demons, they sure are dumb.

As for the makeup of some characters, it looks particularly dumb; it reminded me of The Planet of the Apes (1968), and not in a good way.

But I think the last straw that broke the camel's back is episode 4, which is basically a flashback styled after 70s Chinese dramas. It honestly felt like a fever dream, and 10 minutes into it, I couldn't wait for it to be over. I felt assailed by the images on the screen.

I still haven't watched episode 5, and I don't know if I will.

Last Light (2022)

Written for the wrong decade

[4/10 · 17 March 2023]

Let me start by saying this: Last Light is not very good as far as series go.

• The acting is meh at best.

• The plot is full of holes.

• The story has potential but is not very interesting.

• The overall result is a monotonous series that would have worked much better if the action had taken place in the 1990s.

Here is what I mean:

Basically, without giving too much away, the bad guy and his underlings do something that corrupts the oil supply, which makes cars, trucks, and all other things that require oil to work useless.

Until then, it's okay. But then, cell phones have trouble working; the same happens with the Internet, WiFi, and electricity, resulting in massive blackouts and very limited means of communication all over Europe. And because of all that, the main characters, separated into three groups in different countries, can barely communicate with each other.

It makes ZERO sense for all that to happen in 2022/2023. Corrupted oil has NO IMPACT WHATSOEVER on electricity, the Internet, WiFi, satellites in space, etc. In reality, the characters should be able to communicate very easily with each other using their cell phones.

However, if the action of the series had taken place in the 1990s, it would have made a lot more sense for the characters to be unable to communicate with each other since the Internet and cellphones were not that common back then.

On a more positive note, I was gladly surprised when they used actual French-speaking actors to play French characters instead of bigger names butchering the language. It felt refreshing and respectful. But that's the only thing I liked about the series.

Honestly, I recommend skipping Last Light.

Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio (2022)

My favorite Pinocchio version so far

[10/10 · 12 December 2022]

I'm not going to lie: this movie would have given me nightmares as a kid. Full-blow, fever-inducing nightmares.

Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio is what you would get if you mixed The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), James and the Giant Peach (1996), and Coraline (2009) with the basic premise of Pinocchio's fairy tale. James and the Giant Peach did a number on me as a little boy, just like this movie would probably have.

It's a dark, surprising take on Pinnochio's story, and I loved it. I think the original story takes place in the 1800s, while this version takes place during the 2nd World War. Did you ever think you would see war, bombs, fascism, Mussolini and biblical angels in the same movie as our dear little wooden puppet? I sure didn't, but I LOVED IT.

I'll give this movie a second watch, maybe even a third.

Three Pines (2022)

You wouldn't believe this series is taking place in Québec

[4/10 · 6 December 2022]

When I learned that we would see Chief Inspector Armand Gamache on screen, I immediately started worrying. Nonetheless, I gave the series a shot and watched the first episode.

A bit of context:

Armand Gamache works for the Sûreté du Québec, which is Québec's provincial police corps. People whose mother tongue is French represent almost 80% of the population. French is also the only official language of the province. This means that French is very present, although a little less in certain large cities such as Montreal and Laval, where there are also many Anglophones and people who are bilingual, trilingual, etc.

The series is primarily located in Three Pines, a village in the Eastern Townships of Québec (Cantons-de-l'Est), which are predominantly French-speaking. In some cities, such as Sherbrooke and Granby, Francophones even represent 90-95% of the population.

Do you see where I'm going with this?

The issue:

French and Francophones are all but erased from this series. You hear words of French here and there, and even then, it's not well done. CC's character, for example, spoke in 2 very different accents (from France and Québec) in a matter of minutes. If you don't speak French, you might not have heard the difference, but to me, it was jarring. It was like hearing a Mexican character switch between accents from Mexico and Spain as if it was normal. CC's husband seems to have trouble speaking French, Jean-Guy Beauvoir's character speaks in a weird Parisian French accent that absolutely no one from Québec would have... It's a mess.

You are left with a weird sense of disrespect and confusion. Imagine making a series about an Italian chief inspector who leads an investigation in a small village in Italy. But everyone speaks English, signs and displays are in English, and you sprinkle words of semi-authentic Italian here and there for an exotic touch. That's what watching Three Pines feels like to me.

I get it; the series was made in English with a predominantly English-speaking cast. But at this point, it might have been better to change the location of the series to another Canadian province or the United States.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (2022– )

A gorgeous, but boring and badly-written show

[4/10 · 8 September 2022]

I'll start with the obvious: The Rings of Power looks absolutely stunning. It's amazing what we can do nowadays thanks to technology.

That being said, I find the show itself pretty boring and, quite frankly, badly written. Here are a few of the problems I have identified so far (2 episodes):

• Galadriel is portrayed as an angry teenager with a sword bent on revenge even though she's supposed to be around 5,000 years old at the time of the series. She doesn't care about her own soldiers suffering and dying, to the point that her troops rebel against her orders very early on in the show. We are supposed to empathize with her and relate to her, but when it comes down to it, she's a pretty terrible person. She's ABSOLUTELY NOT the Galadriel we know and love from the LOTR and The Hobbit movies.

• The Harfoots are "filthy, hungry simpletons with stage-Irish accents" (the words of The Irish Times, not mine). They're not the worst aspect of the show, but I find them very forgettable, and every time we came back to their part of the story, I realized I wasn't even wondering about them.

• Halbrand, who is probably going to be one of the main characters (or at least an important one) doesn't exist in Tolkien's lore. He's a complete creation from Amazon. At this point, it would be like making a Harry Potter series and adding a 4th, completely new friend to the group.

• Most Elves act, feel and look like humans with pointy ears instead of ethereal, otherworldly beings. Seriously, compare them to Orlando Bloom, Liv Tyler, Cate Blanchett or Lee Pace and you'll immediately know what I mean. It's almost like they tried to choose the least elvish-looking actors they could find.

• Even though the world of The Rings of Power looks gorgeous, it's not captivating. In a 2-hour running time, which is equal to a full, regular movie, we are still being set up for what is coming. It means that very little has actually happened so far.

Overall, I'm pretty disappointed with The Rings of Power. I really wanted to like this show, but several times while I was watching it, I got up to get a drink or a snack only to realize, once in the kitchen, that I hadn't even paused the TV. I didn't even care that the show was still playing in the background. And I'm the type to pause a movie to let someone sneeze.

Everything's Gonna Be All White (2022)

This feels like a mockumentary, but sadly, it's not.

[1/10 · 9 March 2022]

I would give this show 0/10, but since the minimal rating here is 1/10, here we go.

I was already appalled after watching the trailer, but somehow, the first episode managed to be even worse. All I see and hear is racism, division, hatred, ignorance, prejudice, intellectual shortcuts, generalizations, ridiculous statements... It's almost impressive.

I kid you not, at some point in the first episode, someone says this:

"White people never got over losing the civil war."

The civil war was almost entirely fought by white people... against white people. It was an internal conflict -- Americans VS Americans. So white people both lost AND won the war...

I'm aware of this when I'm not even an American, but for some reason, this fact seems to have totally escaped the American creators of the documentary.

Oh! And apparently, today, white people should feel responsible for slavery! Please... There's a saying that goes: "The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son." I'm not about to feel guilt for the horrible things some dead assholes from another country did before I was born because we happen to share a skin color.

"Everything's Gonna Be All White" tries to fight hate, ignorance and racism with more hate, ignorance and racism. Guess what? It never works.

Richie Rich (2015)

This show is so bad it's sad

[1/10 · 26 April 2015]

I loved the Richie Rich movie (1994) with Macaulay Culkin when I was a kid. Of course, once I watched it again as an adult, I found some things in the movie just dumb, but I could still see why I loved it so much. It was well written, had a good plot, good actors, etc.

This Richie Rich show, however, is simply bad. No, wait, I have a better word for it: horrendous. Story is pretty much inexistent, characters and dialogues are horribly written, and actors are just... not good. After watching a few episodes, I couldn't take it anymore.

I know they are just kids that were probably just very poorly directed, but still, this is something else. They remind me of puppies that are avidly learning to do new tricks. In this case, their "punchlines" are the tricks, and the "laughs" are the rewards. And honestly, it gives a stink of desperation to the whole show. They kinda look like they are on speed or ecstasy too. Yep, a bunch of puppies on drugs, that's pretty much what they look like to me.

And let's not forget the obviously objectified/sexualized robot French maid... She has the best lines, and she's a freaking robot! And just like all the other characters, she's an overused stereotype that is just inappropriate. It's like they took her character from a bad indie porn movie and put it in a kids show on Netflix.

I don't often take time to review movies/series, but this show just made me so mad I had to vent somehow. I can't believe such a show can still be produced in 2015. It's sad for the actors, because you sense they do have potential and talent hidden behind the poor direction, but I officially brand this as unwatchable. There's too much wrong stuff at the same time, and I honestly don't understand how someone could enjoy it.