Today, I will do things a bit different.  Movie reviews! :-D

We made the trip into the city to see a couple of movies for my daughter’s birthday.  With the drive being more than an hour, it made sense to take advantage of it and see two.

In the afternoon, we saw The Incredibles 2, then Solo; A Star Wars Story in the evening.

So I will start with The Incredibles 2.

It’s hard to believe that the first movie came out 14 years ago!  We enjoyed that one, and after reading some reviews, I was really looking forward to seeing it.

I was not disappointed.  I would even go so far as to say, The Incredibles 2 was incredible.

Ah, ha!  I slay me!

Sorry about that.  ;-)

Before the movie started, there was a short called Bao.

We followed from baby bao through angsty teenager bao, to little bearded bao, introducing his fiance to his mother.  I won’t give out any spoilers, but Mom’s reaction to that was not at all what I expected to see!  Yeah.  I teared up.  I also loved the way it ended.  So touching!

On to the main feature.

The movie begins where the first movie ended, which I think was a wise move on the part of the creators, even if they did drop the antagonist pretty much immediately.  After the movie ended and the girls and I were talking about it, I noted that they never did catch that particular bad guy!

Visually, the movie was really beautiful.  They kept the same aesthetic, while the graphics were simply so much better.  At one point, a character walked into the scene and she is wearing a knit cardigan.  Being a fibre artist myself, my eyes made a beeline for it.  The detail, textures and drape of it were amazing.  This was true of everything.  The physics of things like how Elastigirl’s body responded while being a parachute, for example.  The flow of water.  Jack Jack’s transformations.

The movie did come with a warning that several scenes would have bright, flashing lights.  Those definitely were potentially seizure inducing!  But they were also a vital part of the story.

Which leads me to the next thing; the story line.  Which was also really well done.  You had all the family dynamics going on, as the family struggles with the consequences of what happened in the previous movie.  They’ve got no jobs, no home, and with the government project shut down, no support system to help them start over again.  Basically, you’ve got a regular family, trying to figure what they’re going to do next.  They just happen to also have superpowers that are illegal for them to use.

Within all the superhero antics in the story line, this family dynamic continues to play out.  Ultimately, it is their strength as a family, working together, that makes them strong as superheros, too.  As Supers, none of them could reach their full potential on their own.  It is only when they come together as a group that they succeed.

Among the highlights is when Edna Mode and Jack Jack are brought together.  It was hilarious!

The whole thing was very well done, and I would highly recommend seeing it.  No, you don’t need kids, either. :-D

This is a movie I would happily see again, and we will probably buy it when the disc comes out.

Then we saw Solo.

With this one, I’d heard that it was not doing well in the theatres, and was not well liked, but not a whole lot beyond that.  When I first heard they were making a movie about young Han Solo, my reaction was basically, why?  Was there some sort of interest in Han’s back story I missed?

Apparently, not.

Still, I was interested in seeing for myself.

If The Incredibles 2 was incredible, Solo was…

Loud.

Incredibly loud.

I have no idea what was going on in this auditorium, but we spent much of the movie with our fingers in our ears.  It was painful.  I still feel half deaf because of it, after nearly 3 hours.

As for the movie itself…

Well, it was kinda entertaining.  It wasn’t bad, but I wouldn’t call it good, either.  It was just… there.  Lots of action.  Lots of fight scenes and flying scenes and flying fight scenes.

Aside from Han, Chewy and Lando, basically all the characters were new, but none of them were really developed enough to care what happened to them.  The details revealed as the story line developed were not things that mattered.  Did anyone really clamor to know how Han got his surname, or his blaster?  Then there was that pair of dice that kept showing up.  Yeah, it played a part in the Star Wars; the Last Jedi, and you could tell that’s the only reason they got written into this side story.  Stuff like that could have been dropped completely, and no one would have noticed.

Ultimately, when it came to the story progression, there just wasn’t a lot of reason given to care about the story or the characters.  So if all you want is to be entertained and see some cool flying and fighting scenes, it’ll fit the bill.  As far as the plot, it was pretty mediocre, and for all the attempts to throw in twists and turns, they were all really predictable.  It certainly didn’t live up to the standard set by Rogue One.

I’m glad to have seen it, but have no interest in seeing it again.  Definitely not something I’d have any interest in owning.

In conclusion: I would definitely recommend seeing The Incredibles 2.  It’s fantastic.

As for Solo; not really.  Maybe rent it, if you are really curious, but I wouldn’t recommend paying theatre prices to see it.

The Re-Farmer