User:LancedSoul/sandbox/Top 20 Best Movies of 2021

=Part One=



So like I said about the banner blog post, 2022 have gotten better year.

Once again, we are splitting into 2-parts. Ready for part one.





























































Results


This is not over yet. We are continues to part two as soon as I developed.

=Part Two=



Don't Worry Darling and Thor: Love and Thunder












Strange World






Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and Black Adam












Turning Red and Shazam! Fury of the Gods








XdKzUbAiswE

<youtube width = 320 height = 180>

As Turning Red, it brings up an interesting and unique question; what if humans turned into animals by becoming overcome with emotion and then reverted back to human by being calm? The musical score by Black Panther and Tenet composer Ludwig Göransson is awesome. In particular, the original songs by Billie Eilish and Finneas O'Connell for the fictional boy band 4*Town, "Nobody Like U", "True Love", and "U Know What's Up", are also pretty catchy. Much like fellow Pixar films Brave, Coco, Soul, and Luca, the setting's pretty solid since it's set in 2002 Canada, where Domee Shi was raised. Amazing, smooth, and beautiful animation, as expected from other Pixar movies standards as it captures the unique artstyle once again, and, much like Luca, it could be considered a love letter to the style of Studio Ghibli's outputs.

Like Bao, it stays true to the Chinese-Canadian culture. Cute and beautiful character designs, especially the red panda forms of the Lees, who is very detailed and fluffy to connect the unique artstyle. The way that a transformed Mei is hiding in a school restroom when a girl walks out of a bathroom stall is pretty funny. It avoids many clichés, like the infamous "twist villain". For instance, when Mei decided to go to the concert in order to see 4*Town, Ming turns into giant red panda, disrupts the concert and argues about Mei not going to the ritual, which makes her seem like she is the main antagonist, but it turns out it was reversed when Ming reformed herself and turned back to normal and its also worth mentioning that the scene is very dramatic and exciting to watch.

Mei Lee is a very likable and charming protagonist. Also, she is pretty adorable looking, especially in her giant red panda form. Her friends have also stolen fans' hearts for their quirky personalities and unconditional support of Mei's transformation. She is also the first Pixar character to be an Asian protagonist. Mei Lee's friends, Miriam, Priya and Abby, are also likable characters as well with their own individual personalities so they don't blend together.

Throughout the movie, it doesn't have any real villains. At first, Tyler seemed to be a villain, but he had a side arc of his own where he had to accept his weird quirks. Then, it seems as if the villain would be Ming, but even then, her actions aren't villainous, she was just wanting their relationship to stay the same for Mei. Like Soul, Turning Red manages to be mature and address serious topics as it shows significant things like puberty, parent/child issues, and even mensturation, which really helps the narrative and shows that Pixar is not afraid of show it.

The voice acting is fantastic, with newcomer Rosalie Chiang, Sandra Oh, Ava Morse, Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, Hyein Park, and Orion Lee being the best highlights. Jordan Fisher, Josh Levi, Topher Ngo, Finneas O'Connell, and Grayson Villanueva also do entertaining voice performances as the members of the 4*Town boy band - despite getting only one or two lines each outside of singing. A lot of the cast members, such as Maitreyi Ramakrishnan (Priya), Hyein Park (Abby), and even Sandra Oh (Ming) are Canadian while Sasha Roiz (Mr. Kieslowski) was raised there.

Unique plot twists that were well-executed, such as the reveal of Mei's family (except for Jin) being turned into red pandas in the climax for the concert at the Skydome stadium of 4*Town. The humor is well timed and clever, like the party dancing scene, and it doesn't overuse gross-out jokes, outside of the ending where Mei distracts Ming by twerking. Awesome directing from Domee Shi, who directed the Oscar winning short film Bao, since she chose this city as the backdrop of her film because it was her hometown.

The characters are very expressive thanks to the character designs, leading to a lot of fun expressions. The Pixar logo comes with a new twist. As soon as Luxo squishes the I in the Pixar logo, a little Chinese jingle would play briefly which is a good nod to Mei being Chinese-Canadian and Domee Shi herself.

And as ''Shazam! Fury of the Gods'', TBA

Nope




<youtube width = 320 height = 180>

Top Gun: Maverick and Sonic the Hedgehog 2








<youtube width = 320 height = 180>giXco2jaZ_4

<youtube width = 320 height = 180>47r8FXYZWNU

The Bad Guys and Apollo 10½: A Space Age Adventure








<youtube width = 320 height = 180>zpDuBXB_glk

<youtube width = 320 height = 180>Dzuz5s_Qk-A

As The Bad Guys, a running gag present in the movie is there is always hundreds of police cops when our protagonists get caught up in a chase or trying to escape. One would wonder how much the police need to apprehend criminals. Much like other movies, such as The Mitchells vs. the Machines, the film’s character design and animation style has been well received by fans and audiences, being compared favorably to Akira Toriyama and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and to a lesser extent, The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run. While he has very predictable and obvious plot twist, Rupert Marmalade is a decent antagonist, who suggests that Mr. Wolf's group start doing good deeds. In terms all of this, Richard Ayoade does a good voice performance of him.

It is faithful to the children's book series by Aaron Blabey. In fact, we finally get to see how they got Aaron Blabey as an executive producer. The humor is very good. Like the scene where Mr. Wolf attempting to pull his gang out of the gala by using his grappling hook gun. It fails utterly when the hook clips onto his pants and instead pulls them up, revealing him to be wearing pink boxers with white hearts. Everyone stares at him, surprised. (Note that the police cops didn't do anything at all as Mr. Wolf takes out the grappling hook, watching him with frozen glares. Though, they wouldn't need to immediately tackle the gang since his grappling hook is faulty eventually.)

While it is similar to Megamind (another DreamWorks Animation movie) and the first Despicable Me movie, the film does seem to know what it is, so it tries to win us over with its humor, action, and unique characters instead of the story and growth. And, for the important is, it succeeded at that, which is well-executed, since the movie was based on the book series. Fun and fast-paced action scene, like the chase scene between with the Bad Guy's car and the police car.

Very likable and believable characters, notably the Bad Guys (Mr. Wolf, Mr. Piranha, Mr. Snake, Mr. Shark, and Ms. Tarantula), who might be a bad guys gang, but can also be very relatable to pretend to be as a good guys gang. The DreamWorks logo comes with a new twist. Mr. Wolf used the grappling hook to climbs and lied down the moon that replaced the fisher boy and the background is change, which is nice mod to the film itself. Daniel Pemberton's soundtrack is awesome.

And as Apollo 10½: A Space Age Adventure, the animation is absolutely excellent and stunning that is the major upgrade of previous films by Richard Linklater. Much like Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly, it used the animation-style technique theme effect for live-action once again instead of using CGI characters for live-action, considering that it was directed by Richard Linklater. It introduces itself as a fantastical adventure about a Houston fourth-grader who's plucked out of school for a confidential NASA mission in the spring of 1969. This film is beautiful love letter to the space age.

Much like other animated films such as Luca and Turning Red, the movie can be viewed as autobiographical to director Richard Linklater's real life childhood. The narrator talks about how exciting it was to grow up in Houston in the 60s. The footage shown does have the aesthetics of the time period (hair, fashion, technology, the interior of the boys house, and discussions of hippies). Amazing voice acting, especially with Glen Powell, Jack Black, Zachary Levi and Josh Wiggins being highlighted example.

It features an interesting and unique premise that were never before seen: The first moon landing in the summer of 1969 from two interwoven perspectives – the astronaut and mission control view of the triumphant moment and through the eyes of a kid growing up in Houston, Texas who has intergalactic dreams of his own. It is as much a documentary about the time period as it is a science fiction fantasy and the blend here works wonderfully.

The Batman




<youtube width = 320 height = 180>mqqft2x_Aa4

Despite being rated PG-13, it has very a suspenseful and serious atmosphere by doing it correctly having a darker, edgy, and more violent tone that is really fitting and done right to help the narrative than even recent DC films that tried way too hard to be dark and edgy, much like Joker. The idea of the story about the Batman who must find out to the justice about the Zodiac Killer-type villain, The Riddler, who killed the characters by committing crimes in Gotham City, is pretty original.

Like Joker, Robert Pattinson did an outstanding work playing the Batman. While other Batman films like Michael Keaton and Christian Bale were fantastic casting choices at playing him and Bruce Wayne in the first two films in the Burton/Schumacher series and Dark Knight trilogy respectively, Pattinson's performance is just amazing as both, if not, even better. It's also impressive that his performance is a huge improvement over Edward Cullen from The Twilight Saga, considering how both characters are from bat/vampire lore, even through Batman is a normal human. It explores the Batman's second year as Gotham's Caped Crusader rather than retelling his origin story once again since it would be repeating the origin story we’ve seen countless times before. Awesome and epic action scenes, to be expected with DC movies, like the car chase between Penguin's car and the Batmobile and the final battle with Batman and Catwoman fighting the Riddler's followers in Gotham Stadium for the flood.

It finally features a modern version of the Riddler who last appeared in Batman Forever and the Penguin who last appeared in Batman Returns. The film opens with Riddler's first murder on Halloween for Gotham City mayor Don Mitchell Jr., then we get to see how this version of Batman operates. He stalks the streets of Gotham disguised as a drifter, ready to change into Batman at a moment’s notice and he does so when a group of thugs accosts a traveler on the subway. It serve as a stand-alone film unconnected to other DC universes, like the DC Extended Universe, which means the film doesn't need to do fan service and connect to other films in order to hint them. Zoë Kravitz playing as Selina Kyle / Catwoman in this movie again after she voiced the character in The Lego Batman Movie. Carmine Falcone was played by an Italian American actor (John Turturro).

While it was almost three hours long, there is nothing considered boring at times since the pacing works well so we can explore the elements in the film unlike Eternals. Robert Patterson (Batman) and Zoë Kravitz (Catwoman) have interesting chemistry. Amazing direction from Matt Reeves, the director of Cloverfield and the modern Planet of the Apes trilogy. The Riddler is an excellent villain who has the most unique motivation rather than a "generic doomsday villain". His design is also awesome, considering that this time he's a Zodiac Killer-type villain, making him a creative villain. The Penguin is also an amazing villain, who is inspired by characters from The Godfather. His popularity was helped by Colin Farrell's performance.

Michael Giacchino's soundtrack is really unique and arguably one of the best soundtracks in the movie, so what else do you expect? The full 6-minute version of Michael Giacchino's Batman theme is a majestic mixture of dread, loss, and triumph befitting of The Dark Knight's journey. The first proper trailer's usage of "Something in the Way" by Nirvana combined with Michael Giacchino's new Batman theme (first glimpsed in a "camera test" teaser) really gives off the dark vibes of the Dark Knight's world. The theme for the Riddler is a deeply unnerving combination of One-Woman Wail and Ominous Music Box Tune. Catwoman's theme is mysterious, sensual, romantic, and calm, with a feeling of sadness and tragedy underneath it just like Catwoman herself. The overall harsh and dissonant tone with a dash of a "taps" feel score can be considered a listening companion piece to either Jerry Goldsmith's First Blood and Outland scores or Alan Silvestri's Ricochet score.

It draws inspiration from other media, including 1970s films such as The French Connection (1971), Klute (1971), The Godfather (1972), Chinatown (1974), All the President's Men (1976), Taxi Driver (1976), the works of Alfred Hitchcock, the comic Year One (1987) by Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli, The Long Halloween (1996–1997) by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale, and Ego (2000) by Darwyn Cooke and Jon Babcock. An awesome cameo tease of the Joker, who appears in Arkham Asylum, during the near-ending where it was credited as "Unseen Arkham Prisoner" played by Barry Keoghan.

The Northman




<youtube width = 320 height = 180>oMSdFM12hOw

Lightyear




<youtube width = 320 height = 180>wHBBoUtJHhA

Results


That's all for now, get ready for 2023 in late December in 2023 or early January in 2024.