Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016)

It would be easy to dismiss Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them as little more than a misguided studio attempt to drag out a very profitable franchise that by all means concluded. Can't blame anyone for looking at this and imagining something akin to the disastrously stretched out Hobbit trilogy. And yet, with the strength of J.K. Rowling writing the screen play and long time Potter director David Yates at the helm, this sort of prequel might actually be one of the best films in the series.

What is a bit refreshing about it is that as a prequel, it does not connect in any sort of substantial way to the events of the original octalogy. There are passing references to Hogwarts. Albus Dumbledore's name gets dropped. There are Easter eggs that the die-hard Potter nerd will catch, but none of them matter to the plot of this film. Instead, Fantastic Beasts really just expands the world and makes it surprisingly more interesting than it already was, all by simply expanding into America.

Yes, this makes it sound like a very American-centric view, but one of the problems with the other Potter films is that they all take place in pretty much the same places. It was almost always Hogwarts, which as a location became a bit of a drag. Otherwise, it was just a few London locations and then random small towns and forests in Britain. Expanding to America really gave the world a more global feel. Goblet of Fire is the first real hint at the idea of a magic world that extends across the planet, but Fantastic Beasts gives us our first actual look at it.

1920s New York is just inherently a more unique setting, but having the film take place there also allows organic ways to explore the mystical world. The American magic society is not entirely the same as the British one, and it goes beyond what terms they use. (What Brits call "muggles," Yanks call "nomags," and I still wish Rowling had workshopped both a little bit more.) Interestingly in America, wizards need a permit to carry their wands. They have also banned the breeding of magical creatures. There also seems to be more conservative rules regarding wizard and nomag mingling (as in, it is against the law to do so). Characters touch upon this a bit in dialogue, hinting at the history of "witches in America" as a reason. It was actually really clever to see them use actual US history, referring to things like the Salem trials without ever explicitly spelling it out, to establish the lore. Finally, it is interesting to note the magical governmental differences. Where in Britain, there is more of a parliamentary system headed by a prime minister, the United States has a Congress, lead by a President. Actually seeing differences between the British and American magical worlds goes a long way to making it all feel legitimately global.

The story is also rather dark. Instead of starting as something for children and maturing as its base readers aged, Fantastic Beasts simply starts with more mature themes and tones. There are even aspects of the film that are legitimately creepy. That meshes with the more murky color palette used by David Yates, who used a similar visual style when he directed The Order of the Phoenix all the way through The Deathly Hallows Pt. 2. There's a graphical consistency to Yates' Potter films, which really helps connect the worlds despite not actually connecting the central stories. The film itself touches upon several intriguing themes. Though Rowling denied intentionally paralleling World War II and the rise of Adolf Hitler with her Harry Potter story, it is hard not to notice the similarities. Here, where the story occurs in the Roaring Twenties, there seems to be a similar parallel. All in all, the motivation of the central villain (and the set up for the larger threat) isn't ultimately that different from the other Potter films, but it seems to fit more with the time period.

(As an aside: the story of a wizard supremacist trying to destroy the comparatively progressive magic society has some more power to it given recent political events. The central villain's motto very much could be, "Make magic great again.")

Some might complain that the "big reveal" at the end - showing who the villain truly is - was disappointing, since they made it pretty clear from the start who you should assume is the villain, but that misses the point they were going for. While our ragtag group of heroes doesn't know the truth, the audience has been given a pretty clear indication of what to suspect the truth is. It isn't about maintaining a mystery, nor is it about building to some big twist. Instead, this creates a tension with the audience. We are in on the secret while we watch. It makes viewers pay close attention to see through all the intrigue, and increases a sense of concern as we see where things are headed before the characters do. While Kowalski, a nomag, functions to serve as a surrogate for the audience (allowing reasonable exposition dumps), the structure of the film isn't to get movie-goers to feel similarly to the characters.

What also makes Fantastic Beasts stand out is that for a Hollywood blockbuster, they appear to let actors...well...act! Eddie Redmayne's character Newt is such an oddball, and he plays it with a ton of nuance and subtlety that it actually feels like he was playing an actual character that he helped bring to the screen. Ezra Miller's Credence similarly uses body language very efficiently to define his character. In fact, he probably doesn't get more than a dozen lines of dialogue. The acting was a bit spotty in the early Potter films due to so many cast members being literal children. Daniel Radcliffe has grown into one of the best actors working today (with the most amazing and unusual resume). Emma Watson emerged as a solid actor and a powerhouse of a person overall, too. It can be a little brutal watching some of those Potter films though. Here, it is a cast of entirely adults, doing entirely adult things, in an entirely adult world, and they allow the actors to actually play characters rather than simply fulfill narrative functions. Even Dan Fogle's goofball, every-man Kowalski is surprisingly entertaining for such a relatively simple character.

In many ways, Fantastic Beasts feels a bit like a much better version of Sorcerer's Stone, wherein the larger, over-arching story is only just touched upon a bit while the world-building is its primary focus. Yet here, that wider narrative gets more attention, and the world-building is actually more interesting. The lack of blatant connectivity to the other Potter films, save some passing references, actually makes it very accessible. One does not need to have seen any other installment to fully enjoy this one.

Of course, it isn't perfect. There are some holes, and the ending is a bit contrived for the sake of extending melodramatic beats. One of the problems with a world wherein magic exists that can achieve anything is that unless a character dies, they have a default means to essentially "retcon" the entire final act. In this case, so much of the film is about wizards worrying that they will be exposed to the non-wizards, and this results in a crazy finale that does. That is, until they use a convenient magic spell to wipe all their memories and put everything back to normal, so, no harm no foul, I guess? Still, slightly disappointing ending to the film doesn't quite ruin what is otherwise a surprisingly captivating story that is building for more films. I'm not sure if this cast of characters will be center stage for the rest of it. Part of me thinks it isn't strong enough to carry an entire series! Newt was a refreshing lead because he wasn't part of some prophesy, nor was he just inherently a super wizard. He's ok at magic because he is an adult who has long since graduated from Hogwarts. It would be tough to go four more films centered around him, though. While I hope these characters remain present, it doesn't exactly seem set up for them to carry an entire series' arc.

I was admittedly unsure going into this film. I always thought it was the characters that made me like the world of Harry Potter, not the world itself. And yet, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was one of the best Hollywood films of the year, and successfully captured my interest in the world itself. It helps to have Rowling writing the script. The franchise itself has largely been one of the better movie series from Hollywood because of her ability to write well-structured narratives, entertaining and lovable characters, inject parallels to the real world, and sets things up really well.  They also do a great job making sure to include moments where characters actually stop to smell the roses, as it were. In the initial octalogy, no matter how much he sees or how dark the story gets, Harry always has a couple of moments to stare and smile at new wonders he witnesses. It is important to have these moments, to remind the audience of the same thing. These are some of the most visually interesting films coming from Hollywood. Even though they get dark, and we've seen a lot of this before, we should not forget that, and should embrace the joy this world provides as well. With Rowling writing, the spin-off "prequel" is poised to do some great things.

Xenosaga Episode 1: Die Wille zur Macht (2002)

The spiritual successor to the flawed, but interesting Xenogears on the original Playstation, Xenosaga Episode 1 kicked off one of the more interesting JRPGs of the Playstation 2 era. Sometimes ambitious to a fault, like its predecessor, it still largely succeeds in crafting an intriguing universe with fun mechanics for a turn-based RPG.

Thing is, however, if a convoluted and incredibly cryptic story is not your thing, then the story and world of Xenosaga is going to be a huge turn-off, almost instantaneously. While maybe not as confusing and mysterious as Xenogears, that still is the bulk of its drama. References to things not yet explained, character connections that mean something but they don't tell you what yet, motives still vague and unclear: all of these contribute to one of the harder stories to grasp in a genre that is not short of confounding tales. The environments make it a tad more interesting than others, with the galactic setting giving it a space opera vibe that is a little more conducive for the muddled narrative.

The strength of the game is really it's relatively unique combat system. It's similar to its predecessor in that "combo" moves are a big part of it, but there are enough elements within to make it feel fresh. For example, a "boost" bar fills up as characters damage enemies. When it fills all the way, that character can than "boost," essentially skipping ahead for an earlier turn in a genuinely turn-based game (so none of the ATB stuff common in Final Fantasy). Characters also get two moves per turn, but if you "pass" on the second, you can perform three moves on their next turn. These two systems work well and allow for some gambles during combat. Each battle also has a rotating element that each character can take advantage of when it is their turn. There is an element that increases critical hits, one that increases the amount of boost, and one that increases the points earned. Much of the battles, then, involve players figuring out how they want to capitalize on those enhancements, as well as how to utilize their boosts.

Perhaps the biggest flaw in the entire game, however, is that not all of the rules apply to the enemies. In the instance of boosting, characters can only gain the ability by inflicting damage. That causes the bar to fill, and when it fills, then players can use that ability. With enemies, there is no rhyme or reason to when they can cast boost. They don't even need to attack you to boost. This results in battles that often feel unfair and cheap, since you can't predict at all when the game is going to decide that your enemies actually deserve six turns in a row. It's especially problematic in boss battles and late in the game, where there risk-taking might become more a part of your strategy.

The use of A.W.G.S. - this game's version of "gears" - is done in a way that is either terrible or perfect depending on how you liked them in Xenogears. For me, I hated the sections of the earlier game where you had to fight in the gears, so when Xenosaga basically allows a player to get through without actually using it at all, it was perfect! A bit strange that they included it but didn't put any attention into encouraging players to use it. Of course, if you liked fighting with the giant mech suits, then the game handles it poorly, offering no real incentive to use them. Keeping them upgraded can be expensive, and you don't get a lot of money throughout the game.

Character upgrades are a bit complex, but nothing too difficult to handle. Party members obtain skill, ether, and tech points which can then be used to upgrade traits, magic, and combo attacks. Skill points can be used to "extract" abilities from weapons and armor, but they don't go into much detail about how exactly it works. There is a "skill level," but they don't bother to explain how that increases. As a result, skill points will build up quickly, while much needed ether and tech points are both slower to accumulate and more valuable. Those will be exhausted rather quickly.

There's a lot about the game that feels influenced by anime, which makes it only fitting that it spun off into an anime series afterwards. The cryptic nature of the story might offset its unresolved arc to bring players in for the sequel. It's got a fun combat system for what is a purely turn-based game, and it provides some intriguing leveling mechanics. While I happen to like Xenosaga much more than I do Xenogears, it's hard to call it "great." Interesting, yes, but the cheap aspects of the game hold it back. It doesn't help either that it can take up to two hours to finish it when you get to the last save point. I'm not sure I will ever understand why RPGs tend to design their final stretches to be so time consuming. It makes it so that if you die on the final boss (or more like the second or third form of the final boss - because they can never just have it be one - it's wasted so much time that it's hard to convince yourself it's even worth it.

Not sure Xenosaga fits in the upper echelon of JRPGs, particularly of the '90s and early aughts, but it's worth checking out. (As an aside: I really, really wish Namco would release this to the Playstation Store. I found that my copy on PS2 would only work on the original fat PS2, and not the newer slim models. Make this game accessible, Namco! C'mon!)

REDUCTIVE RATING: Pretty Good

Gears of War 4 (2016)

The original Gears of War was one of the games that helped launch Microsoft's XBox 360 way back when. It is only fitting that Gears of War 4 is one of the bigger games in the early stages of the next generation XBox One. However, it doesn't have nearly the kick that the original game did.

One of the problems with any game series that goes on longer than three or four games is that it will almost always struggle to feel fresh. Gears of War 4 suffers from this regularly throughout the game. While the combat of the series is still fun, it does feel a bit dated at this point. The first two games set the tone of run through a linear level, hide behind waist-high objects, pop up and shoot. Gears of War 3 did a good job changing up the gameplay a bit, including enemies that can hit you behind cover which forced players to keep moving rather than hunkering down as in earlier games. Gears 4 attempts to replicate that, with various degrees of success.

Several new enemy types do encourage players to move from cover to cover, including carriers, snatchers, and pouncers. Some of them, however, actually overcompensate. You won't spend much time in cover at all when fighting a snatcher or carrier, and there's actually an advantage to staying exposed against pouncers. Instead of hunkering down, you can find yourself struggling to stay out of cover - something not always easy given how frequently you will run in areas loaded with cover. Early game robot enemies function similarly to the new Locust creatures, with sniper equivalents, scion equivalents, and juvie equivalents. (Think of juvies/trackers as tickers/lambent wretches.) There's a lot of "masking" for new things here; meaning, they redesign a bunch of stuff to make it look new, but actually functions almost identically to enemies in past games.

The weapons are sort of the same way. While there are a few new additions, a number of them are just re-tooled weapons of the past. The dropshot, for example, is functionally the same as digger launcher of Gears 3. Even more, the story is pretty much more of the same as well. It's essentially an amalgamation of Gears 1 (isolation on a mission) and Gears 2 (the mission turns into finding a loved one). The only thing really new about the game is that it is a bit more colorful, openly humorous, and has a neat soundtrack. Much of the game feels a bit like they were playing Naughty Dog games for a while before pitching concepts. Marcus's son JD, who is the character you play as, is basically Nathan Drake, and the environments appear a bit influenced by The Last of Us.

It also suffers from the same mediocre boss design problem that has long plagued the series. Bosses have never been especially challenging to begin with. It doesn't help that they constantly hold your hand the entire way through. Maybe next game, we can skip the characters yelling directions on how you should fight the monster? It's slightly condescending.

The character design is top notch, and can easily be one of the things Gears of War as a franchise doesn't get enough credit for. The characters here are genuinely likable as well. However, that is not enough to make up for its narrative shortcomings. In Gears 1 sees the parameters of your mission constantly changing, the time jumps and new objectives acquired by Anya further enhance the isolation of their mission. Here, the entire thing just feels like one giant fetch quest. Sure, it is functionally the same, but because the entire game has a singular focus, everything just feels dragged out. The act in which you have to chase down a snatcher that nabbed Marcus goes on for far too long.

Interestingly, the best parts of the story were in the early stages. We get to see a post-Locust world, and it is one that deserved more attention. The COG have become tools in a dystopian sci-fi environment with an authoritarian government. There is division growing among the human population. Unfortunately, this intriguing story element is brief, and overloaded with robotic enemies that aren't particularly fun to fight. Eventually, the story changes to be about the return of the Locust. Locust make better enemies, but a less interesting story. Throughout the game, it seems like the main story should be about Marcus and JD reconnecting as family. While it's there in a very, very subtle manner, that too does not get the attention it should.

Additionally, it embraces the Force Awakens thing wherein to capitalize in fan nostalgia, they undermine their previous work. Gears 3 had a great ending, concluding a subtle, but poignant character arc for lead Marcus Fenix. With all he had been through - with all the people of Sera had been through - peace was earned. Marcus concludes the series by tossing away his weapon and looking forward to a future of planting tomatoes and starting a family. The ultimate irony of the franchise is that the lead protagonist was a "gear of war" who did not, turns out, actually like fighting.

While Gears 4 does continue with the concept that he will fight if he has to, it just felt like it took away from Gears 3's conclusion. It didn't help either that when Cole says that he kind of missed the Locust, Marcus says something to indicate a similar position. This betrays the central, most compelling aspect of the character. Plus, all the horrible things that he's endured - the loss of his wife, estrangement from his son, disconnection from the world, and then the loss of his home - it all just changed the sense of satisfactory ending of the last game. Playing as JD was fine (even if he was a bit too "quippy"). For my money, I'd rather they have just left him out of it and allowed him to actually have the peace he earned in the original trilogy.

Still a fun game, Gears of War 4 doesn't exactly provide anything discernibly new. Yet it delivers on what you would expect from the franchise. Many design elements feel dated, but the combat is as enjoyable as it was before.

REDUCTIVE RATING:  It's Fine

Doctor Strange (2016)

Sometimes it feels like every other Marvel movie is "Marvel's biggest risk yet!" We said that about Thor back in 2011. We said it about Guardians of the Galaxy in 2014. Some said it about Ant-Man in 2015. And we said it again for Doctor Strange here in 2016. The difference here is that much of the content within Doctor Strange requires the filmmakers to "break" the cinematic universe we have become familiar with. It could go really well, or it could quite possibly go very poorly!

But Marvel Studios has some intelligent folks in charge. The way they get around their weirder properties is by making them rather similar to the other popular ones. Doctor Strange is visually very different from everything we have seen yet, but structurally almost identical to everything else (especially Iron Man). There's a lot to like about this installment, but I suspect that this is one where people will see the visuals and say, "This is great because it's so different!" while in reality, in terms of substance, it is not different at all.

Perhaps the first problem with the film is that it is your very traditional superhero origin story. Dr. Stephen Strange is your typically arrogant (white) man who comes from a place of relative privilege. He is kind of unlikable, but then he screws up and suffers a personal tragedy. While losing his mind trying to recover from his position of sudden disadvantage (something he is not accustomed to), he stumbles upon an even greater power. Inheriting this power forces the character to learn to become less arrogant and more responsible. It's literally nothing you haven't seen before.

The first ten minutes of the film drag as a result. Fifteen movies into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it's starting to feel like they can, at some point, just start their movies. These constant "origins" lifted from the comics as much as possible are starting to slow everything down. In this particular case, it feels a lot like they could have just started with Strange searching for a healer, with maybe a training sequence resulting in a flashback that showcases his personal tragedy. We literally don't need anything from the opening ten minutes - and yes, that includes the quasi-love interest in Rachel McAdams. At this point, viewers are familiar with entire alien civilizations, other realms, gods, robot armies, Hulks, and dudes with arrows. Are we really still at a point where to introduce a new power or concept, we need to "ground it in reality" for the audience? 

Once Strange finds the Ancient One, however, the film gets on the right track. Yes, I know, I'm supposed to be outraged that the Ancient One - one of the few comic book characters that was specifically created as an Asian person - was instead cast as a white person, but Tilda Swinton is just great, and she is predictably perfect here. (The real problem, by the way, is that Marvel is too obsessed with casting "according to the characters' origins," ignoring that almost all of these characters were created in the 1960s and '70s, when racism was much more in the open. But this is another topic.) Additionally, Chiwetel Ejiofor's Mordo is one of the most interesting "side characters" in any of the Marvel movies. His development felt, in many ways, more natural and clear than even Strange's. It is even possible that this film laid the groundwork for a Marvel movie to finally get an interesting villain in the future.

Oh, that's right. If you're looking for Doctor Strange to finally break the drought of bad Marvel villains, you'll have to keep searching. Mads Mikkelsen's Kaecilius is actually one of the better Marvel movie villains. Unfortunately, that doesn't actually mean anything. One of the other problems clearly plaguing the MCU is that their films don't really build with villains as part of the foundation for the story and themes. Instead, the villains serve a very pragmatic purpose; to introduce a world threatening scenario for the titular hero to stop. 

The visuals are likely to be the lasting legacy of the film. In terms of the action, it would be fair to say that Doctor Strange is  not like any superhero flick you have seen. There's alternate dimensions, magic shields and weapons, realities folding in on itself, warping, demons, and astral projections. This isn't like Iron Man or Captain America when it comes to the action. It isn't even like Guardians of the Galaxy when it comes to the visual style. A lot of this is what makes it so interesting to view. There is indeed no shortage of strange things that occur on screen, and there's plenty of potential "favorite moments" to discuss post credits.

Still, you could shoot some interesting stuff in Fantastic Four, it's still going to be a crap movie. This is not, of course, to suggest Doctor Strange is bad (and it's probably unfair to even mention Fantastic Four). It is more to say that while it is visually different from everything else, it is actually a very by-the-numbers film when it comes to its plot and structure. 

When the Ancient One starts to teach Strange about the world of mysticism, Strange makes a comment about how it "doesn't make sense." The Ancient one replies, "Not everything does. Not everything has to."

The writers seem aware that she is not just addressing Stephen Strange; she is also talking to the audience. This scene is great in that it functions to get the audience on the same page as the filmmakers. As she chides Strange for trying too hard to "make sense of the world" and that he should just "go with it; surrender to its power," she is essentially encouraging viewers to do the same. Let go of logic. Stop trying to make sense of everything. We don't need to know all the ins and outs of magic. Just ride along and enjoy the show! If you can do that, you will enjoy the film a lot more! It's handled very well!

But about half an hour later, we enter yet another exposition dump wherein the film gets very "talky" and "explainy." Much of the dialogue is explanation and exposition. It's a lot of holding the audience's hand and walking them through things - many of which don't even actually matter much. It feels a little counterproductive to their opening statement that "things don't have to make sense," when the spend much of the film trying to explain things to the audience so it all "makes sense."  This rotation of training/studying sequences filled with lots of spelling things out, to crazy, awesome, wild action sequence where who even knows what the heck is happening gives the film a rather inconsistent pace throughout.  For a film that has a lot of visually interesting and exciting moments, it does have a few bits where it's downright boring. This, of course, is not helped by it's completely formulaic structure.

Yet for all that, they actually found a rather clever way to conclude the film. Without going into specifics, the filmmakers actually did come up with a unique, creative, and rather humorous way for Strange to save the day. Think along the lines of Guardians' dance-off distraction and hand-holding friend circle, only better. The solution to the threat is made even better by the fact that Strange was specifically told he lacked imagination. It can be really difficult to figure out a new, interesting, memorable way to have heroes save the day from yet another global threat. Doctor Strange manages to provide one of the best examples of it. 

It does seem like the distinct visuals and the "universe-altering" introduction of magic will make many feel that Doctor Strange is one of the more refreshing and unique Marvel installments. Of course when it comes to art and judging it, we all live in our own realities. In mine, it fits rather squarely in the middle of the pack. For you nerds, it's worth seeing on the big screen, but it lacks anything of substance to really stand out above the rest.

REDUCTIVE RATING: It's Fine