Well. I loved it, of course.

It did what it needed to do and it did it well! The visuals were fantastic, as expected. I was hoping for more shots that would look good for 3D, but I don’t think I saw many. But I’m fine with that. And I don’t know if there are 3D screenings of this.

The cast did a great job. Everyone portrayed their roles brilliantly. I loved that Gerard Butler returned for his role as Stoic.

This gave me all the emotions of the original. Now, there were some visuals, specifically the flying that looked smoother or better in the original movie, but that didn’t bother me too much.

If you enjoyed the original movie, you probably will enjoy this. They didn’t make similar mistakes that other live-action remakes have made in the past. It’s a fun watch!

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Mid-credit scene: Nope, but there are nice visuals.

End-credit scene: Yes, but it’s not really much of anything. I’m not quite sure why they picked to add it. I would have tweaked it a little to make it at least narratively useful. But eh. So, basically, you don’t have to stay to watch it. That can be done when it’s on digital.

(This is my 100th movie review/reaction post!!)

First off, I enjoyed the movie! It was certainly a fun heartfelt movie.

I liked the acting from everyone. Maia Kealoha as Lilo was amazing. She was just a perfect little girl acting like a kid would with all the crazy situations happening. I also was very happy that Chris Sanders returned to voice Stitch. He was the creator of the original movie. He wrote and directed the original movie while also being Stitch. I will say that I would have liked for him to have directed this movie too.

The supporting cast was also enjoyable to watch. A couple recognizable faces which I liked seeing. I know that the character David (Nani’s boyfriend) didn’t have a lot to do in the original movie, but he still felt important. In this movie, I feel like he did the same things he did in the original, but something felt left-out. There is part of one line of dialogue that he makes that had something cut out of it and that stood out to me. Though that’s a writing issue.

I enjoyed Billy Magnussen as Pleakley a lot. He seemed very much like the original version of the character.

I was excited for Zach Galifianakis to play Jumba, and still think he did a good job acting, but they made a couple changes to his character and voice that stood out a lot. And I think those were writing and directing problems.

For Nani, I think Sydney Elizabeth Agudong did a good job. But I think there was something missing in the directing that didn’t let her shine more. The characterization felt a little off, but I can’t place why. But in her big moments in the movie, I think she did really well.

I liked Courtney B. Vance’s portrayal of Agent Cobra Bubbles. They added in new aspects of the character that added to the original character which I liked. There was a bit less of him, but I liked what we got. Though I wouldn’t have said no to Ving Rhames reprising the role from the original movie.

There are three other cameos (besides Chris Sanders) in the movie who I at first didn’t notice because I didn’t know all of the cast of the original movie, but I looked up some and now I realized who they were and now I retroactively enjoyed seeing them in the movie.

There is also a main character from the original missing from this movie which I think hurt the movie. You’ll know if you don’t already.

The movie still had chaotic fun and heart that the original did, and I enjoyed those aspects. But there is something missing from it that I can’t quite place. I think it may be just as simple as the directing wasn’t quite right. But having said that, it was a fun movie to watch and the kids in the theater watching seemed to enjoyed it, so that’s good.

I certainly prefer the original movie to this, but it’s still a good movie for kids to enjoy and learn from. Oh and Stitch and the other aliens looked great!!

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Mid-credit scene: As with the original movie, this one also had photos and drawings continuing the story in a photo-album-like way. So, that was nice to see again.

End-credit scene: Nope. I thought there would be something suggesting more, but there wasn’t.

That was a fantastic movie!

I certainly understand why people have been saying they liked it. It was fun, funny, action-packed, and hit with the emotions.

Seeing these actors play off of each other was a delight. Everyone’s chemistry was amazing. Everyone did a fantastic job! We have a good amount of time with all the characters since they are mostly together for the whole movie.

The threat, while not unexpected, is complex and very well done. Considering what it was, how it was dealt with, it made sense. But there is still potential there in the future.

The movie sped by! I wanted to stay in the world for longer! Though, the next MCU movie is in July, so it’s not a long wait.

The humor was well-placed and well-timed. The heart of the movie was felt throughout it. Of course there will be comparisons to The Suicide Squad/Taskforce X, but I think they did find a way to play the concept a bit differently. And I think it worked well.

Oh and the visuals were great!

It was nice to catch up with these characters even if we didn’t get a lot of updates from some of them.

There was a big theme of mental health throughout the movie and I really liked seeing that.

All-in-all, I had fun watching this and certainly think most people will enjoy it.

*

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Mid-credit scene: A short funny one.

End-credit scene: Yes. Talking about things yet to come. I am intrigued by things hinted at.

So, first of all, I did enjoy the movie. It was fun, light-hearted and kids will enjoy it.

I liked the acting from everyone, I enjoyed the visuals, and the tone was wholesome.

The things that did bother me a little bit were the changes to the original songs. Some changes were lyrical, others were adding lyrics where there didn’t need to be any. I think there were around 5 songs on the original movie, and in this one, they removed at least two of those, the reasons for which make sense, but then that leaves them with 3 songs total. So, they created a lot of new songs. That makes sense, though they did make quite a few songs.

For me, I’m so connected to hearing songs from these classic Disney movies throughout my childhood and as an adult too, that hearing changes to the songs in some of these live-action versions has been challenging. Sometimes small changes work, but when the underlying rhythm of the song changes, it bothers me. One song here was essentially the same, but where in the original, there was only melody that would have been heard, there were unnecessary lyrics added.

Another musical change was that one song that the dwarves originate in the original movie, Snow White originates in this one, but that was in one of the trailers, so I wasn’t surprised by that. And some songs were not really necessary.

I know there was a big deal made about the dwarves between the first teaser we got which had them all as tall men to them changing the characters to looking like the cartoon versions of them instead of hiring actual little people to play those roles. While I do agree that the roles should have been given to the actors that clearly deserved those roles, I’ve always known dwarves in fiction to be mythical creatures, and thus, not necessarily needing to look like humans of any size. So, the cgi look of them in this movie didn’t bother me as it has others.

Some of the dialogue wasn’t the best, but that was only a couple instances.

The other major thing was to do with the Queen. I did enjoy Gal Gadot’s acting as the Evil Queen. But I didn’t feel like the characterization of the Queen was stable. Sometimes she was strong and menacing and scary, but at the end, she wasn’t portrayed as such. I’ve always seen that character as a scary person. The threat of her at the end didn’t really amount to anything whereas at the beginning of the movie and during the movie, she was threatening. It was just odd. The changes to how the plot panned out made me feel like there had to be some huge climax coming and there kind of was, but when dealing with the threat, it kind of fizzled out. I was a bit confused by that. Though the actual end of the Queen was pretty cool.

Okay, I think that’s enough negativity!

I really enjoyed the tone of the movie and the characterization of Snow White herself. She represents hope and kindness and doing what’s right. And Rachel Zegler did a wonderful job at portraying that. And of course her voice is as amazing as it always is. I understand the modernization of her character, and I think it worked well. The climax of the story worked in how she defused the situation, and I enjoyed how she did it. Though I think it would have been stronger with a larger scope with the same defusing. But I still liked what we saw.

And of course, the costumes were wonderful! And the sets were fun to see. I could certainly spend time at the dwarves cottage looking at all the details inside it. And I enjoyed the colors and visuals of the opening number.

Generally, it is a fun movie and I thinks kids will enjoy it. Some adults will too, and some won’t do much. But I don’t think it was a bad movie. I had fun watching it and hearing songs I remember from the original movie.

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Mid-credit scene: Nope

End-credit scene: Nope

But, I really liked the art in the mid-credits. It was reminiscent of the original movie.

I know that this movie has had mixed reviews, but all the negativity seems unwarranted.

Are there some odd green screen moments? Yes, are they noticeable? Yes. But other than that, the movie was really fun!

Loved seeing Sam on the big screen again and as Captain America, instead of Falcon. Joaquin Torres being Falcon was nice to see. I enjoy his character in the comics. The action was great and I see them putting in those IMAX shots indeed. I do want to see this again in 3D.

Anthony Mackie and Danny Ramirez did great jobs in their roles and of course Harrison Ford did a fantastic job as Thaddeus Ross.

The plot was relatively simple. There was a lot of guessing who’s on whose side which was fun to try to anticipate. Knowing who the villain was already, I didn’t feel the mystery of that aspect of the movie, but how they were doing things and how the past was connecting was intriguing.

I’m certainly glad that this year will be giving us a lot more MCU than last year. Can’t wait for more from these characters!

I enjoyed this movie a lot. I’m posting this ad I’m waiting for my second screening!

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Mid-credit scene: No

End-credit scene: Yes. Looking to the future.

That was a fun movie! I enjoyed it!

It was great to see a Sonic movie in the theater finally! Though I would have liked it in Imax 3D, but eh.

The story was essentially what was seen in the trailers, with a couple little twists. The action was pretty cool of course. Very colorful and dynamic. The visuals of course were awesome! The comedy was enjoyable and hokey and included fun references every now and then.

And of course the acting was as good as the other movies. Keanu did a great job indeed! He played the role as seriously as any other role he’s done.

And it was nice to have a particular reference before the climactic battle.

I hope we get more from this franchise! I’m glad I saw this!

“I have dishonored my marshmallow.” is my favorite line XD

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Mid-credit scene: Yes. Probably predictable, but fun and can’t wait to see what it leads to!

End-credit scene: Yes. Also predictable, but nice to have.

This was such an epic adventure!

It felt as long as it was, but I loved being in this world again in this new form. I may not know a lot of the history of this era but it was such a great story.

It did take a bit for me to get used to the animation mix of drawn art and digital art. But by the end it was fine. The voice acting was well done. It was also nice to hear one or two familiar voices.

The story was surprisingly simple but took hard turns that led to everything that happened. The characters were great, I liked all the main characters. The antagonist was a bit dramatic, but that’s ok. The battles were fun to watch.

And of course the music was fantastic. speaking of audio, I will probably watch this in Japanese if it’s available when it comes to home media.

There were a couple bits and pieces that connected to the future we know, but nothing that overtook what was happening in the slightest.

There was also a note made dedicated to the late Bernard Hill, who played King Théoden in the LOTR trilogy.

All-in-all, I liked this and hope we get more projects like this for LOTR.

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Mid-credit scene: Nope

End-credit scene: Nope

Well, that was indeed a movie. It wasn’t as bad as most of the other SSU movies, but that’s not saying much at all. though as this was supposed to come out before Venom 3, it wasn’t supposed to feel like the final SSU movie, so that’s fine. Venom 3 felt like that.

The acting was good, everyone did a good job I thought. The visuals were pretty good too.

The story wasn’t too complex. When this movie was announced and was announced as R-rated, I had my hopes. But as soon as the character of Kraven was described, I knew it was a similarly Sony mistake. Making the character fundamentally different from its comic book characterization is always a mistake. He was essentially similar in what his skills are, but who he is as a person was changed. Making him a hunter of hunters is just a misrepresentation of who the character is.

There were a couple surprise characters that were fun to see. And we already knew one of them was going to be in a main role. They were decent. Though since this universe is essentially at its end, at least when it comes to stand-alone villain live-action movies, I don’t know if we’ll see these actors in these roles again.

It went by faster than I thought it would. But that was fine for me since I had another movie to watch right after, haha.

As a movie, it was fine. As a Kraven movie, it was tolerable. Though, the tag line of the movie talks about the Orin of a villain, but there isn’t really anything villainous about him.

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Mid-credit scene: No.

End-credit scene: No.

Seen on December 1, 2024

This was such a great expansion of the story we knew!

I enjoyed being in this world again of course. The old and new characters blended well together well. The movie did go by faster than I would have liked though. The new characters were fun to get to know.

I did think the music was better in the first movie, but the songs weren’t bad, they just didn’t hook me as easily as the first movie’s did. But I didn’t like that we got a lot more chanting and indigenous language use throughout the movie.

The visuals were of course wonderful. Some of the same cues as before, but also new things. And seeing it in 3D was nice too. There weren’t a lot of big 3D shots, but I enjoyed those we got.

The lore of the world expanded so much in this movie, I hope we get more at some point. Though, in December 2020, there was an announcement of a series spinning out of Moana, so perhaps they still mean to do that. This movie was going to be that series, and perhaps it would have been better to do that so that things would unfold a bit slower, but maybe that could still work. I feel like that would be enjoyed a lot by fans. That way we could sit with the aftermath of this movie in long format before a potential sequel. Similar to the How To Train Your Dragon shows in plot. We’ll see!

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Mid-credit scene: Yes, it connects to the future.

End-credit scene: Nope. But nice music.

Seen on November 23, 2024

Well, that was delightful! I had so much fun with this movie! Of course since most of those who seen it have seen the play or read the book before I won’t go into anything with that much. And again, I’ve not seen the musical since I saw it the first time (either during its initial run on Broadway or during its first tour via the Kennedy Center), so there was a lot that I didn’t remember.

First off, the music, visuals and acting were all amazing. The vocals were strong as expected. The visuals were colorful and emotive. And there were apparently a lot of practical sets which I noticed and liked. Everyone did a fantastic job in their roles, I felt all of the characters on screen.

I didn’t see it in 3D, but there were certainly some shots that I bet looked brilliant in that format.

Even though it’s been almost 20 years since I saw it, I still felt the emotions I felt when I experienced it for the first time and I suppose even more so since I’m an adult and have more complex experiences now than I did back then. Most of the characters are relatable, watching them go through what they go through is intense and enjoyable.

I also forgot that this was part one till earlier today. So I was trying to remember at what point the movie would end. It was certainly a memorable point! It’s a bit of a wait till part two, but I’ll be excited to watch it when it arrives!

If you’ve seen the musical and/or read the book, obviously you’re gonna be seeing this movie, but even if you’ve never done either, I think this is a great movie to watch. Watching the characters grow as you go, is fantastic.

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Mid-credit Scene: Nope

End-credit Scene: Nope