Category: SF&F Movie Reviews

Science Fiction and Fantasy Movie Reviews by otherworldly critics

Tom’s World – 31MAY2025 – More About Movies

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TomD

Of the book based Sci-Fi movies of which I’m aware, the one that was most true to the book was the original 2001. Both Jackson’s Lord of the Rings and the latest version of Dune at least try but both are handicapped by intricate and massive substrates that are almost impossible to set up and capture in the context of 2 hour +/- videos.

Although Blade Runner was barely related to it’s source material, “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep”, by Phillip K Dick, it succeeds on it’s own as a brilliant piece of work.

Though the Star Trek movies will never be mistaken for serious or brilliant work, I still remember my disappointment when the 1st episode without the Shatner/Nimoy cast or the Picard group, offered a close to continuous series of chase scenes in lieu of a plot.

The 1st several Star Wars movies sucked as Sci-Fi but succeeded as entertainment. A decrepit and distorted Hollywood morphed the extension of that series into something bizarre.

I’m almost terrified that Hollywood will take my all time #1 favorite movie, Master and Commander and remake it as a multicultural, multi racial, LGBTQ+ crew fighting for racial equity.

But Which Story?

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The previous post (“Have I Got a Story for You”) produced some stimulating comments and feedback (below in bold print):

I think it just proves there’s a ready market for good science fiction out there.  Larry Niven’s Known Space; David Weber’s Honor Harrington stories; Niven and Pournelle with “Footfall” “The Mote in God’s Eye” and “Lucifer’s Hammer.”  The stories are already there.  But apparently the powers that be want a different kind of story but for an audience that doesn’t like science fiction!

For adults all of the below comments give ideas that should easily be translatable to cinema or television series productions.  The technical problems have long ago been conquered with computer generated imagery.  The only problems are lack of imagination and ideological blindness.

And the people who want the good stories are both young and old.  I’d love to be able to bring my grandkids to see age-appropriate science fiction that isn’t just poorly disguised gender and racial grievance propaganda but actually tells a good story about people they can relate to.

In the spirit of selecting something I could bring my grandchildren to (and enjoy myself!) I figure I’ll throw out a couple of safe but entertaining choices.

My first choice has some problems.  The story premise has become dated based on the current state of the art in computing and thinking machines.  It’s Heinlein’s “Starman Jones.”  Max Jones’s unusual rise through the ranks from stable boy to astrogator was predicated on his “eidetic” memory and abilities as a lightning calculator.  Well, that would seem to be a kind of silly plotline today.  Even the most phenomenal human mind cannot hope to compare with the speed and precision of a modern computer.  So, some other skill will be needed to distinguish the young hero.  The FTL process could be changed so that sensing the space warp is an individualistic skill that he happens to possess to an extreme degree.  Or some other skill, whatever.

But the rest of the storyline works fine for a book or a movie concept.  Max and his mentor Sam can show their qualities on some lost planet in a star system far, far away.  I think it would make a billion bucks.

And even more apt Heinlein juvenile would be “Have Spacesuit Will Travel.”  The protagonist Kip Russell goes through a collection of adventures that are ready made for the big screen.  He’s accidentally drawn into an interstellar police action between a galaxy-spanning civilization and a race of evil predators that have invaded our solar system with the intent of conquering humanity and using them as food.

It’s got FTL space travel, time travel and high adventure.  It even has humanity put on trial in front of a galactic court to determine whether they deserve to exist.  What’s not to love.

And of course, the Heinlein juveniles include at least a half dozen more stories that are highly qualified to be considered for the big screen.  All it would take would be a director with a decent ear for dialog and a script writer who isn’t totally woke.

So, any of you guys aware of any recent science fiction that would be appropriate for adolescents and young adults?  It’s a bit more of a specialist niche but I’m sure it exists out there.  All that has to be done is look.

 

Ed Brault

I would love to see Larry Niven’s Known Space stories and novels brought to the screen. Big, sweeping arcs like Ringworld Series, The Fleet of Worlds, or the epic Man-Kzin Wars; or smaller sets like the Gil Hamilton organlegger detective stories, or the individual novels that help flesh out the Known Space Universe: Becalmed in Hell, the Coldest Place, World of Ptaavs, A Gift from Earth, and especially, Protector, and the related Peace Corben novellas. These would probably be best done like The Expanse; a multi-year episodic TV drama.

The biggest problem would be preventing the studio suits from doing a Disney on the stories. I would consider that an Organ-Bank-worthy crime!

 

Abraham

David Weber’s Honor Harrington series would work well, even with a woman hero.

 

Tregonsee314

I think Ringworld has been in development a couple times, most recently with Amazon/MGM. It is Tough to get a large audience for it (especially as you move into Ringworld Engineers and later) as it wanders into hard R territory though one COULD limit that somewhat. It also would probably push limits of even current special effects for Kzin and Puppeteers. I love Protector it has the advantage that it sticks with a couple characters across its story. It probably would want to be a limited miniseries as it is a smidge too long (at 218 PG) to make a single two-hour movie, though you could perhaps time compress some parts and maybe get there. My own favorite for a series (or maybe 2 movie pair like the recent Dune) would be Niven and Pournelle’s Footfall, if for no other reason than the final battle using Project Archangel.

 

TomD

Reply to  Tregonsee314

It’s been decades since I read Footfall, I really would like to reread that. Niven alone

Niven and Pournelle put out so much. I still think Lucifer’s Hammer was the absolute best of the type.

Ahhh, but Ringworld made “real” and the Mote in Gods Eye—–

 

Ed Brault

Lucifer’s Hammer: The surfer dude riding the tidal wave would be worth the price of admission!

 

Tregonsee314

So many attempts and so little success. Looking for successes I think the latest incarnation of Dune, although flawed in some aspects, was probably the most successful of the 3 (4 if you count the aborted Jodorowsky attempt). I think the Jackson Lord of the Rings was very good even without certain sections (sorry Tom Bombadil, you just aren’t central to the plot). The Expanse did middling well, though I lost track of it mid-2nd season.

The failures are more plentiful. Jacksons Hobbit was a mess with unnecessary additional characters and subplots, even though the acting (Bilbo and Thorin especially) was superb. The Foundation series by Apple mangles the timeline (mostly because with the longer timeline there is no character continuity but for the shade of Hari Seldon) and adds wokish subplots all over the place. Effects were nice and Asimov having ONLY humans in Foundation/ Robots universe simplifies that. All in all, it was a disappointment and I bailed after 3-4 episodes. I think it fell flat for the public because many of its ideas seemed like retreads (E.g. Trantor as a planet covered with civilization feels like warmed over Coruscant even though Trantor predates Coruscant by 20+ years and likely inspired Lucas). And Rings of Power? Mauling the lore of Tolkien to pander to a variety of subgroups combined with puerile 4th-grade fanboy scripts produced an utter catastrophe.

Almost anything Sci-fi that Hollywood has done without a sci-fi novel or story at the heart is a mess. Hollywood seems to want to revert to the pre–Star Wars Sci-fi where all is Dystopia and nuclear hellscape. That things might work out is anathema. Even the vaunted Federation of Star Trek has been being mauled with its hidden perfidy in Discovery and Picard. Not to say dark is bad. Babylon 5 was amazing (especially given the limitations of cost and mid 1990’s special effects).

What seems to matter most is that the primary vision for converting the Sci Fi to the screen needs to LOVE the material. JMS wrote much of B5 and was its director, Peter Jackson Adored Lord of The Rings and co-wrote the script, Denis Villeneuve is a Dune/Herbert fanboi. Each loved the story in its original form and tried very hard to leave the original plot beats and characterizations in place, not bend them to tell their own story like Rings of Power or Foundation did.

Guest Contributor – Tregonsee – 28MAY2025 – Science Fiction Movies

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So many attempts and so little success.  Looking for successes I think the latest incarnation of Dune, although flawed in some aspects, was probably the most successful of the 3 (4 if you count the aborted Jodorowsky attempt). I think the Jackson Lord of the Rings was very good even without certain sections (sorry Tom Bombadil, you just aren’t central to the plot). The Expanse did middling well, though I lost track of it mid 2nd season.

The failures are more plentiful. Jacksons Hobbit was a mess with unnecessary additional characters and subplots, even though the acting (Bilbo and Thorin especially) was superb. The Foundation series by Apple mangles the timeline (mostly because with the longer timeline there is no character continuity but for the shade of Hari Seldon) and adds wokish subplots all over the place. Effects were nice and Asimov having ONLY humans in Foundation/ Robots universe simplifies that. All in all it was a disappointment and I bailed after 3-4 episodes. I think it fell flat for the public because many of its ideas seemed like retreads (E.g. Trantor as a planet covered with civilization feels like warmed over Coruscant even though Trantor predates Coruscant by 20+ years and likely inspired Lucas). And Rings of Power? Mauling the lore of Tolkien to pander to a variety of subgroups combined with puerile 4th-grade fanboy scripts produced an utter catastrophe.

Almost anything Sci-fi that Hollywood has done without a sci-fi novel or story at the heart is a mess. Hollywood seems to want to revert to the pre Star Wars Sci-fi where all is Dystopia and nuclear hellscape. That things might work out is anathema. Even the vaunted Federation of Star Trek has been being mauled with its hidden perfidy in Discovery and Picard. Not to say dark is bad. Babylon 5 was amazing (especially given the limitations of cost and mid 1990;s special effects).
What seems to matter most is that the primary vision for converting the Sci Fi to the screen needs to LOVE the material. JMS wrote much of B5 and was its director, Peter Jackson Adored Lord of The Rings and co-wrote the script, Denis Villeneuve is a Dune/Herbert fanboi. Each loved the story in its original form and tried very hard to leave the original plot beats and characterizations in place, not bend them to tell their own story like Rings of Power or Foundation did.

Guest Contributor – Ed Brault – 27MAY2025 – Niven’s “Known Space” on Screen

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I would love to see Larry Niven’s Known Space stories and novels brought to the screen. Big, sweeping arcs like Ringworld Series, The Fleet of Worlds, or the epic Man-Kzin Wars; or smaller sets like the Gil Hamilton organlegger detective stories, or the individual novels that help flesh out the Known Space Universe: Becalmed in Hell, the Coldest Place, World of Ptaavs, A Gift from Earth, and especially, Protector, and the related Peace Corben novellas. These would probably be best done like The Expanse; a multi-year episodic TV drama.
The biggest problem would be preventing the studio suits from doing a Disney on the stories. I would consider that an Organ-Bank-worthy crime!

Have I Got a Story for You

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I’ve been so busy lately with a lot of annoying stuff so it’s been hard to concentrate on what to write my posts about.  I don’t feel like talking about current events today.  Let’s talk about the movies.  I feel I’m unqualified to discuss the state of cinema because in the last five years I’ve gone to so few movies.

But I do think I can talk about what direction science fiction and fantasy movies should go in.  I guess I’ll start with where it shouldn’t go.  And that would be the way it’s currently proceeding.  What we see for the most part are movies that provide a science fiction setting (interstellar civilization, advanced technology, humanoid robots) but uses it as a backdrop to play out sociological scenarios of interest to the film makers, specifically, wish fulfillment about various sexual and race grievance issues.  A good example is Disney’s decision to turn their various Star Wars productions into propaganda films for why women and blacks are the only acceptable heroes in the galaxy far, far away.

This is a really dumb strategy.  They took a wildly popular and lucrative franchise and tanked it in the name of race and gender equity.  And this with a franchise whose primary market were white boys.  Let us say this was ill-advised.  So, there is the counterexample; what not to do.  Now what would be popular and lucrative?

Well, it probably doesn’t take a genius to say write a story that plays to the people who like science fiction (boys and men) and make it imaginative and exciting.  Look at the original Star Wars movie for a simplistic and not highly original plot that allowed the audience to get lost in the likeable characters and impressive special effects and smile along to the space opera that followed.  And there are hundreds of old pulp stories from Barsoom to Dune that do exactly that.  Whether it’s weird aliens or human galactic empire or some combination of the two we want to see the same story dynamic that’s been around since the Odyssey.  We want to see the hero on his quest to:

  1. Find his way home.
  2. Or, save the princess.
  3. Or, defeat the evil sorcerer.
  4. Or, invent the FTL drive.
  5. Or, whatever! As long as it’s not boring and doesn’t involve girl bosses and racial grievances.

And it’s about time that someone put together another science fiction (or fantasy) franchise to replace the tired ones that are currently limping along.  Star Wars is tapped out.  The Republic, the Empire and the Rebellion have become stale and boring.  Nobody cares.

As have the superhero movies.  We’ve used up everybody’s interest in Marvel’s and DC’s stables of 1940’s to 1960’s spandex wearing heroes.  It’s enough.  Nobody is clamoring for more Captain America or black Captain America or Gay Hispanic Spiderman or She-Hulk or any of this.  It’s now a bore.

And it doesn’t have to be legacy space opera.  Although I wouldn’t mind a Doc Smith or a Heinlein storyline.  It could be anything as long as it appeals to the male audience that enjoys this genre.  It needs action, adventure and maybe a pretty girl that needs saving from some fate worse than death (like middle-management cubicle captivity).  Add in some lively music and lots of cutting-edge special effects and you’ve got a billion-dollar hit.

Hey Elon Musk, if you want a trip to Mars make a movie about a trip to Mars that gets people excited about it.  You’ll even make a pot of gold while doing it.

Guest Contributor – Tregonsee – 14MAY2025 – Review – Watchmen (2009)

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So the original story is by Alan Moore. He was fairly famous in the comic book industry in the 1980’s when this was originally published. Take a moment and find a picture of Alan Moore on the internet, I’ll wait… Are you back? Given that image you will likely be unsurprised to find out he is a notorious and unrepentant anarchist and rather unhinged (even for an anarchist). Other efforts by him include V is for Vendetta and Batman: The Killing Joke. The Watchmen Series was a 12 issue mini-series from DC published in 1986-1987 set in an alternate history where the US has Dr. Manhattan (who is more overpowered than even say super man, his abilities verge on the godlike).
It was rather cutting edge for its period with its serious antihero vibe.

The movie came much later in 2009 after many years of wandering into development hell. In many ways its cinematography and dialogue come straight from the comic series art by Dave Gibbons and Alan Moore’s dialogue. It does skip/compress several subplots, and change the method of the ending though not its source (Ozymandias/Veidt) nor its intent (forestall or avoid WWIII). It was one of the first R rated comic book movies (previous having limited themselves to PG-13/PG) and also one of the first to release in the late February slot to take advantage of College spring break.

As a fan of the original comics I thought it rose to slightly above meh say 6/10. It loses much of the complexity of the original, which given the size of the 12 issue series was somewhat unavoidable even with its bloated 3 hr+ run time. As Chemist notes if you don’t already know some of the plot points it is going to be a whirlwind. Heck as the original comic book doled out over a year it was confusing until the last few comics at the end where all the threads got tied together and many of the hints in the original lurk in the subplots that were excised.

There is an animated retelling done by DC Animation scripted by J. Michael Straczynski and Dave Gibbons from the original It is split into 2 90 minute subsections. It does a better job at keeping more of the necessary beats to help you see the solution and keeps to the original ending. It is maybe a 7.5/10.

Honestly, if you like comics, find a perfect bound version of the original comic books is available this is available for ~$20 the price of 4-5 fancy coffees. It is less than the $24 I paid in 1986-87 for the original comics. Do not try to go buy these at a comic book store (except for the perfect bound single volume version). They’re moderate collector items at $20-30 a each for even poorish quality copies and the first the last and (potential Spoiler) the one where they break Rorschach out of prison run for probably twice that each. As much as a crazy tinfoil hat wearing jerk as Alan Moore can be this is easily in the top 5 of comic series I have read in 50 years of reading comics and is probably better than 90% of most comic/SciFi writing.

Watchmen (2009) – A Science Fiction-Fantasy Movie Review

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Watchmen is a movie based on a DC Comics comic book series from the 1980s written by Alan Moore and directed by Zack Snyder.  Moore is a self-identified “anarchist” (read weirdo) and the fictional world of this story reflects his hatred of anything conservative (read normal).

The story takes place in an alternate reality of 1985 where Richard Nixon is in his fifth term and a band of “superheroes” called the Watchmen have been disbanded after they were used for such actions as winning the Vietnam War for the Americans.  Apparently, people became afraid of their impact on society.  The movie starts with one of these retired heroes; the Comedian being murdered by another extremely powerful masked individual.  He is thrown through the window of a Manhattan skyscraper.

(Spoiler Alert – Skip down to last paragraph to avoid spoilers and read recommendation)

We are introduced to the former heroes.  By the way I recognized none of the actors.  I’m sure some of them would be familiar to anyone who has gone to the movies much in the last fifteen years.

Except for Doctor Manhattan who is some kind of god-like being with psychic abilities and atomic power that can destroy cities, the rest of the heroes are just humans who are strong and trained as fighters.  Doctor Manhattan got these powers while he was working in the American nuclear weapons industry.  He is able to become enormously large, teleport to Mars at will and able to invent whole new power sources for Earth’s future.

When the Comedian is murdered the other Watchmen suspect that someone is trying to kill all of them.  When an assassin tries to kill another one; Adrian Veidt (AKA: Ozymandias) they get the gang back together and look for the killer.  There’s all kinds of action and adventure.  But in the final act we find out that Ozymandias is responsible.  He stages an atomic attack on New York City, London and a couple of other cities and the leaders of the world assume it was Doctor Manhattan that did it as a warning against nuclear states (like the US and the USSR) threatening nuclear war.  This brings the countries of the world together out of a sense of common defense against Doctor Manhattan.  And Doctor Manhattan approves of the peaceful result of the hoax so the secret is maintained.  But one Watchman; Rorschach objects and has to be killed by Doctor Manhattan to keep the secret.  Rorschach’s friends are angry but agree to keep the secret for the sake of world peace.  At the end of the movie, it appears that Rorschach was able to leak the secret before he was killed.

Okay, so what did I think of this movie?  To start off we have Richard Nixon in his fifth term pretty much as evil incarnate.  So, there’s that.  The movie has a dose of sex and violence so this isn’t a kid’s superhero movie.  So, there’s that.  The story itself and the characters have interesting moments.  The question comes down to, is it worth the time to watch it?  I’ll have to qualify this.  If you like comic book stories there is a decent chance you’ll like this movie.  The effects and the acting aren’t bad.  The plot isn’t reasonable but it is clever.  If you don’t like comic book stories, you won’t like this movie.

Guest Contributor – Tregonsee – 08MAY2025 – More Dune

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The fever dream that is David Lynch’s Dune owes far more to the earlier Jodorowsky attempt at a Dune Movie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodorowsky%27s_Dune#Background ) than to Frank Herbert’s novel. These things include

  • Stunt casting Sting mirrors Jodorowsky’s intent to cast Mick Jagger for Feyd Rautha
  • The art work in the Lynch version is greatly affected by both Jodorowskys use of H.R. Giger (then mostly unknown) and Jodorowsky’s use of Moebius (of Heavy Metal Comic book fame) to help create the cinematics and layout
  • The bizarre ending involving the Weirding Modules and Rain on Arrakis steals from the Jodorowsky ending (though doesn’t go QUITE so acid trip as Jodorowsky) and totally diverges from the Dune Module

I did see it in the theater when it came out. It has some good points ( Patrick Stewart as Gurney Halleck, the overall look) but it is of its time and strongly affected by the Jodorowsky work which is NOT what a Dune originalist would like. Here, 41 years on it seems very dated and of its time. Of the three attempts at Dune that got to the screen it is probably the weakest.

Guest Contributor – Arthurincali – 08MAY2025 – Review of Dune

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ArthurinCali has put together a review of David Lynch’s 1984 motion picture adaption of Frank Herbert’s science fiction novel Dune.

For you Dune fans go over to his substack and see what he has to say about both the book and this movie version.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She-Hulk X

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I was watching the 1930s King Kong movie yesterday and thought, “That was a damn good idea for a motion picture.”  It had a love story, a damsel in distress, prehistoric monsters, an ocean voyage to a tropical island, a battle scene involving the latest weapons technology of the time, a strange culture, a scantily clad pretty woman and the capitol city of the world as a backdrop.  It was a fantastic story and considering the special effects technology of the time it must have been a truly exciting movie to watch.

Now I compare this to what passes for adventure movies today and what have we got?  Most of what is out there are superhero movies.  One or more characters dressed up in spandex running or flying around battling each other to cause or prevent mayhem to the human population around them.  And after two hours of this, usually nothing much has happened.  Some space jewel or other has been found or lost and some bad guys have been captured or chased off.  But to all intents and purposes nothing substantive has been achieved or lost.  For the most part no one even dies.  It seems rather pointless.

I think something has been lost from the art of storytelling.  Now this isn’t completely the case.  There are still movies with a beginning, middle and end.  I guess a decent example would be Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy.  Batman Begins, The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises; beginning, middle and end.  We see why Bruce Wayne became Batman.  We see him defeat his greatest adversary and we see him walk away when he can do no more.  It’s not Shakespeare but it is decent story-telling and effective spectacle.

Now compare this to the Marvel “Avengers” series.  There have been dozens of these movies if you count all of the sequels, spin-offs and television productions.  Each “hero” has a sequence of movies and then there are the ensemble films and basically nothing meaningful happens.  And now they’ve gotten to the point where they want to swap out the older white male heroes with black and female successor heroes.  The most laughable one I’d say is “She-Hulk: Attorney at Law.”  I have to assume that if she loses a case she hulks out and rampages through the court building until her client can escape the pulverized masonry.  Basically, these people have no conception of story-telling and are just building boring envelopes that they can fill with CGI effects.

Even something as absurd as the John Wick movies is better than this.  At least it started with an original movie that had a character and a plot.  Granted the character is a cartoon and the plot is as simple minded as any imaginable but there is an arc to the story and things definitely happen; mostly flying bullets and dead Russian mobsters but within the confines of the story it keeps your interest mostly.  Now it is almost unbelievable that they’ve been able to turn this into a series.  The body count in the first movie was in the high two figures.  In the second movie, which was the last one I watched, the action was so frenetic I couldn’t even tell how many people he killed.  The automatic weapons fire was almost continuous for ten minutes at a time.  I don’t even know how we’re supposed to believe that the guns don’t start to melt from the heat.  But even this absurdity is preferable to the boring Marvel movies.

I understand that Hollywood is solely driven by return on investment and pumping out sequels to existing intellectual property like the comic book characters is one of the only allowed pathways to getting a film made.  The exception is someone like Christopher Nolan whose reputation for success will allow him to make a movie like Oppenheimer.  But you can count those trusted movie-makers on the fingers of one hand.  And they’re getting old.  What happens when they’re gone?  She-Hulk II or III or X?