The Randomguy's

Could the The Witch of Mercury save the sunsetting of Gundam?

After the terrible end of Blood-iron orphans, it has been 9 whole year since Sunrise come up with another original Gundam series. In order to revive Gundam from the graveyard, sunrise team up with a fairly controversial screenwriter and present us a new original Gundam show, a show that will draw the youngers attention and would satisfy the needs of old Gundam fans: The Witch from Mercury. Now the first 12 episodes are out, is it any good? Can Gundam series be saved?

It all started with a concept mobile suit idea utilizing the life-changing tech for the disabilities, the mobile suits with Gundarm tech built-in, Gundam. While Gundam was already a success, there were issues in regards to the connection between the pilot and Gundarm system, which could easily kill the pilots. This problem was used by other companies developing mobile suits and eventually led to the conference's disission to terminate Gundam project by force. The research facility was destroyed while Gundam Lfrith pilot by a 4-year-old girl along with her mother managed to escape. Twenty years later, a girl named Suletta Mercury enter the school filled with heirs of the most powerful companies and took the world by storm with with Gundam Aerial.

How you could tell this is not a typical Gundam show is that the apart from episode 0, no one died in the first few episodes. Just when it tricked you as a slice of life girl's love anime, a massive plot twist came out of nowhere and ruined Happy Birthday once and for all. In the whole show although harmless it seemed, there were always dark and terrible shits happening in the background. Such contrast provides a lot of thoughts to the viewer, made them seek the lore of the story, as the final episode dropped a massive bomb and the audience HAVE TO watch the second half of the show later this year.

Above all the mysteries, the one scared most people is definitely the identify of the main protagonist, Suletta Mercury. Although she looked extremely similar to the one pilot Gundam Lfrith in episode 0, they cannot be the same person as the time gap between episode 0 and 1 is 20 years. At the same time, we knew cloning human or modified human is a thing in the story, so who is Suletta exactly? As the story progress, we've seen while being an introvert, Suletta didn't actually care about the people around her, but how people treat her and see her. That might be alarming as although he got close to Miorine and they seemed to have feelings to each other, is that even real to Suletta? Or is it just a character she'd play to be close to Miorine? So many questions yet not many answers. That brings out a big issue of the show. There are so many side stories that have huge potential, but we are now half way through the story and yet most of them still need time to develop or unveil. It is a big question mark whether all these plots would reveal themselves in the second half. The show is legit so far, it'd be a shame if it turned out to be one of those shows we never speak of for good reasons.

When we talk about mecha shows, one of the most important thing is of course the fights. The mecha fight in the show is... alright. Don't get me wrong, the combat scenes is definitely one of the top tier in this decade, but the fights are so short that it's just not enough. As the latter half of the story should be much more chaotic, let's hope there will be more amazing fighting scenes ahead of us.

So, the final conclusion, is Witch from Mercury a good Gundam show? Well, looks like it so far. The stocks are high at the moment, but whether it delivers would be decided after the next 12 episodes aired.

Bullet Train is every action movie in one piece

Do you enjoy your action movie? All the ridiculous and hilarious part, and some American sarcasm humor? If all of the answers are “hell yeah!”, then, Bullet Train is the one for you, and here's why.

When a killer codenamed ladybug finally got back to business, he was assigned a retrieve mission filling in for another guy. Little did he know that the bullet train he boarded and had plenty of stuff going on. Getting the target is easy, but somehow he kept running into troubles and couldn't get out of the train in time. When everything went wrong, can ladybug survive from his mission?

The short answer is Yes, like every other action movie protagonist. As an action film, this movie has Everything. Cool fights? Checked. People died? Checked. Weird and awkward jokes? Checked. Plot twist? Checked. In normal circumstances, that seems to be rather alarming, but Bullet train is not your normal action film. In fact, the greatest thing about this movie is that despite having all the cheesy elements, they nail every single one of them perfectly. Moreover, somehow the movie still finds time to talk shit and make fun of the mediocre action movies. This film is just an excellent textbook for how every action movie should be done. My favorite part of the film is the way it introduce new characters. With every first appearance of the character, they have this big neon light effects on their name in huge texts. Some of the names just felt like the producers were too lazy to come out of a name and they just kind of put something on it, which is extremely hilarious. The only complain I have is that the setups of the premise were a little bit too long that it could turn people off and missed the great 2-hour experience.

To summarize, Bullet Train is a must watch for all the action film fans. It's got everything an action movie would've had. Rent it, pay for it, pirate it, just make sure you watch it.

Black Adam has probably one of the best visual of the year but it fails to deliver in all the other aspects

Just as every DC superhero movie has dark mode by default, Shazam come as a surprise as it explores what it takes to be a hero in a relatively light-hearted way. But that doesn't mean DC has quit being dark. Starring The Rock, here comes a question no body cared but wondered: What if Shazam were evil (somewhat)?

Long long time ago, the champion of Kahndaq save the people from the oppresor. Back to morden days, Kahndaq is now ruled by a bunch of silly mercenaries, yet the people were too weak to fight back. When the champion was waken, he would bring blood and storm to the city of Kahndaq.

Honestly, This is a classic Dwayne Johnson's movie where he acts as himself as per usual. Most of the characters are forgettable, even other heroes and villains too. Fortunately, the visual effects are so stunning that you won't worry about what's actually happening. There were some twist in the movie for sure, but the hints were so obvious that it wouldn't surprise the audience one bit. Main characters would die, but the film didn't give us much to care about, and we know from the beginning he's definitely not goint to live. The romance was done in a very enjoyable way and it didn't interfere the main story, so that's a plus. Otherwise this film doesn't have much to show, Just another man with superpowers struggles to control his powers and having identify crisis at the same time. Same old same.

The best part of the film is without a doubt the amazing visuals and the Snyder-like slow motion shots. The best performance would of course go to Pierce Broadman as Dr. Fate. But for other parts, they're OK. The most disappointing part is 100% the storyline. Black Adam has always been a very self-motivated tyrant, but the one we got in the movie were nothing like that. Considering this guy was supposed to be the Nemesis of Shazam, I can't even picture Shazam and Black Adam fighting in this universe. In the end Adam finally sat on the thorn, but he thought it was wrong and destroyed the throne. That was the most outrageous thing for him to do! Not sure if it's done to fit Dwayne's public personality, but this Black Adam wasn't black at all.

In conclusion, Black Adam is a very good looking film. If you want to see some beautiful effects, this one is for you. But if what you seek is the dark story of Black Adam, just skip this film.

Vivy is definitely one of the best sci-fi anime out there!

Do you like Sci-fi? Do you like robot? Most importantly, do you like good stories? If so, Vivy-Fluorite Eye's Song is a must watch. Join the 100-year-long quest of Diva to save humanity. This, is Vivy.

The story began with the rouge AI robots one day started killing humans with no signs in advanced. Just when everything was ruined, a scientist sent an AI, Matsumoto, back to the past to save humanity by modifying the singularity points of AI development. However, Matsumoto had to partner with another AI and convince her to join him on the mission. That AI was Diva, the only AI lasted for a hundred years.

In this world, AI fails to function properly if given too many tasks, so each AI was given one sole purpose. The main character Diva was given the purpose of 'make everyone happy with her singing,' and her companion Matsumoto was given the purpose of 'avoid the war between AIs and humans.' To convince Diva to help him, Matsumoto initially twisted the narrative as 'to make sure your audience will live, you have to help me.' Diva eventually agreed to help, and went by the name Vivy, a name gifted by her first fan, during the world-saving mission.

However, it would seem that whatever they did, the results never went their way. For instance, there's a tower that indicates the development level of AI. The original plan was to slow down the pace of AI development, but the tower still grew taller even when they changed the singularity points. To be honest, whatever they did eventually ended up being a positive influences to AI development. Each episode we were given a touching story with well-done plot twists and proper ending, but you'd have a feeling that what they've done probably didn't really mattered in the wider scope. In fact, the latter episodes kind of proved that as well. So, if the quests themselves wasn't the point, what's the meaning of all this? You got it, it's the character growth along the way. In the whole show, Diva was searching for the meaning of 'using your heart' to get better at singing. Sure, it's not news that robots always struggle to understand how human works, but Diva was that kind of person that will directly ask you 'what does it mean?' is pretty funny, probably in hope of getting a clean and definite answer when there is none. I'm glad to report that in the end it Diva did find her own definition of the human heart, performed the best show of her life, and saved humanity.

One talking point I'm quite fond of is the purpose of an AI. Although only given one purpose, when you think about it, that wasn't really the case. To accomplish the true purpose, you'll always find new sub-purpose that will help you fulfill the main purpose. In Diva's case, she was even capable of over-extending her purpose of 'making everyone happy with her singing' to 'save humanity to prevent her future audience die.' You can say that she called herself Vivy when saving the world, and therefore it counts as two personalities. However, Vivy is till 100%vDiva, it's not like she gained a second personality from saving the it's just the robot figuring out she had different characters in different situation, but this idea itself actually challenges the one purpose rule. That makes me wonder the problem may not be AIs cannot handle multiple purposes but other reasons. Sadly I didn't find any definite answer in the show, but a novel series is currently on its way, let's hope the idea would be explained further.

When it comes to saving humanity, of course there are some fight scenes, and I must say the fights were done incredibly well that you can clearly tell this is two robots fighting rather than human. Although being humanoids, the AIs' moves and gestures just constantly put you off and kept realizing the fact that they are robots, and this feature was best express in battles, I really dig it.

In conclusion, Vivy-Fluorite Eye's Song is a great anime. It has Everything, Good story, good emotional attachment, good character design, robots, sci-fi stuff, great fighting scenes, and constantly tricking you into listening to the opening. I could hardly imagine someone watch it and doesn't like it.

Star Trek: Strange New World has regained my interest in Star Trek series

As a casual Star Trek fan born in the 90s, the Star Trek I know was pretty much limited to the trilogy in recent years starring Chris Pine. The image of USS Enterprise and the crew is of course aligned with those characters in the movies. That being said, after Picard, Lower decks, and Discovery, I do know that the Star Trek universe is so much bigger than that. Hence, when I learned that there was a new series out, I did not hesitate and clicked on the title.

In this series, we followed the footsteps of captain Pike and his Enterprise crew along with their struggles. Captain Pike had nightmares about his foreseen future. His number one was actually forbidden to join Star Fleet, the linguistic expert wasn't sure if she's gonna stay. Security officers had issues too. Nevertheless, they ventured into space without hesitation. This is where all it started.

Obviously, when you're on a ship, there will be a lot of characters to cover. Star Trek series had an advantage that different race would have very different looks, but this is still no easy tasks. Luckily, the show generally describes the characters very well, with their magic trick of diving into the story with different characters' eyes. From the different point of view, one can understand the personalities of a character and his behavior pattern well, and this really helped as the storyline become much more serious.

Perhaps it's because I'm don't know that much about the series, seeing some familiar characters in the show makes me feel weird. If Spock is already in the Enterprise with Pike, how the hell would he be with Kirk? Or, most importantly, why would he be with Kirk having the exact same struggles? Uhura somehow joined the fleet this early, but clearly she was still a cadet when Kirk first met her. I'm sure there's a good explanation of all this. It's just a thing I kept thinking about while watching the show.

If there's one thing delivered well in the show, that is hope. The hope to become a better being, the hope to change the future, the hope to overcome one's terrible past, the hope of everything really. And the best part of the show is definitely how the characters head straight on with their mission and dealing with their inner struggles at the same time. The best part is when they had an epiphany and just chose to go along with it and actually work out fine. Even in the darkest time and the most difficult moment, The Enterprise always found hope and defeat whatever stood in their way. Although at times it would seem the solution to the problem is oversimplified, it's still very satisfied to see the growth of each character.

In summary, Star Trek: Strange New World is an amazing show, really recommended. It portraits a beautiful universe and shows us that there's hope everywhere, you just have to find it.

How Moonfall was able to be clever and dumb at the same time is a pure miracle

We humans are always been fascinated by the wonders of the stars, every day and night, we look up and wonder... what it's like out there? Why are we here? Are we the only being that developed civilization in the vast universe? With our imagination, legends and stories were told through generations about the stars and the signs. And as one of the biggest start we see daily, there are tons of stories around the moon. We do like to speculate how such big stuff can circulate the planet Earth without crashing into us or drifting to space. What the hack is the moon? In Moonfall, the question was answered.

It all started from 10 years ago, when astronaut Harper, Marcus and Fowler performing regular maintenance for a satellite, they were attacked by some unknown alien technology. Marcus died from the incident, and Harper was to blame as this was eventually considered as a human error by the court to hide the secretes of the moon. Ten years later, a Dr, Houseman discovered that the orbit of the moon was changing, which supported his conspiracy theory that the Moon is actually an artificial Megastructure, he got Harper to help and the two would join now NASA deputy director Fowler on the quest to prevent the tragedy of Moon falling from the sky.

I have to admitted the first scene of the alien attacking feels like some top quality content, and the plots before the whole world-saving stuff were very well-written. You can easily understand the dynamics of the people, their desire, and the reason behind their actions. When the bad news hit, you'd see very different reactions from the characters. Some just ditched their responsibility and fled to seek protection, some stayed and tried to come up with solutions, while some only wanted to take advantage of the situation. The dark emotions and harsh realities were executed well, you could feel the immense pressure even through the screen. However, the movie has a big problem, which is that it couldn't decide it wants to be clever or dumb. And the solution? Let's be very clever and really dumb at the same time. In fact, let's play clever and dumb right next to each other so people will notice how clever and how stupid we can be. That's what this film feels like to me, especially on the dialogs. Sometimes the characters could speak as if they've mastered the whole Shakespeare collection but sometimes they just don't know what they're talking about. Some jokes were good, but some jokes really shouldn't exist in this world. But the most ridiculous event was probably that the big three simply just took a decommissioned shuttle and flied to space on their own, no assistance required. It's not like they were using a state-of-the-art aircraft, it was probably from the cold war period, but somehow it only took 3 men who don't really know their stuff to take off. Also, the stepdad kind of died for no good reason other than convenience. In the plot he was trying to save his family, but when Harper's son do the same thing, he was saved by teenage romance. That really work?

To sum it up, Moonfall is an OK movie. The character designs were great and the story itself was full of potential. However, how the main characters deal with challenges were way too easy, making the dark and deep setup didn't really work. And let's not get started on the jokes. I'd say it's a guilty pleasure film, probably best to consume it with a group of friends and popcorns.

Top Gun: Maverick is no doubt the best action film of the year

Strictly speaking, I'm not old enough to know the 'Top Gun Craze,' when everyone rides a motorcycle with cool jacket and sunglasses on. As I grew up, I did watch the original Top Gun for a few times and wasn't that impressed. The Plane shots were very confusing, the interaction between characters sometimes were pretty awkward, and I still don't get why everyone was so sweaty as if they just jumped out from a swimming pool. Although the story line and how the story telling was brilliant, I cannot said I had good times watching them. But still, because I've watched it so many times, I kind of know everybody's characters and their personalities. And with this background, Top Gun: Maverick is a very enjoyable experience.

The story started with our good old Maverick, although aged, still got his naughty vibe and determination. He was then assigned back to Top Gun for a extremely difficult mission, aimed to train the young pilots for one last time, which includes his old partner's son, Rooster. From the start of the movie we were shown that although he was able to live with the death of Goose, it was still a huge nightmare keeping him awake. And although he became much more mature, he was still the madman we knew. Then he met Penny, one of his old lovers when he was younger. Just as the atmosphere felt pretty good, Rooster came. You could almost taste the guilt Maverick felt from the way he avoided him by instinct. When the piano was played and the classic song started, the feelings within Maverick's eyes were almost painful to watch. This is how you know that this movie will be a great film. No long conversations that make you feel asleep. No forced romance to get people aroused. The film just speak to you like a film should in the first place.

With the setup so nice, the rest of the movie surely doesn't disappoint, and most issues I have about the previous film were not seen in this one. The Plane shots were amazing, and the characters just felt genuine. The story itself is pretty straightforward, basically the same plot as the old one. In hindsight this is a terrible thing because usually the story told twice wouldn't be as good, but Top Gun Maverick did not make you feel that. In addition, they add a very emotional twist near the end, so if you don't think twice you would not have noticed that this is the same formula. To be honest, you know this is a Tom Cruise film throughout, but that doesn't mean it's a bad thing. The great thing about Tom Cruise is that even when you know it's him, you will still enjoy the movie nevertheless. The plot twist especially leaned on that and it proved to work as beautifully as it should.

The way I see it, Top Gun: Maverick is a film that I can easily recommend to everyone. The characters are charming, the fight scenes are breathtaking, and the story is simple yet good. I think this is Tom Cruise and the whole crew sending a message: This is what Top Gun should've been. Back then we don't have the technology and resources ready, so we reimagine it. Needless to say, they succeed. With flying colors.

If you like Nicolas Cage, you'll love The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

For all the good or bad reasons, everybody knows Nicolas Cage. Personally, I remember him from National Treasure and Next. But other films I've seen starring him were just a blur. To be honest, I would've missed this movie if it wasn't for the PR team's genius work. You see, the film was named “Cage's super mission”, which itself is 100% drawling all the eyeballs. I really haven't watched a film with Cage in it, but I've heard things and am sort of hesitate to watch it. But eventually I've seen it, and here's what happens.

Right at the start, we are reminded how great Nicolas is by showing some clips of Con Air. After that, we've seen Cage was in his mid-life crisis. His career was stuck, his family was falling apart, and he has no money. As a result, he got no choice to take a job to participate in a rich man's birthday party. As it turns out this is exactly what he needed. The rich man is a huge fan of Nicolas Cage, and they just bond right after they met. At the same time, CIA think the rich man is a huge cartel leader and wanted to use Cage to arrest the guy. So the story begins.

First thing first, this is a comedy with some action scenes in it. Alright, once we clear that up, this movie is absolutely gorgeous! The plot is obviously inspired by the rumors and scandals of Nicolas Cage himself. We kind of know that he's struggling in recent years, but to let he act as himself and face these problem is a bold move. I can say without a doubt that this pay off massively. To see Cage himself facing his issues is so satisfying. And to see Cage start an adventure heavily based on his experience is very interesting. Spoiler alert. In the end, Cage really confront his problems, kill his demons and become a better person. This is a journey of how a struggled, broken man find his way back. And it's a brilliant journey.

In summary, this film is for all the Nicolas Cage fans. You don't even need to be a fanatic one to enjoy it. I'd recommend it to everyone who know him.

Jurassic World Domination ends the series with huge disappointments

Dinos are back! This time, not in the park, but in real world! How will people react to the dinosaurs? Can we make peace with them? Or will we exploit them due to our selfishness? Can we survive this? Let's find out in Jurassic World Domination.

It's been a couple years since the dinosaurs broke up from the mansion. The girl Owen and Claire saved has grown up. Blue got a baby. The evil company Biosyn took baby Blue and the girl for reasons unclear, so Owen and Claire started their quest to save the children, without Blue. On the other hand, Dr. Sattler and Dr. Grant decided to team up to reveal the vicious plan of Biosyn genetics to expand their seed sell numbers through dino-bugs that feed on non-Biosyn crops. Biosyn was a big company ran by Tim Crook and it kept all the dinosaurs in a certain area. Yep, Although it's called Jurassic World, we're still stuck in a theme park.

This film is straight up Fast and Furious: Dinosaur madness. A loads of thing just happened that often felt way too convenient. Suddenly you got a CIA friend, and soon enough you get a pilot friend. The worse part of this film is that you don't feel anything for the good guys, no matter old or new. Owen and Claire have no personality and the doctors are all messed up. There were good shots and good scenes, but the plot is so dreadful that you'd find a million problems watching the film. When the last film set to widen the scope of the dinoverse, you'd expect a lot more deeper thoughts in the stories. But in reality, it's just a loads of re-used jokes, and most of them didn't even work very well. The biggest failure of the film in my opinion is not bringing Blue along. Just imagine how much they could do about if a dinosaurs is on their side and a ton of interesting jokes could be made. It's such a shame they didn't try that.

In summary, Jurassic World Domination has good dino-shots, but the story sucks, and the characters are not relatable at all. It'd still be a fun time with popcorn and bear, but after watching you will not remember it at all. I don't really recommend this one unless you are a massive Jurassic fanboy/girl.

Thor: Love and Thunder is yet another marvel movie you will not remember

July 11th, the first day of me officially leaving my job. What should I do in the lovely morning of Monday? Hmm, I think I should go to the theatre considering it's been a while since like forever. What? There's basically only the new Thor and Detective Conan? Fine, let's see what Thor is up to this time. What happened in the last movie again?

Thor 1 is about Thor meet his girl friend. I don't remember about Thor 2. I only remember Loki and Thor made peace in Thor 3 but nothing more. But from the Avengers movies, we know Asgard was destroyed and he go fat, start hanging out with Guardians of the Galaxy, turning a new chapter of his life. After the good the bad, and the ugly, what kind of god has Thor become?

As it turned out, Thor is back to his old ways, a selfish, arrogant god that somehow still deemed worthy to wield the hammer. And yes the broken hammer is now back together (in a way) and grant the dying Jane (Thor's ex-girlfriend) the power of thunder! The couple together with other noble companions started their quest to stop the anonymous god killer from killing gods. Maybe they'll visit some other gods and form a strong alliance, or maybe they'll kill a bunch of gods themselves, who knows?

I'm gonna put this straight out. Although I do enjoy the film, it gives of the vibe of guilty pleasure, which is not what I seek from the Marvel movies. Obviously I do not expect some epic heavy stories, but to be honest I'd get the same energy from an episode of The Big Bang Theory or something like Friends. The story is barely convincing enough, the interactions between the character felt so strange that I can't really believe in it. Also, the change of atmosphere from seriousness to comedy is just way to fast and didn't work. The special effects at times were off a little bit. Thank God the fight scenes were still pretty decent.

All in all, I think you can totally skip Thor: Love and Thunder. You don't need to put yourself into this situation unless you just want some joy in your life which can be gain simply watch a 20 minute episode of other stuffs. Just watch Honest Trailers and Pitch Meetings when they come out. This film doesn't worth your time.