Catching Fire Review

Catching Fire was a complete success. This sequel to the Hunger Games was stuffed full with emotion and devastation even more-so than its heartbreaking predecessor. As loved-ones and strangers die around Katniss, the true beauty of the movie was in Jennifer Lawrence's phenomenal acting in times of immediate trauma. Jennifer lost it when terrible things were happening, so much so that the audience has no choice but to lose it with her.

Catching Fire nearly doubled its budget from the $78 Million budget of The Hunger Games, which is a large contributing factor to its quality skyrocketing above the first movie. And this movie just had a much larger scale. Quality actors and actresses held every role  of the tributes so that even minor fight scenes had the sense of epicness.

Through Cathing Fire, Jennifer Lawrence and the rest of the cast show us a glimpse of what trauma looks like. They show us pain and agony and the line where agony becomes too much to bear. They show us what love looks like when the end of life may be around the corner.

These movies (and the books) have often been criticized for their violence and marketing toward a younger crowd. I agree that the themes of The Hunger Games trilogy are not appropriate for the two 10-year-olds I was sitting next to in the IMAX showing last night. But I have never seen a movie that portrayed a more anti-violence stance.

The characters in the books and movies don't fight to win and move on. If they fight and win, they scream in their sleep from nightmares, see the bodies of those they've killed in the woods. It haunts them every day. Those who fight and lose are mourned constantly.

Even the movies spend enough time on this for the viewer to know: their loved one's will never forget them and are shaken to their core by loss. The Hunger Games series shows that their are terrible consequences for violence and does justice to the true human reaction to loss and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) often found in military memoirs and other non-fiction trauma stories.

Because of the scope of the movie, incredible acting by all (especially Jennifer Lawrence), and the true emotional trauma that the movie shares with the audience, it will be a massive hit. I suspect it will over double its box office return from the first Hunger Games ($691 Million) and will be rated as one of the best movies of the year. (I personally think it is the BEST movie of the year. And I don't think The Hobbit will beat it out.)
*Update: Catching Fire made $158 Million on its opening weekend, failing to clench the record of biggest opening weekend by only $3 Million from The Dark Knight Rises. Catching Fire has made $318 Million worldwide as of Sunday Night.

If you haven't yet, go see this incredible cinematic production. It is a humanizing experience that we often don't get in our everyday lives. Everyone deserves the opportunity to encounter two basic connections to humanity that are the emotion and loss that can be felt in watching Catching Fire. 

The experience of losing someone you love right in front of your eyes is not something that every one of us will encounter in our lives, and that's a very good thing, but that also means we will not be able to fully relate to those of us who have had that experience. Though Catching Fire doesn't give a substitute for that experience, it unlocks the emotional responses that go along with these particular types of trauma. It makes us feel what the characters feel and engage terrible atrocities in humanity that we would never have to face otherwise, at least for most viewers. It gives us the chance of empathy and understanding.

To feel the pain of death is to forget about homework and your job tomorrow morning. We can put aside matters of the day to day and reengage themes that exist at the base of our humanity. Life, death, loss, fear for ourselves and for our loved ones. Catching Fire brings us more than entertainment. It brings us a look deeper into ourselves.

We can now look forward to Mockingjay: Part 1, which will be equally as emotional or even more so. In a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Jennifer Lawrence said she cried on her first read-through of the script. This will be very good.

Catching Fire Releases Tonight

Catching Fire releases tonight at 8:00pm in many places around the U.S.! One of those places is Goshen's own Linway Theater. Tickets are going fast for the early 8:00pm showing, so buy them early if you want one (I believe you have to buy them from the actual theater, not online).

Starring Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, and Elizabeth Banks, this sequel to the epic Hunger Games is expected to ROCK the big screen when it is released tonight. A series of extremely exciting and gutwrenching trailers have been released over the last few months, and from them, we know that this movie will diverge from the book's content a little more than the first book did. president Snow's role will be significantly expanded, and the arena looks incredible.

I, personally, am excited about the divergence from the book content somewhat. Look at The Lord of the Rings trilogy as an example of a movie that left the book's content behind significantly in all three movies and achieved cinematic genius. Compared to the original The Hunger Games movie that tried to stay very close to the book and didn't quite achieve it. Trying to follow the book directly is impossible. Period. There isn't enough time in a movie to do it. It's better to make a fantastic movie than to try and fail at reproducing a book on the big screen.

The book details Katniss and Peeta's journey through the district as victors on a Victory Tour, but most importantly, the aftermath of their taunt at the Gamemakers by trying to kill themselves rather than kill each other. The movie will deal with revolts, struggling between saving those you love and fighting for change, and wrestling with how love can become real if it was fabricated from the beginning. It will be deep and powerful.

I hope Catching Fire accomplished wonders tonight. It is expected by many to break the $1 Billion mark as Iron Man 3 and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey recently did. If the hype over it is any indication, I think it will.

Thor: The Dark World

Thor: The Dark World, in its third week in the cinemas, has made a significant impact in the world box office compared to the first Thor movie. One main draw of the sequel compared to the original may be the increased screen time of Tom Hiddleston as Loki alongside Chris Hemsworth's Thor. Hiddleston played a strategic and humorous anti-hero/villain throughout the movie, which kept the viewers and engaged and always entertained by his ever-deepening personality. Another large boost came from the incredibly successful Avengers movie, which highlighted Thor and Loki both as more interesting and watchable characters.

From the original Thor's $65.7 Million opening weekend box office, Thor: The Dark World jumped to an opening box office gain of $85.7 Million. As the movie begins to level out, the final worldwide gross is $477.8 Million, receiving over half of that from foreign countries. Though Thor 2 didn't come close to Iron Man 3's $1.2 Billion, it is on track to be the highest grossing Marvel movie without Robert Downey Jr. in it.

Overall, audiences rated Thor 2 as an "A-" film through CinemaScore. The intense actions scenes, strong female roles, tragic and heartbreaking scenes, and ridiculously funny Loki moments all added up to be a very successful film. If you haven't seen it yet, I highly recommend it.

Legend of Korra Comes to a Close

On Friday night, Avatar: The Legend of Korra released as usual at 8:00pm, but what fans didn't expect was a challenge from the makers of ALOK that, if won, would allow for the release of the season finale a week early! At 1:00pm on Friday, KorraNation and Bryan Konietzko (co-creator of ATLA and ATLOK) posted on their Tumblr pages a video of Janet Varney (voice actress for Korra in the show) giving the fans of ATLOK a challenge: If the post of that video would get reblogged 10,000 times before Saturday began, they would release the season finale of ALOK on Friday night at Midnight. The Avatar fandom made quick work of this challenge, and by now the post had been reblogged over 22,000 times. The season finale aired early on Friday (sometime even earlier than the promised midnight release), and the Book 2 Avatar mini-series came to an epic close.

The greatest part of the season finale was its massive scope. To provide the Avatar, master of all four elements and embodied by Raava, the spirit of all light and good in the world, with a viable challenge, this finale had t be something of epic proportions, and it surely was. *Spoiler Alert* Although it seemed almost too much like a typical over-escalating anime, Unalaq's transformation into a massive dark spirit giant gave the finale a gravity that had never been seen before in the Avatar universe. Korra was forced to step up then, and become equally as giant as she embraced the cosmic energy in her spirit, which gave a shout out to the ATLA fans, using the same scene from ATLA season 2 and season 3 finales when Aang tries to embrace his own cosmic energy. And that wasn't the only shout-out to long-time ATLA fans. Commander Zhao from season 1 of ATLA was found in the "Fog of Lost Souls" that Uncle Iroh helped them find. Within that fog, Tenzin breaks down, feeling the pressure of his father's legacy on his shoulders, and elderly Aang appears int he show for the first time.

A couple of the strange things in this episode were that Korra was left to use her cosmic energy to battle Evil Unalaq even though her Raava spirit was gone, meaning anyone could have joined her or battled in her stead. Also, Raava declares in Beginnings part 2 that Wan and she are "bonded forever," but then Vaatu simply rips Raava right out of Korra's body. At the end, Raava would have had the option to chose anyone as her new host, meaning anyone could have been the new Avatar, especially since Korra lost the connection to all her past Avatar lives in the battle, but she links with Korra again as if it were her only choice. Personally, i would have chosen Jinora.

Despite Korra's unshakable resolve to defeat Unalaq, she would have been defeated if it wasn't for Aang's adolescent granddaughter, Jinora. Jinora has become one of my favorite characters of all time because she reminds me most of Aang from the original ATLA series. She is kind, wise, humble, and spiritual. And in this episode, she literally brings light back into the world so that Raava can manifest once again. I'm not quite sure how she does this, but we can be sure that her essence and spirituality basically resurrected the spirit of light, making Jinora one of the most spiritually mature and pure characters in the Avatar universe.

As season 2 comes to a close, the fandom is already plaguing the creators with news about season 3. We know this much so far:
-It will have a focus on Earth
-Lin will have a more prominent role
-There is an Earth Queen
-It will be released "much" quicker than Book 2 was released after Korra's first season.

Movies to Watch Out For

There are some awesome fantasy movies coming out within the next 6 months:

November 22- Catching Fire
This movie has the potential to be the movie of the year, with a much grander scope than the original Hunger Games movie had and some artistic digressions from the book that the first didn't dare to take, It is on the top of my must-see list.

Catching Fire Final Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zoKj7TdJk98

December 13- The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug
This movie speaks for itself. Coming from Peter Jackson and based on Tolkien's novel, The Hobbit plus the appendices from The Return of the King and adding a whole new character (female elf, Tauriel), this movie will be much faster paced than the first one and begin moving toward the climax of the company's journey at The Lonely Mountain.

The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvGcbFIfJos

January 1- I, Frankenstein
Taking a new look at the Frankenstein character as a superhuman force, stronger and faster but hidden in the shadows for years, this movie will be a great sci-fi remake of the traditional story with plenty of good vs. antihero vs. evil vs. good action.

I, Frankenstein Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxOSPfUw3qw

March 21- Divergent
If the movie is anywhere near as good as the book, it will be a hit. They already publicizing the movie with character stills with their elaborate tattoos from being in the "Dauntless" faction. If you don't know what I'm talking about, you soon will!

Divergent Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sutgWjz10sM

April 4- Captain America: The Winter Soldier
At first, I gave these post-Avengers hero movies a skeptical look, mainly because each hero's pre-Avengers movie was not too-well developed and seemed to only serve as a necessary precursor to Marvel's big movie. But After seeing Thor: The Dark World, I'm sold that these are quality movies and Captain America, Like Thor, will definitely be worth seeing.

Captain America 2 Trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLWsK1ZFunA

June 27- Transformers: Age of Extinction
Personally,I think the Transformers trilogy was enough. They don't need to keep pushing the already closed -up storyline further and further because it makes money. At the same time though, I thought the third edition was the best one yet and is still one of my favorite movies of all time, so I'm ok with just one more go at it. The title eludes to the fact that it will be the definitive last.

Ender's Game Review

Ender’s Game hit the movie theaters on its opening night of November 1, and it took first place in the box office that weekend, making $27 Million just over that weekend. In the week it has been in theaters, Ender’s Game has accumulated about $53 Million, putting it on par with other sci-fi movies like After Earth and beating out similar adaptations like The Golden Compass and Eragon. Since the budget for Ender’s Game was $110 Million, they will be looking to earn double what they have in this first week to at least break even.

           

 Even though most reviews are giving Ender’s Game ratings like 60% (Rotten Tomatoes) and a 51/100 (Metacritic), I would give this new sci-fi adaptation an 85/100. The movie is a thought-provoking Journey of Ender, the genius main character who is recruited by Colonel Graff and what seems to be a world government to train to be a future colonel of the army against another planet’s inevitable invasion. In the book, Ender’s Game, the kids are recruited for this program around ages 6-8, but the movie sets the children at an older age of around 12-14, and it works fine. Asa Butterfield does a wonderful job depicting Ender Wiggin, who is portrayed to constantly be thinking of logical and strategic ways to live and to advance, and Abigail Breslin (always a favorite actress of mine) does justice to Valentine Wiggin in the limited amount of screen time she had in this first movie of the potential series.

            

But the part of the movie that hits the hardest is in the movie’s opening quote: "In the moment when I know my enemy well enough to destroy him, in that moment I think I also love him." Throughout the movie, we see Ender developing as a compassionate person as well as a brilliant warrior. It is there two elements clashing against each other that make the movie itself brilliant.

           

The only reasons I can see for its average box office earnings are: 1. The trailers weren’t focused enough on the story of Ender, an interesting and quirky hero. Instead they focused on Colonel Graff (Harison Ford) as the decisive and rough-edged commander of the movie—much less interesting for an audience who wants some intersting sci-fi. 2. It is competing with other big-shots in the sci-fi world this month, including Thor: The Dark World just a week later, and Catching Fire on the 22^nd. 

I was much more excited for Thor and Catching Fire that Ender’s Game, and even though that didn’t stop me from seeing it as well, it may have been edged out of the sci-fi market this month by its strong competitors.

            

Overall, I recommend Ender’s Game highly as a movie that is more thought-provoking and meaningful than Thor, but probably not Catching Fire, which will be an absolute must see, come Nov. 22.

Legend of Korra Must be Saved

            Avatar: The Legend of Korra (ALOK) isn’t boding well in its second season. Last year, its first season premier brought it 4.55 Million viewers, and the show averaged 3.5 million viewers for the season, making it one of the most watched cartoons of 2012. This year, however, ATLOK’s season premier, “Rebel Spirit,” brought in only 2.6 Million viewers, and has averaged only 2.0 Million viewers so far in its season, hitting an all-time low of 1.1 Million viewers with its fifth episode, “Peacekeepers.”

            ATLOK’s first season was the definition of building action and well-developed plot. ATLOK is a continuation of the Avatar universe initially expanded in the series, Avatar: The Last Airbender (ATLA), in which the world is split into four nations, each nation having the control of a certain element (Earth, Fire, Water, or Air), but the Fire Nation wages war on all the other nations. The Avatar is a half-spirit, half-human guardian of the world who can control all four elements and is charged with guiding the world toward peace; when one avatar dies, the avatar is reborn as a new baby, creating a life cycle. Aang, a ten-year-old boy from the Air Nomads is the Avatar in ATLA, and it chronicles his journey to stop the war. This show actually received more views than ATLOK ever did, finishing the last four episodes with almost 6 Million viewers per episode.

            In ATLOK season one, we learn that Aang has grown old and died, and the new Avatar is Korra, born to the Southern Water Tribe. She is much different from Aang, who was a pacifist and very spiritual. Korra is hard-headed and violent, throwing herself into any situation. The plot of season one progresses as a mysterious “Amon” leads a non-bending movement against all benders (people who can’t bend any of the elements against those who can). It turns from peaceful to violent, and we never know Amon’s identity until the finale. The suspense leading up to that moment was paramount, and we have known for a while that Amon has the ability to take people’s bending away. Korra eventually fights the final battle against Amon, who has a secret ability besides taking bending away, and wins at the cost of her own bending. As she gives up hope at the end of the finale, she makes a spiritual connection with her other Avatar lives, and Aang, the Avatar from the previous series, gives her her bending back. One of the biggest draws of the ATLOK is its constant reference to the characters we all know and love from the original ATLA series, throwing family members and children of those characters into the new mix in ATLOK. It brings back memories and nostalgia of ATLA, which was developed over a total of 61 episodes over three seasons. The character were well formed in this longer time period, compared to the 12- and 14-episode seasons ALTOK airs in.

            All this to say that this universe matters. ATLA and ATLOK have been proven some of the best TV shows in the cartoon world and overall, both of which receiving awards for best animated show here and in countries across the globe. This is why its sudden decline in viewers is so distressing.

            So what changed from season one to season two? What did the average viewers drop by nearly half in this new season? It turns out, a lot has changed.

            To start, the show’s season premier dates were nearly a year and a half apart, both changing the air period from start of summer to start of the school year, and making anxious fans wait all too long, possibly losing much of its fandom. On top of that, the actual writers of ATLOK have changed! Yes, our beloved Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko have handed off the writing torch to new writers such as Joshua Hamilton and Tim Hedrick. Both of these writers also wrote for ATLA, but didn’t lay a hand on the first season of ATLOK. Another contributing factor has been the numerous airtime changes. The first two episodes aired at 7:00pm, while the next few aired at 8:30pm, and now the current (and supposedly permanent) airtime is 8:00pm. With all these changes, I hope the low viewer count is only temporary, and this great fantasy universe continues to thrive.