Galaxy's Edge review

My wife and I had the opportunity to visit Batuu on Sunday, October 28th (in WDW in Orlando).

First and foremost, I've seen a lot of click bait articles and YouTube videos saying "Galaxy's Edge is empty and here's why" and in my experience, those articles are simply not true.  It was a Sunday morning in Hollywood Studios and there was a steady stream of people walking towards Black Spire Outpost and it was constantly busy during the hours I was there.  The only quiet time was at night, but let's start at the beginning.

If you've unfamiliar, here's a map of the area.  We entered via the Grand Avenue side, which is where the Resistance area is located.  You can see where the new ride will be as there were a few cast members "standing guard".  There was also an X-wing and an A-wing.  They were cool to see, but I found them to be cooler looking and sounding at night, but more on that later.

We walked past the market area on the left and stayed more towards the right so we passed between Ronto Roasters and then the Droid Depot and hung a left.  (If you hang a right, you head towards Toy Story Land.)  There is a little courtyard-ish area where there are the refreshers (bathrooms), and a little bit of a bottleneck of people, but right after that we found the Milk Stand.

Re:  Blue milk, in a word, fantastic.  

It was a little odd at first, but then it was super addicting.  My wife and I shared one, and then later got another one.  We didn't try the green, nor did we try either with alcohol.  Something for next time.

Next to the Milk Stand is the First Order Cargo with the giant First Order ship.  I don't know what it's called, but we saw some Storm Troopers who saw my wife's BB-8 ears (from Etsy), and they told her that her “allegiance may be questioned".

We passed Oga's Cantina and made our way to Smugglers Run.  It was only a 55-minute wait, and it went surprisingly quick.  When we finally got to Hondo, we made our way up near the front of the stagging area and scored jobs at Pilots.  I controlled left and right; my wife controlled up and down.  We made it back with 31% power back.  I'm glad we didn't die/fail the mission.  We were able to get one vial of coaxium.

Afterwards, we walked past Docking Bay 7 and went through the "market" area to check that our briefly.  We had a FP for the Indiana Jones show, but we didn't make it in time, so I think we checked out Toy Story Land to potentially do Slinky Dog Dash before our 1 PM reservation at Oga's for "lunch".  

Re:  Oga's.  

I feel like it's something you'll want to experience, but unfortunately it wasn't the best experience.

1. There is a line of people waiting outside to get in.  Even if you have a reservation, you are asked to stand in line to get "checked in".  Once you get checked in, and your spot becomes available, a cast member yells your name as they walk down the line looking for you.  They take you to the entrance/exit where there is only one way in and out as other cast members "guard" that spot.
2. The bar area and entire experience is 95% standing, so there are no seats around the bar.  The bigger alcoves and tables go to the larger groups, so if you're a group of two like my wife and I, you're mostly likely getting put at the bar.
3. We got placed at the very end of the bar on the far-right side which was near an area where only cast members were allowed.  It's a blind corner so throughout the entire "experience" cast members were constantly yelling “corner” to avoid a collision.
4. We were greeted by an older gentleman who welcomed us and placed some coasters down and took our drink order.  I guess this is on me, but I THOUGHT they served food at Oga's.  They do NOT.  They have some sort of snacky thing (Batuu Bits) and a meat/cheese plate thing that wasn't on the menu.  I was kind of disappointed and annoyed as I was hungry.  I later learned that even though they serve breakfast, they don't serve lunch or dinner.  
5. Located at the edge of the bar was a young man making drinks.  3 or more tickets would print, and he'd make the drinks.  He wasn't our bartender, and spoke to us once, but was just kind of going through the motions.  He got us our second round as the initial older bartender didn't check on us when our drinks were finished.
6. Drink-wise, my wife got the Jedi Mind Trick and I got the Bespin Fizz.  The Fizz had a cool presentation and tasted good.  For our second drink, my wife got a Bespin Fizz, and then I      got a Yub Nub.  You can get it without paying for the mug, which costs $15 which they still make it in the Ewok mug.  I did later decide to purchase the Ewok mug ($30), which they give you a clean one in a box when you leave/pay.  Four drinks (plus mug) and the snack was over $100 without the tip.
7. From where we were standing, we could NOT see DJ Rex.  We did hear him talking and playing music the whole time, which was okay.  The original cantina song did play which was nice I guess.  I didn't really know what to expect music wise.
8. Before leaving, we wanted to walk around to see the entire bar to realize how tiny it was.  Also, the opposite side of the bar was a mirror image of the other.  
9. Lastly, we were initially told that the experience was 45 minutes which I think is about the time we stayed.  No one forced us out and I had a feeling that if we kept ordering drinks that we would have been able to stay.

We headed to Toy Story Land to get some lunch quick.  We did mobile ordering somewhere and just split a sandwich.  I was kind of in a bad mood after Oga's and my wife wanted to go to Magic Kingdom, so we did that.

We came back to Batuu at night, which I alluded to earlier.  You can really hear the ambient sounds of the forest/jungle area at night, and the sounds of the ships and the droids were lit up.

Since I missed Dok's earlier, we made it a point to check that out after riding Smugglers Run again.  This time it was only a 20 minute wait and we were both gunners.  We only had one engineer.  If you don't have a sixth person, that vacant job gets put on "auto pilot” per the cast member.  We did slightly better with 39% power left on the Falcon and we got 2 vials of coaxium.

Re:  Disney Play app.

Earlier in the day, during Smugglers Run, I was able to enhance my experience with the app while waiting in line.  As I mentioned earlier, the line kind of moved fast, so I didn't have a lot of time to “play”, but what I did get to experience was cool.  I scanned a container that held a droid arm that was going to Lothal.

I was also able to hack a communications tower near the refreshers and got some information about a Wookiee (not Chewy) that was shot or something.  I think I needed to hack the other towers to get the whole story.

Overall:

Even though I spent ~6 hours total in the land (~4.5 hours during the day and ~1.5 hours at night), I didn't really feel immersed in the world.  It was a neat experience to be sure, but I would want to go back and spend more time there, but at the same time I want to have fun (and ride rides), so spending $100+ on a park ticket just to experience a subset of the entirety of Hollywood Studios seems like a waste of money and of my time.

Side notes:

1. The Void at Disney Springs – highly recommended the Star Wars “Secrets of the Empire” experience.  It’s definitely worth the cost, and probably best with four friends.
2. Star Tours – was fun and I’m glad we did it before going into Batuu.  I’m looking forward to them adding TROS stuff to it later this December.
3. Pandora’s Flight of Passage – was probably the highlight of the trip as I think on it.  It hits 4 of your 5 senses.  The wait time of 90 minutes sucked, but the 4.5 minute ride was fantastic.

Joker [2019] review

While Joaquin Phoenix and the entire cast does a great job, it's really a downer of a movie.  I appreciate how it's not really an origin story, but it's more of a hard breaking tale of mental illness.

With this movie attempting to be grounded in reality and not being your typical fantasy adventure, I would be remiss to mention the uneasiness I felt during the film.  With the real world threats of violence and a police officer posted near the employees taking the tickets, I don't know if most of my dread was generated by the movie or a possible looming outside incident.  I was just hyper aware of my surroundings while trying to get lost in the film so I found it a little difficult to do so.

While the movie was dark in tone and you really didn't know what was going to happen next, quite frankly, I kind of expected the movie to be a little bit more fucked up.  While there are some truly violent scenes that happen to the main character, I wanted to sympathize with him more and then I really wanted to see him let loose.  Maybe a more unleashed Joker would befit a sequel.

The last half of the movie does crescendo to a point where you it feels both satisfying and heartbreaking.  The final few minutes take the viewer to a place that may generate a lot of discussion as it's up to interpretation and semi open ended on the journey that just took place.

I definitely look forward to watching this again in the comfort of my own home in the future.  Right now, I will say that I give a slight edge to Heath Ledger's Joker performance.

Westworld [1973] review

I'm curious.  In 1973, was this considered a good movie?  Did people love it?  Either way, this movie does not stand the test of time, and frankly, it's just not a good movie.  The dialogue is minimal and uninspired.  The characters are very underdeveloped.  The movie is trying to sell you on the idea of Westworld as if the park itself is the main character.  The movie fails on all fronts.

With the recent HBO show as my only point of reference, I know the general idea of Westworld.  If you don't, that's okay as the movie begins with a commercial to introduce you to the land, kind of.  It's more of advertisement than anything - "only $1,000 a day!".  Once that is complete, the movie focuses on two friends - Peter and John.  John is played by a young James Brolin (who looks a lot like a Christian Bale).  John has been there before and literally smiles the whole time and that's about it.  Peter, as the newcomer, plays the part of audience member as he asks questions, is skeptical of who is and isn't a robot, and is in constant disbelief on what you can or can't do, which is supposedly nothing.  So what do they do?  - the bare minimum.

Plot-wise, the friends enter a saloon and the Gunslinger (Yul Brynner) insults Peter.  Peter shoots him and the Gunslinger is taken away.  Then the two friends have sex with two prostitutes.  The next morning, the Gunslinger is back and Peter shoots him again to "save" John.  This time Peter is sent to prison for it.  John breaks him out and they ride away.  They sit in the desert to do nothing, but they have to move the plot along.  For reasons unexplained, a robot snake attacks John which is the first sign that Delos, the company running the park, is losing control of the robots.  The Black Knight robot kills some random guest in Medieval World that we haven't been following this whole time so why would we care about him?  The Gunslinger is back again and is some how able to shoot and kill John.  It's explained earlier in the film that the guns don't work on warm blooded guests, but only work on the cold/no blooded robots, so I guess the guns have also malfunctioned along with the robots?!

The rest of the movie plays like the Terminator where the Gunslinger chases after Peter.  The music consists of what sounds like someone jumping on a diving board for the entire final act in an attempt to create tension and maybe give the Gunslinger a theme when he was on screen.  Peter makes his way into the Delos lab and tries acid on the Gunslinger's face.  It slows the Gunslinger down for a little bit, but he keeps going.  Peter makes his way to Medieval World and is able to use a torch to set the Gunslinger on fire and the movie ends.  Everyone else appears to be dead.  The other robots that revolted?  MIA.  So yeah, this movie is pretty bad.

Little [2019] review

If you're unfamiliar, the basic concept is that Regina Hall's character of Jordan gets a spell/curse put on her by a random little girl and she wakes up 13 years old again.  The intent of the movie is that hilarity will ensure as Jordan has to navigate life as an adult trapped in a child's body.  It's kind of like A Christmas Carol where adult Jordan is Scrooge and she gets a chance to re-learn a lesson that she didn't quite learn when she was young - that just because you were treated poorly as a child doesn't give you the right to treat people poorly when you're an adult and have money and power.  

Personally, I'm not a huge Regina Hall fan.  I didn't like her character in "Girls Trip" or this movie.  Obviously, you're not supposed to like her character, but I suppose you're supposed to sympathize with her.  In the end, I didn't really find that the case.  

As a comedy, thankfully there were some funny parts where I laughed out loud.  This was mostly thanks to Issa Rae who played adult Jordan's assistant, and Marsai Martin who played the young Jordan.  There's one or two tiny heartfelt moments, but they don't involve the main character, just a side character named Isaac that I later learned actually has real talent and was cast as the voice of young Simba in Favreau's The Lion King.

Overall, I get what this movie was going for, but the execution was lacking and the writing could have been better.  There was some tone issues where serious parts played more silly so therefore they didn't feel grounded in reality.  A better utilization of sound would have helped as some scenes felt devoid of any background music at all.  There were also moments that were supposed to play for physical comedy that just came off as mean spirited.  Lastly, there were two scenes with a child flirting with an adult where the first one was tongue in cheek, but the second was kind of uncomfortable.  

Twins [1988] review

Schwarzenegger and DeVito do not disappoint in what I consider a classic late 80s comedy.  Schwarzenegger naivety in the real world pairs perfectly with DeVito's abuse of it.  They balance each other out thematically, and almost comedically with Schwarzenegger taking the burden in the beginning and DeVito more in the middle with his side hustle.  In the final third of the film when it becomes more about family, the laughs do decrease dramatically so we can have a heartfelt ending.  I would have appreciated if they could have kept the laughs going, but I understand that the tone has to switch when things get serious so it feels like there are actual stakes.  (A similar thing happens in "Knocked Up")  Kelly Preston and Chloe Webb, playing the female co-stars, don't get too much time to shine as the movie focuses on the twins.  Maybe they could have been incorporated more in the final act instead of being sidelined but I'm not sure how you execute it without it feeling silly. 

Overall, the movie still holds up after 30+ years.  With rumbles of a possible remake staring Momoa & Dinklage, I think you may insult a lot of people making Momoa the "perfect human" and Dinklage the "genetic defect" so I wouldn't be surprised if they decided to swap the roles and change up the jokes completely.  In recent roles, Momoa tends to be more silly while Dinklage is more serious, so I think it would work.  It would would be interesting to watch if they did something different and didn't just rehash the original, in my opinion.

Once Upon a Time In Hollywood [2019] review

Walking out of the theater, I felt that I kind of got it, but I kind of didn't.  I talked it over with my wife on the way home and then I watched the RedLetterMedia review and understood what they were going for and it made a little more sense.

I don't want to spoil anyone, but if you're going to see this, I think it would help having a general knowledge of the real world events involving Charles Manson and Sharon Tate.  Detailed knowledge isn't crucial but the movie assumes you have some knowledge, because it won't be explained to you.  Those real life events serve as the movie's backdrop and what's at the forefront is story of Rick Dalton (DiCaprio) and Cliff Booth (Pitt).  From there, this movie is essentially Tarantino's take on a fairy-tale. 

The acting in this movie does not disappoint even when it's meant to be on display due to the meta nature when the movie is a film within a film.  The line between the actor's reality and our reality is walked with precision and expertise.  There are a few scenes that go on a little long where I was wondering what the point was, but I chalked it up to quality time spent with these characters so we end up caring about them, otherwise the final act wouldn't work. 

Also, I learned that from the aforementioned review that Tarantino took a lot of time to re-create 1960s Hollywood and use a minimum about of digital effects as possible.  Personally, I guess it felt like 1960s Hollywood, but as a non native I didn't appreciate it as much as maybe a native would.  I know "La La Land" got a lot of praise for its treatment of Hollywood and since I don't have that extensive background of that area and/or era, it was just that - background.  I cared more about the characters and plot than I did about Cliff driving around for 5 minutes.  Although, it was nice to see the driving and feel the time it took to get from point A to point B instead of it feeling like insta-travel.

Overall, this wasn't my favorite Tarantino film, but I have a good appreciation for it.  I loved the scenes where he expertly created tension as those sucked me in and had me at the edge of my seat.  He does that very well and the payoff definitely comes later so you have to have the patience for it going in hence why I didn't see this movie opening weekend and waited until I was prepared to go on the journey.

Aquaman [2018] review

Surprisingly, I enjoyed this movie.  There are some character name drops early in the film before you're introduced to said character which may cause confusion, but thankfully there is a scene that helps clear it up.  Specifically, late in the first act, a certain sequence flips back and forth between the past and the present which was welcome to give the audience background on how Arthur was trained and which character(s) is aligned with which people.  I'm also glad Mera name drops a certain character which lets us know when this movie takes place in the timeline of recent DC films.

With that said, there were other character names mentioned in reference to family trees and who was related to whom which I was a little lost on, but I'm sure a second watch would help clear that up.  I got the general gist and that was fine.  I'm glad there was an actual story and not just action scene after action scene.  I did like the way scenes were shot when there was action.  Getting that full 360 view worked well and made most scene flow.

I do admit that I did have to google, "Is Aqauman bulletproof?" as I didn't realize he was nor did I understand why certain characters needed water to breath, but I guess since they've never been on land before that they were out of their element.  This works at the time, but there were some inconsistencies that are kind of ignored in the final act.

But overall, it wasn't too campy, the tone was consistent with a good mix of seriousness and humor throughout.  There were a lot of set pieces with different rulers and such, again a little confusing on first watch keeping all of it straight when this was my first introduction to this world, but upon second watch I think things will make more sense.