ABOMINABLE Review

As with most animated films, Abominable is about a girl who is looking for a purpose. Someone trying to fill a void left by a departed parent, but what is different about writer/director Jill Culton's (Open Season) film is that it doesn't deal as much with this emotional process through the mind of a child as it does that of an older teen/early adult; an individual mature enough to more fully comprehend the ramifications of such a life event than a character like...Nemo. This isn't to say that automatically makes Abominable more interesting or better than that Pixar classic or any of the many Disney animated films that open with or include the death of a parent. What it is implying is the fact the journey we go on in this latest DreamWorks fable while still familiar, hits the recognizable beats with something of a different perspective. It is for this reason that I almost wish the film hadn't resorted to leaning so heavily on the (somewhat unexpected) magical element as contributed by the yeti referenced in the title, but it is this friendship between the mystical creature, Everest, and our protagonist, Yi (Chloe Bennet), that ultimately lends real soul to the proceedings and keeps the movie from becoming a kitschy fantastical tale solely for the kiddos. These magical elements also make for some wonderfully creative imagery that will sweep one up in the themes of perseverance, dealing with loss and the importance of friendship even if such routine topics don't initially strike one as engaging. Great supporting characters such as Peng (Albert Tsai) make for great comic relief and therefore some memorable moments while Eddie Izzard's Burnish, the purported antagonist, is oddly hysterical and childish in frequently hilarious ways even if the movie lets us know too early exactly what it's going to do with the character.

AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. Series Premiere Review

There has been much hype around Marvel's transition from the big screen to the small and we finally have our first idea about how Joss Whedon and Kevin Fiege will satisfy fans super hero appetites in between their massive feature films. I have always been weary of TV shows that originate as spin-offs from movies (or from other TV shows for that matter), but as this was simply going to fall into a rather familiar primetime genre and wasn't going to try to make a super hero mini-series, but a look at the liitle-seen government agency in the background of the big movies there was reason to believe it could work. That and Clark Gregg's Agent Coulson has become somewhat of a fan favorite by this point and that he would be heading it up lent the series a whole other level of credibility (and hey! even Cobie Smulders shows up for a few scenes as Maria Hill). Though it is impossible to gauge how the entire series will turn out by simply watching one episode it at least gives us an indication of how the makers plan to structure this and how it will intersect with the movies it will be correlating with. I highly doubt that Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. will directly tie-in or effect any of the events that occur in Thor: The Dark World, but we may see some easter eggs in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and most certainly in The Avengers sequel should the series be successful enough to make it more than two seasons. Given that idea I think it's necessary to give these characters a shot and see how well they can expand the Marvel cinematic universe as that is after all, the point. Whedon, who created the show and wrote the pilot with his brother Jed and his wife Maurissa Tancharoen, is a series that sports his signature humor (which I've never been particularly attracted to), but does well to manage a large cast of characters and keep the audience engaged and on its toes enough that I will continue to watch if not simply because it has "Marvel" above the title, but because I want to be in the know when I walk into their movies in the future.