Date Night with Ryleigh - Star Wars Night

 My date for the night is dang cute. And she scored a puck!

Chicago Cubs - 2016 World Series Champions

  Birth of my kids....a few other days, but this is top 5 moment for me.

The final out..

My Reaction

At Last!

 Birth of my kids....a few other days, but this is top 5 moment for me.

The final out..

Arrival

Went to this one just with nothing to going on this morning and see what all the buzz was I've been reading about. And well I'm still trying to figure it out.

There are quite a bit of flashbacks....or forwards and at times made one feel that it was a continuous loop, but then dropped in this line "If you could see your whole life laid out in front of you, would you change things?" Which was a line from an episode in How I Met Your Mother, where Ted then says just because you know how something is going to end doesn't mean you can't enjoy it.

So....yea I think the point was to make one think after seeing it, which it did. Really interesting visuals and the communication amongst the races and it was decently acted. But I don't understand all the hub bub.

Arrival
5/10 Stars.

Today Was A Good Day!

Fun talk w a lady on the train this am...made friends w 2 gals from Seattle... made friends w Rick and Rick jr at Sluggers and got invited to their family outing at a dive bar South of Wrigley...hugged a strange man after the win....sang a Mexican song with Red Sox fans and befriended the bar manager and his wife. Oh and Fly the W. Now supper at Howell's & Hood.

    

    

    

2016 Summer Movie Awards

Movies Seen : Batman v Superman ; Captain America Civil War ; Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles : Out of the Shadows ; X-Men Apocalypse ; Now You See Me 2 ; Finding Dory ; Mike & Dave Need Wedding Dates ; Ghostbusters ; Star Trek Beyond ; Jason Bourne ; Suicide Squad

Best Flick : Captain America : Civil War – This movie is AMAZING.  I really enjoyed Winter Soldier and the Russo’s made a great flick here too.  This put the dudness I had with Age of Ultron away and puts DC in the corner with their Batman and Superman flick. 

Best Dude :  Robert Downey Jr – Tony Stark – Captain America Civil War : Going to just rename this the RDJ award.  Is there a better role for a better actor ever?  (Minus Harrison Ford Indy & Solo)

Best Dudette : Aubrey Plaza – Tatiana – Mike & Dave Need Wedding Dates : Playing on the other side of Anna Kendrick, and then vs Adam Devine and Zack Efron, I thought she nailed a lot of this movie and was up there with the guys as just as funny.

Best Scene : Tony Stark in Queens, NY talking to Peter Parker  and the awkwardness of a teenage SpiderMan and cockiness of Tony Stark.  Also add in the Aunt May – Tony Stark conversation and RDJ-Tomei effect.  - Captain America Civil War

                       : Charles and Erik talking at the end of X-Men Apocalypse, stating their same lines from the very first XMen in 2000 : X-Men Apocalypse

Magneto: Does it ever wake you in the middle of the night? The feeling that one day they will come for you? And your children?

Prof. Charles Xavier: It does, indeed.

Magneto: What do you do, when you wake up to that?

Prof. Charles Xavier: I feel a great swell of pity for the poor soul who comes to that school... looking for trouble.

Best Fight : #TeamIronMan vs #TeamCaptAmerica : Captain America Civil War – It was like Hogan vs the Warrior at WrestleMania.  Huge fight scene with all these characters we were given in origin stories.  Spidey is the best since Spider-Man 2 in the film, the Black Panther is awesome, Ant-Man and Iron Man and the rest are all great too.  Marvel seriously is rolling.

                    : IronMan vs Captain America & Winter Soldier : Captain America Civil War – As good as the fight was with all the heroes, this fight is INTENSE!  2 vs 1 and the blows that are landed and hit are amazing. 

Biggest Dud : Batman v Superman – To preface this, I’m not a Superman fan, wasn’t blown away with Man of Steel, and Batman and this world has A LOT to live up to with the world that Christopher Nolan and Christian Bale built.  I don’t mind Batfleck and think he did a decent job, a lot better than George Clooney, but this movie just didn’t seem to hit that Dark Knight – Dark Knight Rises DC worldish.  That being said, I think that Suicide Squad will be a redeemer for the DC World.

Anticipated Sequel : Spiderman Homecoming, Avengers Infinity War, Black Panther, Ant-Man & Wasp and Iron Man 4.

Summer Movies Not Seen Yet :

Neighbors 2
Independence Day : Resurgence
The Jungle Book

Suicide Squad

 

Friday, I hit the anti hero flick Suicide Squad, DC's bad guy team up flick to try and build into their cinematic universe.  Earlier in the year they gave us Batman v Superman which was a dud, so I'm hoping this was going to break the curse.  Critics lately have ripped it pretty well and I'm not sure if they have BvS hangover or what, but it wasn't as bad as was graded. 

I tried to go into this flick with an open mind after the mess of BvS and also clear eyes on Jared Leto's Joker compared to Heath Ledger's take on the character.  And I thought they did a lot of good things.  The film focused more on Deadshot, Harley Quinn, the Joker and Amanda Waller.   Which they were played by the bigger stars, so I think that's why the focus went there.  Both Margot Robbie and Will Smith nailed their characters and I'm sure we will see more of them in a Batman spin off, and Viola Davis will have a role in the DC universe to come. 

I really wish we could have seen more of Katana and Killer Croc and really liked Diablo and how they really gave his backstory.  Leto's Joker really had some good moments BUT he's not Ledger.  It was almost a mix between Ledger's Joker and Nicholson's Joker. 

Overall the film didn't flow great, thought it was really choppy, but its filled with some really great action and some good one liners.  They had some snip-its from trailers that didn't make the flick which I think was an editing mistake, and it nailed the mid-scene credit.  Overall not terrible, not great, its DC. 

6/10 Stars #werethebadguys

Jason Bourne

 

Last night I ventured out to the 5^th Bourne movie and 4^th starring Matt Damon.  This one finds Bourne actually off the grid after he jumped in the East River being a fighter.  He’s not really doing great in life, moving around a lot but is off the radar till returning character Nicky (Julia Stiles – um where has she been?) seemingly goes from drinking coffee and reading to hacking the CIA, and thanks to that Bourne is back on the grid.  Tommy Lee Jones, along with an asset and a new Cyber Director try to take them out.  Chaos ensues in Berlin and Vegas.  

The action scenes were great Bourne scenes, what you expect to see from Bourne movies.  I would have liked to see more development into why Nicky was hacking the CIA.  She seemed content at the end of the 3^rd one.  Tommy Lee Jones was really good too as a CIA Director and the new gal as the Cyber director, was really good and they moved somewhat on with her development and seems to be where they will set up the sequel. 

I do wish they would have done a few things differently, like mentioned  with Nicky before.  If they are planning another trilogy, I was hopeful for different outcomes for the main antagonists….and it would have been a nice tie in to somewhere see Jeremy Renner’s character intertwined somewhere.  Maybe that comes in the next flick?

Overall this was a not a bad summer popcorn escape movie, but it doesn’t hold to the previous Damon Bourne flix.  6/10 Stars

Star Trek Beyond

 

I'm no where near a Trekkie, I grew up as a big Star Wars fan and basically denounced anything Trekkie.  The USS Enterprise couldn't hold a torch to the Millennium Falcon, and well still doesn't...BUT with the reboot by JJ Abrams a few years ago and Into the Darkness I've started to enjoy the stories.  Today hit up Star Trek Beyond, the 3rd in this series.  Really good popcorn summer flick.  Has the scifi stuff to be all Trekkie but this one adds in more on the ground action too.  Think that's a lil from Justin Lin and his Fast & Furious days.  Really like the development of Bones and Spock's relationship and Bones over all.  I felt he was underused in the sequel.  Also the nod back to the past was really great!  Hope they keep it up with this group and create more stories. 

7/10 Stars

Ghostbusters

Had no kids tonight, and thought I'd hit Ghostbusters at the 540 showing.  I'll preface this with having watched, and loved, the original I was going to compare it to that no matter what. Now there were some funny moments, and some good one liners, but I felt most of it was all shown in the trailers. The movie felt more like fillers for what we already saw.  The graphics and effects were a lot better than the originals, which came to be expected and the cameos were great too and nods back to the orignals.  The girls were good, Wig and McCarthy and new comers, but Chris Hemsworth and his humor over shadowed the girls. I'm sure there will be a sequel, and I'll prob go see it too.  

4/10 stars