Is it just me, or are there really no good movies anymore? I mean, I do like the Marvel films, but outside of them, what's been good recently? There's a movie just out today called Extinction, starring Michael Pina. I love alien invasion movies. I love Michael Pina. But the movie is getting terrible reviews. I'm sure it's not good.
So what's been out this year? I haven't seen Incredibles 2 or A Wrinkle in Time, and I'm sure there's a good chance that one or both of those are good, so perhaps it's just that I don't get out to movies enough anymore. But Pacific Rim 2 was apparently terrible - the DVD from Netflix has been sitting in my living room for weeks and we haven't yet gotten to it. Ready Player One was unsurprisingly not nearly as good as the book, and I'm skeptical that the Star Wars spinoff Solo or the new Jurassic World movie are worth watching.
The rest of this year isn't looking that great either. The Venom movie looks to bomb before it's even come out, there's a Predator remake, a Scarface remake, and a Haloween sequel, none of which I'm overly enthusiastic about, and the X-Men Dark Phoenix movie, which recycles a plot they flubbed in the third movie of the original X-Men franchise, has been pushed to next February.
There are a lot more sequels this year - I'm not thrilled about any of them. The Freddy Mercury biopic starring Rami Malek looks interesting, and Holmes and Watson might be funny, only because it stars Wil Ferrell and John C Reilly. But even if I enjoy the stupid humor of that one, I likely won't qualify it as a good movie.
Is 2019 looking any better? The recent announcement of Glass (Click for trailer), a sequel to the 2000 film Unbreakable and the 2016 film Split seems interesting. That and the Hellboy reboot with David Harbour are scheduled for early in the year, so they might be good.
There's a Lego Movie sequel, which will of course be good, and a remake of Jacob's Ladder (seriously??) before we get Captain Marvel in March, which I know I'll enjoy. Oddly, one month later we get the Shazam! movie, in which Billy Batson changes into DC's Captain Marvel. Two different characters named Captain Marvel in two months? I don't know about that. I did like Zach Levi as Chuck, so maybe that film will be watchable despite being DC.
May gets us my personal most-awaited film of the year, the Avengers sequel, with a title that still hasn't been revealed. But I still don't know what to think about that Channing tatum Gambit movie. It could be decent, but it really could be so so very bad.
I'd originally ruled out the Godzilla sequel as anything worth watching, but then I saw the recent trailer with Millie Bobbie Brown. Aw - she's in it? Now I have to watch.
There's a Minecraft movie with Steve Carell. Pfbbt. An Aladdin remake of some kind with Wil Smith as the genie. Pfbbt. A Men in Black spinoff. Pfbbt.
What's next summer bring us? Toy Story 4? Seriously? Okay - that one won't be bad. A Disney Lion King remake? Seriously? The New Mutants? Hmm. I guess it gives the X-Men folks a chance to try something new. And... what?? What's this? Top Gun 2? With Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer? Ha! I can't say this one will be good, but I'll likely see it.
And to round out 2019, we've got the second part to the It remake. Yup - I knew that was coming. The Joaquin Joker movie - did we really need this? A He-Man movie, again? Is this culturally relevant in any way? And... interesting. A DC Wonder Woman movie (that was really the only halfway decent DC film) set in 1984. Sounds interesting.
And at the end of 2019, we hit perhaps the only two non-Marvel films that I think might potentially be good. I mean, there were a few cartoons in my above listing that might be okay, but even the films I'll watch, such as Top Gun 2 and Godzilla, I don't think they'll be great.
So, first, the Star Wars capstone. The end of the series. Of course this is going to be huge.
And second - have you heard of this? A new Terminator movie. I know, my first reaction was an eye-roll as well.
But wait.
Unlike the crappy T3 terminatrix, the horrendous T4 with Batman John Connor, and the somewhat passable Terminator Genisys with Emilia Clarke, this one has a lot going for it.
That's right, they're giving this one the Highlander 3 treatment and entirely ignoring the crappy intervening films. The Terminator is going to be the guy who played Ghost Rider in Agents of SHIELD. I thought he was okay. But seriously, this one is going to be all about whether the script is any good. Maybe they'll write something like the idea I had back in 2007.
To answer your overall question about the state of movies...
I think there are multiple reasons for the lack in good movies.
-First, we have so many reviews out there. I think once a movie gets some kind of negative review, we (as moviegoers) automatically assume it's bad. Look at movies from when we were young, some of them got horrible reviews, yet we loved them. Granted, we do not have the time to watch a ton of movies, so we need something out there to point us in the right direction. I am just as guilty, if a movie receives a bunch of negative reviews or a low Rotten Tomato score, I think twice about seeing it in the theater. Then when it does come to netflix or something, I think "eh, it got horrible reviews, why bother." But who knows, maybe it is a movie I will like.
-The studios do not like to take risks. And that is pretty much the moviegoers fault. We do not go out and see too many movies that are not Star Wars/Marvel/Pixar, etc. Interesting, original movies do not make the money, so studios do not want to invest in them. However, we may see this starting to turn. Look at Blumhouse...they make insane amounts of money by making some very good horror films.
-Fandom itself hurts movies. Now the movie makers are trying to either please everyone or trick everyone (you see this more with tv shows--a fan on reddit guesses how a show will turn out with some crazy theory, and the showrunners take the show in a crazy new direction to trick everyone). I feel like I've ranted enough about fans over the years.
--Okay, I have no idea where I am going with this...I guess just trying to say that maybe you should check out that Extinction movie. Maybe it will be cool. Maybe you will dig it. Let me know if you do. Then I will watch it.