Craft: Legacy lacks craft and legacy

Directed and written by Zoe Lister-Jones, starring Cailee Spaeny, Michelle Monaghan, David Duchovny, Zoey Luna, Gideon Adlon, Lovie Simone

Making friends is hard, so when Lily moves to a new town with her mom and falls in with a coven everything seems great. However, things fall apart when the magic they do turns out to have consequences. The only problem with that premise to this sequel to the 90s jam that did not age well, is that the consequences are kinda not there. While the film is well shot, the script and acting are so hit and miss you would think a blind witch was poking at the movie's voodoo doll. Two and a half spells, skip this one and leave the original back in time as well. 

Notes, beware spoilers and spooky happenings

Mom and daughter sing a long

Starting your movie with a mom and daughter car sing-along to Alanis Morissette's "Hand in My Pocket" should have made me worried. But I thought, hey that's the young girl (Spaeny) from Bad Times at the El Royal, you liked that. And Michelle Monaghan! What are you doing here?

Duchovny looks bored

I wanted to say "Man, they drug David Duchovny into this" but it's more like "what did they drag Duchovny out from under?" I'll talk about his character more later, but as he's aged the laconic Mulder has just become a dull who could care.

Why school next day?

So Lily and her mom have moved to this new town to live with Duchovny and his sons (and nobody has met? Where's the backstory here? Was this a cruise ship marriage? I feel like I'm missing something important but I was probably on my phone texting how silly this shit is), and she has to go to school the next day? I've moved several times in my life, and no way did I schedule starting something new the day after arriving. What is this movie thing?

Period all over 

Biology is a tricky subject, so I'm just gonna say: the actual fuck. The menstrual cycle is a mystery to me as a man who has never had one, but I'm pretty sure by the time it's dripping down a chair you have some idea it's happening. And if this heavy flow day is something to do with the witch stuff, then it never gets brought up again. Not even that weird Hollywood crap about syncing cycles or whatever.

Oblivious hidden room is oblivious

So this movie starts a lot of stuff that gets tossed out. Duchovny's sons and a gay/bi romance are swept away tot he point where I almost don't want to talk about how it really looked like there was a hidden witch door in the house. Unless there was, and then I'm sorry. I was texting about how bored I was.

Detention for throwing dude

While I do not condone violence, I also do not believe a girl less than five feet can physically throw a six foot dude who is facing her back any distance. That he was harassing her, and she got detention is crazy.

Stage 1: telekinesis

I haven't talked about the witch girls (Luna, Adlon, Simone) because other than the welcome diversity of latino, black, and transgender individuals there is nothing to them. The actresses are fine given what they have to work with. Nobody in school likes them, so they get power and… that's it. To compare the first one, each girl had a nemesis or issue they were dealing with that magic helped. Here one girl lights her finger on fire, and they all get sparkle makeup. Also, stage 1 of magic is moving shit with your goddamn mind?! That's X-Men level, not witches in the suburbs level power. 

Breaking and hexing

To get back at the detention guy, they break into his house and cast a spell on him. Not get something from him at school, but break and enter his home. These are our good guys.

Editing off fire finger

Just a little nitpick, but there's a point where Tabby blowtorches some graffiti off her locker with her finger. Then, less than five minutes later, she seems to learn she can do this. It feels like noone was paying attention.

Weird cringe confession

Something good! I like that they made the asshat a nice guy. Little too perfect, but whatever it's a silly teen witch movie. His confession of being bi and struggling with that is cringe worthy, but also kinda real and charming. It goes nowhere, but the scene was nice.

Pearls and jacket to bed

Then our heroine, while decked out in full clothes and pearls, takes bi asshat's shirt to bed, casts another spell on him, and jills off with it. Just weird. Wait maybe until bedtime.

If we can't use power responsibility

So bi asshat dies, supposed suicide, and the girls blame Lily because casting a spell to change his personality was bad but making him love her was worse. So they decide, in the most grown up decision I have seen with no worries since never (not even the abortion in Fast Times was arrived at this quickly), the group decides to quit magic cold turkey. 

Bad dad

Here's the point where I feel this movie thought it had something good to say, had its heart in the right place, but shit the bed. Duchovny is the bad guy. He married the mom to get Lily, killed bi asshat for man reasons, and is now gonna take Lily's power. Except, other than being a normal dick, he's never seen doing much in the movie to warrant being THE bad guy. Even then, when he snaps after she gets detention, he argues with mom for a while and as far as I can tell does little else. There's supposed to be the message of "women stick together against men" which would have been great, but everything leading up to this felt meandering. It felt like it was playing with the original's "power corrupts" and then zigs at the end to little effect. Weird effect with the very tame burning him alive, too. There's just no horror in this one to earn a bad guy.

She didn't call

Not gonna lie, this is the whole reason I watched this movie. I heard Fairuza Balk was back and wanted to see Nancy again, if not in her crazed glory, then as a mentor figure. But Lily shows up to the hospital (without calling, I'm pretty sure you have to set an appointment instead of just walking in), and we get a quick shot of Balk before credits. I felt cheated and baited to a sequel that will never happen unless Jason Blum gets drunk one night and decides to green light another sequel. And I'll watch that one, too, because as much as I've railed against this movie I really do like supernatural trash dramas. Bring on a follow-up to the Faculty, Rodriquez!

Blumhouse's The Craft: Legacy

Starring Cailee Spaeny, Gideon Adlon, Lovie Simone, Zoey Luna, Nicholas Galitzine, Michelle Monaghan, David Duchovny, Julian Grey, Charles Vandervaart, Donald Maclean Jr.

Buy on Amazon

Frighteners (1996) kinda holds up maybe: the review

Directed and written by Peter Jackson with Fran Walsh as co-writer; starring Michael J. Fox, Trini Alvarado, and Jeffrey Combs

As a child of the 80s, Michael J. Fox could do no wrong. Yet, I struggle to say I have watched all his movies. This killer ghost collaboration with Peter Jackson is Fox's last theatrical movie, a quirky gem with more charm than scares and quality acting than effects. Something is killing the people of Fairview and paranormal investigator Frank (Fox) and Dr. Lucy (Alvarado) tries to get to the bottom of it while being harassed by X-Files wannabe FBI agent Dammers (Combs). A curiosity more than a classic, The Frighteners holds together with the only cohesive thing in the movie: pure mania. It gets three rattling old cars from me so check it out.

Here be spoilers along with my notes:

Opening would be scary without effects

While it makes little sense in the context of the movie, the opening scene of Patricia (Holy shit that's Dee Thomas, the mom from ET) and her mother is pretty harrowing. Except for the ghost effects. While this is the same WETA company that would soon make history with the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, they were kinda trying their best here. But those practical effects are just great fun to watch.

Voice Over article

Oh voice over exposition, you are so goofy. Here we get an editor reading a reporter's story about the mysterious deaths in town as well as the town's serial killer history. Why is an editor reading it to the reporter? He fucking wrote the thing; he knows what it says. And then she says to squash it and talk to a real person instead of giving a history report which is what any editor worth a letter to the editor would say. Sure, it was nicely written, but anyone reading the paper knows about the killings.

Crazy old lady

I fucking love a crazy old lady with a shotgun keeping her daughter under lock and key. Write that on my tombstone.

Ghost effects awesome

I know I crapped on the effects at the beginning, and I stand by that the "Freddy Kruger poking out of the walls'' is not very well done. However, I think the actual ghost effects of John Astin, Chi McBride, and Jim Fyfe's ghosts are well done indeed. No matter if they are squished or cut up or blown apart, I just kinda dug how they looked and felt in the world. They still feel a little "floaty" (yes, even for ghosts, haha you got me) and not in the world (yes, even for ghosts, haha you got me). It would have been a nightmare, but they should have left some of the ectoplasmic slime everywhere that Frank keeps talking about.

Anniversary castle wine

This fucking place. Do these places exist? Castle restaurants that don't have jousting? I know this is New Zealand masquerading as… America somewhere (I thought Pacific Northwest or Maine, but research says it was supposed to be Midwest? Okay…), but I've never seen this.

Why is she a witness, sheriff just found out

This is some nitpicking nitpickery, but there's a bunch of logic flaws. First was the opening ghost attack, but whatever it's fun. Here though… So a guy gets killed by a ghost reaper in the bathroom of the restaurant in front of Frank so he runs. Later at the police station, the sheriff finds out the guy was with Frank. Okay. Then right after in the same scene we get Lucy, who was eating with Frank, hauled into the station. Why? Did they think she killed the guy in the bathroom? If they suspected Frank, why did that guy have to tell the sheriff? 

Museum sex and violence

Man, this museum scene is wacky. We got priceless treasures being used and abused, both physically and sexually. We got mayhem, dead people, and mummies. The hell kinda town is this?

Wild FBI Guy

I could describe this guy all day and not do him justice. He wears a lead vest sometimes. His chest is a criss cross of scars and symbols. He acts like Van Helsing coming off of mushrooms by using more cocaine. Add in he is the same guy that played Herbert West, and I just love whatever he's up to.

Squeeze her heart, dumbass

Not gonna lie, the ending was frustrating. The evil ghost has been killing people no problem all movie, then in the end can not. For no reason, he has to use physical means to take people out, be it knife or shotgun. Another logic hole, but still enjoyable.

The Frighteners

Starring Michael J. Fox, Trini Alvarado, Peter Dobson, John Astin, Jeffrey Combs, Dee Wallace Stone, Jake Busey, Chi McBride, Jim Fyfe, Troy Evans, Julianna McCarthy, R. Lee Ermey, Elizabeth Hawthorne, Angela Bloomfield, Dee Wallace-Stone

WandaVision Proves Hurt People Hurt People

Marvel got back into television with a relatively small story with big implications. WandaVision could have been a lot of things (people speculated the whole damn way), but in the end it became a solid superhero story about grief and loss in every good and bad way the genre can offer. 

Wanda dealing with the trauma we have seen throughout her six years is an interesting story, especially for a being who can warp people's minds and the physical matter around her. Where it stumbles is ending with a physical battle and a clever trick that leads to solving deep emotional problems. Wanda has learned and grown, but in the end it does not feel satisfying for her to just walk away from everything she did as an unstoppable magical badass after almost destroying a small town and enslaving its occupants. 

In the end, I love Wanda more as a character, but I am not sure she can be trusted with her powers. I guess we will see more about her development in the new Doctor Strange whenever it comes out.

To the Notes! Beware spoilers for the whole damn season and the MCU as a whole.

Intro to Magic

There's been magic in the MCU since Doctor Strange (maybe even Thor) popped in waving his hands around. But what we have here is real magic. "Change the world not fucking around damn sure not science we do not understand" magic. What happened in the nine episodes was more than floating shit around and telepathic mind tricks. It also was not Strange's "we know kung fu" brand of magic. Agatha gave a motherfucker superpowers, and Wanda rewrote reality (giving another motherfucker superpowers). That's pretty damn wild, even if the rules seemed a bit arbitrary and convenient to the plot. Turns out just writing stuff on walls can take away another witches' powers. Cool for her to say that.

Agatha Harkness

OMG I love Kathryn Hahn in this role. To be honest, the only other roles I remember her from are her solid run in Parks and Rec and the best part of those Bad Moms movies. Is this the comic book character we all know and love? Fuck if I know. Fuck if I care. Hahn dominated this series as a mysterious character and as a magic sucking witch from witch there is no escape. Fuck yeah she killed that dog and she'll kill your ass, too.

Grief and Darkness

The best turns in this show played on Wanda's grief and the darkness that wormed its way into the world around her. Subtle, eerie shades of David Lynch crept in like worms in spaghetti. A normal sitcom world laugh track became a chorus of demented screams inside the heads of viewers as scenes turned in on themselves through Wanda processing her life. Only when Agatha pushes the past on her do we fully see the discomfort Wanda has been feeling, but even then things seem only being processed on the surface. The darkness is still there even when Wanda has processed Vision's death. She gives up him and the kids, but I'm not sure she gave up the dark parts of herself.

Love and Forgiveness

Speaking of Vision, that son of a bitch damn near made me cry. First talking to Wanda in her Avengers room when they fell in love, and then that damn end scene where he says he'll always be a part of her. Bettany and Olsen fit so well together I found it very easy to realize he's a robot and she has enslaved a town and does not seem to feel bad about it.

Messy Neat Ending

Man, I know this is a comic book superhero thing, but maybe there did not have to be a big light in the sky and a punchy fight at the end? Ultimately both Wanda and Vision do have some smarty-pants talking the villain to death-ish moments, but it almost felt like the "de-icing" scene in the first Iron Man. The solutions are clever and in character, but I don't feel satisfied. Sure, Wanda gets a fancy new outfit (that looks amazing), but, and I do not think I have said this enough, she enslaved and tortured a town full of people. They beg her to stop. Dottie begs Wanda to let her hug her child again. Wanda's Hulk "Take it all" moment at the end does not fix this. And is flying not a spell? Because Agatha should have dropped like a stone when those runes went up.

Monica

Monica Rambeau is one of the most exciting characters the MCU has dropped. Sure we met her as a kid in Captain Marvel, but here dealing with the death of her mom she's so much more. Then she gets some poorly defined superpowers and hell yeah I want to see what they do with her. However. Here she is just a champion and overall scapegoat for Wanda's actions. One of her last lines is saying she would have brought her mom back, too. Which, yes, of course that's human nature to mourn for the dead. But she should have followed up with "but I probably would not have enslaved so many people to my will while I was at it."

Evan Peters

Fuckers gonna troll. Disney, you bastards.

Darcy and Woo

They really are just so great. Those damn magic tricks. Flourish!

Darkhold

Same shit from Agents of SHIELD?

Let me know in the comments, on the Contact Page, or at contact@bannedlibrary.com what you thought about the episode or if you have any thoughts on the damn Darkhold.

Marvel WandaVision Scarlet Witch & Vision Retro 50s T-Shirt

Marvel

Coincidence in the Mandalorian

I opened a beer, filled my vape tube, and started the Mandalorian.

     First season was fun. A finding your legs type of affair where the characters were being felt out. Mando strolling in cock first, shoulders back, shooting people the way the Force intended. Every once in a while, like his shoulders, there was a slump. Never for long, though. Rally cry and pew pew and Mando and Baby Yoda riding into the sunset.

     The first episode of the second season brought a giant dragon and some hell with it. Krayt Dragons ain't nothing to fuck with. Still, you could say the whole thing was justified. Mando came to town looking for other Mandalorians and left with some Fett armor. Felt good, a return most welcome. Except this time I did not seem so worried about Baby Yoda.

     If that is his or her real name.

     Maybe it is fatigue? That cute little face is still adorable. I want them to succeed. Yet I find myself more often than not with the second and third episodes saying, "Did nobody teach BY anything in the first fifty years?" Simple stuff like "don't put that in your mouth." I'll get to that.

     We start the second episode with Mando and BY roaring across the desert. On a steel horse they ride, wanted dead or alive. Some guys with a rope decide "dead." Shit's trashed as they closeline our heroes. Then our heroes kill them. I began thinking, telling my notebook, "what?" I mean, of course they are being chased. Look at that cute bastard. But how did those guys know Mando was riding that way? It's a big goddamn desert yet there's only one rock formation in or out on Tatooine? 

     Maybe they didn't know shit about BY and were just raiders. Sure, but I feel like they went right for him. In the end, like all of us, the last man standing bites off more jetpack than he can chew and is launched skyward. His fall mirrors the fall of man as a superior opponent looks at a child and shrugs.

     Moving on! Back to camp where Mando gets transport for a frog lady and her delicious eggs. I mean, they do look like that jar at the end of the bar filled with pickled eggs that nobody but the guy with one arm touches, but Baby Yoda is into it. And, to say again, who taught this kid to eat everything. Even if his first few dozen years were as a larva or whatever, goddamn somebody slap that kid's hand. I thought he learned his lesson, but then came the spider eggs.

     The standoff and flight against the X-wings brought a smile. When everything looks okay, then those wings open up, that's just simple storytelling. They could have said "Hey, we just wanna talk about some crazy shit you did that we might let you go for," but cops gonna be cops.

     Now I'm gonna dump on the frog lady. Who on an ice planet trapped underground wanders off to maybe find a hot spring? And who does not look around before getting bare ass and dumping their babies in the pool. If my mom did that, I would be dead and deserved it. Not to mention all the kids getting eaten by that adorable big eared green trash compactor.

     Spider fight and cavalry save the day for some reason. Come'on. Ice Spiders? Somebody played a lot of Skyrim on their refrigerator while writing the script. Effective, but expected. And those X-wings just found them on that whole goddamn planet? I drop my glasses in my studio apartment and it takes ten minutes before I can see again.

    Coincidence makes kings in the Mandalorian. The old golden rule is "coincidence can get characters into trouble, but they have to get themselves out." Having space rangers show up to blast your troubles away feels wrong in retrospect.

    Hobbling out into space, we get to some actual others of our dude's kind! And it is Motherfucking Starbuck! Gotta say, when they took off their helmets and called him a cultist, I dug it. Nobody writes stories where our "outsider badass" might actually be a brainwashed sycophant (outside of most movies sanctioned by the US military). Texting with a friend, she said, "so Mando's a Jehovah's Witness?" I just hope he gets to celebrate his birthday up in the stars. 

     And then we have another "help us or we won't help you" plot, which seems to be the series main bag. I'm for it. Our guy is always on the ropes with his little puppet of hunger and gets to display how awesome he can be almost constantly. We do get another "Mando's fucked without coincidence" on the pirate ship, but I will trade that for the hallway scene where he's getting battered then blows shit up.

     Wrapping up, we carreen ever closer to this being a sequel to Star Wars: Clone Wars and Rebels. "Go find Ahsoka Tano," Starbuck said. And so we go, knowing full well that by the end of this season Starbuck holding the DarkSaber will make many nerds piddle on the carpet. 

    I never completed either of those series. At some point, Star Wars became "not for me." I was always into the sword fights and the World War II imagery, but the drama often falls flat. Politics in the real world holds way more sway over my mood than made up in-fighting. I like Mandalorian because of the simple "guy and a kid against the world" story. Grand schemes are not at play, global fuckery is not an issue, and just getting to tomorrow feels like enough.

    Hell, that might be my new catchphrase.