Jay’s Take: Hobbs & Shaw

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Everyone seems to remember watching Tokyo Drift, but don’t actually remember what happened in it, or what happened to Lucas Black’s career after he tried taking over for Diesel (maybe there WILL be a Sling Blade 2?). Whatever transpired behind the scenes, someone in a suit decided then that the whole format of the series had to change. Removed almost-entirely was the car culture and racing that was the original trilogy’s bread-and-butter; the original cast was brought back and references to “family” and “sticking together” were amped to 11; and every action scene seemed like it had to outdo the one before it. So birthed the “new generation” of F+F movies with the fourth one in 2009, BRILLIANTLY titled Fast & Furious, and the series stayed relatively consistent for a while. With the fifth (Fast Five) and sixth (Fast & Furious 6) movies in 2011 and 2013 respectively they stuck to Lin’s formula; brought back popular characters from the first three movies and shoehorned them together; and strung them all along in a shared-universe plot. 6 also introduced our titular team to Dwayne Johnson’s hard-as-nails cop Luke Hobbs and Jason Statham’s bad-guy-turned-good Deckard Shaw.

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Jay’s Take: The Great Hack

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The greatest hack the devil ever pulled was making the world believe he was just a Facebook personality test.

Typical Netflix. Cambridge Analytica rose to public consciousness when Trump won the 2016 election so since then, we have had innumerable news reports; documentaries; movies; new files in the investigation coming to light; etc etc etc. As long as there is air we will NEVER FORGET about the security compromise that SHOCKED A GENERATION (sic Monty Python). I followed along when the story broke (only because I couldn’t get away from it) but never thought it directly affected ME, personally. I know that online is no longer a safe bastion and possibly never was: that ANYONE can read ANYTHING you publish, ANYTIME, even when you delete it! So why post anything incriminating? But people do all the time and it is for these people this movie was made: a step-by-step breakdown of the events that led CA to bankruptcy; Zukerburg under fire; and a whole new hashtag for the internet to use to protest the lack of online privacy.

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Jay’s Take: The Lion King 2019

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I saw this on the 19th and have really been dragging my ass to post something about it. What is there to say? Can anything be said? Is it worth it to say it? Disney is beyond criticism at this juncture. Because really, why is it necessary to remake these movies with little more then updated window dressing, a modern celebrity roster, and minor tweaks that will date the movie twenty years from now even more then the twenty-year-plus old original? Other then to sucker a new generation of young parents to buy their obnoxious children more useless merch? No I did not like The Lion King remake. It was ghastly watching the opening sequence remade with CGI and its edgy, realistic tone. No more pomp during the musical numbers: that wouldn’t happen (kitties are colorblind, remember!). No visions from the heavens: just cloud formations that are up to interpretation. And no metaphysical displacement from Rafiki: he gets his news from, literally, shit. It wasn’t fun. It felt like the Jon Favreau who I’ve known since Swingers had finally given his virgin asshole to the train of lizard people waiting for him in the Disney boardroom.

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