Commentary – It's Been Real!

Ocean’s 8 – An Ocean of What the F*ck?!

Alright, this is my first time doing a bad movie review, but I’ve got to do this. I mean, it’s a ripoff of the original Ocean series! Now, we’ve all noticed the trend that has been appearing lately: find a good, successful movie already made by men, and remake it with women. Okay, I don’t know about Hollywood, but I believe in originality. If you’re taking a perfect recipe and changing the ingredients, but still calling it by the same name, you’re doing it wrong!

I’ve watched all three of the original Ocean’s movies, and I enjoyed them. The elaborate plans, the quirky characters, the narration of their heists were entertaining, and they did a good job with just Julia Roberts as the female backup. Now, before anyone starts saying anything, I want to remind you that I am a young, Hispanic woman; so don’t even think of pulling some Leftist bullsh*t on me. When Holllywood decided to take those good recipes and change the ingredients (i.e. the gender of the characters) they set it up for ruin from the start (Ghostbusters, 2016; do you have to ask?). Of course, they tied Sandra Bullock’s character to George Clooney’s character in the original trilogy, but that still wasn’t originality on the part of the writers of this latest silver screen fiasco.

The movie received very mixed bordering on not so good reviews. It currently has 67% on Rotten Tomatoes, and people have said that Bullock and her gang are no substitute for Clooney and his boys. Now, that’s not to say movies about women are always going to fail. Wonder Woman was very successful and presented the DC character very well, but for me personally, the story was a bit of a drag, and I was more interested in Captain Steve Trevor (but, I’m a normal girl, so that’s to be expected). Lara Croft did pretty well, and there was no gender flipping going on in that movie. The Hunger Games Trilogy with Jennifer Lawrence was well received, so there is proof out there that movies with women as the lead characters can do well. Just don’t base them off a movie that previously had an all or mostly male cast. That’s just Hollywood banking off the success of the first installment and hoping it carries the new one.

I glanced at the other reviews from critics and the common man prior to writing this post. Most of them said the movie was ‘fun’ but that was about it. The chemistry of the cast was really the only thing most people could agree on. There were several videos on Youtube, discussing why this movie was so bad. As well as informing us what the cast thought of the reviews. Yes, we understand that most actors try to be proud of what they’ve made as a sort of validation for doing what they do for a living. However, actresses Mindy Kaling and Cate Blanchett (why, Cate, why?) have been blaming white male critiques for the bad reviews and ‘misunderstandings’ concerning their movie. Just accept responsibility for your f*ck up already.

Here is a video that discusses it in greater detail. It’s a little over 14 minutes long, just to let you know. Ocean’s 8 Actors Blame White Male Critiques

It almost sounds like when you were a kid and you did something wrong and then blamed the dog for it. In this case, the white male critiques are the dogs. “No, sweetie, the dog didn’t eat your homework, you just didn’t do it.”

And on that note, it’s been real!

Middle Earth Men = Sexy

This one is for the women out there. I was under ten-years-old when The Lord of the Rings trilogy came out and I obviously couldn’t go to the theater to see it. I had to get older and read the books before I could see the movies. Anywhoo… when I did finally read the books and was allowed to watch the movies, I enjoyed them immensely. I was a teenager at the time, so of course, I was attracted to the good looking men on screen. And for those of you who like him, I’m sorry, Legolas was never an option for me. My older sister had a long standing crush on him, and I felt like he was forever tainted because of it (ha, ha, ha!).

When I first watched the trilogy, I was interested in guys like Aragorn, Boromir, Faramir, and Eomer. They were just so cute! As I got older, and The Hobbit came out, my tastes narrowed a little bit. I don’t really care for elves. Sorry, just don’t. Maybe it’s their cold exteriors and arrogant attitudes? Just a thought. I preferred the men and the dwarves (The Hobbit) for sure. Now that we’re all adults, I asked my younger sister who she liked. Of course, the elves were not on her list either. Her list was as follows:

The Lord of the Rings

Boromir (Sean Bean)
Faramir (David Wenham)
Eomer (Karl Urban)
Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen)

The Hobbit

Thorin (Richard Armitage)
Fili (Dean O’Gorman)
Kili (Aidan Turner)
Bard (Luke Evans)

In the grand scheme of things, MY list for both is below:

Thorin/Boromir (I can’t pick, so don’t make me)
Fili
Faramir
Eomer
Kili
Aragorn

Sorry! Bard didn’t make my cut. The men all have a passion for something, and the same goes for the dwarves. The elves are just kind of bleh. No offense to them if they actually do something good, but there isn’t much else to them. Legolas was better in The Lord of the Rings than in The Hobbit. Just as a person, I mean.

But, the guys my sister and I picked are sexy men, who can fight, and kick orc ass! Because they’re SO long, we only watch them every once in a while. We tend to tell each other when we’re about to do it though, because we enjoy the other’s company and commentary throughout. I am probably due to watch them here again soon, and my younger sister and I will gush over the cute guys and crack jokes for the entire 3 hours of each movie. We have way too much fun!

And on that note, it’s been real!

The Middle Earth Rant

Alright, I thought that I should tell you guys about something that has been a part of my life for the last several years that I have been doing with my siblings for the last several years. And nope, it has nothing to do with Monday. I just found that picture and thought it was hysterical.

So, in my house growing up, before you could watch the Lord of the Rings movies (since they came first), you had to read the books. But, before you could read the Lord of the Rings, you had to read The Hobbit ahead of that. It was such a process to watch a couple of movies. The first time I watched the Lord of the Rings Trilogy, it was with my parents and older siblings. No talking, just watching. As the years went on, and my younger siblings read the books and joined in the fun. And when I say fun, I mean fun!

My younger sister has a very similar type of sense of humor to me: dry, witty, and sarcastic. We watch the Hobbit movies and the Lord of the Rings, the witticisms fly like nobody’s business! I keep saying we need to film ourselves watching them, because nobody would believe us otherwise. We make each other laugh and/or what we say, fits with the moment in the movie. We nail it every time. And it’s not like we watch the movies all the time. We space them out, and only try to watch them once or twice a year because they take up so much time. But, I will say this: if I didn’t watch these movies with my younger sister and younger brother, I wouldn’t enjoy half as much.

And on that note, it’s been real!