Dell on Movies Against The Crowd Blogathon

Dell on Movies is hosting the fifth year of his blogathon Against the Crowd, where bloggers share their unpopular opinions about movies "everyone" seems to love or hate. The blogathon sounded like a lot of fun, and not something I've participated in before. It was interesting to rummage through different genres, trying to find movies I thought were universally loved or hated and then find out my assumptions were completely wrong. I'm pretty surprised I actually found a pairing that fit a genre. If you want to see the full blogathon and the rest of the entries, check out Dell on Movie's blog here!

The blogathon guidelines:
1. Pick one movie that "everyone" loves (the more iconic, the better). That movie must have a score of 75% or more on rottentomatoes.com. Tell us why you hate it.

2. Pick one movie that "everyone" hates (the more notorious, the better). That movie must have a score of 35% or less on rottentomatoes.com. Tell us why you love it.

3. Include the tomato meter scores of both movies.

Here are my two picks. What do you think - agree or disagree? Feel free to let me in the comments!

UPDATED: Is Wonder Woman 1984 Going Meta? and Other Thoughts about the Non-Sequel

Photo Credit: Warner Bros. Pictures

We have another year to go before Patty Jenkin's highly anticipated return of Wonder Woman hits theaters November 2019. As more production stills and filming locations surface online, I'm already wondering what in the world is going on in this sequel - a surprising return? nods to George Orwell? Kristin Wiig as the villain? Here are some theories of what may be coming in Wonder Woman 1984. Spoilers and theories are included beyond this point - you've been warned!

Ranking the Mission: Impossible franchise

Tom Cruise was already a breakout star in the 1980s with movies like Taps, Risky Business, Top Gun, and Rain Man under his belt. Heading into the '90s, Cruise was on his way to take over the box-office and change the action genre forever with a little movie called Mission: Impossible. Starring as IMF agent Ethan Hunt in 1996, he started a franchise that twenty-two years down the road is still going strong. Honestly, it just doesn't feel like a proper summer at the movies without Cruise headlining this thrilling franchise that just keeps getting better and better. With the release of the sixth movie (read my review here), I'm ranking the Mission: Impossible series.  How would you rank the franchise so far? Feel to let me know in the comments!

5 (Real) Ideas to Fix the Oscars

Award shows should be an exciting affair, and generally, they are for the people who they’re geared towards – Grammys ring in devoted music lovers, Tonys for the theatre crowd, Oscars for cinemaphiles, and so on. However, over the past several years  the Academy Awards has felt pressure to increase its ratings despite movie fans accepting the ceremony format (excluding the lack of diversity, of course) the way it is.

With making the Oscars more dynamic in mind, the Academy Awards's planned some big changes. Two, in particular, set fire to the film community: the show's running time will be limited to three hours period (by filming the technical winner's speeches during commercials and then aired as a montage). And, creating a new separate category for Popular Film instead of acknowledging blockbusters with other Best Picture nominees.

While their new ideas certainly had good intentions, it's not difficult to notice that the Oscars ceremony continues to gloss over its other mistakes. From forced comedy sketches to general pat-each-other-on-the-pack merriment, there's harmless flubs that makes it feel like we're watching the same ceremony over and over again; small reasons why the ratings continue to decline. So, how can the most anticipatory time of the year for movie buffs actually change for better? I have a few ideas. I'd love to know how you feel about the Oscars' announcements. Let me know in the comments!

Why It’s Okay To Lean Onto Fandom in Troubled Times

Every day there are always more shocking and disturbing headlines highlighting what’s going wrong in the world. Not that tragic, controversial, or destructive incidents haven’t been occurring since the beginning of time, but now with social media, the spotlight singles out every event at the same time: gun violence, net neutrality, police brutality, incompetent governments, Families Belong Together, horrific allegations of abuse and sexual assault - to name a few. As technology captures every minuscule or massive piece of news, the world never stops watching and reporting, moving faster than humans can process one event from the next.

The news has become so rampant and extreme, reality is a blender of all of our scariest dystopias because life is becoming a real dystopia. One day it’s The Handmaid’s Tale. The next day it’s 1984. Or Brave New World or Animal Farm. Combining them all together can feel like we're in a never-ending episode of Black Mirror, so much so we only wish Rod Serling was narrating us for The Twilight Zone. While we all have the best intentions to log onto the internet or social media to stay-up-to-date, what we see and read almost binds us to our sails being deflated. No matter what at the end of the day we're still normal people with a sense of responsibility to the world around us, who are also trying to do our best. But it's also so easy to feel absolutely helpless about it all.

Top Nomination Picks for the 70th Emmy Awards

Summer is winding down, but the new season of television is just around the corner. Which means it's almost the biggest time of the year for TV land. On September 17th, 2018, the Emmy Awards will celebrate actors and series nominated by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. Will Donald Glover make history again? Will underdogs like The Americans have a chance to sweep? I thought it might be fun to share my top picks of major award categories (check out the full list of nominees here). Who do you hope will win at the 70th Emmys? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below!

Mission: Impossible Fallout (2018) Is The Best Franchise That Keeps Getting Better

On the very rare occasion that Tom Cruise doesn’t deliver on his promise to thrill moviegoers, almost every summer we count on the renown star to bring on the excitement as the daring spy Ethan Hunt. Waiting for another installment has become an event in itself for fans anticipating where Cruise will take his passion for this sage next. Every Mission: Impossible installment seems outdo the last tone. Coming back for the sixth time, Mission: Impossible Fallout again proves to be the best entry in a franchise that just keeps getting better.

After failing to recover three plutonium nuclear cores, IMF Agent Ethan Hunt is forced to team up with the CIA’s top assassin August Walker (Henry Cavill) to prevent the weapons from falling into the hands of a religious anarchist group known as the Apostles. While dealing with the aftermath of capturing one of its dangerous associates Solomon Lane (Sean Harris), Hunt’s past comes back to haunt him, and question how he can save the world just one more time.

Every Mission: Impossible has been naturally different in their own way as the films have changed hands between directors, writers, and supporting casts. Despite definitive stylistic transitions between movies, the series has never lost the core of what it’s always striven to be: an action-packed escape with fun characters. Though the franchise as a whole and individually are far from bad (the earliest ones are certainly dated but not the worst), Fallout is not just a physical rollercoaster ride but an emotional symphony in humanizing its hero.