Metroid Prime 2: Echoes - A Retrospective Critique

 

Year of release: 2004
Developer: Retro Studios & Nintendo
Publisher: Nintendo

The recent release of Metroid Dread on the Nintendo Switch has given me cause to replay (most of) the games in the Metroid series, a series that Nintendo hasn't known what to do with at times. Super Metroid was one of The Great Video Games of Our Time, but it didn't sell particularly well and the series was blessed with no more children. That was, of course, until Samus Aran, the series' lead character, was featured in Super Smash Bros., which did sell well and led to a resurgence in the public's curiosity with the series; this would lead to Metroid Prime, another one of The Great Games of Our Time and the first iteration of the Metroid Prime trilogy (quadrology, if one includes Metroid Prime: Hunters, which I don't) (quintology, if one includes Metroid Prime Pinball, which I do). This trilogy (including the featured game in this retrospective piece) was very well-received, but there were dark times on the horizon. Cue a disastrous Team Ninja Project that completely missed the point of the series and a worthless handheld game that didn't even feature the lead character and it appeared as though the series had been abandoned in an oubliette. It took a passionate fan remake of the third-worst game in the series to get Nintendo to realize that people actually care about these games and that revisiting the series would be the worth the company's time (whereupon The Plumber promptly slapped the hands of the fan programmer away and pushed out a far less-interesting version to middling reviews).

My journey through the series has led to occasionally surprising conclusions: I have newfound respect for the original Metroid, I no longer have the patience for Metroid II: Samus Returns, and I've found it to be worth owning a Nintendo Wii even if its only function is as a dedicated Metroid Prime 3: Corruption machine. I've also found Metroid Prime 2: Echoes to be something of the middle child of the Metroid Prime trilogy; specifically, it's the Wakko Warner of the trilogy, often providing some of the best moments but never quite living up to the impact of its siblings.

The Bad Seed's Comically Bad Ending

 

Different kind of shocker

Writer (novel): William March
Writer (play): Maxwell Anderson
Writer (screenplay): John Lee Mahin
Director/Producer: Mervyn LeRoy
Cinematographer: Harold Rosson
Starring: Nancy Kelly, Patty McCormack, Eileen Heckart, Evelyn Varden, Henry Jones
Runtime: 129 minutes

I need to talk about the ending of this movie really quick.

Dragon Ball Z: Dead Zone

It's time to Rock the Dragon.

Jesus Christ Superstar - The First Movie to Feature Twerking

Written by: Melvyn Bragg, Norman Jewison, Tim Rice, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John
Directed by: Norman Jewison
Music by: Tim Rice, Andrew Lloyd Webber
Starring: Ted Neeley, Yvonne Elliman, Carl Anderson, Barry Dennen, Philip Toubus, the principal from Billy Madison
Cinematography: Douglas Slocombe
Are we still giving credit to huge movie studios that don't love us back?: Universal Pictures

There is no great shortage of biblical film adaptations; it's called the greatest story ever told for a reason. There are varying degrees of success here; one can quickly point to either version of The Ten Commandments or Ben-Hur as useful and worthwhile works of art, while Wholly Moses! and Noah's Ark are wastes of time. It's a tricky balancing act; you've got to respect both the belief system that's been around for a couple millennia lest you upset one of the biggest religious movements in the world, but you've got to commit to the art form as well lest you disappoint the general moviegoer. Right about the 1970s, Tim Rice and Andrew Lloyd Webber had a really bright idea: how about a musical that portrays Jesus Christ as some sort of funk rock superstar?

Fitzcarraldo: Conquistador of the Useless

Director: Werner Herzog
Writer: Werner Herzog
Starring: Klaus Kinski, Claudia Cardinale

Music by: Popol Vuh

Fitzcarraldo is a movie about a guy who drags a boat up a hill.

When Harry Met Sally...Ringing in the New Year by Going Completely Off-Brand

Year of release: 1989
Starring: Billy Crystal, Meg Ryan, Carrie Fisher, Buddy Hackett Bruno Kirby
Writer: Nora Ephron
Director: Rob Reiner
Cinematographer: Barry Sonnenfeld

2018 just has to be the year. I don't know what it'll be the year for, but it oughta be the year for something really special. Anything can happen; we got the Buffalo Bills in the playoffs, we got a failed gameshow host as U.S. President, and I hear tell they might even be bringing back Animaniacs. The human race is precipitously balanced on the edge of a razor blade, or maybe we're skating on thin ice, or perhaps we're dancing a waltz on a powder keg, or we could just be doing none of those extremely stupid, dangerous things and there isn't a superfluous metaphor to apply to society these days, try as we might. Maybe it's because I watched Good Girls Revolt, witnessed talking heads on the news debate whether the United States would turn North Korea into a concrete parking lot or vice versa, and saw the Iranian protests, but it seems like the world is just raring for a revolution of some sort. People sure would like to belong to one. The populace desires change. As usual, I've got just the thing.

Folks, it's time to for us, as a species, to watch more Rob Reiner movies.

50 Shades of Grey - Whips, Nips, and the Drizzling Shits

I wasn’t planning on writing a review for this shit. Fifty Shades of Grey is two (!) hours and nine (!) minutes long. Dozens of scathing deconstructions already exist, both for the books and the movie. Some of those reviews were written by people with far better knowledge on BDSM and romantic relationships than I. I was just going to get reeeeally high, watch the movie, laugh a lot, and go to bed. It was supposed to be easy. Fun. A lighthearted romp with a movie that grossed 167 million God-Bless-America dollars and received a steady 25% on RottenTomatoes. The leading pair were known to have no chemistry, and supposedly the book author had a total stranglehold on production. It was incidentally nominated for an actual, honest-to-god Academy Award. This should have been great! I love pig slop that’s easy to point and laugh at- that’s why I’m here. Plus, I’d already read the books. And by ‘read the books,’ I mean ‘floated in a pool listening to the audiobook.’ Really, who has time to read actual books nowadays? Not this mess of a human being, that’s for sure.

So here I am, taking deep breaths and readying my brain for the onslaught. These next couple hours surely won’t be intellectually stimulating, but they might at least be pleasantly bad. And hey! I hear people get naked!

Silent Hill 3 - Just a Little Bit Overrated

Taking a break from my massive Tekken retrospective, I deigned to replay the original Silent Hill  a couple days ago. It still holds up as one of my favorite games ever made, and my pick for the scariest game ever made. Even though the 1999 PS1-era graphics make it look like the Blocky Horror Picture Show, the first Silent Hill game is fascinating in just how well it succeeds at creating an effectively chilling, horrific atmosphere. There are flaws to be sure; the aforementioned graphical limitations do no favors unless one is into that sort of thing (like I am), the voice acting is about as bad as one might expect for a PS1-era survival horror game, and it's a bit hard to buy the idea of an all-powerful cult when you only see one of its members, yet I find myself replaying it at least once a year to remind myself just how scary it is and how engrossing the atmosphere is. Silent Hill has to be one of the absolute finest games ever made.

Fantasia 2000

Fantasia 2000

Fantasia was released some 77 years ago, a result of Walt Disney's misreading of the citizenry's support for animation. What should have been the zenith of Joe Public's recognition of animation as high art was instead a masterpiece that didn't make any profit until 1969 - 29 years after its initial release - and even then it was released as a sort of gimmick with a psychedelic-styled advertising campaign (if you need drugs to enjoy Fantasia, there is something dangerously wrong with you). Featuring some of the most beautiful animation the world had ever seen set to some of the most beautiful music the world had ever heard, with the entire crew working the hardest they ever had or would, the movie should have been the biggest thing to hit the art world, more powerful than a revolution - a giant steel obelisk standing as testament that none before or since would compare to the majesty of Disney.

But it didn't make enough money.

Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers The Movie: Part 4

Film's Climax Produces Insurmountable Mental Breakdown

Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers The Movie: Part 3

Mom so help me God if McDonald's gives me the Rocky toy one more time I will raise Hell of a biblical magnitude in that shithole and that clown won't show his face if he knows what's good for him.

  

Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers The Movie: Part 2

In which I continue to mock this movie for being a cash grab, knowing good and Goddamned well I had every single Happy Meal toy.

Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers The Movie: Part 1

Capitalism at its most radical.

The King of Iron Fist Retrospective Part 2 - Tekken 2

This is bullshit, Jeff. If you keep spamming the eye lasers I'm taking my Dualshock and going home.

UFC 200 - Return to the Brocktagon

WITNESS ME

The King of Iron Fist Retrospective Part 1 - Tekken

Witness the power of the Terrible Zaibatsu 

Mortal Kombat - That Sonya Blade Is One Piece of Ace

Actually written by Chris the Intern, I'm an idiot who posted it on the wrong account.

 

                                                                                                              Fan poster: Source

Chris' opinions do not reflect or represent the views of terrible blog dot net. 

God dammit Chris. 

Silent Night, Deadly Night - Santa's Watching, Santa's Creeping

Silent Night, Deadly Night

Directed by: Charles Sellier

Starring: Nobody

Release Date: November 9, 1984

Run Time: 85 minutes

Body Count: 13

In the Winter of 1984 a slasher directed by the man who created Grizzly Adams snuck into theaters. The poster depicted an axe-wielding Santa Claus going down a chimney and old white people were less than thrilled about it. It opened on the same day as A Nightmare on Elm Street and made more money at the box office, but the power of middle class white people was too strong to fight and it was unceremoniously yanked from theaters. So what is so special about this silly little Santa Claus murder movie? Why does this film have such a strong cult following, and why in God’s name are there four sequels? Let’s dive in. If the movie itself is even half as good as its name, we should be in business.

Jack Frost - The Most Important Film Duology Since Drumline

Santa's Slay - The Most Important Wrestler-Dressed-As-Santa-Murdering-People Film of Our Generation

GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOLDBERG