The Fault In Our Stars (2014) review

The Fault in Our Stars a.k.a TFIOS is a movie based on a young adult novel with the same title written by John Green. I FINALLY HAD THE CHANCE TO WATCH IT. It's romance, which is not my usual favorite type of movie/book, but this one is special, I guess.

I will start with the book first, okay? Okay. (See what I did here?)

I read TFIOS a while ago simply because it's very popular on the internet. And it turns out that I really like it. Yes, the plot is kind of typical romance, but not as cheesy as Nicholas Sparks' books. But what I really like is John Green's writing style. Especially I like his choices of words and quotes. How to describe it huh? Powerful? Idk, but they stuck with you even after you finished reading it. In my opinion, the plot is not that strong, but the characters and the wordings are awesome.

So, with great novel comes great expectations for the movie, right? Yeah I was excited about TFIOS movie. But to be honest, after I watched it, I don't feel the strength of the story, the appeal, as much as when I read the book. Maybe, maybe, it's because, again, the plot is basically standard. Maybe that's what made the movie feel kinda flat, boring, with no intense peak, except perhaps at the twist. 

As for the quotes, thank you writers for putting most of the great quotes in the movie. However, to me there's a difference between reading them and hearing them being said. You see, when the characters said the quotes in the movie, it's like those words just passed through you. But when you read it, it's like you can process it in your brain and you can find the beauty of it. For example, one of my most favorite line in the book, 

“The world," he said, "is not a wish-granting factory.” 

Gus said it after he told Hazel about his cancer returning. That's some painful bitter truth right there but it didn't get enough appreciation because, well, it only took maybe 2 seconds to say that line. 

Really, read the novel. Way more beautiful than the movie. 

Enough about the things I don't like. I love some aspects of TFIOS movie. One, the way Ansel Elgort portrayed Augustus Waters. He got it. He totally got it. He understood that Gus was one cocky, pretentious dude and Ansel did it justice. Gus always wanted to be a hero, to leave something important so everyone will remember him after he died, and Hazel knocked some sense into him that being important for one other person is enough. 

I didn't expect to enjoy Shailene Woodley's portrayal of Hazel Grace, but I did. The cynical, realist girl with cancer, who found happiness in her bitter life from Gus. I like the way she portrayed the love Hazel felt for Gus. It's not over the top like usual teenagers movie. It fits perfectly with the characterization of Hazel Grace. Well done, you two.

Fun things I'd like to add. It's pretty clear since the beginning about Gus' fate. It's obvious that he's gonna die at the end. Some clues:

• Gus insisted to call Hazel with her long name, Hazel Grace. Maybe this is some kind of a "powerful" metaphor to him. You see, Gus likes metaphors and symbols and stuffs. When Hazel started calling him Gus instead of Augustus, there's a quote in the book where he said “You used," he said, and then took a sharp breath, "to call me Augustus.” 

• Gus said “I’m on a roller coaster that only goes up, my friend.” We all know there's no such thing as a roller coaster that only goes up. At some point, it'll go down. And for Gus, it went down the day he discovered that his cancer is coming back and he "lit up like a christmas tree".

• Anne Frank's house is the set where Gus and Hazel kissed for the first time. Anne Frank died not long before the war ended. She was so close to surviving the war but she didn't make it. It's almost the same with Gus, he survived without cancer for months, but then things go unplanned. Damn you John Green. 

One more thing I like is the music. It fits the movie tone really well and it's beautiful.

I give The Fault in Our Stars movie 3.5/5 noise. I love that it stays true to the book, the quotes, the characters and everything. But perhaps for those who haven't read the book, plot-wise it's flat. Also I don't really enjoy the camera work, but I honestly can't pinpoint why. But still, thank you John Green for a beautiful pain that is TFIOS.

X-Men: Days Of Future Past (2014) review

X-Men: Days of Future Past is the sequel of X-Men First Class (2011) and also X-Men The Last Stand (2006). This time, original casts from the old x-men trilogy and the newer casts from x-men first class were joined together to save the past and the future, which is a super cool concept I think. Also since The Last Stand was a total mess, this movie kinda "undo and redo" everything. Confusing? Yes.

--- SPOILER ALERT ---

X-Men DoFP opened sometime in a future where we met old characters like Kitty Pryde (Ellen Page), Iceman (Shawn Ashmore) and Colossus, along with some new characters Warpath, Bishop, Blink, Sunspot, in a fight against robots called Sentinels which job was to destroy every single mutant. 

At first we saw that the mutants were losing the fight, some of them were killed, except for Kitty and Bishop who were running away. Kitty was then seen performing some sort of a mutant thing on Bishop's head and all of sudden everything was gone. What???

An explanation came later on when the group met up with the X-men gang, Prof. Xavier (Sir Patrick Stewart), Magneto (Sir Ian McKellen), Storm (Halle Berry), and of course Wolverine (Hugh Jackman). Kitty then explained that she got the ability to transfer someone's consciousness to the past. So basically in the earlier event, Kitty was sending Bishop to the past to warn them about Sentinel's attack, so they could run away before it happened, thus preventing the fight to ever happen in the future. 

So we got the premise here. Kitty could send someone's mind to that person's body in the past, let that person change the past hence changing the future. But, once that person came back to their present time which was now different, only them could remember the whole thing, no one else could. 

Based on that, Prof X got the idea to send someone back to 1973, where the whole Sentinel thing started. So in 1973, Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) killed Trask (Peter Dinklage), the guy who created the Sentinel program. This made him a martyr, and made mutants the enemy of regular people. Also Mystique got caught after killing Trask, and her DNA was taken and used to further developed the Sentinels. Prof X's idea was to prevent the killing from happening, thus preventing the Sentinels war versus mutant. 

Prof X was supposed to be the one sent to the past since he was the strongest telepath, however his physical body wouldn't be able to withstand the "journey to the past" so Wolverine was the one to go.  

Waking up in 1973, Wolverine then sought out younger Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) who now lived in the empty mansion with Hank McCoy a.k.a Beast (Nicholas Hoult). After the events in X-Men First Class, Charles was a broken depressed man. He lost his "sister" Mystique, he lost his friend Magneto (Michael Fassbender), and he was paralyzed. Beast managed to make a serum to heal Charles' spine momentarily with the cost of his telepathy ability. Which was fine for Charles since he didn't want to hear others' thought anymore.

After a few moments of Wolverine trying to convince Charles to help stopping Mystique, and persuaded him to free Magneto, who was now a prisoner at Pentagon after being involved in the assassination of JFK (although later we found out that Magneto didn't shoot JFK, instead he was trying to save him by curving the bullet), they began the mission to free Magneto with the help of another mutant called Quicksilver (Evan Peters). 

Meanwhile, Mystique had been investigating Trask and found out about him experimenting on mutant. That's why she planned on killing him in Paris. But Wolverine, Charles, Magneto and Beast managed to stop her plan. Moreover, all of sudden Magneto tried to kill her to ensure that humans would never be able to use her DNA against mutant. Weird, in my opinion, because it seemed like Magneto suddenly remembered that he's a villain.  

The event in Paris sort of increased the awareness of mutant's existence among humans. The US president then approve Trask's Sentinel plan out of fear of mutants. The prototypes were to be unveiled at the White House in Washington DC, but before that, Magneto managed to modify the Sentinels and insert metal in the system (??) so he could control the Sentinels. 

Long story short, everyone was now in DC, Magneto flew a stadium to sort of barricade the White House and used the Sentinels to attack people, Mystique was still trying to get to Trask, while Wolverine, Beast and Charles were trying to stop everything. Instead Magneto stopped Wolverine and Charles easily though. He impaled Wolverine with bars and threw him into a river and Charles was trapped under heavy metal post from the flying stadium.

The president and other important people were hidden in a safe bunker, and Magneto pulled the bunker from underground. He then threatened to kill everyone while being watched worldwide. Mystique, disguised as The President, stepped forward and shot Magneto instead. She still wanted to kill Trask, but Charles talked some sense into her, made her release those people and let Magneto and Mystique flee. The Sentinel program was cancelled thus preventing the war in the future from happening. 

Mystique then impersonated Stryker (a military guy who later did experiments on Wolverine in X-Men Origins: Wolverine) and saved Wolverine from the bottom of the river. Then Wolverine woke up in his present time (the future) but now in the Xavier's school instead of the dark place where the movie started. There he saw everybody alive and happy, including characters that died in the future Sentinel war and X-Men The Last Stand (Cyclops, Jean Grey, Storm, Rogue, etc).

--- SPOILER ENDS ---

A few thoughts on X-men Days of Future Past:

• I was initially confused. Why is Prof X still alive in the future?? I mean, it's clear that DoFP timeline is the continuation of X-Men The Last Stand (when younger Charles saw into Wolverine's mind, he could see Jean as Phoenix), and it was obvious that in The Last Stand, Prof X's body was destroyed by Phoenix. Yes, his consciousness was transferred into someone else in the end, but why does he still have his body??

• I googled it, and it turned out that Prof X was using his twin body (or is it a clone body?? Idk) in the Sentinel's war future. I understand that it might be too complicated to explain this in the movie, but as someone who has watched all the X-men movies (except The Wolverine), but not familiar with the comic, it made me confused.

• Since when did Kitty have the power to send someone back to the past? I thought her power was only to go through walls. 

• Really, there are so many inconsistency between Days of Future Past and The Last Stand. Magneto lost his power at the end of The Last Stand, how did he get his whole power back?

• In The Last Stand, the story was built around the Cure from a boy that could suppress the gene X in a mutant so their mutation would become normal, much like Hank McCoy's serum in this movie. But, in The Last Stand, Beast looked surprised about it whereas he was supposed to easily make one himself . Continuity error, perhaps but idk, in my opinion this made the whole story line of young Charles Xavier could walk again after his spine was hit became unnecessary. 

• At the end of this movie, everyone who died in the original X-men trilogy was seen back alive, Jean Grey, Cyclops, etc. That means, this movie basically erased the whole events in X2 and X3 timeline. This is huge, okay. I get it, X3 was a total disappointment, but erasing the whole story, that's new I think. I can't remember other movie franchise that did this kind of thing. But at the same time, it's a bold and genius step. This opens up a whole wide story line and plot possibilities for future X-men movies. Plus this might bring back my favorite mutant, Phoenix, so well played there, Simon Kinberg and Bryan Singer. 

• 1973 Wolverine didn't have his adamantium claws yet, so I assumed the event in X-Men Origins: Wolverine hadn't happened yet. But since the past had changed, that means Wolverine origins would change as well, right? Plus at the end, it was shown that Mystique was the one who saved him, not Stryker. So, yeah, not just X3 that got erased, Wolverine's series would also get alternated. Awesome.

• Despite of the whole timeline confusion, I really like characterization in this movie. Each big character (Wolverine, Prof X, Magneto, Mystique) went through big parts in the story and yet they didn't overshadow each other. Especially Charles Xavier's character growth, from the broken James McAvoy's Charles, seeing him rebuilding his hopes up, until he got his Sir Patrick Stewart's Charles character back, it was great. 

• A great surprise to me came from Quicksilver, the mutant with super speed ability. In my opinion, he was totally the scene-stealer in this movie. At first look, Evan Peters with medium grey hair was weird, but once they got into action, maaan quicksilver was such a fun character. The Pentagon kitchen scene was also absolutely cool and entertaining. 

• On the other hand, Peter Dinklage was really underused. The whole plot was built on  Tarsk's sentinel program and yet he didn't even seem like the villain, like something was missing. Or maybe it's because I'm more used to him as Tyrion Lannister in Game Of Thrones, where Dinklage's act is beyond superb.

• Magneto, still as over-the-top as always. Really, flying with the whole stadium was unnecessary. Clearly his goal was not to conceal what he did at the White House, since he put the camera to record his actions. So, why the stadium?? But then I remember in The Last Stand, Magneto practically flew a whole giant bridge. So yeah, maybe dramatic flair has always been one of Magneto's characters, lol.

• Other than that, I think this movie was great. Bryan Singer is the one who directed X-Men, X-2, and X-Men: First Class, so his style has been proven great multiple times, I suppose. The transition between past and future scenes were also clear, with a contrast difference between bright 70s set for the past and the dark dark dystopian future. 

I give X-Men DoFP 4/5 noise. For a big movie with such a heavy plot, it was executed really well I think. You might need to think hard to understand a few stuffs, especially if you're not familiar with the whole X-men movies and universe. But overall I think it's enjoyable, great action, clean effects, a nice amount of humor, plus seeing old characters back on screen was very nice.

Godzilla (2014) review

Godzilla is probably one of the most famous monsters film franchise in both eastern and western industry. Even now I still remember bits and parts from the 1998 Godzilla movie, the one with Matthew Broderick, where Godzilla destroyed New York city. 

Because of that, and also because the trailer for this movie, first I thought the new Godzilla movie would have a pretty much similar plot, human finds monster, monster destroys human, city ruined, human kills monster, end of story. I was wrong.

--- SPOILER ALERT ---

This movie opened with a b/w classic 1950s footage of the military attacking some kind of monster with nuclear bomb. After the footage + opening credits, pretty cool, the story moved to a mining area in the Philippines, where the miners and some scientists, namely Dr Serizawa (Ken Watanabe) and his partner whose name I didn't catch (Sally Hawkins), found a huge fossil and a mysterious thing like a dormant spore. 

Meanwhile, there was an intense seismic activity, like an earthquake but not (?? geology stuff, idk) in a nuclear reactor in Japan, where Joe Brody (Bryan Cranston) and his wife Sandra worked. The quake caused a leak in the reactor, so the whole plant must be closed to avoid radiation. Sandra didn't make it out of the place, but Joe did.

15 years later, Joe and Sandra's son, Ford Brody (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) was now a navy lieutenant, some sort of a specialist on bomb de-activator. He lived in San Francisco with his wife Elle (Elizabeth Olsen) and their son Sam. Ford got a call from Japan, informing him that his dad got arrested so Ford flew there to bail his dad out. 

Once there, Ford discovered that Joe was still obsessed with the disaster that killed his wife. Joe was sure that it was not a natural disaster, but something else that got covered up. He studied everything about that day, the signals, the patterns, everything. Up to the point where Ford thought that he was crazy. 

Joe's obsession lead him and Ford to the quarantined area, where they then got arrested and they found out that the reactor had been reactivated. Turned out, the people at the reactor (Dr Serizawa was there too!!) were keeping a huge unidentified creature there, and apparently the strange activity that occurred 15 years ago was happening once again there. Joe tried to warn everyone there about the electromagnetic pulse pattern he discovered that was somehow similar to the present event. 

After a few minutes of Joe screaming and the scientists looking confused, they finally reached the conclusion that the creature was actually feeding off the radiation energy emitted from the reactor. Soon after that, the creature woke up and started destroying everything. Is that the Godzilla?? Nope. This monster looked more like a grasshopper with flat head, and it could fly. Double trouble. 

That monster, later called MUTO (Massive Unidentified Terrestrial Organism), caused a destruction at the reactor, and Joe got killed there. The MUTO flew away, btw. Ford, now sad because he realized his dad was not so crazy after all, then tried to fly back to San Francisco. But he was taken into custody, and sailed to Hawaii along with some military people and also Dr Serizawa's team. Why Hawaii? Because the MUTO was tracked heading there. 

On the way to Hawaii, we got everything explained, about the MUTO, about Godzilla, which was actually a larger monster that lived somewhere in deep ocean. Humans had been trying to kill Godzilla for years, covering it with "nuclear testing", but it never worked. Dr Serizawa believed that Godzilla was actually some sort of a force of nature that kept the balance of life. Weird guy this Dr Serizawa. He believed that Godzilla would hunt and stop this MUTO. And surprisingly, it turned out to be true. WHAT?!?!?

After that, another chaos, this time a battle of monster vs monster, and Honolulu was left in ruins. Once again the MUTO flew away, and Godzilla chased after it. It was soon discovered that there was another MUTO, much much much bigger, this time it's a female (again Dr Serizawa called it before anyone else, how???) and this one could not fly. Apparently, MUTO #1 was going to meet up with MUTO #2 to breed. Things escalated quickly, yeah?

Also MUTO #2 was actually from the spore Dr Serizawa found in the Philippines at the beginning of the movie.

The military created a plan to lure all the monsters to the ocean, (which happened to be located near San Francisco, where Ford's family was, cliché) and blast them with this nuclear bomb. Long story short, the plan didn't work, MUTO #2 stole the bomb and created a nest in the middle of SF instead, where she stored her eggs, and let the eggs feed off the energy from the bomb. Clever. 

The Military now no longer had the weapon, so they let Godzilla fight the MUTOs, instead of shooting at the monsters. YES. Godzilla is the good guy of this movie, the anti-hero. I didn't expect this at all. 

Btw, the bomb stolen by MUTO #2 was still active, so the army must take it back before it exploded and destroyed the whole city. Here, Ford became our hero. He also managed to destroy the nest along the way. Well, typical but okay. 

Long story short, finally Godzilla managed to kill both the MUTOs. MUTO #1 was killed by crushing him on a building, and MUTO #2 was killed by Godzilla's atomic breath (??? where does this come from? Why don't you use it earlier and make everything simpler, Zilla???). And then Godzilla went down on the ground as well, looking dead. 

At the end, Ford was safe, happily reunited with his family, the city's saved from nuclear destruction, the monsters were dead, humans were alive and all those happy stuffs. One little surprise came after that. Apparently, Godzilla didn't die, just tired. It got back up, and walking slowly to the ocean. And the news were calling him the "savior" of the city. YAY!

--- SPOILER ENDS --

A few things I noticed and liked, from this movie.

• Godzilla being the "good guy" was a really good twist to me. As I said, I expected this movie to be kinds similar to the 1998 vers where Godzilla was the monster, the bad guy. Plus, recently Pacific Rim with all the Kaiju vs Human reaffirming my prediction. Boy, I was wrong. It's a nice difference in Hollywood's monster movie genre, I think. Maybe it's just me, but it's kinda weird but it's impressive how the creators make viewers actually root for the Godzilla even more than for the human heroes. Seriously, during the battles, I was wayyy more concerned when the Godzilla got hurt, then when the humans got hurt haha.

• Also I like how the monsters attacked not only The US, or only the New York city, like typical "battle till destruction" movie (like in The Avengers, aliens wanted to rule the earth but only focused on NYC, lol).

• I like the cinematography of this movie. It had a lot of scenes where viewers were put into the position of the people under attack. The cameras didn't just focus on the hero's (Ford's) point of view. Like, viewers can see the destruction going on through the glass at the Honolulu's airport as if we're in there, or from within the bus on the Golden Gate Bridge, or from within the train that was attacked by MUTO. We did not just get the "eagle" view, and I think it gave a slightly deeper thrilling sensation. 

• Special effects and digital animation were cool. I like that the Godzilla looked more like a lizard monster, compared to the 1998 one that looked more like a Dinosaur, imo. The ocean movement, the ruins and debris after the chaos, I think, were even better than Pacific Rim's. 

A few things I noticed and don't like, from this movie.

• Characterization. Somehow, even though with all the back stories, it felt like I couldn't actually connect with Ford or Joe or any other characters. Usually, for me at least, viewers should easily "fall" for the main characters in a movie. But this, idk mannn, it feels like all the humans were so shallow, just a "storyteller" that served only to tell viewers about Godzilla and MUTOs. Wasted potentials, I say. Ken Watanabe was usually great, but he spent most of this movie looking off, Aaron Taylor-Johnson playing stone-faced Navy guy, and Bryan Cranston got killed so early. Also no character development. 

• Some things were delivered in a weird way, some with no explanation whatsoever. Like, Dr Serizawa, yes he told us about Godzilla being the force of nature that will restore its balance, but how did he know?? Also some of the whole seismic activity connected with electromagnetic pulse, and the whole radiation thing was confusing at first. 

• So many clichés.  Godzilla's atomic bright blue breath, for those who are familiar with Japanese Godzilla series might have known about this but as someone who's not, that part was a surprise but felt a bit cliché, like saving the best weapon for the last critical moment, how very Japanese's superhero typical. Also the fact that of course the worst part of the battle took place where our hero's family lived. Duh.

Overall, I give Godzilla (2014) 3/5 noise. Enjoyable to see, but not amazing. Good twist, but lack of depth and a bit boring at some parts. The Godzilla itself was cool tho, kudos to the effects dept.

The Amazing Spider-man 2 (2014) review

The Amazing Spider-man 2 is, of course, the sequal of The Amazing Spider-man. Still starring the Stonefield couple, Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker a.k.a Spider-Man and Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy. Personally I like the first movie more than this one but I honestly can't pinpoint why. Haha.

--- SPOILER ALERT ---

This sequel opened with a bit of history of Peter Parker's parents, about the night they left Peter, and about their death. It seemed like Peter's Dad was recording a video explaining his action or something and uploading it to "Roosevelt" before he was killed. No explanation about what "Roosevelt" was tho. But later on Peter figured out everything, including his dad's reasons bla blah, I don't really see the significance of this story line, tbh.

Shift to present day, Spider-man was still roaming NYC, saving the day from villains, although actually he's supposed to be at his graduation ceremony. There're some comedic bits throughout the chasing action. During the villain-chasing, Spider-man saved a guy named Max (Jamie Foxx). He's kind of a loner guy with no friends, and since Peter saved him, he became sooo obsessed with being Spider-man's friend. A bit creepy.

Moving on to the graduation. Gwen Stacy was seen giving a speech at the ceremony. Oh I need to say this. The first 20 minutes or so of this movie was FULL OF FORESHADOWING. So for those who are really shocked to find out about the ending of this movie, ????? I mean, are you even watching? It's crystal clear. Here let me explain:

• Peter kept on getting this vision of Gwen's late father looking at him. We know in the first movie that Gwen's Dad didn't want Peter to date her anymore since it could be dangerous for Gwen's safety. And well, Peter kept on seeing his "sad" face, very telling.

• Gwen's graduation speech. I don't recall the whole exact speech since I watched the movie last Sunday, but basically Gwen was saying things like "what makes life valuable is that it won't last forever, what makes it precious is that it ends" or something along that lines. HOW WAS THIS NOT CLEAR ENOUGH??? Her speech basically foretold her own fate.

• Peter broke up again with Gwen because of his vow to Gwen's Dad. Later on, Gwen got an offer for a scholarship or something from Oxford, so she would be moving to England. When Peter tried to stop her, Gwen said something like "maybe we're on a different path". Another foreshadowing? Not as strong as the speech, but still.

• PLUS, if you've seen the old spider-man movies, the ones with Tobey Maguire, then you should know that Peter Parker's love interest will be Mary Jane Watson a.k.a MJ. Even in the comic books, correct me if I'm wrong since I never read the comic, Gwen Stacy was "only" Peter's first love. I loooove the chemistry between Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone, so yeah it's sad to know that we won't be seeing much, if any, of their interaction on the next sequel. But I'm also glad that the movies stay on the same track with the comic book's plot. 

Let's get back to the movie. Harry Osborn (Dane DeeHan) came back to town. He was Peter's childhood best friend, and also the son of Oscorp's owner, Norman Osborn who just died because of a disease he claimed to be an "Osborn curse". Harry was also showing symptoms of the same disease so basically he spent the entire movie being obsessed with finding the cure for his disease. 

Later he found out about spider poison (that made Peter a Spider-man) that might help him, so he asked Peter if he could get Spider-man to meet him, so Harry could ask for his blood. Peter (Spider-man) refused, since he's not sure what his blood could do to Harry. Harry took this the wrong way, tho, causing him to hate Spider-man.

Meanwhile, Max got in an accident at Oscorp involving seemingly modified electric eels, so then he turned to an electric monster named Electro. At first he was not exactly bad, only wanted to be given attention. But then he caused a big chaos in Times Square, blackout, electrical explosion everywhere so Spider-man had to stop him. In Electro's mind, Spider-man took away the attention given to him, so he started to hate him. 

Something I noticed in Spider-man universe, it seems that almost all major villains first started as a friend of Peter's and then turned to enemy because of a certain reason. It gives viewers some kind of a back story, a reason why they turn evil. Unlike other franchise such as Captain America or DC's Batman or Superman, in which the villains are mostly originally evil, without reasons related to the hero.

I mentioned before about Gwen leaving for England. After a while, finally Peter decided to follow her, claiming Gwen to be his "path". A few romantic, sappy moments later, Electro stroke back, now attacking the city's power source causing blackout all over the city. 

Of course Spider-man beat him after some intense battle that filled the screen with electric blitz, but Spidey was not alone. This time Gwen Stacy assisted him, by turning the power back on, causing Electro to explode due to over-charged. Is this the end? Nope.

Harry Osborn was not satisfied until he found the spider's poison. He found out that Oscorp actually kept a bit in some sort of a secret place. Unfortunately, just like Peter said, the poison didn't do well for Harry. It turned him into a hideous goblin like creature, who then used a armor suit and flying board. Yes, he turned into the Green Goblin.

Right after the end of Spider-man vs Electro battle, Green Goblin came to the power source and started the final battle. Harry as Green Goblin figured out that Spider-man was Peter Parker, so he used Gwen as his target to provoke Peter. After another epic battle, with less explosion and more flying/punching action, of course Spider-man won the battle. BUT, he was too late to save Gwen's life. Oh. To be expected, but her death still looked tragic.

RIP Gwen Stacy. I really like your character, you're like young Pepper Potts. If we compare Gwen's character to the old MJ (Kirsten Dunst), I like Gwen waaaaaay more.

Peter was devastated after Gwen's death. It was shown that he visited Gwen's grave for a long time. Funny thing, seasons changing was shown on screen, it seemed like it's been a year, but then viewers were told that it was only 5 months after the event. Spider-man was no longer existing. But then Peter re-watched Gwen's speech, mainly about hope, and photos of Gwen and Peter were shown, very dramatic, so he got back up and went back to be the city's superhero.

--- SPOILER ENDS ---

Personally, I felt like Green Goblin's story was too forced in this sequel. Viewers basically only get a few minutes of Green Goblin in this movie, for one final battle versus Spider-man. It felt very, idk, rushed. Like, maybe yes we can see the part where Harry turned goblin-like, but the epic battle should have its own epic screen time. In the old Spider-man series, Green Goblin was a major part of Spider-man heroic career. I'd prefer if there's only Electro and some other minor villains in this movie, save the Green Goblin for the next installment perhaps. HOWEVER, since in the end Harry didn't die, so maybe we'll see more of Green Goblin next year. Also based on some spoilers I got, the next villain will be Dr Octopus? Sounds good.

A few other things I need to say about this movie.

First, Jamie Foxx. Standing ovation maaaan, I totally didn't see Foxx in both Max and Electro. Also kudos to the make-up, digital image dept. Even physically, I couldn't really see Jamie's face when he's Electro. Cool.

Dane DeeHan a.k.a Harry Osborn a.k.a Green Goblin. First thought, this boy looked soooo young, like a college graduate kid. Plus I thought his age difference with Andrew Garfield was far. Since I was more used to James Franco as Harry, and Franco always looked old even back then. Boy, how wrong I was. DeeHan was actually 28 years old, only 2 years younger than Andrew, and he is actually older that Emma Stone. Whaaaaaat.

Emma and Andrew, strong chemistry just like the first movie. Maybe being a couple in real life helps a lot haha. Also I like Spider-man goofy, sassy character even more in this sequel. Peter also had many hilarious lines in this sequel. Tobey Maguire's Peter Parker was too emo, too gloomy for a teenager.

Effect and graphic was great. Especially whenever there's Electro on screen, and everything started to became electrically disturbed, exploded, lights everywhere. Pretty. Oh also I watched it in IMAX 3D format, so the battle scenes, Spidey's flying around New York buildings, were even more entertaining. 

I give The Amazing Spider-man 2 hmmm 4/5 noise. I still think the history of Peter's parents and Green Goblin arc in this movie was kind of unnecessary. If it's how it was written in the comic book then well Idk, but yeah. Other than that, music, effects, characterization, GREAT. 

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) review

Captain America: The Winter Soldier is the sequel of 2011's Captain America: The First Avenger. The story took place after the Battle of New York event in The Avengers (2012).

---SPOILER ALERT---

In this installment, the captain a.k.a Steve Rogers must once again face the bad guys HYDRA, which was supposed to be destroyed after the first movie. Here's the surprise, apparently, for years Hydra had infiltrated SHIELD, and now they have moles in SHIELD even on the top level of the organization. So yeah basically you can trust no one there.

Earlier in the movie, SHIELD director Nick Fury told Rogers about Operation Insight, which was SHIELD's new super weapon that could eliminate multiple threats even before the crime occurred. CRAZY, I mean really that is one sick idea. 

Later we learnt that it turned out Operation Insight was after all, simply put, Hydra's ultimate plan to basically kill all their enemies at once. 

So, of course, it's now Captain America's task to stop Hydra from launching and controlling Operation Insight. With the help of Natasha Romanov (a.k.a Black Widow, still as badass as ever) and a new character Sam Wilson (a.k.a Falcon) a former pararescue with METAL WINGS SUIT. Cool. Very cool. I mean look at that.

But the surprise didn't end there. In the attempt to stop Hydra from launching those weapons from SHIELD HQ, Rogers also had to fight Hydra's deadly assassin, known as The Winter Soldier (hence the title of this movie, well). After a pretty intense battle scene, the Captain found out that the assassin was no other than his old best friend Bucky Barnes, who was assumed to be dead back in the war times. Plot twist, Bucky's memory was totally wiped so he didn't know who Steve was. Poor Steve.

Long story short, of course at the end Captain America saved the day. Those deadly weapons were destroyed, Hydra's top level people were killed BUT at the same time SHIELD had also fallen AND the Captain was missing after the battle (although viewers still could see him after that) AND most SHIELD agents changed carrier. And this storyline actually ties with the latest episode of Agents Of Shield, which I'll post later. 

--- SPOILER ENDS ---

Now let's talk about what I thought throughout the movie. 

First of all, great great great pace. Action packed, but still the story line was told clearly, not too rush and not too slow, and no too much unnecessary dialogue or drama. Because personally, I think the first movie was kind of boring due to the long backstory. 

Some action scenes done by the Captain might be a bit over the top, but well, since this is a superhero movie so I guess it suits the adrenaline rush experienced by the viewers. There were also light jokes between the lines, between Steve and Natasha and it's hilarious at the right portion, in my opinion. 

Scarlet Johansson once again delivered a superb performance as Natasha. I could see the dynamic between her character and Steve Rogers. No forced romance there, they're more like partners, siblings and I think that's awesome because that's exactly what they were, a team. 

Chris Evans as the captain and Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, pretty much similar quality to their other Marvel's movies. So is Cobie Smulders as agent Hill, her appearance on screen might not be big but you can't argue that she hold a vital part of the plot.

A different performance came from Sebastian Stan, who played The Winter Soldier a.k.a Bucky Barnes a.k.a Rogers' old best buddy. This time as the assassin, we could see more fighting scenes from him, plus according to some news, he actually trained for months for this role so, yeah congrats Mr. Stan you did it well. Plus I'm used to Stan as a drama actor (Gossip Girl, Once Upon A Time) so it's kinda awesome to see a different kind of role from him. But his long hair, I'm not a fan.

A nice surprise for me came from Anthony Mackie a.k.a the Falcon. I never saw any of his movie before so I didn't know what to expect, but it's great to see a new face playing a big role as the hero's sidekick. Moreover, his all flying scenes was executed well, almost as smooth as RDJ's Iron Man, but with wings. Kudos to the digital animation department, really.

To conclude, I give Captain America: The Winter Soldier 4.5/5 noises, so many surprises, great action, definitely enjoy this one waaaay more than the first movie!