Writer. Library person. First in the world to platinum Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two on PS3.
“Jurassic World? Not a fan…”
A Force Awakens style adventure to cap off a series rather than begin it. A blatant and unashamed appeal to our nostalgia, our thoughts and concerns made meta through Ian Malcolm’s golden voice. Dinosaurs dinosaur.
My VHS cover pull-quote: “All we needed was Dennis Nedry’s howling ghost exacting revenge on Dodgson to make this thing perfect. Was Wayne Knight busy?”
“Sometimes the family weirdos get a bad rap.”
An energetic and beautifully animated 60th entry into the Disney animated canon that’s about family, acceptance, and toxicity. It shares a bunch of themes with Moana, as well as the unrestrained touch of Lin Manuel Miranda’s songwriting skills. The wide ensemble of genuinely developed characters (as developed as 90 minutes allows) helps set it apart from other animated fare. More importantly, though, the main character has glasses and that makes me feel seen as someone with glasses.
My VHS cover pull-quote: “Releasing The Eternals: Part II so close to the first one was risky, but it definitely pays off.”
“Well, I’m really good at swimming.”
Definitely one of Disney’s most emotionally mature entries into their animated canon, tackling weighty themes like loss and humanity’s seemingly natural discord and distrust of one another. Heavy stuff. It’s a near perfect synthesis of what they tried to do in their underrated early 2000s actioner efforts like Atlantis and Treasure Planet (and, to a slightly lesser extent, later stuff like Big Hero 6 and Moana) and another welcome evolution of what being a ‘princess’ means and looks like.
My VHS cover pull-quote: “Also features some excellent fight and action choreography, like, better than The Raid. Or just like The Raid but with a con-baby.”
Nick Perilli