Picking up from where the original left off, Azumi 2: Death Or Love sees the cute, young assassin and her one surviving colleague, Nagara (Yuma Ishigaki), heading off to slay the final warlord, the last of the troublesome triumvirate, whose death they believe will bring peace to Japan.
Soon, Azumi (Aya Ueto) and Nagara fall in with a Robin Hood-style bandit, Ginkaku (Shun Oguri), who happens to be the spitting image of Nachi, the beloved friend that Azumi was ordered to kill as the final part of her training (this is because Nachi and Ginkaku are played by the same actor).
Also joining their little gang is a zealous neophyte ninja, Kozue, played by the instantly recognisable Chiaki Kuriyama (from the awesome double bill of Kill Bill Volume 1 and Battle Royale).
Azumi's final mission proves to be her toughest as the last warlord, Masayuki Sanada (Toshiya Nagasawa) has gotten into bed - literally - with the head of a ruthless, and warmongering, ninja clan, a superhumanly fast harridan called Kunyo (Reiko Takahashi).
On one level Azumi 2 is more of the same as Azumi, although the blood-letting is considerably more restrained in this second film, but it still delivers a smart plot looking at honour, friendship, blind obedience, betrayal and the lengths some people will go to to see their mission fulfilled.
As before there are numerous glorious set-pieces, beautifully choreographed and shot, with the "poison spider web" in the bamboo forest being the most inventive.
While Chiaki's performance is, as usual, both memorable and menacing, the film - as with the first one - belongs to Aya Ueto, whose Azumi is one tough cookie who could give Buffy a run for her money any day.
However, the two volumes of Azumi films share certain characteristics with the structure of Quentin Tarantino's two Kill Bill films; both have their largest and most gruesome fights at the climax of the first volume and their heroines have to carve their way through a number of sub-bosses before facing off against the final Big Bad at the end of volume two.
This final confrontation stands out not so much for the actual conflict but for the position Azumi is put in by her own side, when Sanada suggests he would be willing to withdraw his troops from the impending war if Azumi is left to face him in single combat.
Azumi 2: Death Or Love doesn't quite touch the giddy heights of the first movie, but is still a more satisfying conclusion to the tale than Kill Bill Volume 2 was to Kill Bill Volume 1.
While I enjoy anime as much as the next geek, nothing can beat the sheer visceral thrill of live-action comic book adaptations.
Serialised in comic form since 1994, Azumi is the ultra-violent tale of a teenage girl raised, with nine young boys, in a hidden mountain retreat to form an elite cadre of assassins to restore peace to Japan by killing off warlords who make trouble.
The two-hour movie starts slowly, and at first I wasn't sure where it was going. Then once the 10 assassins were exposed to their "final test" before heading into the outside world to complete their mission, I began to appreciate what a brutally clever film this was going to be.
Obviously it helps that Azumi herself (Aya Ueto) is very easy on the eye and let's be honest to most geeks there are few things hotter - besides our significant others - than an Asian lady with a katana!
And, yes, there is a lot of blood - more than a Victorian slaughterhouse - although few actual graphic wounds (one severed arm and a couple of decapitations that I can recall) but the swordplay and creativity of the stunts distracts from the red stuff anyway.
Azumi and her cohorts are tasked with killing three particular warlords, but to get to their targets they have to carve their way through hordes of samurai, ninjas and bandits in a variety of inventive settings and, often, massively outnumbered.
Mix this in with some incredible characters - the stand-out being the effeminate psychopath Bijomaru Mogami (Jô Odagiri) - and a thought-provoking plot and Azumi surprised me by quickly rising to classic status.
Tackling honour, friendship and the cycle of violence, the film certainly doesn't preach, instead choosing to serve up its lessons with a heavy dose of tomato ketchup through its morally ambiguous protagonist constantly questioning the veracity of her mission, but finding her heritage impossible to ignore.
For those who love their chanbara, I cannot recommend Azumi highly enough.
Turn the Tide is an Epic Asian folk metal collaboration between NiNi Music and RYUJIN (Ryoji Shinomoto).
Blending traditional Asian instruments with melodic metal, the song tells the story of the legendary Pirate Queen Zheng Yi Sao and the storms of war that turned the tide of battle across the seas.
Shot across Asia with shots from the beautiful Hokkaido.
Godzilla Minus Zero picks up in 1949, two years after the tumultuous events of Godzilla Minus One, and continues the story of the Shikishima family as they face an all-new calamity.
Additionally confirmed out of CinemaCon, Ryunosuke Kamiki, the hero who faced Godzilla’s terror in Godzilla Minus One, returns as Koichi Shikishima, and is joined by Minami Hamabe as Noriko Oishi, who miraculously survived Godzilla’s first attack on Tokyo.
Today's entry in this week of early Sinbad movies is a little known chanbara excursion from that brief period in the Arabian sailor's storied career when he was, in fact, Japanese.
The film begins with him inexplicably (in that it's never explained) escaping from being burned alive for the crime of piracy.
Back on his ship, however, in no time at all, Sinbad and his crew are caught in a massive storm and their vessel destroyed.
Sinbad and a couple of survivors are adrift, with a large chest of jewels, when they are set upon by the dread Black Pirate (Makoto Satô) who makes off with the treasure, leaving Sinbad for dead.
Our hero washes up on a beach, where he meets horny wizard Sennin (Ichirô Arishima) who carries his family curse of becoming paralysed whenever he sees the exposed flesh of a woman's cleavage!
Through a series of misadventures in the nearby town, Sinbad eventually falls in with a bandit queen and would-be rebel leader, the rather lovely Miwa (Kumi Mizuno, who crops up in several well-known kaiju films of the 1960s), and learns that the local ruler is taking peasants' daughters, in lieu of taxes, to bolster his harem.
Meanwhile, there's shenanigans at the nearby palace, where the sickly king (Takashi Shimura) remains out of sight.
The king's conniving Chancellor (Tadao Nakamaru) is trying to engineer a coup by getting himself hitched to Princess Yaya (Mie Hama, who appeared alongside Sean Connery in You Only Live Twice), with the help of his cackling pantomime demon-witch ally Granny (Hideyo Amamoto), whose skills include brewing poisons and turning people to stone with her gaze.
The princess, however, is betrothed to the Prince of Thailand (Jun Funato), who is due to arrive any day now for their wedding, which would scupper the Chancellor's ambitions.
Sinbad begins to suspect what is going on when he realises the jewels the kindly princess is wearing come from his own treasure haul (their original provenance is never truly discussed, but I like to think it's booty from a previous adventure of the "I'm not really a pirate" Sinbad).
Unsurprisingly, the lurid claims made in the movie poster (above) are gross exaggerations (the 'giant', for instance, is just a tall bloke, like Bernard Bresslaw in Hawk The Slayer or Hafþór Júlíus Björnsson in Game of Thrones) and there is no "lost world".
Nevertheless, The Lost World of Sinbad is a damn fine romp.
There's even some nice misdirection through the Chancellor's double-dealings that adds a surprising degree of complexity to the central plot.
Mitsukô Kusabue turns in a particularly good performance as Sobei, the Chancellor's overlooked consort, who definitely delivers some of the best snark .. before running afoul of Granny.
While the film boasts no monsters, there's plenty of magic on display, even if Sennin and Granny only have a handful of spells each in their repertoire.
Sennin's main trick is transforming himself into a fly, primarily to get around (including landing on a dancer's breast at one point... because family curse!), while Granny leans heavily on her petrifying gaze.
Towards the climax of the movie, a peculiar sequence sees Sinbad strapped to a giant kite to evade the enemy guards, when he and the rebels are storming the castle,.
He's not riding the kite like a magic carpet, as shown in the (again misleading) poster, but for some reason strapped on its back - facing the sky - so I have no clue as to how he was supposed to guide it.
Sinbad eventually gets into the castle entirely by chance!
Otherwise, the plot - for a dubbed effort that changed so much from the original and unfolds in a setting you'd never associate with Sinbad - is solid, has some good politicking in the court scenes, a cast of interesting and memorable characters, and, as you might expect with Toshirô Mifune involved, pretty decent fight scenes.
This afternoon, our regular "tree safari" walk found us at Chiddingstone Castle (which looks like a stunning stately home indoors, but - because of Alice - we could only wander around the grounds).
The first thing I have to say was, despite now being Spring and the start of British Summer Time, it was blooming cold. And that's from someone who usually isn't bothered by the cold. The wind chill factor was really getting into my aged bones and I was not a particularly happy camper for much of the walk.
The main treason Rachel chose Chiddingstone for today's walk was the avenue of Japanese cherry blossoms that were in full bloom. Rachel knows I love cherry blossom (which is why we have a young cherry tree planted outside our house, although it will be decades before it can rival the beauties here... or in Japan).
Freaky bridge - not for me!
At the end of the avenue is an arched wooden bridge over a lake, but it's one of those "open" bridges that freak me out 'cos of my balance/vertigo issues after my stroke.
So we diverted round the end of the lake instead, where there's a wonderful rock formation - and a tree with signs of fairy habitation (well, it has a couple of large openings in it!).
The "fairy tree"
I am totally smitten by this rock formation at the end of the lake
This little rivulet that runs through the rocks helps fill the lake
Alice had a lovely time, meeting a number of adorable fellow dogs as well as attracting her usual coos and cuddles from friendly, dog-loving humans who always mistake her for a puppy and are then amazed when we tell them she's nearly 12.
After our walk, I insisted we have a bite to eat in the stately home's café. As we had to sit in the courtyard (under cover) - again because of Alice - I took advantage of the box of blankets provided and spread one over my legs, like a pensioner.
Rachel ordered herself a cream tea while I had a hot chocolate accompanied by a couple of crumpets with raspberry jam.
The locally-sourced jam was incredibly delicious so when Rachel was settling our bill I asked her to get us a pot of the jam as well.
Once we got home (it was so nice to be in the warmth again!) I added "crumpets" to the shopping list, so I could replicate the experience I had so recently enjoyed in the courtyard of the Chiddingstone Castle café.
The theme of 'honour' is often central to samurai movies, but I can't think of another movie that has handled its complexities as well as 13 Assassins.
Directed by Takashi Miike (who I tend to associate with graphic and disturbing horror movies rather than chambara swordfighting flicks), this is the story of 12 samaurai and a woodsman, who acts as their guide, plotting the death of the Shogun's half-brother, the evil Lord Naritsuga (Gorô Inagaki).
Naritsuga isn't Darth Vader/comic book evil, but a full-on, conscience-free psychopath, whose violent appetites, arrogant ambition and total disregard for human life threaten to shatter mid-19th Century Japan's fragile peace.
Of course, because of his blood ties with the Shogun (he's also the son of the previous Shogun), he goes unchallenged, until the Shogun's advisor Sir Doi (Mikijiro Hira) gets tacit approval from the Shogun to deal with the problem "off the record".
Doi recruits seasoned samurai Shinzaemon Shimada (Kôji Yakusho) for the difficult task - Shinzaemon's only chance is to ambush Naritsuga on the road back from the capitol to his family lands, when he's accompanied by around 70 soldiers.
In this time of peace, finding trained samurai up to such a task is hard work, but eventually Shinzaemon assembles a hit squad of a dozen and comes up with a plan to divert Naritsuga's caravan through a village which Shizaemon will have had fortified and turned into a "death trap".
While the plot is very straight forward, the story can get rather complex for a Western viewer as the opening, explanatory text flashes by fast enough to give you whiplash, and then the dialogue is quite heavy with a lot of names and places (much like Game Of Thrones in that sense) and much, if not all, of the motivation for the protagonists is driven by the concept of honour - they know it's a suicide mission, but it's the right thing to do to save their country (before Naritsuga can assume the high political office that has been offered to him by his half-brother).
On the other side of the coin, Naritsuga's chief samurai Hanbei (Masachika Ichimura) - an old frenemy of Shinzaemon - knows that his master is evil, but also sees his obligation as protecting his master with his life and not questioning orders.
The first hour-and-a-quarter of 13 Assassins sets the chess pieces in place, motivations and reasons are established, the assassination team is assembled (and some have a brief tussle with some henchmen of Naritsuga's clan), but all this building up to the stunning finale, a 45-minute running battle between the assassins and Naritsuga's army (which turns out to be far bigger than they first believed).
Now, I knew in advance of the much-heralded 45-minute battle scene and wondered if Miike could pull it off. And the simple answer is: yes. It's almost a mini-film within the film, never gets repetitive or boring, allows all the assassins their moment in the spotlight, is incredibly creative and bloody (without being unnecessarily gory) and wholly convincing. It shows how a small force of highly trained individuals with a strong leader and a solid plan can take on a much larger force and achieve some sense of victory.
There are, of course, some similarities between 13 Assassins and Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai, but not to the detriment of either film.
The brilliant Luminism channel brings us a pair of featurettes examing great fantasy films that managed to bomb at the box office (often due to a marketing failure by studios unable to grasp genre pieces).
As well as helping me get my Christmas shopping finished nice and early, this year's Black Friday also saw Amazon offering some cut-price Prime Video subscription deals for the many, many channels available through its central hub.
So, I got myself a sub to Crunchyroll, which I'd been circling for months.
But what is Crunchyroll, you may ask?
Google summarises it as follows:
Crunchyroll is a streaming service for anime and other Japanese entertainment, owned by Sony Group Corporation. It offers a vast library of anime series, films, and manga, with content available to stream both with original Japanese audio and subtitles or with English dubs.
I had two main reasons for this subscription: (a) I was fed up waiting for more episodes of My Hero Academia to be released on blu-ray and wanted to see the final season and the spin-off series, Vigilantes; and (b) I wanted to see what other fantasy anime were available that gave off similar vibes to my new favourite shows: Delicious in Dungeon and Frieren: Beyond Journey's End.
Now, I knew there were a LOT of animes out there, but I don't think I was fully ready for the full Crunchyroll library (and this is nowhere close to all the animes, as there are several other streamers offering similar content, such as Prime Video itself and Netflix, the home of the Studio Ghibli movies).
The first thing I did was finish season seven of MHA, but then I wanted to save the show's final season and spin-off, allowing myself time to explore what else there was in Crunchyroll's portfolio.
I make no bones about the fact that I suffer decision paralysis when being faced by too many options, but endlessly scrolling through the shows and movies I now had access to nearly melted my little brain.
I watched the first episodes (or two) of several almost random choices that looked like what I was looking for - which is really easy when episodes are a little over 20 minutes long - but found myself being extremely persnickety. They were good, but not EXACTLY what I was hunting for.
One thing I did quickly learn though is that I much prefer anime that's dubbed into English. When I was watching Japanese language shows I found the subtitles were changing much too fast and I couldn't keep-up and was also missing the visuals while trying to read.
This is odd because I watch subtitled movies and a lot of Japanese documentaries on NHK World-Japan and have no issue with their subtitles.
I've currently settled on The Water Magician, which is - so far - an easy-going isekaiserial with 12 episodes in its first season.
Being a lifelong fan of Alice in Wonderland and The Wizard of Oz, I'm interested in the the isekai genre as it's something I've often thought about introducing - somehow - into a roleplaying game set-up. A number of recent Japanese-inspired systems I've been looking at fully embrace the idea of "people from our world finding themselves in a fantasy world".
Of course, I've now found my own fantasy world - Crunchyroll - and may be lost for some time as I ferret around to find the magical MacGuffin that will solve all my problems... or give me the inspiration I need for my next roleplaying campaign.
Although officially licensed from Marvel, Toei's 1970's live-action Spiderman (not Spider-Man) show, aka Supaidâman, is way more Power Rangers than modern Marvel Spider-Man movies; his powers come with their own transforming robot (Leopardon) and flying car... because Japan!
Beyond his hyperagility, the majority of Spiderman's powers also seem to originate from his alien suit, the Spider Protector (Venom-much?), and include "spider sense", which acts more like a radar, and a variety of vintage powers such as "spring string" (rope-likeprojectile webbing) and "spider netting" (for capturing bad guys in).
For a Westerner it's weird, earnest, fun, mixing a character we know so well with the established tropes of Japanese super sentai sci-fi to create a truly unique and wonderful show.
And there's something deliciously camp about the way Spiderman likes to bust a move and strike a pose at every opportunity - even when it serves absolutely no purpose.
Each episode is less than 24 minutes long, including a trail for the next instalment, and tears along with the speed and careless abandon for logic that makes certain old children's shows so enjoyable.
Occasional bursts of dialogue border on the nonsensical, but this could simply be a mistranslation in the subtitles, and there's certainly never any doubt what's going on in the very simple storylines.
Beyond the costume, and the odd refrain from the classic Spider-Man theme music, there's very little of Peter Parker's DNA in this iteration of the character.
Even his supporting characters are wildly different. Although, in his secret identity, the protagonist is a bit of a waster and coward, he's also the "man of the house", looking after his younger sister, Shinko (Izumi Oyama), and little brother, Takuji (Yoshiharu Yabuki).
I'm guessing their late parents had good life insurance as no-one in this family appears to have a steady job, yet putting food on the table doesn't appear to be an issue.
These first four episodes establish a simplistic formula and stick to it, while still drip-feeding the audience with more and more information about Spiderman's backstory and powers.
But in the meantime, here's my summary of these episodes...
EPISODE ONE: The Time Of Revenge Has Come! Attack The Iron Cross Army! The origin story - it's soooo different to that of Peter Parker's Spider-Man.
Shinji Tôdô stars as Takuya, the motorcycle-racing son of space archaeologist Dr Hiroshi Yamashiro, who receives a psychic summons from a stranded alien Garia (sometimes called Galia).
Garia has been on Earth for 400 years, having chased Professor Monster (Mitsuo Andô) and his duck-billed Iron Cross Army here after their conquest of Planet Spider.
Professor Monster
Garia is seeking revenge for the devastation of his homeworld, but has been trapped underground by Professor Monster until Takuya came along.
Not sure what Professor Monster was doing for those four centuries if his plan, as stated, is to conquer the Earth? Perhaps he was waiting for humanity to just wipe itself out?
In a very Yoda-like move, Garia passes on the power of Spiderman to Takuya then appears to die, instantly reincarnating as a spider that spouts motivational commentary to Takuya.
Takuya's father is killed by Professor Monster's forces when Takuya's family are investigating a crashed UFO, which is actually Garia's ship, the Marveller (see what they did there?) and so now he has two reasons to seek revenge on Professor Monster.
EPISODE TWO: My Serious World! The Man Who Lives According To His Destiny: Professor Monster has started to derail trains, using a giant flying brain creature, for reasons...
Takuya wanders into a church and recounts his origin story to a statue of Christ (bit odd), giving us some more information about Garia and Professor Monster's feud and how they both ended up on Earth.
There's a suggestion that after Garia and Professor Monster fought in the samurai era, leaving Garia trapped underground, Professor Monster went into hibernation until recently.
Back in the 1970s, the arachnid Yoda, Garia, decides he's done enough, curls up into a spidery ball and dies - for real.
After this things start to slot into a formula: Spiderman fights some of the duck-billed Iron Cross Army ninjas, the creature-of-the-week appears, the creature grows to kaiju size, Spiderman hops into his flying car and summons Leopardon.
The giant robot and the kaiju fight, then Leopardon throws its sword at the monster - which explodes.
The end.
EPISODE THREE: Phantom Thief 001 vs The Spider: In a plot eerily reminiscent of the 2018 season of Daredevil, Professor Monster uses one of his creatures - a large insect that projects powerful light beams from its bug eyes - to bust Phantom Thief 001 from police custody, then brainwash him into thinking he's Spiderman.
The notorious thief then goes round tagging all his burglaries with Spiderman's name, and ruining our hero's reputation.
This is all a cunning plan to lure the real Spiderman out and, when he confronts the hypnotised Phantom Thief 001, he is ambushed by Iron Cross Army ninjas and the insect creature.
There's a nice touch where the real Spiderman saves the impostor, after the Iron Cross Army decide they have no further need for him, but then the story segues into its formulaic final act.
Ninja fight. Kaiju. Flying car. Giant robot. Power sword. Explosion. The end.
EPISODE FOUR: The Terrifying Merman! Silver String That Brings A Miracle: Takuya Yamashiro wakes from a prophetic nightmare that Professor Monster has written a computer program which has divined - after studying all the available film footage of his fights - the ultimate way to kill Spiderman.
Then, Takuya sees a death announcement for Spiderman in the newspaper, complete with funeral arrangements set for a couple of days' time.
The Spider Bracelet
This is, of course, part of another plan by Professor Monster to lure Spiderman into a trap.
The Professor has created a wicked Merman to attack innocents, and chasing this creature Spiderman falls into a cage... and has his first face-to-face meeting with Professor Monster!
After being severely wounded in his cage fight with the Merman, Spiderman escapes, but is later lured into another trap when the Merman and the Iron Cross Army kidnap freelance photographer Hitomi Sakuma (Rika Miura), Takuya's younger sister's best friend and the closest this Spiderman gets to having his own Mary Jane... but without any overt romance.
In this episode we learn a bit more about Spiderman's powers: with his suit he can see in the dark, but the alien injection that made him Spiderman has also granted him superhearing and a rapid healing ability.
I'm not sure if the prophetic dreams are a new power or simply a plot device for this episode as they're never explained.
It's also amusingly bizarre that Takuya wears a huge bracelet (with Spiderman written on it) - which contains the Spider Protector and has other gadgety uses - on his wrist, but no-one ever notices this!
After rescuing Hitomi, Spiderman heads into the final act and you should know the score by now:
Ninja fight. Kaiju. Flying car. Giant robot. Power sword. Explosion. The end.
The Marveller transforms into Leopardon, which has a spectacular array of anti-kaiju weaponry
Trapped inside a haunted house, a body builder must survive a blood soaked night of insanity to save himself and his friends from a demonic ghost that is hell-bent on revenge.
Bloody Muscle Body Builder In Hell aka The Japanese Evil Dead wears its love of Sam Raimi's original movies proudly on its sleeve and makes no bones about "homaging" styles, shots, and even classic lines from Evil Dead and Evil Dead II.
Writer/director/star Shinichi Fukazawa's 1995 subtitled horror barely lasts over an hour and while it starts slowly, the extended final act is simply a gonzo sequence of man-versus-indestructible demon that fans of Raimi's early work will really appreciate.
The basic plot wallows joyfully in its grainy, direct-to-video, amateur constraints following the titular bodybuilder opening up a creepy, rundown, old house in the city - which his father owned decades ago - to try and woo back his ex-girlfriend, a photojournalist looking for a "ghost story".
They've brought with them a psychic, who promptly gets possessed by the angry spirit of a murdered woman and can only be stopped by the complete dismemberment and destruction of their corpse.
The ghost uses the psychic's abilities to boost her own and trap the bodybuilder and journalist in the house, like a supernatural escape room where their only chance at freedom depends on the total eradication of the paranormal presence.
There are moments - particularly when animated body parts combine - that reminded me of that other old school, darkly funny, Grand Guignol splatter classic, Re-Animator.
Stop-motion special effects bring a touch of Jan Švankmajer to the proceedings, while also feeling very Japanese, and the body builder's climactic discovery of his 'inner power' was reminiscent of both the TV iteration of The Incredible Hulk and Grant Morrison and Richard Case's Flex Mentallo in Morrison's seminal run on the Doom Patrol comics.
A shockingly fun, cheap and cheerful, short film, what Bloody Muscle Body Builder In Hell lacks in originality it makes up for in its passion for the material, accepting its budgetary and technical limitations and embracing them with great aplomb.
"Howdy, folks! Welcome if you're new here or returning, ready to take a ride through the wild world of Western films? Today, we’re talking about the man with no name who redefined the genre: Clint Eastwood. From a mysterious gunslinger to a legendary director, Eastwood didn’t just star in Westerns - he reshaped them. So, grab your hat, saddle up, and let’s explore how Clint Eastwood became the ultimate Western icon."
I'm not, by any stretch of the imagination, a video game player, especially since my stroke left me without the requisite attention span or hand-eye co-ordination to be any good.
However, I'll admit to a fondness for fighting games and mashing some serious buttons in my university days playing Street Fighter (side note: I tried rewatching the 1994 Jean-Claude Van Damme movie the other week, and it has not aged well).
That said, as far as I recall, I never played Mortal Kombat, so have no real knowledge of the game's mythology or investment in the characters.
It seems there's a supernatural martial arts tournament every century (it's not really clear how often) and if the Bad Guys of the Outworld plane win 10 tournaments in a row the Elder Gods will allow them to invade Earth (or something).
Outworld is a grey Zack Snyder-filmed Burning Man Festival kind of place, full of people in black pleather BDSM costumes.
Anyway, these guys and gals have already won nine tournaments in a row (just how rubbish are the Earth's champions?) and Outworld's Emperor Shang Tsung (Chin Han) wants to ensure victory in the 'final' tournament by sending assassins to Earth and killing our contenders before the tournament even begins.
But... if he can do that already, why are they even bothering with the tournament?
Because reasons, I guess.
There's an awful lot of hand-waving when it comes to spelling out the backstory and deep motivations of all involved, ultimately meaning the plot of Mortal Kombat has holes in it you could fly an Imperial Star Destroyer through.
The Emperor of Outworld's assassins are led by Sub-Zero (amazing martial artist Joe Taslim of The Raid fame) who has incredible ice-based superpowers to complement his martial arts moves.
In the pre-credits flashback to Ancient Japan, he sends the great ninja Hanzo Hasashi (Hiroyuki Sanada) to Hell, establishing an enmity between the two men that spans time and space.
Back on modern-day Earth, unsuccessful cage fighter Cole Young (Lewis Tan) is drawn into these shenanigans because his bloodline marks him as a champion, and he ends up getting recruited by a pair of special forces operatives, Sonya Blade (Jessica McNamee) and Jax (Supergirl's Mehcad Brooks), to protect him from Sub-Zero.
There's a quest to find a hidden temple, which gets resolved quick sharpish, and soon they are joining the forces of Lord Raiden (Tadanobu Asano), Elder God and protector of 'Earthrealm', to stand against Shang Tsung's fighters. Mortal Kombat is dumb and occasionally nonsensical but has enough superpowered beatdown chutzpah to power through.
One of the film's problems, on top of its logic-lacking narrative, is that by being all post-modern and having the Bad Guys trying to circumvent the titular Mortal Kombat tournament, there ends up being no actual Mortal Kombat in the movie at all.
That said, the film is at its strongest when there's fighting going on. And, unsurprisingly, there's a lot of amped-up fighting going on in its 110-minute duration.
It also, as befits the reputation of the Mortal Kombat gaming franchise, features a lot of brutally violent 'finishing moves'.
So, there's that.
Sadly, Cole and Sonya, the two nominal leads, are quite bland, but luckily they are initially teamed with the foul-mouthed Australian mercenary Kano (Josh Lawson), who pretty much steals every scene he is in.
The lack of strong leads is countered by the sheer number of different fighters involved in the story.
This isn't one of those superhero movies where powered characters plough through hordes of faceless goons.
Mortal Kombat is about small groups of unique combatants beating the shit out of each other.
And if that sounds like your sort of thing, then you'll probably enjoy Mortal Kombat.
If, with a title like Jason Takes Manhattan - and an opening sequence of gritty, violent New York streets - you were expecting a Death Wish/Punisher-style satire of '80s NYC street crime, you're going to be sorely disappointed.
To be honest, whatever you were expecting from this strange entry in the franchise, you're going to be disappointed.
To mark the senior class graduation of pupils from Crystal Lake's Lakeview High School, a party cruise down the coast to New York has been organised.
Unfortunately, before it even gets going, a freak accident resurrects Jason's corpse back to un-life, from its lake bottom resting place after the explosive finale of The New Blood.
Anyway, the MV Lazarus (see what they did there?) sets sail with an almost full complement of horny teens, a couple of teachers, minimal crew, and one superhuman zombie stowaway.
In charge of the school trip is Charles McCulloch (Peter Mark Richman), the teacher you see if you look up the phrase "sanctimonious dick", who also happens to be the uncle of aquaphobic orphan and obvious 'final girl' candidate, Rennie Wickham (Jensen Daggett).
Rennie's plagued with nightmarish visions, like something from a J-horror, connected with her phobia and her inability to swim, having nearly drowned in Crystal Lake as a youngster.
Eventually, this is ham-fistedly tied in to Jason's early years - but I wouldn't even start trying to figure out the timeline of the Friday The 13th franchise; that way lies madness!
First order of business on the Lazarus, once it's out in the Atlantic, is for Jason to off the captain and pilot.
Luckily for the Lakeview students one of them is the captain's son, Sean Robertson (Scott Reeves), Rennie's boyfriend, who has absorbed a modicum of ship piloting by osmosis.
There promptly follows an all-too-short (because it's exciting, even though it has nothing to do with "taking Manhattan") game of cat-and-mouse as Jason stalks victims around the decks, corridors, and cabins of the ship (my pitch for a future Friday The 13th film in this vein: Jas-On A Plane).
Then, rather bizarrely, the bulk of the class is wiped out off-screen, mentioned in a casual aside with zero emotional resonance for either the survivors or the audience.
Unfortunately, it very quickly becomes clear that Jason Takes Manhattan suffers from similar narrative flaws to A New Beginning, even though it really is Jason doing the killing here.
The killer no longer appears to be following his own unspoken "rules": the victims may, originally, be from Crystal Lake, but they're not on the lake shore anymore (the turf he 'protects') nor do they have any connection to the summer camp where his journey began.
And, yes, they do finally get to New York, about an hour in to this 100-minute movie, but having arrived on dry land, the small group of survivors are promptly mugged.
Then Rennie is kidnapped, drugged, and almost raped... until an unexpected saviour comes along.
After running around the docks for more than 20 minutes, Rennie and Sean make it to the subway, with Jason in pursuit.
Interestingly, and back on brand, Jason concentrates on the Crystal Lake duo, and only kills New Yorkers who get in his way.
The zombie then promptly gets zapped by the third rail, giving his prey time to actually make it onto the streets of the city... before they dive down into the sewers to escape him.
The climax of the film becomes a race against time, as our heroes have to find a way back out of the sewers before a midnight toxic sludge purge (was this a real thing?)
Without wanting to spoil anything (in a 30-year-old movie), the toxic waters somehow melt all Jason's twisted, zombie, persona off of him and transform him back into a (dead) young child.
Simply put, Tokyo Gore Police is quite possibly one of the craziest, most mixed-up movies I've ever enjoyed.
Merrily playing hopscotch along the line between genius and insanity, decorated with more severed limbs than you'd ever want to see and almost certainly the largest volume of free-flowing blood, there is no escaping the "gore" in the film's title.
Set in the near future, with a recently privatised police force controlling the city and freaky cybernetic mutants, known as "engineers", running rampant, Tokyo Gore Police tells the story of Ruka (Eihi Shiina) - the Force's top "engineer hunter".
The katana-wielding cutie is haunted by dreams of the death of her father (also a police officer) and is plagued by a penchant for self-harming.
The movie mixes the body horror of David Cronenberg with the dystopian future and dark humour of Robocop, but just as you think it can't get any more over-the-top it pushes the envelope that bit further like a live-action anime where literally anything is possible.
The engineers have a power which may be scientific or supernatural (but most likely somewhere in between) to transform any wound into a weapon, leading to such mind-hammering creations as phallus cannons and breasts that spray acid.
In pursuit of a particularly methodical serial killer, Ruka, begins to find herself turning into an engineer as she is simultaneously drawn into mystery of her father's murder and the police impose a major crack-down on engineers (and anyone who shows the slightest resistance to their investigations).
There are definitely shades of Buffy The Vampire Slayer in there as well, with an attractive protagonist raised to fight monsters that she discovers she has a dark connection with but as blood-splattered satires go, Tokyo Gore Police is in a class of its own.
Enduring images will be seared into brain - from the police chief's quadriplegic gimp pet to the physically re-sculpted prostitutes in the night club (the human chair is truly disgusting) - but Tokyo Gore Police isn't just about the shocks, at its heart is a solid (if a bit hackneyed) mystery-revenge story that allows the horrific action to evolve around it.
Add in some random TV adverts for self-harming knives, supersharp swords and the Tokyo Police Corporation, and you've got almost two hours of crazy that is quite happy to swing from extreme violence to the poignancy of Ruka surveying the aftermath of a slaughter by her fellow officers.
Be warned though, where Western films might cut away and fade to black, Tokyo Gore Police lingers that bit longer and, yes, the special effects are often quite primitive puppetry but that doesn't make them any the less suggestive. You don't need a multi-million pound CGI budget to get under an audience's skin.
Certainly not for the feint of heart or easily disturbed, Tokyo Gore Police makes Hollywood nonsense shock-horror franchises look like the silly little homemovies they are by not sacrificing plot and character on the altar of excess, using the gore instead to paint a picture that actually tells a story.
Set in 1719 on America's Northern Great Plains, Prey follows eager young Comanche warrior Naru (Legion's Amber Midthunder), who struggles for acceptance by the male warriors in her tribe, despite her formidable tracking and herbal medicine skills.
Even her brother Taabe (Dakota Beavers) can't fully acknowledge her prowess.
However, when she spots a fiery "thunderbird" in the skies, she takes it as a sign that it's time for her "kuhtaamia", a coming-of-age ritual where you hunt something that can also hunt you.
When an enigmatic creature, presumed to be a lion or a bear, threatens her community, Naru goes off on her own to prove herself.
Only, it turns out that the big beastie in the woods is actually an alien Yautja (Dane DiLiegro) aka a Predator, who has come to Earth for some sport.
Escaping the alien killing machine, Naru and Taabe fall into the hands of a veritable army of brutish French fur trappers.
Even tooled-up with (admittedly primitive) rifles and pistols, the French prove to be little more than target practice for the heavy-armed, high-tech alien as it cuts a bloody swathe through their numbers on its hunt for more challenging prey.
Rhythmically paced, with no time for padding or slack, Prey is a lean, stripped back to basics, entry into the Predator franchise.
Taking place several hundred years before Arnie faced a Predator in Central America, this prequel engages a willing audience from its opening sequences - introducing us to the Comanche way of life - through to its kinetic, blood-soaked final act.
On one hand, it's a slow burn as the diametrically opposed hunters - human and alien - work towards their eventual confrontation, but on the other the film is beautifully and dramatically composed, making great use of the Canadian wilderness in which it was shot.
Assisted by her (thankfully) indestructible canine companion, Amber Midthunder is a charismatic action lead, although her Naru segues a bit too comfortably from hunting animals and fighting the Predator to out-and-out murdering Frenchmen.
Writer-director Dan Trachtenberg's script, co-written with Patrick Aison, does a great job of foreshadowing important elements that will eventually contribute to Naru's inevitable victory over the seemingly indestructible Yautja.
In the latter half of the 99-minute movie, however, it does tend to lean too heavily on emulating the original 1987 Predator and having Taabe actually say "if it bleeds, we can kill it" is a real cringe moment in an otherwise solid script.
What I'd like to see now is more of these "historical Predators": how about one set a hundred or so years later in the Wild West, or feudal Japan (Yautja vs samurai and ninja), or Medieval Europe (as depicted in the Kickstarter-funded Predator: Dark Ages, back in 2015), or during The Battle of The Somme (or some other grim First World War setting), or Victorian London, or the Stone Age?
The possibilities are endless. Although, if humanity wins every time you have to wonder why the Predators keep coming back!
My pop culture Odyssey: a slice of super-powered geek life with heavy emphasis on pulp adventure, superheroes, comic books, westerns, horror, sci-fi, giant monsters, zombies etc
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