"MASTERS OF THE AIR" DELIVERS A LOAD OF HYPE...

🎥🎞️Series Review🎞️🎥 - MASTERS OF THE AIR [2024] - PG13 - AppleTV - Produced by Steven Spielberg, Tom Hanks, Gary Goetzman. Created by John Shiban, John Orloff. Based on Masters of the Air by Donald L. Miller. Starring Austin Butler, Callum Turner, Barry Keoghan, Nate Mann, Anthony Boyle, Bel Powley, Francis Lovehall, and Ncuti Gatwa. 9 episodes. Budget $250 Million.

Based on the historical legacy of the 100th Bomb Group during WWII, just a few months prior to D-Day, this series follows several air crews who partook in some dangerous, and many times deadly, missions to bomb sites against the Germans. At the beginning of the heavy bombing campaigns, thousands of young pilots and their crews were given missions that offered very little safety, air cover, and a plethora of personnel who were ill trained to prepare themselves for capture and eventual imprisonment by hostile forces that didn't have any honor in treating prisoners. By the end of the war, many pilots who were considered killed are found to be alive and instant heroes of the war.

THE GOOD - Incredible details in production bringing back the 1940's with stunning wardrobe, air planes, and locations. The air battle sequences were intense, again showing just how bad some of those brave young men had to deal with being attacked by enemy forces. The CGI was pristine and the movie production did an outstanding job in presenting flight operations that looked very real, capturing the essence of being in tight spaces, and the aftermath of returning home in a damaged plane, only to seeing the plane and the crews, patch up the aluminum aircraft and head out again on another dangerous bombing run. There were some epic bomber fly-by scenes that screamed for attention by the viewer of the magnificence of those huge military planes.

THE BAD - There is a LOT of bad acting and mumbling by the actors in this film. Butler does an okay job in his role of Major Gale "Buck" Cleven, but his overall delivery in the series is anything but that of a glorified extra. Most of the film is narrated by Boyle's character Major Crosby, but it isn't made quite clear until the latter episodes. The air battles were short and could have been extended. There's bad character development and the names of all of the other characters, and believe me there were many, aren't even memorable. The series seems to just touch the surface of a good story arc and then toss you in another direction without any explanation. With the exception of the narrator some events, there is no continuity of time and some of the main characters in the beginning of the series just disappear until mid way through the series; there's no flashback story, which would have been a big part of explaining what happened in the series.

POST MORTEM - Masters of the Air is an okay series, but honestly there's nothing to brag about and I feel that more effort was put into the production of "Band of Brothers." I understand that this series was based on a book, but the underlying truth is that a lot happened in-between episodes that surely should have been presented, at least in flash backs, to give a better understanding of what happened to many of the air crews after they were shot down. I think that more time could have been expended on clearing up all of the mumbling dialog and clearing up the sound from other scenes. I wouldn't spend too much time trying to watch all of the episodes in just one day, you might be disappointed in what you experience.

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫[3.5 of 5 Stars]

TAKING A LOOK BACK AT J. J. ABRAMS' "SUPER 8"

🎥🎞️Movie Review🎞️🎥 - SUPER 8 [2011] - Amazon Prime - Directed and written by J. J. Abrams. Stars Joel Courtney, Elle Fanning, Kyle Chandler, and Ron Eldard. Produced by J. J. Abrams, Steven Spielberg, and Bryan Burk.

Strange things are afoot in a small town in Ohio during the summer of 1979.  First, there was a train derailment that was witnessed by a bunch of teens shooting an indie movie; then there were some power outages, large machinery was stolen, and all of the dogs in the local county went missing. Making things seem worse, the derailed train was owned by the U.S. Air Force and suddenly a large fire threatens the lives of everyone in the small town, forcing an immediate evacuation. What could be the cause? Are aliens involved?...watch the movie and fall into the dark spell of intrigue that only Abrams can bring to life with his trademark lens flairs and quick action film formats, that seem to dazzle the new breed of action seeking viewers around the world.

But honestly, SUPER 8 had a lot of potential when it was first released. The train derailment alone was a masterful piece of action and surprise, completely not expected when I first saw the movie in the theaters. The entire theater was aghast with the energy from the crash, that I witnessed everyone look about the theater wondering how such an event was produced on camera. After that, the innocence of the film lost its luster and the magic of film making just tanked into a world of never ending stupidity, which Abrams' has learned to sell to the big wigs in Hollywood, but not the fans that watch his movies. Using an old 80's format, something that he admitted to in interviews, as a large aliens full appearance was kept out of camera until the third act of the film, something that Steven Spielberg did in JAWS [1975] while he was waiting for the practical effects machine to be put together and work properly. Once the new CGI monster was revealed, and it was huge and ugly, the total embodiment of a large beast turned out to have the heart of a smaller ET monster.

THE GOOD - The story arc with the teens was the best part of the film. The character development between the six teens was well scripted and developed for the film; I actually began to give a shit about what was going on around them and the way their parents treated them. The visual effects and sound were pristine and some of the camera angles were filled with epic little wide screen shots.

THE BAD - Oh my God is the film filled with some really bad technical crap and lens flair galore! Abrams, known to prove that he has little knowledge about how the military actually works, goes off the rails in this movie. Nothing is ever explained, and this claim that "the little box with a secret" is a hallmark to his writing ethic, just falls apart at every little attempt to show the "dark side" of the military and how officers and soldier act and carry out their duties without any regard for civilians. There's a chaotic scene in the fourth act of the film where tanks are firing, missiles are flying, and machine guns are shooting off all on their own, with the help of the aliens control over machinery...??? The alien never seemed to have presented this ability before, such as shutting off cars, buses, or anything else; just that this was happening in the fourth act in a "wouldn't this be cool" segment of the film. It was totally silly and the film suffers a lackluster ending because of it. Abrams continual use of his "nothing education" about how things actually work, is so evident in this film. How he was chosen to lead the new Star Trek movies is beyond comprehension, especially in a SciFi universe that demands to present how things work. No wonder why he felt more at home directing and writing the last of the George Lucas Star Wars trilogy, where nothing needs to be explained.

POST MORTEM - The 80% of SUPER 8 that totally got wrecked by Abrams continual bad writing bullshit was actually saved by a short zombie movie that was being produced by the teens in the film. I remember sticking around through the end credits when the film suddenly presented the teens finished film in it's entirety. That small film was a total gem and something that should have been a larger staple in the film. For all of the work the veteran actors put in the film, it suffered horribly and could have been a major part in bringing a more heart worthy appearance in the film early on, proving that maturity is the best medicine for any horrifying event to bring a town together, than just tear it apart. Showing that at the beginning or middle of the film would have been "mint!"

⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 [3.5 out of 5 Stars]