Re: What Did You Watch? 2025-05-28 (Wednesday)

On 5/30/2025 12:15 PM, Ian J. Ball wrote:

On 5/29/25 3:05 PM, shawn wrote:
 

On Thu, 29 May 2025 13:50:35 -0700, "Ian J. Ball" <ijball@mac.invalid>
wrote:

On 5/29/25 7:52 AM, Dimensional Traveler wrote:
>

What Did You Watch?

>
After an unexpectedly long workday, I finally got to "John Wick 4":
>
John Wick 4 (Peacock) - The most ridiculous "John Wick" yet!! I don't
know if that's a good thing or a bad thing!!

>
It's a great thing.
>

    I don't think this was in glorious 4k on Peacock (I'll have to
double-check when I get home).

 Correcting myself - apparently, it was 4k, on the 4k TV. It doesn't show up as 4k on Peacock on the iPad or the iPhone, but it does on the TV.
 

    Sidenote: The same visual artifacts I was occasionally seeing with
"Andor" were also popping up during this movie, especially during the
desert scene early in the movie. As "Andor" is Disney+ app, and this was
Peacock, it had to mean that the issue was the 4k TV. Sure enough, the
problem went away when I switched from "Cinema Home" visual mode (and I
was seeing the same artifacts in "Standard" mode as well) to "Filmmaker"
visual mode. I have no idea how they've screwed up "Cinema Home" visual
mode so badly - I've got to think that this problem has been introduced
with a recent update from LG, as the 4k TV was definitely not doing this
before.
    Anyway, this was a fun, but ridiculous! ride.
    SPOILERS
    Will
    Surely
    Follow
    I was disappointed that some previous characters, like the
"Adjudicator" from the previous film, didn't show up in this one.

>
I'm not sure what purpose she would have served in this movie.

 She was just a good villain - I would have liked to have seen her again.
 

The thing I don't get is at the moment she decides to order everyone killed, what stops them from just putting a bullet in her for good measure.  She was ridiculously cocky and sure no one would lay a finger on her, and she was right.

    I also was annoyed that so many hatchets were buried from "John Wick
3" - both Wick and the Bowery King should have wanted Winston dead, but
it's almost like the events of "3" didn't even happen on this front. (I
guess they felt like they couldn't throw Ian McShane overboard!)

That never made sense to me either.  It felt like at the end of 3 they were hedging their bets and being a little vague as to where McShane's loyalty really lied, then in this one it's never mentioned.

    And, on this same front - Did they just get insanely lucky in
killing off Charon in this flick, just before Lance Reddick died IRL? Or
did they change the film somehow after Reddick died?!

I think it was just a coincidence.

    I was quite surprised when Shamier Anderson (of "Wynonna Earp", and
before that season #1 of "The Next Step"!!) popped up in this in a
pretty darn prominent role.
    Meanwhile, they have Donnie Yen playing the Asian Daredevil (how do
they get away with this!?!) as John Wick's main "rival" (though, unlike
in "3", this time the rival is actually an old buddy, and not a deranged
fanboy!!). Also popping up in this one was Hiroyuki Sanada (he's
everywhere these days), Japanese(?) pop star Rina Sawayama, and Clancy
Brown! (as "The Harbinger"!).
    Whatever else you want to say, the "John Wick" films *look* great on
screen, esp. "2" thru "4". This one has lots of great shots of backlit
thugs standing around palaces and opera houses and churches and the
like, for your visual eye candy!

>
They know how to deliver on the eye candy. Something you would think
more movies could do.
>

    Hey - are those napalm(?) shotgun shots(?) a real thing, or not?!

>
Yes, they are a very real thing. Dragon's Breath shotgun shells.
>
real life
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNx1GgzYlSI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rd_V3dsNyA0
>
Wick verse
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkxVhFg81fs
>
Some amazing plotting for the movement and shots in that sequence.

 

Someone should have won an academy award or two for that sequence!

OK, if they're magnesium, then they wouldn't work as portrayed in the movie (IMO). In the movie, they really seemed more like "napalm shotgun shells".
 

That was another killer filmed sequence in this film - looking down on
John Wick as he wields the napalm(?) shotgun(?!) and exterminates loads
of thugs!
    In the ridiculous department, apparently John Wick (& co.!) have
"inter-dimensional travel" among their various superpowers, what with
the way John Wick (& co.!) hopped all around the globe in mere
miliseconds in this flick!
    I also am having a harder and harder time buying the "criminal
underworld world-building" they're doing in these films - this High
Table stuff and all it's accompanying pomp and circumstance is insane!!
The last several films (I think all the way back to "2") have definitely
suffered from the lack of an appearance of even a single cop or Fed in
the proceedings.

>
Cops are smart enough to not get involved in anything that appears to
involve the High Table.

 It just blows any remaining believability out of the water with these films!
 

    I also didn't care for the obvious use of CGI (and/or greenscreen?)
in this film - especially the sequence in Paris with all of the cars was
most obviously CGI in large part.
    I guess this film wraps up the "High Table" storyarc. (Indeed, the
end of this one implies John Wick is dead!) But apparently a "John Wick
5" is in the works - but it sounds like this film is going to be more
like a "Fugitive"/"Equalizer" type thing, without all the insane High
Table malarkey.

>
Don't forget the other movie that is forthcoming in the Wick verse.

 Yeah - but when will "Ballerina" get past Starz?! Probably 2 years after its release!
 

I already have my tickets for next week.  I'll let you know how it is worth seeing now or if you should wait 2 years or see it streaming.