More so than your average movie summer, this was a fairly mixed bag of a popcorn-munching season. There were tons of stinkers—as always—but there were a good amount of really good ones too.
More so than your average movie summer, this was a mixed bag of a popcorn-munching season. There were tons of stinkers—as always—but there was a good amount of really enjoyable ones too. The biggest thing about this summer movie season, though, was just how average so many movies were.
Of the 38 movies that I have seen from this blockbuster-heavy season—thank Jeebus for free screenings—only about four or so really made an impression on this end. If I had to choose, Life Itself was probably my favorite, but that comes from a slight bias as it was based on my writing idol, Roger Ebert. X-Men: Days of Future Past was about as awesome as superhero movies can get these days, while Dawn of the Planet of the Apes lived well into my high expectations. Also, The Rover was definitely the best underseen movie of the season, by and far.
But, while there were certainly some fun movies along the way — Guardians of the Galaxy was fun, if forgettable, and fell victim of wearing its influences on its sleeve; flicks like Snowpiercer and The Fault in Our Stars were compelling; and, despite its middling audience response, I actually had a pretty darn good time with this new, well-directed Godzilla movie — most of the summer’s movies, seemed to come and go like their release dates.
Especially in the comedy department, this movie season had struck a fairly soft keynote. Comedies this summer seemed to be pretty good, but not great, such as Neighbors, 22 Jump Street and What If. Or just bad, like Tammy, Sex Tape, And So It Goes, Let’s Be Cops and the terrible Think Like a Man Too. While last year was disappointing too, at least there were some genuine good-to-great comedies such as This is the End and The World’s End to spice things up against schlock like We’re the Millers and The Heat. This summer, nothing comedy-wise spoke wonders. Including Chef, which many loved, but I found just alright.
The rest of the summer movies went any which way, but landed mostly near the middle. How to Train Your Dragon 2 was quite average, and Edge of Tomorrow was setting itself up to be a genuinely good movie, but craps the bed at the end so as to make just another pretty good movie.
But what really spoke volumes this summer were the disappointments. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was the first Spider-Man movie I didn’t like (which should say something), and Magic in the Moonlight was the rare Woody Allen movie that left me shrugging my shoulders. Wish I Was Here and Sin City 2, meanwhile, were disappointing primarily because nearly a decade of build up on each only led to more or less mediocre films. Also, the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie was pretty bad. But you probably knew that by now.
Some summer movies I missed, like Maleficent. While others, like Transformers: Age of Extinction, I avoided like the plague. But I saw enough to where I gained a good-enough gist of the season as a whole, both from the blockbuster and indie sides. Would I call this a bad summer for movies? By no means — but to call it a good summer doesn’t quite ring the right tone either.
Will Ashton is a senior studying journalism and a writer for The Post. What were your favorite movies this summer? Email him at wa054010@ohiou.edu.
