Fist First (2023)

By depicting 4 different stories, Director Sergio Tovar Velarde keeps the focus on the shared humanity and search for love (both self and romantic) of various gay Mexican men.

If the message here is that without a support system, grieving people turn into monsters, it’s not really well-delivered and may be flawed as a message itself.

Overall, Cruella stands above the other Disney retellings. Its dark and bold, and that is exactly what these retellings should be. Emma Stone continues to prove she's one of the finest young actresses working today, and Emma Thompson gives one of the best villain performances in the last decade. The fashion is stunning, the dogs are adorable, and the story is wildly vibrant and original. It's classic movie fun, and it shouldn't be overlooked.

It only seems to prove that when the company had their backs against the wall and needed an all pleasing, generic movie that had to make up for The Last Jedi, they chose to sacrifice almost everything that made their main protagonist interesting and that made her stand out as the strong female character that a generation of young movie goers was supposed to look up to. Instead, we were left with a Rey that was so much less than she could have been. And I guess that’s the real story of Rey and The Rise of Skywalker; they could have been so much more, but they were just more of the same.

Emily Henry’s adaptation reaches romance movie standards, but not romance reader standards.

While the film didn’t hit me as emotionally as I wanted it to, I still enjoyed it. I simply wish there was a little more, particularly with the world building.