MLK BLVD. 

I write for a diversity-focused film review blog, so I’ll be honest: I really wanted to like Pretty Lethal. Starring Maddie Ziegler, Lana Condor, Iris Apatow, Avantika, and Millicent Simmonds, Amazon Prime’s new thriller seemed like it would be a girl power movie about dancers with a horror action twist. Sort of a Suspiria for teens. But with shallow and unlikeable characters, a confusing plot, an overreliance on violence, and cringey dialogue, any fun the movie started out with was quickly lost. What was left was a faint echo of greater horror movies about dancers made before. 

Trolls: World Tour doesn’t just pay lip service to diversity and inclusiveness. There is no white-washing of the voice actors. From the actual K-Pop group Red Velvet voicing the K-Pop Troll bounty hunters to Keenan Thompson playing the Tiny Diamond baby to Kunal Nayyar’s Guy Diamond, the cast includes more than just token minorities.

In an all-black community in Louisiana, a young girl learns her father has committed infidelity and turns to hoodoo to seek justice.

How powerful can a story be when it is stripped to the bare essentials of just a room, a handful of people and raw human voice?

Apparently, nothing's ever enough. It has its flaws, but does that warrant the amount of criticism 'Barbie' is subject to?

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.