After witnessing the atrocity of Return of the Living Dead Part 2, I was hoping that the third installment of this series could at least redeem itself from that low. In this installment of the brain craving zombies, Curt and Julie are a couple in love. When Curt learns that his father must be transferred to Oklahoma City, he decides to run away with his girlfriend so that he won't have to deal with the move and not have to start over again. However, while driving down the road, the couple get into a nasty car wreck, killing Julie in the process. Knowing of a chemical from his dad's lab called trioxin that can raise the dead, he decides to expose the substance to his girlfriend's corpse. Little does he know that whoever gets exposed to trioxin gains a deadly side-effect. Return of the Living Dead 3 is an easily forgettable film. The zombies in the movie are almost nothing like the ones established in the previous two films. The only thing that this film had in common with the others was the trioxin and the fact that the zombies can't be killed, even if they're shot in the head. Everything else seemed like it could be any zombie movie. The famous ROTLD phrase "BRRAAAIIINNNNS" is only mentioned once in the entire film. Every other sound uttered by the zombies is either and "Ugh" or a grunt. I really wish that this film followed a little bit more continuity like the second one. The good thing about this film, however, is that it's leaps and bounds better than Part 2. The acting has improved and the visuals are pretty good (particularly the scene when Julie modifies herself). Unfortunately, this doesn't make up for a weak story and loose continuity with the other films. If you want to wash the bad taste of part 2 out of your mouth, you can watch this, but I'd prefer that you see the original instead.

This wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. After seeing the first trailer for this comedy, I decided to wait until DVD to see this because it's from the same director who did Horrible Bosses and has some funny people cast in the lead roles. Fortunately, I was able to catch it tonight for only $3 at my local small movie theater. I'll just go ahead and say that this is not as good as Horrible Bosses, however I did have a good time with it. The story follows Sandy Patterson, a man who has just left his old job to work with some of his rebellious friends. However, after trying to refill his car's tank at the gas station, he realizes that someone has copied his information and spending all of his money. Enter Diana, the woman who has stolen Sandy's identity to buy as many things as she can. With his life falling apart, Sandy offers to drive down to Florida and bring Diana in so that his name can be cleared and his identity saved. Little does he know that Diana has been doing things in her life before he met her that could risk both of their lives. I actually had a good time watching this film. Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy work really well together and have great hateful chemistry. Some of the biggest laughs come from Diana, whose character is so ridiculous that it's hard not to laugh toward at least one thing that she does. Unfortunately, where this film fails at is the story. There are so many sub plots introduced in the film (such as a debt collector) that don't feel quite concluded by the end of the film. It was confusing to understand why the director decided to let their stories go. I understand that the story is supposed to focus on Sandy and Diana but if they're not going to do much with the sub-plots, then they shouldn't have added them at all. Overall, Identity Thief does have some laughs and is well worth a rental to watch with friends. I wish that the script had been a bit closer edited, but the film is still a good time to be had.

In the third and, most likely, final entry into the Iron Man franchise, Tony Stark has been broken after the events of The Avengers. He's barely sleeping and his relationship with Pepper is slowly slipping. When a new terrorist known as the Mandarin starts attacking people, Tony decides to look into him. Little does he know that there's a lot more going on than just the Mandarin, something involving the Extremis virus. I thoroughly enjoyed Iron Man 3. This film is a vast improvement over Iron Man 2 and, dare I say it, even more fun than the original. The characters have depth and the story is very entertaining. RDJ once again brings his A game into this film delivering one of his best Stark performances since The Avengers. I loved the tone that was created in this film as well. The audience can tell that this is a much darker version of Iron Man as they witness Tony struggling with his inner demons and trying to figure out his place. The best moments of the story in my opinion involved the Extremis virus. It was an intriguing plot that had my full attention throughout the whole film and made me wish for more once the film ended. I will admit that there were problems, but they were very minimal. Unfortunately, I can't go into these problems since they would be potential spoilers. I can say however that one of the problems DOES NOT include the Mandarin twist. I didn't mind it at all. I understand why comic book fans were upset, but I found it to be an interesting idea. Overall, Iron Man 3 turned out to be a great way to begin the summer movie season. There are some problems, but I was able to overlook them and witness a fantastic film.

What the hell happened between this film and the original Return of the Living Dead? The first film was great! A cult classic with some fun comedy and the birth of the stereotype that zombies love brains. Now, even though this film follows the same rules for ROTLD zombies, we get a poorly executed sequel that was extremely unfunny. In this follow up to Return of the Living Dead, a few boys find another tank with the chemical (now identified as Trioxin). Long story short, two of the three boys open the tank and raise the dead who are instantly after people's brains. I can't believe how bad this film was. Usually, when the first sequel of a series comes out, it can go one of two ways. Either it can (rarely) be better than the original (i.e. Evil Dead 2) or not as good as the original but still entertaining (i.e. Iron Man 2). This film, however, blows past both of these rules and turns out to be just plain awful. The acting is off-the-wall awful. I couldn't take anyone seriously because they were all being too cartoonish, even for a horror comedy! I couldn't stand the kid in this film. He was just annoying throughout the whole thing. He made me want to pull my hair out because he was so awful! Even the zombies were bad. The make-up was much worse than what we got in the original. They just looked too plastic for my taste. Some of them even sounded like hicks (Get that screwdriver out of my head!). The only redeeming quality of this film lasts only 8 seconds. Some random zombie pops out of nowhere when the others were being electrocuted and he was dressed like Michael Jackson from the Thriller music video. He was so absurd that I actually found myself laughing. Stay AWAY from Return of the Living Dead Part II. This is just a time waster that's boring and not even funny.

The year was 2006. I was 12 years old at the time and I was a HUGE fan of Superman. I would always watch the TV Show and the Justice League series, as well as catch a glimpse at the comics if I could. When I heard that this film was coming to the theaters, I was beyond excited and kept nagging my dad to take me to it. When I finally got to see it in the theaters, I left the theaters extremely pleased with what I just saw. However, even though I loved the movie when I saw it, I never saw it again. Now, with Man of Steel coming out this summer, I had the pleasure of revisiting all the theatrical Superman films (I will get to the other 4, but this is one that I really want to talk about now), making this the first time in 7 years that I have seen Superman Returns. Taking place after the events of Superman II (and thankfully abandoning continuity from III and IV: Quest for Peace), Superman has been missing for quite some time after learning that astronomers had discovered where his home planet once was. When he returns to Earth, he finds out that life on Earth has adjusted to not having him around. Once he dons the red cape and tights again, most people greet him with enthusiasm. The only person who doesn't seem so happy is his former love interest, Lois Lane, who was heart-broken after he left. While Superman tries to adjust back to his routine life on Earth, Lex Luthor is once again up to his evil tricks. This time, he plans to rule the world by using some crystals from the Fortress of Solitude (which he discovered in the second film) for his own nefarious deeds. Superman Returns is not as great as I remembered it being. I'm still a fan of the man of steel, but I have become more educated on the subject of film; knowing when acting is good or bad, or when a film isn't written very well. Brandon Routh is definitely not as good as Christopher Reeve was back in the 70s and 80s. He does an okay job in the role, but I always felt like there was something missing. The replacement for Lois Lane was really hit or miss because there were times when I felt that her acting was a bit off, but sometimes she nailed what she was doing. The only replacement that I actually thought was a great recast was Kevin Spacey as Luthor, who did a magnificent job playing the role. I actually preferred him over Gene Hackman because of how devilish Spacey was while also having that same amount of wit that Hackman created. The story for this film wasn't too bad. There are plot holes in this film, but they can be kind of hard to pick out at times. Where this film succeeds at most is action and the use of the classic John Williams score. The action scenes were always fun to watch and the score was just brilliant. Superman Returns is an okay end to the series started by Richard Lester, but it could have been better. There's some good actors and some pretty decent action. There's no way that this film will go down in history like Superman: The Movie, but it's still worth 2 hours and 30 minutes of your life to sit through it.