Atlas, Industria and Ninja Kamui (Season 1)

Where future tech makes plot holes!

Atlas

In a world where AI had advanced so much they look a lot like people, then warred against their human creators and fled the planet, a random lead falls into the hands of the world government who call in a specialist scientist who hates robots (played by Jennifer Lopez) to team up with a force of humans riding robots to go fight the bad robots on bad robot planet. The opening narration kinda sounds as tacky as my sentence there, but this turned out to be an enjoyable but predictable film.

While the CGI is ok and the main plot points are decent, I feel the creators added things that they thought would be "cool" which puts many devils in the details. How exactly does an oxygen -mask- necklace provide air? THROUGH SCIENCE! How does this character achieve with almost zero training what the legion of trained extras failed to do? SCIENCE!? Control two extra arms made from 10 minutes of scrap metal bending? SCIENCE!!!! Seriously though, you need to like or at least not hate Jennifer Lopez if you watch this as she carries 3/4ths of the movie. I don't mind her acting so it's fine with me, but if for any reason you don't like her then definitely give this a skip.

Industria

This is a decent, albeit short first person shooter about messing with technology and getting transported to another world full or hostile machine men and machine dogs. Easy controls and simple enemies won't really challenge an experienced gamer but it is still good nonetheless thanks to the voice acting, the atmospheric maps, and the plot - which has some very strange bits that make no sense at all and leaving many questions unanswered - possibly to hook you in for the sequel. Thumbs up for this one.

Ninja Kamui (Season 1)

It is the future and the way of the ninja has gone global but due to a rift based on their code the loyalists brutally hunt down their rebel bretheren which leads to a John Wick scenario if John Wick was a futuristic ninja. Yes, the protagonist is pretty flat here as is the plot but the smooth and violent action scenes coupled with a decent sound track almost make up for it. I say almost because apparently since this is the future, ninjas eventually get mecha type armor suits then it becomes a bunch of robots fighting each other with martial arts. While that's ok-ish it really breaks the excellent combat streak that this show started with making season one finish with a "meh". If there's going to be a season two then this will really need to up its game.

Double Statham: Parker and Wild Card

Parker

How the movie does not end at the "van scene", I do not know.

Jason Statham is a professional heister, but after being teamed up with a crew that doesn't uphold their end of the bargain he hunts them down to teach them a lesson. Like, don't screw up killing a guy because he might be upset at that if he actually survives. Yep, that happens in this movie. Fortunately there are pretty nice and brutal action sequences in this flick but there's one glaring problem with it: JLo. Yep. While I don't mind her acting ability or screen presence it's just the way her character is written that makes it smell like they went "Hey, let's put in Jlo!". Why?

Because she's nice eye candy?

This also results in Statham putting on a ridiculous Texas accent for a part of the film (undercover purposes you know) and it is ... really bad? I'm being polite here. It's a pity since the first act (that has no Jlo) is pretty engaging, then it sort of drops to a lower gear when she appears. All up I give it two firing pins out of five, can only recommend it to Statham / JLo fans, and wouldn't want to watch it again.

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Wild Card

Jason Statham is a "security specialist" in Las Vegas who has an aversion to firearms. Again, thanks to his skills there are some nice action sequences to be had here even if some fight segments are sped up, it still works. Also there are lots of decent actors that have more or less cameo roles in the flick and the use of country music works well given the setting.

But he looks so harmless...

While this does have a bit of action the movie is actually a character piece to which the action plays second fiddle, and it actually makes for a good change. Statham's character has a pretty basic goal all up, and it soon becomes clear that he's actually his own worst enemy. Probably helps that this is based off a book. I also have to commend the editing work here as they manage to really make the most of the run time and by that I mean off the top of my head I can't say they should have cut "x" which I normally do. It's a pretty clean and entertaining piece of work, and one I give two and a half cards out of five to.

Would I watch this one again? Yes!