Smurfs: The Lost Village Gets, Well, Lost Trying To Tackle An Interesting Idea

The old axiom "third time's the charm" has been run into the ground as an axiom used in movie reviews to signify that the third entry in a certain movie franchise is the best movie in said movie franchise, but for Smurfs: The Lost Village it's kind of true, though it's more like "Fourth time's the charm" since the Smurfs did have that one animated movie back in the 80's, The Smurfs and The Magic Flute (which I have not seen). Having seen the 2011 Smurfs movie but not its 2013 sequel, I can say that Smurfs: The Lost Village is an improvement over that Raja Gosnell directed motion picture, though it's still got some seriously Smurfed up qualities to it as well.

Kung Fu Panda Continues To Defy Expectations With Its Christmas Special

Here's another exciting entry in this Holiday themed column, 25 Days Of Christmas Pop Culture! From now until Christmas Eve, I'll be tackling one piece of Christmas pop culture! It could be a book, movie, TV special, song....so long as it's festive for this time of the year, it'll be checked out in this daily column!

Kung Fu Panda shouldn't work. On any level. But the entire endeavor made one crucial decision that changed everything; they got Jack Black to play the titular kung fu warrior. Black plays Po with undying eagerness that's always fun to watch, especially when his exuberance has to be used against tremendous antagonists. Even after two movies (the second of which hadn't come out when the subject of this review came out) that were excellent, a Christmas special should have simply a cash grab, not a reaffirmation of the franchises quality.