(This review may contain spoilers).

I thoroughly enjoyed the original Jumanji movie and while I sometimes find another movie in a franchise can be disappointing, when I saw the trailer for this movie, I was very excited about seeing this film.

I really enjoyed this movie. I felt the actors who played the original versions of the characters did a really good job of showing their personalities and I especially liked Jack Black playing a teenage girl; I thought he did a fantastic job of playing a teenage girl. Karen Gillan was good, too…but I couldn’t really connect Kevin’s portrayal with Fridge as shown at the beginning. And it was hard to imagine Dwayne Johnson as really being a teenaged boy. I just connect him too much to being the confident action hero and I felt that persona came across more.

The aspects of the computer game were quite cool and a bit more unique, with the three lives and the NPCs. There were some aspects that didn’t really get expanded upon, though, such as the game telling them to keep their health up.

It was really good to see the relationships form between the characters, especially in regards to the interactions between Bethany and Alex. It was good to see that, even though they could access the skills they had in the game, they still had the doubts and weaknesses of their true personalities.

While there was a lot of good humour in this movie, I also felt there was a good balance of serious moments along with that. And by the end of the movie, it was really good to see the way all of the characters had their parts to play.

I did like the fact that this movie had a few nods to the original, even though no one knew the origins of the game. And it was good to see the usage of technology…and also how the events of the movie changed the characters by the end.

I definitely enjoyed watching this movie and it was one I would like to watch again in the future.

(This review may contain spoilers).

This was another movie I had some quite mixed feelings about. While it was good to see there was some acknowledgement of the repeated plot devices, such as the riff-off, it was disappointing to see none of the male characters from the previous movie put in an appearance.

While a film with so many characters couldn’t really show details about all of them, it was good to see a bit more focus on the characters like Aubrey and Fat Amy. I couldn’t help but feel sympathy for Jessica and Ashley, both of whom seemed to be characters only used as filler; a fact that might have been acknowledged by the movie, but was still disappointing to see.

I liked being able to get glimpses of the lives of the former Bellas, but Gail and John were even more annoying in this movie, if that’s possible. I can’t really say I knew any more about them in this movie than I did in the previous one.

I thought the idea of the movie, with the groups singing for the troops, was a really good one and I felt the movie would have stood strong without the need for the competition on top of everything else. Unlike the previous two movies, I couldn’t really have cared less about the competitions; and the other groups lacked any real conflict.

I really liked the songs, whether they were being performed with or without instruments. And I liked seeing Lilly have a bit more of a role in this movie outside of just being the weird girl.

I thought Fat Amy was awesome in the previous two movies, but I found her more unkind and less humorous in this, which was a shame, as I felt she was a strong character previously. And there was a lot shown about her past and what she could do that had zero foreshadowing.

I was a bit disappointed in this movie and I won’t rush to watch it again any time soon, even though I do intend to listen to the soundtrack again in the near future.

(This review may contain spoilers).

After watching this movie, I have some very mixed feelings. I did enjoy it for what it was, but I can’t deny there were certain parts that did disappoint me.

I think perhaps the strongest part of this movie was the humour. There were times I found myself laughing out loud. However, I did find the scene with Poe and Hux talking (or not, rather) at the beginning was very awkward humour, as it referenced things that don’t actually exist in the Star Wars universe.

I felt this movie tried too hard to be like The Empire Strikes Back. I have to admit, I liked Rey a bit less than I did in episode seven. I felt she didn’t have quite the same personality I’d seen in The Force Awakens.

While it was good to see some of the conflict in Kylo Ren, I didn’t really feel like he was as interesting a villai as he could be. While it was good to see some of the background between him and his uncle, there wasn’t really a lot shown about him and his parents…even though Han wasn’t in the present day.

While I did like seeing the film focus more on Finn and Rose as well as just Rey training with Luke, I was questioning the wisdom in the actions they took. Poe didn’t seem quite as responsible as he was in the first movie and I felt the other storyline could have been worked in a lot better. And I have to say, DJ was quite a disappointing character. I had the feeling he was supposed to be a rogue like Han Solo, but he just wasn’t that interesting.

I did think there were some areas where it was hard to suspend my disbelief and although I do want to watch the third movie in this trilogy, I’m not too fussed about seeing this movie again. I’m hoping the final film will pull this trilogy back to the level of at least The Force Awakens.

(This review may contain spoilers).

I did watch the first of the Bad Moms movies and enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. I nearly didn’t see this movie, but then wound up seeing it with one of my friends at the cinema.

I felt the movie started off really well in showing the aftermath of what had happened and setting the scene. It was good to see that each of the main characters’ mothers had their own personality and was completely different to her daughter. However, I was disappointed that there was almost no focus on the kids and their personalities. It seemed they only appeared when it was convenient to the plot; and I couldn’t have named any of them off the top of my head.

It was good to get something of an idea of Ruth’s upbringing, even though I felt the moments of her actually caring about her daughter were few and far between. While it was clear she cared about her grandchildren, I really couldn’t see it when it came to Amy, who I felt demonstrated far more patience than I would have done in the same situation.

To be honest, I spent most of the movie thinking all three of the mothers had major faults. With the exception of Ruth, none of them interacted with their grandchildren – and apart from one brief scene, Ruth’s only interactions with hers was to give them expensive gifts that sounded like she was trying to one-up Amy.

It bears repeating, I think, that for a film about Moms, the children had very small roles to play. Rather than seeing Carla truly caring about her son – which Iris seemed to see, despite a lack of scenes with the three of them together – all I saw was a woman who didn’t care enough to even consider a Christmas present for him and did the laziest thing possible. Even by the end, there was nothing good or heartwarming shown between them.

To be honest, perhaps the strongest part of this movie was the adult humour, even though it was very cringeworthy at times. Probably the part I actually found myself laughing at was when Amy, Kiki and Carla stole a Christmas tree from the mall.

I would say that this film was fun to watch, but it wasn’t a feel-good movie in the same way a lot of Christmas films are. And in my opinion, the first movie was much better, with more of a focus on the characters being moms, rather than just bad.

I have to say, I don’t intend to buy this movie on DVD when it comes out; and I don’t have a burning desire to watch it again in the near future.