Aliens is, undoubtedly, a great movie. On its own its a super fun watch and it works really really well as a sequel, its a movie i thouroughly enjoyed
and would definitely not be upset to rewatch. My true belief however is that there is no way this is a better movie than Alien and everytime I hear
someone say that it takes about fifteen years off of my lifespan. Maybe I'm not an action movie guy or maybe im the only person with a brain left
on earth but Alien had a more interesting set up and cooler visuals than Aliens did and while Aliens told a great story, it simply isn't as interesting
as Alien. Awesome generally speaking though, only thing I can say I wasn't a fan of is how Ripley is now actively being written as a woman and how
that trend continued through the rest of the sequels, they shouldve kept writing her as a male character and just switching the gender at the end like
they did for Alien.
BARBIE IS NOT REAL FEMINISM
Barbie 2023 was promoted and responded to as if it was a feminist film and to this day that irks me. Barbie was a lot of fun, I saw it like three times
in theatres when it came out and I definitely enjoyed watching it, but calling it feminist is a massive stretch in my opinion. There was an attempt
at promoting feminst ideals with America Ferrera's character giving that speech on womanhood and Barbies meeting with Ruth (though I found her
statement about mothers having to stand still to see their daughters succeed a little strange for an attempt at feminist messaging), but still it remains
a fact that Barbie as a movie said absolutely nothing and the things it did say applied to a brand of white liberal feminism that is both not
a real representation of feminist values and also really boring. Barbieland is pretty obviously meant to represent an inverse of our society,
being matriarchal instead of patriarchal, but it is incapable of being an interesting commentary because Ken never cared about equality, just
like men in real life he only cared about being above or better than the women who denied him what he wanted. In her attempt to sympathize with
Ken, Greta Gerwig essentially throws the feminist messaging out the window. It's annoying how much of a sterile nothing-burger it is as a movie and
the entire aesthetic of it, while a lot of fun to participate in at the time, did it absolutely zero favors.
