Films & Fiction Weekly

Since his reinvention as an action star, Liam Neeson seems to have a thing for various forms of transport, with his movies taking place on planes, trains, big rigs, and now a bus. Ice Road: Vengeance is the sequel to the 2021 movie The Ice Road, though it only bears the slightest connection to that movie.

You could give it the tagline “Were we’re going we don’t need plots!” because really it’s all very basic, about some bad guys threatening a village in Nepal by building a massive dam, but luckily Liam Neeson’s there to save the day, on a trip to Mt. Everest to scatter the ashes of his brother who died in the first movie.

So is it any good? Yes, obviously, it’s a Liam Neeson action movie. They’ve reached the point where they aren’t to be judged on the same level as other movies. Everything about it is pure cinematic perfection that nothing will ever match, as Neeson has to drive his bus across scary mountain roads with one hand, while punching bad guys with the other. It’s the movie of the year.

It also might be the last action movie that Neeson does (though he’s said that before), which is a sad thing, but at the same time, this movie is really a perfect example of his action movies: basic plot, basic characters, bad bad guys, serious tone, plenty of brawling action sequences, and a big focus on transportation.

Supergunn II: The Confusion Continues

James Gunn has announced that Man of Tomorrow, the sequel to Superman, will release in 2027… maybe.

I really have no idea, because a few weeks ago, when a fan asked him to clarify what the next movie he was writing was, James said:

‘Yes, yes, sorry. This is the same movie. Superman has a major role. It’s not “Superman 2.”‘

Whatever that mean I’ll leave you to work out. It seems that whenever Gunn “clarifies” something he just makes it more confusing, then pretends he never said it and we just misunderstood him.

As the leader of the DCU though, he needs to stop doing this. I don’t know if he thinks it’s cool, or wants to really look like he’s connected to the fans, but it just confuses everything and makes it look like he has no plan for the future. Maybe he doesn’t, I don’t know, but he doesn’t have to advertise that to the whole internet.

Alien: What on Earth?

Alien: Earth continues to surprise me. The latest episode decided to show us everything we already got from the prologue, just much more slowly, and with an extra helping of stupidity. Ripley was right about IQs dropping, because no one in this show has any sense. I don’t see how you can spend billions fitting out an expedition to collect life forms that could be the most dangerous creatures in the galaxy, and not test candidates for their intelligence.

Speaking of life forms, Morrow said that they picked up five: there’s the xenomorph, the eyeball, the leeches, and that thing hanging from the ceiling. So what’s the fourth? Is it something I missed, or will it be brought out later as a surprise?

Jurassic World: Fallen Franchise

It looks like Jurassic World: Rebirth will get a sequel, or at least that there’ll be some sort of attempt to make yet another entry in this franchise, yet there is a trend happening in this franchise, and it’s not just in the declining quality, but also the declining box office.

The last four movies have had a constant downward trend:

• Jurassic World (2015) $1.67 billion
• Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) $1.3 billion
• Jurassic World: Dominion (2022) $1 billion
• Jurassic World: Rebirth (2025) $860 million

Rebirth is still in theatres so will make a little more yet, but that’s a steep decline, with the box office totals almost halving in a decade, despite inflation. Obviously this is partly to do with the decline in cinema attendance since COVID, but also shows how much this franchise has fallen. The next film will likely do even worse, but still Universal won’t stop until there’s nothing left.

They will never realise it, but the studios are the greedy, immoral corporate bodies that want to exploit dinosaurs. We the fans are the poor bystanders who always get eaten because of them. It’s time this park was closed for good.