It’s said that even the best laid battle plans only last until the first shot is fired. For the first time since we started, we have a freeform bye week. My brother, the “man with the plan”, went in this week without a plan, and it shows. All previous picks had at least been following some internal logic. But Mars Attacks! was picked because, and I quote: “it looked weird”. I guess by that token, I can be thankful we didn’t end up with some freaky parody porn or something. Anyway, onwards to adventure!

For a Tim Burton film, I was left rather unimpressed, and a little disappointed in the lack of Johnny Depp. The film feels as though it’s either trying too hard to be “campy”, or not hard enough to be a serious contender. Several characters were brought in with enough focus that you could believe they would matter, but no. Disintegrated. The visuals could’ve really benefited in the same way as the overall tone: go for “retro” B-movie schlock, or put some more effort in. The aliens looked like they stepped out of an optimistic CDROM adventure game. It honestly feels like the movie ran out of money half of the way through, because suddenly there was a mad dash to get to the ending. The characters that matter don’t feel like it, and the ones that feel like it don’t matter. Save yourself some trouble, and just read a wiki summary. It’s more likely to be entertaining. 1/5.