Unreality Companion: Ten Movies to Look Forward to in 2015

In which I expand on the content from my weekly Unrealitymag.com article.

Since this last week's Unreality article was a look back on the quality films that 2014 gave us, I figured that the opposite was worth looking into for its companion piece.  So let's take a look at the must see films of 2015.

10) Terminator Genisys  Terminator 3 aside, I've been a loyal fan of the franchise since I first saw The Terminator as a kid (and even Rise of the Machines wasn't that bad).  They've successfully straddled multiple genres, logically tackled the wibbly wobbly science of time travel and followed a cast of interesting characters and their increasingly tangled narrative for going on four decades now.

Terminator Genisys takes the series to its logical conclusion: circling back around on its own narrative to that fateful night in 1984.  But, as often happens with time travel, something's gone horribly wrong.  Instead of coming to the rescue of the hapless Sarah Connor, she comes to his - as if fully formed from the head of Zeus - with the Schwarzenegger Terminator in tow.  They now face an amped-up version of Judgment Day's T-1000 and the prospect of straight-up preventing Judgment Day itself.  While I'm a bit leery of undoing three films worth of internal logic central to the franchise's driving narrative, I can't help but get excited about the best-looking Terminator film since 1991 and the chance to see just how meta the narrative can get by retreading its own origins.

9 - Jurassic World  It took me a good long while to finally warm up to the idea of yet another Jurassic Park, especially given how disappointing every single sequel has been, but I think that the franchise may finally have rediscovered what made the original great in the first place.  No longer concerned with bringing dinosaurs to mainland America nor whatever the Hell was supposed to be going on with the third film, Jurassic World features an actual, working dinosaur preserve, a stable population of dinosaurs and an insurgent breed of engineered mutants: simultaneously bringing everything back to square one and exponentially raising the original's stakes.

Besides, it has Star Lord riding into battle with his private army of Raptors.  What's not to love about that?

8 - Tomorrowland  I've seen this film's trailer half a dozen times already and I still have no idea what to make of it.  The retro-futurism in the titular city, although glimpsed for only a few seconds, looks like incredible fun and the in-camera interplay of the two worlds (as the protagonist varyingly picks up and puts down the pin) worked far better than it should have.  Even if Tomorrowland falls short of Pirates of the Caribbean quality, I think that it's pretty safe to say that Disney's learned their lesson from Haunted Mansion.

7 - Victor Frankenstein  It should come as no surprise that I am a huge fan of horror.  In the last few months alone, I did run-downs on the best 21st Century Horror Movies, why Blumhouse Productions is the only real name in cinematic horror these days and more-or-less kept up with the new season of American Horror Story.  It only makes sense that I would be drawn towards a reworking of Mary Shelley's timeless tale of monsters and madness.  And when that film features the immeasurable talents of Daniel Radcliffe and James McAvoy, it promises to be more than just some tired retread quickly drawn up to capitalize on the resurgent popularity of the horror genre (I'm looking at you, I, Frankenstein).

6 - The Lazarus Effect  Remember what I said about Blumhouse Productions earlier?  Their uncanny knack of turning pulp into legitimately thrilling films is the exact reason why I would be as keenly interested as I am in an original film that I know next to nothing about, featuring the talents of a non-entity director, non-entity screenwriters and a cast of capable (if largely unaccomplished) actors.  Mark my words, The Lazarus Effect is going to be the best original horror film of the year.

5 - Sinister 2  Blumhouse has a really full slate in 2015.  Between this, The Lazarus Effect and Insidious: Chapter 3 - not to mention the now-bumped to 2016 Conjuring sequel - there are a surprisingly high number of horror films to look forward to in the coming months.

The first Sinister was an absolute masterpiece of suspense and execution with a highly franchisable concept.  One friend of mine has pretty much had the film on a continuous loop since its home release in early 2013.  Given how much Baghuul's previous victims play into how he stalks his current ones, it will be interesting to see exactly how much the original's plot is revisited.

4 - Ant Man  Despite its troubled production, which saw the tragic departure of director Edgar Wright, filming went ahead with this Marvel outing as planned.  With any studio not named Marvel (or Blumhouse), replacing the acclaimed director of the Three Flavors Trilogy the seminal mind behind Bring It On  would have probably been its death knell.  But if Marvel has proven nothing else this year, it has the uncanny ability to pick the right talent for the right projects, regardless of how questionable (or just straight up terrible) it seems on the surface.  So rest assured, despite how things may look on the surface, Marvel has this super-sized outing in the bag.

3 - Spectre  Bond's most recent outing (and, potentially, Craig's last as 007) brings the iconic S.P.E.C.T.R.E. (Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion) back to the big screen for the first time since For Your Eyes Only (itself having first appeared in Dr. No).  The franchise as a whole, and Skyfall in particular, has shown a remarkable knack for knowing exactly where and when to incorporate elements from its fifty-year history to make it feel like it's a part of something larger than itself.  Don't be surprised if Quantum, the terrorist organization that was pulling the strings in Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace, ends of being some peripheral extension or modern incarnation of the iconic organization.

2 - Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens  The central question that Star Wars fans are consumed with concerning this film is "did Disney learn from Lucas' misguided prequel trilogy?"  Having had long and hard to consider both side's arguments, I can definitively say "probably."  Writer-Director J. J. Abrams turned the floundering and incredibly niche Star Trek franchise and redefined it into a rampant mainstream success.  Cowriter Lawrence Kasdan was responsible for not only Episode V and VI's scripts, but for Raiders of the Lost Ark as well.  Throw in the original cast and the possibility of being the first in a big-screen adaptation of The Thawn Trilogy, and Disney seems to be doing its best to do right by the film's broad audience (and, more importantly, their money).

1 - Avengers: Age of Ultron  The follow up to not only my favorite film of 2012 (The Avengers), but my favorite film of 2014 has some pretty big shoes to fill.  But with writer-director Joss Whedon returning along with the meta-franchise's impeccable cast, everything appears to be soundly in hand for the Avengers' second outing, which will feature Earth's mightiest heroes squaring off against Ultron: a Stark-revived defense program that is most likely the spiritual successor of Project Insight.

Ultron concludes that the Avengers themselves are the biggest threat facing global security, he sets off to take each of them out in the name of the greater good.  Even more intriguing, though is that Kevin Feige (the Godfather of the MCU) has refused to reveal exactly which Avengers are in which Phase 3 movie specifically because doing so would spoil where certain members end up at the end of Age of Ultron.  This, along with other evidence, lead me to believe that Guardians of the Galaxy 2 will end up being a loose adaptation of Planet Hulk, although questions abound concerning the fates of Black Widow, Hawkeye and Nick Fury as well.

And this is with me not going on about Mission: Impossible 5, Ted 2, Insidious: Chapter 3, Cinderella, Justice League: Throne of Atlantis, The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2 or The Jungle Book.  No matter which way you look at it, 2015 is going to be a huge year for movies.

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