Volcano’s Reel Reviews

By Vincent Volcano, retired arsonist of the silver screen, scarf aflame and patience extinguished. Audience Score: 37. Now there’s a number with integrity. It’s the Celsius at which my interest in Marvel TV crystallizes into indifference. Premise check: Simon Williams, aspiring actor, gets superpowers and auditions for relevance on Disney+, alongside Trevor Slattery—an artifact from […]

By Vincent Volcano, retired Hellwood arsonist of emotion, owner of one (1) stubbornly blazing red scarf Flames Fade, but Classics Burn Forever! Initial descent Netflix has birthed another neon-lit morality play where Miami looks like a cul-de-sac in witness protection and the moon is apparently sponsored by a gel filter. The Rip reunites Matt “stoic

By Vincent Volcano, Retired Tormentor of Taste and Former Hellwood Director-in-Exile. Flames Fade, but Classics Burn Forever! Ah, a new year, a new bout of contagion cinema. Charlie Polinger’s The Plague arrives like a rash you swear isn’t contagious while scratching it in close-up. At a taut 95 minutes, it’s the rare modern movie that

By Vincent Volcano, emeritus arsonist of emotion and retired director of Eternal Ember and Inferno’s Gate. Scarf blazing, patience smoldering. Let’s light this wick. Netflix has stretched the Hawkins farewell tour like taffy over a lava vent, carving the final season into Volumes, Chunks, Slices, and—if executives get peckish—Fun-Size Episodes you can trade at recess.

By Vincent Volcano, retired scourge of Hellwood, scarf aflame and patience extinguished. Initial Inferno A24 has gift-wrapped us a 150-minute Christmas stocking of sweaty paddles and weaponized quirk. Josh Safdie, now a soloist in the orchestra of anxiety, serves up Marty Supreme, a ping-pong passion play “inspired” by 1950s table-tennis zealots who dared to believe

By Vincent Volcano, retired Hellwood arsonist of emotion, still smoldering in a director’s chair that squeaks like a B-movie dolly shot. Flames Fade, but Classics Burn Forever! Let’s irradiate the obvious: Fallout Season 2 arrives on Prime, still swinging a sledgehammer made of tonal whiplash and nostalgia scrap metal. It’s an adaptation that, like most

By Vincent Volcano, Retired Director, Occasional Arsonist, Reluctant Optimist Flames Fade, but Classics Burn Forever! If you’ve ever stared at the fuzz under your bed and thought, “This should be 106 minutes of baroque melancholy punctuated by bloodless carnage and an assassin with no name,” congratulations—you may already be Bryan Fuller. Dust Bunny is a

By Vincent Volcano, Retired Hellwood Arsonist-in-Chief, scarf ablaze and patience extinguished Ah, the animatronics are back, and so are the jump scares timed like a metronome in a funeral dirge. Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 arrives with the stealth of a birthday clown and the subtlety of a chainsaw, promising to appease both lore-goblins and

By Vincent Volcano, retired Hellwood firebrand, scarf aflame and patience extinguished Rian Johnson returns with Wake Up Dead Man, the third Benoit Blanc frolic, a whodunnit so glossy it reflects the audience back at itself—smirking, congratulatory, and convinced it’s clever for recognizing the trope it’s about to applaud. It’s the cinematic equivalent of a magician

By Vincent Volcano, Retired Tormentor of Taste and Former Director of Things That Actually Used Fire You can always tell a modern awards-season hopeful by the way it whispers, “I’m sensitive,” while hiring a trailer editor who cuts like a caffeinated hummingbird. Rental Family, courtesy of the unflappably tasteful Hikari, is a gentle comedy-drama about