MB-reviewer185

I did not know anything about this film because the teaser trailer was vague and the synopsis on IMDB does not give that much information about anything the film focuses on, so whatever reveals in the film is going to be a surprise; what got me interested in this film, other than the questionable teaser trailer, was that this film is by the same creators as the horror film Barbarian (2022) another film I did not know that much about going in but liked a lot after seeing it, so I was hoping to feel the same thing for this film. The thriller Companion (2025) was great with excellent performances, well-done suspense, lots of surprises and twists, great cinematography, a premise that is interesting and makes you ask questions about the world, and an entertaining dark sense of humor; I do not want to go too far into spoilers because I want you to go into this not knowing much, but I will talk about non-spoiler details involving the plot and keep anything involving spoilers vague to keep you in the dark about what happens.

This is in the main trailer for this film, so I am going to say Sophie Thatcher gives an excellent performance as Iris this companion robot made for romance purposes, once she learns about her existence and finds out about her settings and how to tamper with them, she does so much amazing stuff as an actor being scared, smart, upset, questioning, and being awkward but realistic at the beginning when it came to being in a relationship; when she does get some sort of upper hand in certain points, you are on her side the rest of the film. Jack Quaid also gives an exceptional performance as Josh who is just an awkward loser who has Iris as his companion robot for romance stuff, but at the beginning he already seemed controlling because of the way he talks to Iris, so once the reveal occurs and he becomes increasingly like a jerk who is actually involved in something bigger going on making him a weird character. Lastly, I am just going to say that there are other characters who are friends of Josh who also have something to do with a bigger situation going on, and each one of them are entertaining and have their own kind of character backstory so you can at least get behind them in many scenes.

The main trailer gives away the companion robot part of the plot, but while watching the film there are way more twists and turns throughout, they do this to keep the energy high or to keep it interesting/thrilling to watch because of the number of surprises in the film; the comedy of the film worked well with the rest of the film and the jokes were edited well so they were more effective and the film keeps you on your toes throughout the film so you do not know where it is going to go making the thriller part of the film fun to watch. Lastly, I will say that other than liking the pretty and nice-looking cinematography of the location a lot, I like some of the subtle world building this film does involving how the companion robots work and how they are used in the world along with keeping certain details vague without giving you too much information and details; also, the main plan or thing going on with Josh and his friends was interesting figuring out what they were doing and how they did it.

The thriller Companion (2025) was great with excellent performances, well-done suspense, thrilling sequences, lots of surprises and twists, great cinematography, a premise that is interesting and makes you ask questions about the world, and an entertaining dark sense of humor; I do not want to go too far into spoilers because I want you to go into this not knowing much, but I will talk about non-spoiler details involving the plot and keep anything involving spoilers vague to keep you in the dark about what happens from the beginning to the end of the film. I really liked this film and liked the topics it handles when it comes to relationships, who you date, or how any girls or women might act while having a controlling boyfriend/lover; this film might not be for everyone depending on if you like these kinds of films, but I highly recommend giving this a watch and going in knowing nothing about it, it will help with the experience and the many twists and turns it throws at you.

The graphic novel Dog Man series by Dav Pilkey this film is based on is cute and entertaining for children, now DreamWorks is doing an adaptation of the Dog Man graphic novels, just like how they made an excellent adaptation of the Captain Underpants graphic novel series also by Dav Pilkey with the film Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie (2017); because DreamWorks did an amazing job adapting the Captain Underpants graphic novels, I was excited to their adaptation on another graphic novel series by the same author. The DreamWorks film Dog Man (2025) is a fun and entertaining animated movie that has great voice acting, excellent animation, fun action, funny comedy, a nice message for families, and things people who are fans of the Dog Man graphic novels will notice and like seeing; the whole film looks and feels like the graphic novels it is based on just like the Captain Underpants film DreamWorks released eight years ago, making this film entertaining and funny to watch because of the visuals and sense of humor it has.

The lead character Dog Man does not say anything, so all we get is facial expressions and standard dog noises like barking or growling, and it works well throughout the whole film, and you know what he is thinking/feeling in certain situations especially when you know how he becomes Dog Man at the beginning of the film by learning about the connection he had with his owner/police partner; I liked the dynamic between Dog Man and the chief of police because they were both funny and they each had their own scenes that was either funny or emotional. There are not that many other characters in this film except for the chief of police voiced great by Lil Rel Howery who has a lot of funny moments in the film with him trying to prove he is not shown to be stupid but instead a good police officer when on duty, so he works with Dog Man very well but wants to show he is as good as him; the other character is a reporter named Sarah Hatoff voiced well by Isla Fisher who shows up throughout the film with some funny scenes.

The main villain is a cat named Petey voiced great by Pete Davidson who was throughout the film with him making contraptions to fight against Dog Man in many different was, which includes him breaking out of cat jail a lot and Dog Man trying to find him, but also you do get some backstory behind him after he makes an adorable clone of himself named Li'l Petey voiced in cute ways by Lucas Hopkins Calderon; Li'l Petey was adorable and him not knowing how to be evil like his creator was funny with there also being a great friendship between him and Dog Man. I loved the animation and visuals because it feels like the graphic novels it is based on with funny sight gags, details on certain objects or buildings, certain misspellings like how a kid would spell or say things, and visually fun action sequences with the overall very funny sense of humor kids and some adults will like; I will also add that the soundtrack score to the film is well-done, the film has effective emotional moments, and a good message about friends and family.

The DreamWorks film Dog Man (2025) is a fun and entertaining animated movie that has great voice acting, excellent animation, fun action, funny comedy, a nice message for families, and things people who are fans of the Dog Man graphic novels will notice and like seeing; the whole film looks and feels like the graphic novels it is based on just like the Captain Underpants film DreamWorks released eight years ago, making this film entertaining and funny to watch because of the visuals and sense of humor it has with how it states the obvious about certain things or dumb characters will act at certain moments. I was just as entertained as the DreamWorks's last film Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie (2017), that is because they knew how to take a well-loved graphic novel series and make it into a visually pleasing and fun animated film that lots of families can enjoy; give this a watch if you are a fan of the graphic novel series or if you like DreamWorks's films in general.

When it comes to the Sony Spider-Man spin-offs the Venom film trilogy is the best ones in this universe because it is fun and funny despite some issues with each one, but then you have Morbius (2022) which was just bland bad, and Madame Web (2024) was laughably bad and by far the worst one; what I have heard is that this Kraven film will be the last one of these spin-off films Sony will make, but what gave me little hope was that this film is rated R so hopefully it will be at least entertaining or fun to watch. The film Kraven the Hunter (2024) is an entertainingly bad movie but in a fun way which is why I will say that it is at least better than the last spin-off film we have gotten because the lead performance is not bad, the action sequences are fun, some good cinematography, parts of the story that could be interesting, and characters who have potential; there are quite a few issues in this film with some involving bad side characters, poor development for one of the antagonists, dumb moments in the story, and occasional odd sound design.

I will start by saying that Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Sergei Kravinoff/Kraven the Hunter gives the best performance of the film, because you do understand his past and him not wanting to be a crazy person in a way like his father, but he was cool to watch in action sequences; there is also some kind of connection you feel between him and his brother Dmitri Kravinoff played fine by Fred Hechinger, who does not do much in the film except be the emotional side of Kraven's past other than their mother and move the plot along. The character Calypso Ezili played ok by Ariana DeBose does have a connection to Kraven and how he became who he is but also is mainly just there to move to the next plot point in certain scenes; her scenes go from being a bit silly to being too bland while also knowing about Kraven's father in the process so she can help out in some way by the third act climax. Lastly, I am just going to say that I wanted more development on the brother or Calypso to at least have me care about someone during any intense moments or just in any action sequence that occurs, but then again, the one of the main antagonists are not that great in terms of knowing something about them.

One of the main antagonists is Aleksei Sytsevich/Rhino played by Alessandro Nivola who I did not care about and the only thing you know about him is that he hates Kraven and Kraven's father, and he uses a serum to have hard skin and be strong; when he becomes his full Rhino form, the design is close to how the comics portrayed the character but it misses out on some small details and the CGI design around the face and body looked off and it made me laugh because of how silly it did look during an action sequence near the third act. The other antagonist is Kraven's father Nikolai Kravinoff played well by Russell Crowe who is the cause of terrible things that occur in Kraven's past, who takes hunting very seriously, and he is too hard on his two sons on how to be a good hunter and to be a man; the main thing I noticed is how there is nothing else to him except that he will make up excuses for certain things and complain about how a real man is supposed to deal with a problem, but then he is dealt with quickly in a sort of satisfying way.

The action sequences are fun to watch and bloody/brutal to watch which is why I like that this is rated R, but also, I do remember some action/chase scenes that were entertaining to watch, along with some parts in the story that was interesting, but that is what leads into the issues with the film; the film has bad performances from side characters, bad dialogue that was done in ADR, a script that had a mix of interesting ideas and bad lines of dialogue, and lots of dumb moments with multiple things that do not make sense when it comes to defeating a villain, how the lead character is developed by the end of the film, along with another villain character from the comics named The Foreigner who is played ok by Christopher Abbott but is only there to get to help out the main villain and use his powers a couple times. I know there are people saw this film and hated it or thought it was boring, but though I agree the film was bad, I did not think the film was boring and was thoroughly entertained by it because what would occur in the film would be stupid but it was still fun in some way, which is why this film did make me laugh at quite a bit at the dumbest moments like these weird abilities that Kraven somehow gets despite not being in the comics.

The film Kraven the Hunter (2024) is an entertainingly bad movie but in a fun way which is why I will say that it is at least better than the last spin-off film we have gotten because the lead performance is not bad, the action sequences are fun, some good cinematography, parts of the story that could be interesting, and characters who have potential; there are quite a few issues in this film with some involving bad side characters, poor development for the antagonists, dumb moments in the story, and occasional odd sound design. This is better than Madame Web (2024) despite it still being bad, but I would watch this again as one of those guilty pleasure films that I can put on and be entertained by, while also notice certain things being setup by the end of the film that I know is not going to be followed up on; you can skip this if you do not like these Sony Spider-Man spinoff films, but if you do like them, you might have some fun with this.