Happy New Year everybody! It’s a great time to be alive as we’re at the beginning of a fresh new year and who knows where we could go from here? You know what, this may come out of nowhere, but I think I’m done with The Blog Complainer. I’m retiring. The year is two days old now and I want a chance to see the world and see what it has to offer. I don’t want to be trapped down here in my basement talking about the same two movies for the rest of the year. I’ll become a travel blogger! Yes, that’s a great idea. As a parting treat for all my fans I’ll review one more movie before packing up my things for the great beyond that awaits me.

I just saw Mary Poppins Returns and it taught me that if you want to make a lot of cash, then don’t change anything about yourself, do the same thing that people like about your work and then you’re in the money baby!  So bugger that travel blog idea, I’m staying right here and I’ll be meaner than I’ve ever been before. No, I’ll just be myself because nobody likes change.

To start the year off we’ve got Mary Poppins Returns and it’s about what you would expect. So if you have seen the trailers or even the original Mary Poppins then you have already seen this movie. Everything plays out pretty much precisely how the original movie goes, beat by beat. So you’re probably asking yourself why even bother making a new movie instead of just re-releasing the old movie? Well, that’s a good question, and if you guessed money then you have a knack for pointing out the obvious.

Since this is nothing more than a factory made movie I guess I should mention it’s not that bad. It’s full of a lot of nostalgia pandering but it’s not as in your face as other movies like this and it does also offer up enough new material so it looks like some effort was put into it. It’s just a shame that the rest of the movie is so uninspired. There are some pretty cool musical numbers that are well sung and well choreographed, although none of the songs are particularly memorable. Already I’m struggling to remember what they were.

So this movie follows the adult versions of Michael and Jane as they continue to live in their childhood home. (And before you ask, they’re not a thing!) So here comes the similarities …… Michael has the same personality and arc as his father, Jane is a clone of her mother and at one point in the movie she joins a rally, Michael’s kids are exactly him and his sister as the older boy and the girl are pretty much identical and the little boy has a bit more personality but is pretty much the same. There is also a character they befriend later in the movie who is super friendly and cheerful but he has a really annoying accent!  There is a crazy old person on the ceiling, the sea captain on his house boat, a grumpy old guy running a bank and I presume you get the point. Then there is Mary herself who I was a bit skeptical about but surprisingly Emily Blunt did a really good job here.

There really isn’t much more to say and now I wished I had another movie to put this next to. So in the end what you’re getting is an almost exact copy of Mary Poppins. It’s colorful, it’ll make you feel like a kid or whatever, it’s a good movie to put on in the background while you’re on the toilet watching the 1964 Mary Poppins or anything else. I don’t know, when I watch a movie sequel I prefer it to be different and add something to the established universe but this movie plays it so safe that is just kind of exists. 5/10. It’s something I feel like I’m going to forget about in a month’s time and if this sounds of interest to you then knock yourself out, I don’t care what you watch, talking about this movie is making me feel sleepy so wake me up when something interesting comes along.

Coming today or tomorrow will be my top best and worst movies of 2018 everything has been building towards this moment so stay tuned. Also another list of 2018 stuff coming right after the top 10s. Once that’s done I’ll introduce a new series that I have been working on for the last two months. A storm is coming and I can’t wait to show you all what that is.

Then after that business as usual so I’ll be back tomorrow with the lists and until then I have been the Blog Complainer, Signing Out.