Trailer Watch (6/13)

I had started this idea a year ago but dropped it, but I liked it a lot! So I think it's time to bring it back! Every week I'm gonna take a look at some of the trailers and give them a rank - See It, Stream It, or Skip It!

This week, we have two major releases and one decently opening limited release. It's a big sequel weekend though, as we see a sequel to a major animated feature and a bit of an unexpected previous hit. We'll start off with -

How To Train Your Dragon 2 

The original How To Train Your Dragon benefited from amazing visuals and a lot of heart, despite a lackluster story and pretty awful dialogue. Remember how the tagline for the first Superman film was "You'll believe a man can fly"? While that was true then, the first film in the Dragon series is a movie that really made me feel like I was flying on a dragon. Plus it had an absolutely mesmerizing musical score. Early reviews for this movie are coming in super strong, declaring it to be better than the original. I hope the script is more interesting than the first. So far, it looks like that's definitely going to happen. Then there's the equally amazing visuals, visuals that made me sit on the edge of my seat just during the freaking teaser trailer. I have incredibly high hopes for this movie. So I'm gonna go ahead and say See It.

22 Jump Street

This movie benefits from the amazing writing and directing talents of Phil Lord and Chris Miller, famous for Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and The LEGO Movie. They've proven themselves over and over again to be unbelievably funny and wonderfully directors of comedic timing. The first 21 Jump Street was an amazing homage to buddy cop and 80s action films. The joke of the trailers of this movie is that it's going to be exactly the same movie. But knowing the guys working this film, it will keep that sense of humor while building on its original premise beautifully. Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum also make for quite a funny pair. I was surprised at how much I liked the first Jump Street. This time, I'm not going to be as surprised if I enjoy it. I'm definitely going to say See It.

The Signal

This is a limited release, but it looks like it's opening enough places to mention. While I can't say the trailer is uninteresting, I can say it definitely bears some signs of being pretty terrible. There looks to be an enormous amount of stories going on, and a lot of focus on imagery rather than substance. Obviously I can't say that for sure. But this is only writer/director William Eubank's second major film, and his previous film received average at best reviews. This one is coming in at 50% on Rotten Tomatoes. It looks like it could be really interesting, but it also looks like it's going to cater mostly to science fiction fans, despite advertising itself more as a horror/thriller. But most importantly, a critic compares it to District 9 in creativity. That's a bad sign, knowing that while District 9 is a good movie, it's definitely not original. So even though I'd be lying if I said this trailer wasn't interesting, I'm probably not going to get around to seeing it anyway. I'm probably gonna Stream It.