Happy early Chrismukkah

I recently finished a re-watch of The O.C., a show I hadn't seen since it aired on TV, about twenty years ago. Even though I watched it in real time (from 2003-2007), I barely remembered anything about the last two seasons; hell, I barely remembered anything about the second season. The first season was the one I had the most memories of. I wanted to share some thoughts/bullet points with you about this show. Also, I'm writing this assuming you're already familiar with the show! And without further ado, California, Californiaaaaa, here we coooommmme! 

1. Seth and Summer are almost two entirely different people in the first episode - The premiere of the entire series is good, but it's shocking to see how different Seth and Summer are, compared to what they eventually become. Seth just comes across socially awkward and not having any friends. Here, it seems like he has no friends because he's a shy, nerdy kid, but really, people don't like him because he's a bit of a douche. He becomes very confident and he's a proud nerd. You could chalk it up to him getting confident because of Ryan, but yeah, I don't think so. I think they just changed his character to fit in better with the series. By the next episode he becomes the "cool" Seth we all know and love...or love to hate.  Summer is just awful in the premiere. I have no idea why Seth would even like her. Yes, she's pretty, okay (but we're talking about a place where everyone is attractive), but God, what a bitch! Granted, she is funny sometimes. ("Chino? Eww!") She's a total whoo girl, just "whooing" the entire time and being annoying and drunk. She literally leaves a drunk and passed out Marissa on her porch when she can't find the keys to get into her house. And yes, Summer is a bit superficial, but she is also a good person as the rest of the series goes on. In this episode, she's just a superficial bitch. I think they needed to change both their characters drastically for them to get together. If I was watching this for the first time and knew they ended up together, I would be very confused by the first episode! 

2. Seth and Summer's relationship happened way too fast - Since we're on the subject of Seth and Summer.... I think this would have been better if it was a slow burn. Not too slow, though! This series was only four seasons, after all. I would have had them get together in season 2 instead of season 1. I looked up to see when they first started dating and it's episode 20. Summer was well aware of his feelings for her, but he was dating Anna. In fact, wasn't he dating both of them at the same time on the sly, but they both found out, so he chose Anna? Which makes no sense because he's been pining for Summer since 6th grade or whenever. I would have just had Seth date Anna, thinking he has no shot with Summer whatsoever, then they can become friends through Ryan and Marissa and get to know each other that way. Start season 2 with Summer dating Zach and Anna still leaving to go back to Pittsburgh. I would still have Seth and Zach work on their comic books and then Summer will see the drawing Seth did of her for the comic book and she sees how much he likes her and that's how they start dating. Yes, it would change some things around, but I always thought they got together way too fast. The first time they have sex, it just felt like they were doing it to get it over with. It wasn't sweet or romantic or cutely romantic or even awkward (well, maybe it was a tad awkward)...it was just..boring. 

Also, I have to give a shout out to Captain Oats and Princess Sparkles, Seth's plastic horse and Summer's My Little Pony, respectively. Princess Sparkles' name is actually Princess Sparkles; I looked this pony up to make sure. She's from the Princess Ponies set. I had Princess Pristina myself. 

3. Anna had the worst fashion sense - Ugh, what was this girl thinking? LOL, I found a reddit thread with somebody asking, "Does anybody not really love Anna's fashion sense?" Uh, yep...me! Now some people do like her style (huh?), but I had to post some of the comments that made me chuckle:

She must have pissed off someone in wardrobe who did their best to punish her.

Her style gives me Disney channel vibes.

It's like they put all the leftover options on her and called it a style. (This person likes it, though.)

Her style was over the top, way more than other kids.

The girl likes lots of colors and newsboy hats (sometimes pink, fuzzy newsboy caps) and she believes in layering, but, not like in a good way. Here are a few examples of the atrocious outfits she has worn: 

-Black shirt with a sparkly pink tube top over it, olive green skirt with a chunky black belt and tan boots that go up to her knees. Just terrible.

-Fuzzy pink newsboy camp, black shirt with collar, purple top over the black shirt, white skirt, electric blue leggings, and a pale purple coat. Is she colorblind? This outfit was especially egregious. I could only find a picture of her wearing it when she's sitting down, but I wish you could see all of it in it fugly glory:

-A yellow t-shirt over a long-sleeved pink shirt with a blue knit scarf. Remember, this live in SoCal. Why the scarf? She's also wearing a blue bracelet or watch over the sleeve of the pink shirt. She looks like an absolute idiot. 

-A shiny pink coat over a black top (you can't see too much of it because the coat is zipped up most of the way. This isn't too bad, but then they show a full body shot of her and we see she's also wearing a brown skirt with a black belt, purple tights, and pink shoes. Like, WTF? Unfortunately (fortunately?, you can't see the pink shoes in this pic:

-A silk pink camisole overalls white t-shirt. I guess this is supposed to be her sexy bedtime wear. 

-A pink top with a sheer neckline and the rest of it looks like a cheap polyester material with a black floral skirt. And let's not forget the blue tights and gold strappy shoes. Again, I ask, if she colorblind? 

-An ivory satiny short sleeved top that seems to tie and button down the front (question mark?) over a red and white striped long sleeved shirt. At least she paired this with black pants instead of some crazy color.

-A black and white geometric dress (which isn't too bad on its own) with a long sleeved pink shirt under it and lilac tights. 

-Brown jacket with white polka dots over a white top with designs I cannot decipher, plus a blue tiered ruffled skirt and pink tights. Seriously, WTF? 

4. There are plenty of meta jokes in the series, but one of my favorites is a reference to The Sixth Sense - Okay, so I can't quite remember the context, but I think Seth must have gotten really drunk and threw up and when Ryan brings it up to him the next day, Seth wants to know how much he vomited and asks if it was as much "as the little girl in The Sixth Sense." Mischa Barton, who plays Marissa Cooper in The O.C., played PukeGirl in The Sixth Sense. (Her character's name is Kyra Collins, but I've always called her PukeGirl...that scene was terrifying! And a bit gross with the vomit.)

5. The Spider-Man kiss was one of the most contrived scenes - This kiss between Seth and Summer happens in a season 2 episode from 2005; the movie it was inspired by came out in 2002. I feel like by that time it was old news. Yeah, I guess you could say it's an iconic scene in the movie, but the way it happens on The O.C. just, ugh, I'm sorry, I hate it. It didn't come organically at all and I think that's why it irritated me. It was like they (the writers) wanted Seth and Summer to recreate the famous kiss between Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst in Spider-Man because Seth is a comic book nerd, but the way they got there, :::rolls eyes:::  (Oh, wait I just realized I could have just used this emoji: 🙄, but there's something so nostalgic and familiar about the first way I wrote it. I think I learned it from TWoP; iykyk.) They had broken up at the beginning of season 2 and Summer has been dating Zach. She's supposed to be going to Italy with Zach and his family for his sister's wedding. 

Keep in mind that it's raining quite hard during this episode and because Seth hates wearing hats, he's wears a Spider-Man mask (it's more of a head piece as it goes over the entire head) if he has to go outside which is the dumbest thing I've ever ever heard of. Seriously, he would rather wear that ridiculous Spider-man mask that just wear a hat? See, this is already stretching it. 

He's watching TV when the cable goes out, so he decides to climb up to the roof to fix the satellite which just seems really stupid because 1) it's POURING and 2) does he even know what to do? Oh, and 3) he's also the only one home. What if something happens and he falls? Which is exactly what happens...he's tied a rope around his waist and after he ties the other end to the chimney, he slips off the roof...he's lucky he didn't break his neck. Meanwhile, Summer has left the airport because she's decided she wants to be with Seth and she finds him hanging upset down like an idiot (keep in mind he's wearing his Spider-Man mask...which would seem it would hinder his vision) and they recreate the Sam Raimi Spider-Man kiss. I literally groaned when I saw this. Instead of copying an iconic kiss, I'd rather them just create their own iconic kiss. Plus, it's just so unrealistic that Seth would do this on a sunny day, let alone when it's pouring outside. Please. 

6. Marissa shouldn't have been expelled from Harbor for shooting Trey - She shot him in self-defense, okay? And it's not like he died. In case you need refreshing, Trey is Ryan's older brother (the one who stole the car in the first episode) and he's recently been released from jail. Because he's her boyfriend's brother, Marissa has been really nice to him, helping him find a place to live and look for a job. Unfortunately, Trey takes this niceness as a sign that Marissa is into him, but that isn't the case. He gets very aggressive and starts to assault her when they're alone at a beach, but she's able to hit him with some object (maybe a stick; I don't remember) and runs away. For some reason, she doesn't tell Ryan about this. I guess she doesn't want him to know that his brother tried to rape her. Of course (a few episodes down the line), Ryan does find out and he goes to Trey's place to beat the sh*t out of him. Marissa finds out and follows Ryan and arrives at Trey's place to see the two brothers going at it. She's afraid that Trey is going to kill Ryan because he has him pinned down and is strangling him so she grabs a gun and shoots Trey. Like I said, he doesn't even die so it's not like she's some stone-cold killer. She was just trying to get Trey to stop hurting (or possibly worse) Ryan. 

Actually, both she and Ryan were expelled from Harbor, but Sandy was able to get Ryan back into Harbor. But I thought it was ridiculous that Marissa was kicked out. They really only did this for the storyline.

7. Seth lying to Summer about not getting into Brown infuriated me - So Seth's dream school is Brown and Summer decides she's going to apply too because maybe they'll both get in. Seth reminds her that usually only one person from Harbor gets in (which is insane they have a representative from Brown if only one person is going to get in...). Well, Summer gets in and Seth does not. Seth lies and tells everyone he did get in. He thinks he can just convince the dean orsomeone to let him in. (That does not work.) Instead of admitting to Summer he didn't get in, he keeps up the charade that he did. He does this because he's worried that Summer won't go so she can be closer to him, but let's be honest, while he may think that, he's just embarrassed that she got in and he didn't. He tells her that he decides he doesn't want to go and breaks up with her. Poor Summer was so devastated and wondered what she did wrong when he couldn't admit the truth. Terrible play on Seth's part. 

8. Julie Cooper needs to branch out her dating circle - I get that this is a TV show, but what is up with Julie only dating (or marrying) people who are related to her friends of her daughter's friends? After she divorced Jimmy she married Caleb, Kirsten's father. Then after he died, she dated Neil Roberts, Summer's dad and they got engaged rather quickly. Let's be honest: we love Julie, but the woman is a gold digger. Even though she liked Neil well enough, I never believed she loved him, she rather just loved his money and his huge mansion. That relationship didn't last and then she started dating the Bullitt, the only person who wasn't related to someone she knew. Even though Bullitt was a billionaire, she broke off her romance with him to be with (and this came out of left field) Frank Atwood, Ryan's father, who was recently released from jail. (Ryan sure has a lot of family members who have been in jail!) This relationship just happened and it made no sense...it really didn't have time to cook. They have a baby together, but they're not together romantically at the end of the series, just friends. That relationship was a real WTF moment...like Julie, I love you, but maybe let's not get involved with your dead daughter's ex-boyfriend's absentee con father. Also I know people change and blah, blah, blah, but wasn't he in jail for beating his then wife? Julia, you can do so much better.

9. I predicted one of the storylines before they revealed it to us - Okay, so I probably shouldn't brag about this, because I'm sure many viewers saw this coming as well as it was really obvious (at least to me!). In season 2, we find out that Caleb (Kirsten's father; Seth's grandfather) had an affair, oh, like sixteen years ago when he was married and that resulted in a child. He's been paying the woman child support (and also paying her to keep this quiet).  

Meanwhile...a new student named Lindsay starts at Harbor. At first, she and Ryan don't get on the right foot, but soon they start dating. (This happens during one of the 925 times when Ryan and Marissa are broken up.) One day she comes over to his house and the woman that Caleb had a child with also is over to talk to Caleb about something...I don't really remember, but the point is that I knew that the woman was the mother of Lindsay! And I was right! That means Lindsay is Kristen's half-sister, which means Ryan is dating his adoptive half-aunt (is that right?), bwah! Okay, I'm not sure if by that point in the series if Sandy and Kirsten have officially adopted him (according to a quick search on Google, I guess they never do, but they are his legal guardians? :::shrug::: (or I guess I can just type this: 🤷) but still, that's a little too incestuous for me. I know Ryan and Kirsten aren't really related, but it's still a little weird. Oh, well, by the end of the season Lindsay will move to Chicago and will never be brought up again. 

10. I preferred Kaitlin over Marissa (and I preferred Willa Holland's Kaitlin over Shailene Woodley's) - Even though we see a very young Kaitlin in season 1 (hi, Shailene Woodley!), she doesn't come back as a series regular until the last season (and we do see her in a couple episodes in season 3). She goes off to boarding school in season 2, hence why we never see her. She went as Shailene Woodley and came back as Willa Holland, ha! (Though Shailene Woodley got a pretty decent acting career, so I'm sure she got over the fact that she wasn't re-cast.) While I knew Kaitlin would return to the show, I forgot what her character is like. She's pretty much non-existent in the first season, just Marissa's little sister. I think they just sent her off to boarding school because they didn't know what to do with her. Really, Marissa would probably be better off at boarding school! I thought when Kaitlin returned, she would be a Mean Girl type - very exclusive who she was friends with, looked down her nose at other people, flaunted her wealth, but I must have misremembered because she wasn't like that at all. She doesn't really care about being friends with all the popular kids; her only friends seem to be Luke's younger twin brothers who follow her around like puppies. She makes them do her homework. Unlike Marissa, who liked to be involved in school and was a pretty good student, Kaitlin could care less about that. There's a scene where a true Mean Girl (played by Ashley Benson; you may remember her as Hanna in Pretty Little Liars) is having a party at her house, but she's only inviting certain people. She actually hands out invitations to a group of eager girls, leaving several out who are disappointed they didn't get an invitation. Kaitlin is in the background when this is going on and she pipes up and tells everyone she's having a party the same night and that EVERYONE is invited. Of course, everyone ends up at her house (including Mean Girl's super hot (and super gay, heh (and yes, Mean Girl definitely knew he was gay)) boyfriend. Anyway, I think I just preferred Kaitlin's casual (sometimes she was too casual!) vibe over Marissa. Marissa was just SO DRAMATIC! I get it; it's a teen soap. It wouldn't be very exciting if she was a stable person, but seriously, that girl just exhausted me! 

BONUS - If you ever watch (or re-watch) this show, I would recommend listening to the podcast Keeping Up with the Cohens. Yes, there is the podcast that Melinda Clarke and Rachel Bilson did and that's a good one too. I've only listened to select episodes of their podcasts, mostly when they have someone else who was on the show or show runners. Keeping Up with the Cohens is hosted by three friends who loved this show when it aired when they were teens. They do pretty in-depth reviews and also have a segment where they choose the song of the episode (because there were so many songs that played in one episode!) and an outfit of the episode. The first season they would do four episodes (they were watching the DVD boxed set and so were going by how many episodes were on one disc), but then they did two episodes per podcast episode and I preferred that. They're just a lot of fun to listen to. The O.C. is a great show to do a recap review on because it's only four seasons (and the last season is shortened). I find a lot of television show recap reviews will eventually fade away over time before they finish the series after the first three or so seasons. 

Amaze, amaze, amaze!

Project Hail Mary

Directors: Phil Lord and Christopher Miller

Cast: Ryan Gosling, Sandra Huller, Lionel Boyce, Ken Leung, Milana Vayntrub

Released: March 20, 2026

Before I saw this movie, I read the book. Actually, I listened to the audiobook which I really enjoyed. I became quite immersed with the story. The movie is just shy of almost three hours while the audiobook is 16 hours! I highly recommend it if you saw the movie and liked it. As you can imagine, the book goes a tad more in depth! For instance, they took out the guy from New Zealand and the whole Sahara Desert plot. For those of you who just watched the movie, you're probably asking, What guy from New Zealand, question? What's this about the Sahara Desert, question? Exactly. But I get it. I understand that not everything from the book can make it into the movie. I think for the most part they did a good job of adapting the novel into a movie. 

Project Hail Mary was written by Andy Weir, the same guy who wrote The Martian (and was made into a movie with Matt Damon). I also read the book (and I actually read the physical book - in fact, I own it).  No surprise, this is also a sci-fi story. 

There is a "streak of infrared light from the sun to Venus" called the Petrova line (named after a "radio telescope enthusiast named Irina Petrova" who noticed this two years ago). In this streak, there is a bunch of tiny little black dots called astrophage (ha! I was quite familiar with that word since it's mentioned A LOT in the book) that are essentially eating the sun and dimming it. It is bit of an issue because over the next thirty years, the earth could cool 10-15 degrees. This means crops will die, and people and animals will die of starvation. So, not great. 

The movie starts with our main character, Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling - ha, both character and actor have the same initials!), waking up on a spacecraft from an induced comma. He sees there are two other astronauts - a Chinese man and a Russian woman, but they are both dead. They don't really go into much about why they were in a coma, but it's really interesting in the book. Basically they put the astronauts in a coma so they wouldn't go crazy and kill each other because they would be in a small enclosed space for about four years (UGH!). But I'm getting ahead of myself. 

He has no idea where he is until he looks out a big widow and sees outer space. He starts to have flashbacks and this is how he eventually puts the pieces together. He's a middle school science teacher and he remembers telling his class about how the sun is dying, but reassures his kids by telling them "the best minds in the world" are working on it. 

German Eva Stratt (Sandra Huller) with the Petrova Task Force comes to his classroom (after all the kids have left) and pulls out a journal titled "An Analysis of Water Based Assumptions and Recalibrations of Expectations for Evolutions Models" (yes, I paused the TV so I could jot all that down!) which Grace wrote. BIG YAWN. That sounds like something that could put you to sleep! There was one part of the thesis where he claims that water is not necessary for evolution. She asks him if he still believes this and he replies while "water is required for life on Earth, a completely different planet might have completely different conditions." A lot of his colleagues were skeptical over this and he was pretty much kicked out of the scientific academia circle after he called a the leading expert in the field "a staggering waste of carbon" which is so on brand for a biologist. This is why he now teaches middle school. 

He is hesitant when she tells him he needs to come with her. According to her, "Petrova line samples splashed down last night. I want you to tell me what they are, how they work." She has chosen him because of that scientific journal he wrote and he wrote it because he has a doctorate in molecular biology. But when she adds that the samples survived on the surface of the sun, that gets his attention. He meets Carl (Lionel Boyce) the bodyguard who escorts him into the SUV. 

He is driven to a lab where he's completely covered up in a hazmat suit. There is a big concrete wall with a window separating him in the lab from Stratt and a bunch of officials. She's communicating with him via a radio and reminds him to try not to rip his suit because the entire room is filled with argon. 

He can't seem to be able to see into the astrophage (since I listened to to the audiobook I'm not sure if this should be capitalized or not; I've seen it printed both ways online so I'm just gonna lowercase it) even though he's tried x-rays, microwaves, gamma rays, and visible light. We know it's a tedious process because all the officials except for Stratt are falling asleep. He finally discovers it's a tiny alien cell. He's very excited about this when he announces it to his audiences, but when he looks back at the cell, he's discovered it's died. But this is good because now they can find out what these little dots are made of. He takes the sample and see it's composed of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen, so it's made almost entirely out of water. This disappoints him greatly. 

Stratt basically tells him, "Thanks, bye"; she has over 300 other biologists from around the world to help figure out what's going on with these dots, but he still wants to help, so she leaves him three of the tiny cells so he can continue to study them. 

He and Carl buy a bunch of supplies at a hardware store (with the government's money; I laughed when they also each got a pair of sunglasses and a bunch of candy; Grace's choice of candy appears to be Twizzlers). They're trying to figure out why the astrophage traveled to Venus. They build a large wooden crate where Ryland hangs a box inside that crate that is supposed to represent Venus. He even has it set "to emit the same infrared light frequency as Venus's C02 atmosphere." Carl dumbs it down for us non-scientific folks: "So if the dots move when you turn the lights on, that means they're looking for CO2." 

The atrosphage move off the slide when they begin the experiment. Ryland can't just go in the crate to retrieve them because they will escape if there is light. The only way to retrieve them is to move the crate into an enclosed room within the bigger room they're in which they cover the windows with foil that they duct tape to the walls. It's a good thing they bought a crapload of foil and duct tape! I guess they knew they would come in handy! When Ryland enters the dark room, he not only finds the three astrophage, but there is a fourth. He calls Stratt to tell he they figured out how astrophage breeds. 

He's taken by fighter jet to an aircraft carrier in the middle of the ocean. Stratt asks him if he can do the astrophage reproduction at scale. She introduces him to a room full of scientists who are working on this issue. They have figured out that the C02 of Venus helps the astrophage breed and that's why they're going there. 

It turns out that Grace was flown to this top secret location because they need two million kilograms of astrophage. Stratt has to quickly grant him clearance to Project Hail Mary and she presents a slide show explaining what it is: "The sun is not the only star dying. There is a clear pattern of infection. Every star was infected by its neighbor except one." That is Tau Ceti, which is 11.9 light years away. Okay, when I saw how that was written out on the screen when I watched with the subtitles on, I was like, Ooohhh, that's how you spell it. For some reason, I was thinking it was Tau City, but I knew that couldn't be right. Anyway, it is uninfected despite being well within a cluster of infected stars. Nobody knows why this is so they built a ship to go there and find out. It was easy enough to build the ship (really, question?), but the energy required to power the ship is the problem, or at least, it was. This is where the two million kilograms of astrophage comes in. If they can make enough of it, they'll be able to reach Venus. Ryland isn't sure about this. The cells store a lot of energy and if they make a mistake, that much astrophage could vaporize California, to give an example. Stratt reminds him that is why they "live on a boat in the middle of the ocean" in case something like that happens. 

Grace reiterates, "So you wanna build a near-light speed spaceship, have it travel further than any human-made object has ever traveled, and visit a star just to 'see what's up?'", question.  Stratt confirms this and when Ryland asks what will happen once they get there, she says, "There won't be enough fuel for a round-trip so they send their findings back to Earth on probes." On the screen behind her, we see the "Beetles" prototype design. This is an Easter egg for those who read the book, though it should be spelled "Beatles." (Though to be fair, I never read the book, so maybe it was spelled "Beetles" :::shrug:::.)

When he learns that the astronauts are basically going on a suicide mission, he asks if there's any other possible solutions, but this is the only choice they have if they don't want the entire population to starve "and watch everything on this planet go extinct." 

In another flashback a little later, Stratt introduces the flight team to Grace. He meets the pilot, Commander Yao (Ken Leung); the engineer, Oleysa Illyukhina (Milana Vayntrub); and the scientist, Martin DuBois (Malachi Kirby); plus their back ups. Once the mission is completed, they will have the option to end their lives on their terms or "the alternative is a slow, miserable death by starvation." The Russian woman wants to do "lethal injection with heroin" and the Chinese pilot jokes, "I'll have what she's having." This is true that Illyukhina wants to die that way (she wants to experience "massive pleasure" before she dies), but Yao just wants to shoot himself in the head to end his life. I guess they wanted to lighten the morbid scene, so they just had him make the joke. Of course, neither of them will have to worry about that because they just never woke up from their comas which is probably the best way to go if you're going to die anyway, though it doesn't help if you're dying before you've completed your mission! You may be wondering why Grace only found the bodies of Yao and Illyukhina and why he himself was on the Hail Mary when he wasn't one of the astronauts prepared to go. Well, I'll get to that later. 

Aboard the spacecraft, there is a computerized voice dubbed Mary that is there to answer Ryland's questions. While this computer is still there in the book, Ryland figures out most of his questions himself, but I suppose this is to help move the film along. When he commands Mary to "call Earth" (lol), the AI informs him, "Current transmission time to Earth is 11 years, 10 months, 14 days, and six hours." That makes the Pony Express look like high speed internet! 

Okay from here on out, I will be spoiling the movie, so if you haven't seen the movie then and don't want to be spoiled, then don't read any further. 

Warning! Spoilers ahead! Warning! Spoilers ahead! Don't cry if you're spoiled because I warned you! 

Okay, I probably could have waited a few more paragraphs, but I wanted to touch on something. When I listened to the audiobook, I had NO idea there was an alien in it and when Grace sees the large alien spacecraft, I was thinking there's no way there's an alien...there must be some explanation. Well, I was wrong because there is indeed an alien! 

I watched the trailer for the movie after listening to the audiobook and for the first minute and thirty seconds of the two minute trailer, I was impressed that Rocky wasn't shown or mentioned. I think there is one little moment shown where Grace is meeting him for the first time, but if you're not familiar with the book, you wouldn't know what's going on. So I'm thinking, oh, I love that. They're keeping the alien out of the trailer. That's brilliant! Uh, yeah, no, that didn't happen. The last thirty seconds of the trailer is all about Rocky. Now they don't show him (maybe just like a claw), so at least they saved that for the movie. But there's a scene of Ryland recording a video and saying, "So I met an alien today..." and I'm thinking, Why are they spoiling this?!, question? Okay, yes, they're probably assuming most people who are planning to see the movie have read the book, but I bet there are a lot of people who never read the book who also saw the movie! In my opinion, they should have kept the alien out of the trailer! Or at least maybe hint at an alien and take out the "I met an alien today" line!  Okay, thank you for listening to my gripe about this! 

Once Grace approaches the Tau Ceti orbit, he sees a huge unidentified flying object that Mary refers to as "Blip A." We are only thirty-six minutes into the movie at this point. In the audiobook, it's about four hours in when he notices the odd spacecraft. It is gigantic in comparison to the spacecraft Grace is in. He's freaked out and wants to get away from the other spacecraft which can only be described as otherworldly. In the book, he's more curious about it. But in the film, he's desperate to get away from it. There is a bit of a comical scene where we see him zoom away, only for the other spacecraft just to follow him. An automated arm outside the spacecraft sends what looks like a bottle (except not made out of glass or plastic). Grace surmises it's either a message or a bomb. It hits his space vehicle and goes off into the void. The next one is moving a lot slower than the last one and he realizes it's because the aliens think he's dumb, haha. He has to put on an EVA suit and go on a space walk. I think this would be terrifying, especially if you've never done this before. 

The bottle is difficult to open because it's made out of Xenon (he has machines to tell him what is is) which is odd that a gas is a solid. Once he gets it open, inside is a model showing where the alien's planet is compared to where they are now (what, question? is Google Maps available in space, question?). Grace comments that this alien is "also a long way from home." In return, he adds Earth to the model to show where he's from and sends it back. 

Now we're ready for Ryland to meet Rocky. Well, he's unnamed at this point, but I enjoyed the alliteration of that sentence. 

One thing I appreciate about the movie was the visualation of Rocky. When I listened to his description in the audiobook, I had a hard time imagining him. He's described as looking like a spider about the size of a dog (specifically a Labrador) with a carapace. He's faceless and has five limbs that have three triangular "fingers" that look more like claws. He kinda sounded freaky to me! He got his name Rocky because his exterior looks like it's made out of rocks...which is how he looks in the movie. 

I also appreciate that Rocky was created as a puppet rather than CGI. He is voiced by James Ortiz who also operated the puppet. The voice is fine, but after listening to hours of Rocky's voice in the audiobook, that's what I was used to. When we first meet Rocky (in the audiobook and movie),
he communicates by "speaking" in musical notes. It almost sounded like an electric organ in the audiobook. (BTW, I would love to know how this is conveyed in the physical book.) Once Rocky is speaking English, in the audiobook, you can still hear the musical chords behind the words. It also has a robot-sounding quality to it, but this is probably to reflect that his words are being translated through a computer. Rocky's movie voice does have a computerized sound to it, but the background musical chimes are missing. It just wasn't the same, so it was a little jarring. To me, it just didn't sound like Rocky. This is not my Rocky! 

I'm still not exactly sure how Rocky's alien language was translated into English. I mean, it's not like Google translate has Eridian. It's a little more elaborated on in the book, but I'm still a little skeptical that Ryland could understand Rocky...but I get it. If the main character or the readers/listeners/viewers couldn't understand Rocky, then that would just be frustrating! All I'm saying that if, for some crazy ass reason, someone in real life met an alien, there's no way they'd be understanding the alien as well as Grace understands Rocky...but I digress...

When Grace becomes the first human being to come into contact with an alien, there is a cute moment where he finds that whatever pose he makes, the alien will mimic him. It's also really cute when the alien laughs; it sounds like a little chitter. 

Now there's a lot of things about Rocky that never gets addressed in the movie or are very quickly addressed while in the book we learn a lot about him and his his physiology and biology works and what his home is like. For instance, they never touch on that he's 291 (!!) Earth years old. When Grace asks Rocky what he misses most about home, he replies, "My mate" and says they've been together for 186 years, so I guess that's a clue that Eridians live a long time. Also, the reason I'm using Earth years is because Eridians use a whole different system, which makes sense. It's explained in the book. Grace also asks what Rocky's mate's name is and Rocky replies with a long musical note. 

For the most part, I was fine with how Rocky was portrayed in the movie, but there were a couple of qualms I had. The first one was that he didn't end all his questions he asked with the word "question." Every single question he asked in the book ended with a question, like "What do we do now, question?" or "What does that word mean, question?" (hehe, he asked what the word "jerk" meant after Ryland called him one...Ryland told him it didn't matter!) or "How long since last sleep, question?" You get the idea. In the movie, he looked to be on track to follow this tradition, but then he asked a question without saying "question" at the end, and then it happened a few more times. Now they would still pepper in him saying "question" at the end of his questions, but it wasn't consistent and it drove me crazy! That was one of the endearing little things Rocky did in the book and I do not approve that they took it out of the movie. 

Also, I feel like they made him just a taaaad more annoying than he is in the book and I wouldn't call him annoying in the book. There are times when Ryland gets a little irritated with him, but Rocky can dish it right back to him. In the movie, when Rocky moves in, he's asking a lot of questions (hence the reason they probably don't have him end each question with "question" because there's so many of them in a row it would probably annoy the audience...just a theory), but in the book he's a lot more smarter than he's portrayed in the movie (not that he's an idiot) and doesn't come off as the comic relief. Look, he's no where near Jar Jar Binks level, but I would trust book!Rocky before movie!Rocky. 

Grace quickly realizes that Rocky is having the same issue him. His sun in his orbit is also dying. Rocky recognizes astrophage when Grace shows it to him and says, "Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad." I don't know how many times he says "bad" exactly, but it should have just been three times. As it is pointed out in the book, he says a word three times in a row if he's trying to emphasize something.

Grace is keeping a video diary of his findings and this is for the benefit of the audience; this was not in the book since he told us everything in his head. There are some funny moments where he's complaining about his new roommate but has to speak very softly because Rocky has excellent hearing (very true fact from the book). He's whispering and Rocky can still hear him, ha! 

Oh, wait! There's another Rocky moment in the movie that didn't quite gel with the book. The film got it right that Eridians like to watch other Eridians sleep (he often asks Grace if he can watch him sleep), but they do not like anyone to see them eat as it is a private matter. In the book, when Grace asks if he can observe him eat (he let Rocky watch him eat), Rocky is very hesitant about this. In the movie, Rocky is watching Grace eat and he comments, "Grace look disgust when eat." The Rocky I know and love would never say that. In the book when he watched Ryland eat, he was intrigued. When Ryland (in the movie) asks how it looks when he (Rocky) eats, Rocky replies, "Beautiful" and when Ryland asks him to show him, he's fine with it. No, no, no! Rocky would never volunteer to eat in front of anyone and he would never refer to it as "Beautiful!" Quite the opposite! 

Rocky was the sole Eridian on his spacecraft because the other twenty-three that were with him all died of radiation. Grace comments in the video diary that Rocky's species doesn't know anything about radiation or relativity, which is true to the book, but goes way more in depth.

Ryland and Rocky come up with a plan to orbit the planet where astrophage breeds to collect a sample and figure out why it's not eating the Tau Ceti star. (I just looked up Tau Ceti and it appears to be a real star with its own Wikipedia page. I just scanned it because it looks really boring.) So they do that and decide to give this planet a name. They decide to name it after Rocky's mate, but Grace needs a word to translate it into something he can speak. When this happens in the book, I knew he was going to suggest Adrian and I've never even seen the Rocky movies, but even I know there's an Adrian. And, yes, this is exactly what happens and they name the planet Adrian. 

Once they collect the samples, they do some experiments. I did like Ryalnd's shirt which showed a picture of the periodic table and under it were the words "I wear this shirt periodically." I bet he's a fan of Breaking Bad, but really, who wouldn't be? The samples they found include life. Rocky gets excited and exclaims, "Life is reason!" He explains that "Life on Adrian makes astrophage die" and if they bring this predator home, their stars won't die. 

Now they have a new plan where they will get very close to the Adrian atmosphere and lower a collector that Rocky has assembled to, you guessed it, collect more samples to get this Adrian predator. Grace will have to go out on the hull to reel in the collector to reel it in, like he's fishing. If they're not at a precise angle and speed, they will die. That's not terrifying. Grace is able to collect what he needs during the mission, but once back inside the ship they hear a loud creaking noise and realize that the gravity is tearing the ship apart. Grace hits his head and passes out and Rocky risks his life by getting out of his makeshift bubble that's keeping him safe (you know because he and Grace are used to different atmospheres) and drags Grace to his bed where he's given medical treatments. Poor Rocky is on fire, but makes it back to his little pressurized ball. When Grace wakes up and sees a trail of black sludge, he realizes that Rocky got out to save him. He sees an unconscious Rocky and is happy when he wakes up a few days later (or however long it is.) I have to say this scene is way more emotional/scarier/crazier in the book. 

While Rocky is unconscious, Ryland creates the predator that he dubs taulmeaba. He tells a comatose Rocky that all they have to do now is "breed enough to survive the trip." It was really cute when he makes a bunch of get well cards and tapes them to Rocky's sphere.  

Okay, remember when I mentioned that Grace meets the three astronauts that will be on the mission, but one of them (DuBois) wasn't aboard the spacecraft, question? This is because he was killed a few days before the flight was to depart. When I saw a flashback scene of Ryland and Stratt standing outside with a large building in the background, I immediately knew which scene this was from the book. I knew the building was going to blow up because inside there were scientists (including DuBois) who were working "with a dangerous amount of astrophage." That is why there was no DuBois. And you may also be wondering why DuBois's replacement didn't replace him. It's because he was also killed in the same explosion. That seemed kind of dumb! But this is the reason why Grace was abroad. He is pretty much the only scientist available that knows what's going on with Project Hail Mary. He did not want to go, but was pretty much forced to go. He was scared of dying, but Stratt pointed out if he didn't go, he would die anyway, along with the rest of the planet. 

At one point, Ryland has to tell Rocky that he's not going to survive this trip. Rocky is upset by this, but Ryland tells him he's made peace with it. When Rocky discovers that Ryland will need two million kilograms of astrophage, he has plenty and is happy to give him some so he can make the trip home. Grace starts crying because he is so overwhelmed with happiness. When this happens in the book, Rocky ask him why his face is leaking (question?), but he never asks this in the movie! He also cried when he found out that Rocky was okay after being unconscious. 

Everything seems to be looking up. Both Ryland and Rocky will save their planets and Ryland will get to go home. It will be a loooong trip, but now he has the mileage (it's that the right word, question? Probably not) to get there. The journey will be four years, 2 months, and eleven days. And I thought the road trip I took from Omaha to Charleston about a decade ago that took about two full days was never ending! 

Ryland and Rocky say their tearful goodbyes (well, Rocky isn't crying because he physically can't) and Ryland even gets to visit Rocky's oddly shaped spacecraft (which is not a scene in the book) before they go their separate ways. So there's twenty minutes left in the movie and about this part in the audiobook, there was about an hour and a half left, so I knew they were going to rush/skip over a few things!

There's one last issue Grace has to deal with and this goes way more in depth and is a lot more stressful in the book! Like, when this was going on in the book, I was STRESSED OUT! But maybe because I knew everything would work out, I was less stressed out while watching the movie. Plus it all happens pretty quickly, so there was no time to stress! 

Grace hears a warning on the ship saying "contaminant detected." The taumoeba were able to get through the Xenonite which they were in. Luckily, he was able to stop them before they ate all the astrophage on the ship, which remember, are his ticket home. The issue is that he's worried about Rocky because Rocky's ship is made of Xenonite and the taumoeba will already be in his fuel line. He's going to be stranded without fuel and his life support systems will fail. As Ryland muses, "He's looking at a long, slow painful death alone." How do you say "Rocky is f***ed" in Eridian, question? 

Ryland must make a Sophie's choice: return to Earth or go and save Rocky. He only has enough fuel to choose one. Of course he saves his space buddy! I do think he made the right choice. Rocky is such a great character, you can't help but cheer for Ryland to save the alien. And of course Rocky is indepted to him and puts in a good word for him on his planet where Ryland will be a guest for the unforeseeable future. He's even pretty much fluent in Eridian by now! 

And yes, Earth is saved too He was able to send the taumoeba to fight off the astrophage and Earth will be spared, hurray! The one thing I don't like is that we see an older Stratt watching the videos Grace sent and he's talking about Rocky and showing footage of him. In the book, nobody ever found out about Rocky (because there was no video diary!) and I kind of liked it that way. 

I enjoyed the movie and I implore everyone who also liked it to check out the book, especially the audiobook. It is definitely worth the 16 hours.

Survival of the Fittest

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Director: Sam Raimi

Cast: Rachel McAdams, Dylan O'Brien, Dennis Haysbert, Edyll Ismail

Released: January 30, 2026

If Cast Away were a horror movie and it was two people stranded on a desert island instead of one, it would be this movie. I'm not really a horror movie person (as you've probably noted from my lack of horror movie reviews), but I am a Survivor person and the main character is a fan of the reality show. I wouldn't call myself a Survivor Super Duper Fan, but I would refer to myself as a Survivor super fan. I've watched the show since the first season in 2000 and there are only two episodes I missed while watching live: the very first episode and some random episode during season 4, Marquesas. I missed the very first episode because I didn't have any intention on watching it, but my parents saw it and told me about it and I was intrigued so I watched it and I was hooked. I can't remember why I missed the Marquesas episode. It might have been because the weather was bad and it kept getting interrupted by the stupid weather man. God, how the hell did we ever survive without streaming? I mean, seriously? How did we do it? Considering I just wrote that sentence, I would not be long if I were ever stranded on a deserted island! Anyway, back to Survivor: I could name you all the winners from all the seasons (though I don't know everybody's last name!). I even found about the Survivor connection in this from a Survivor podcast (Rob Has a Podcast). 

Linda Liddle (Rachel McAdams) is the Survivor aficionado. Actually, I would say she's more of a survival aficionado and a Survivor casual fan. She seems more interested and well-versed in the survival aspect (like making fire or building shelter) than the strategic and social aspects of the game. We see she is socially inept at work where she is the strategy and planning manger of a company where she's been promised a big promotion, but after her boss dies his swarmy son, Bradley Preston (Dylan O'Brien) takes over and gives the promotion to one of his bros. 

I do think they did a good job of making Rachel McAdams look unappealing and socially awkward. Regina George would eat Linda for breakfast. Sure she has the glasses and ponytail which is Hollywood's favorite way to make a girl look ugly, but her hair is greasy and she has this mole on the side of her face which isn't exactly a Cindy Crawford beauty mark and she doesn't even try with her appearance or her clothes. She comes off as someone with zero self awareness and it's a bit cringe. What she lacks in social skills, she makes up in her job which she is very good at, hence why she's been promised this big promotion.

When she finds out she's been passed over for the promotion and marches into Bradley's office and demands to know why, he basically tells her she's lacking the social skills. He invites her to join him and the rest of the team on a business trip to Bangkok for a meeting. (I have to be honest...I'm not exactly sure what business they're in.) 

While on the flight, Linda is working on some important document for the meeting (she's pretty much doing al the work) and has her earbuds in. When she takes them out, she can hear laughter in another part of the plane and she realizes everyone is laughing because they found her Survivor audition tape online. I'm confused: does Survivor just upload everyone's audition tape online? I highly doubt that, so how did they even find this? Did she upload her audition tape online? Judging by her horrified reaction, I highly doubt it. She hits the delete button and everything she's worked on completely disappeared in a matter of seconds. We'll never get to see how she handled that because the plane crashes into the sea and the only survivors are Linda and Bradley. Of course. 

Luckily (I guess, I mean lucky for this situation, I guess) they're not too far from an island. Bradley is unconscious and Linda sees him washed up on the shore. His leg has been badly cut and she basically saves his life. She stops the bleeding and has built a shelter that would make Boston Rob proud. (You know he'd take her to the end!) When Bradley wakes up, his first priority is to get the hell out of there and is annoyed that Linda has been making shelter and fire and catching fish and gathering rainwater. She tells him she had to do all that stuff for their survival. 

Because of his leg, he is unable to walk so he's completely dependent on Linda. He gets a little snippy with her, telling her he's the boss and she walks away leaving him without water for an entire day in the hot sun. When she comes back with water, she reminds him that the power dynamics have shifted and they're not in the office anymore and he's going to have to listen to her. He knows she's right and he needs her help especially after he's starving and tries to eat a disgusting bug that just turns into goo into his mouth (we know this because he immediately spits it out) and she's a few feet over eating sashimi in frond leaves. She's cutting it with a knife which she tells him she found washed up on the beach. 

The two of them actually do seem to get along. At first. After she's made a spear to kill a boar (a very obvious CGI boar) they're both very happy that they're eating meat and she makes a joke that she's the one that brought home the bacon. I'm glad they're enjoying the meat because it was quite the ordeal for her to kill this boar. She had to stab it about three or four times before it finally died and it was coughing up phlegm and blood in her face. 

While Linda is exploring one day in another part of the beach, she sees a small boat and is about to call out to it, but then quickly hides from the boat, obviously not ready to be rescued. This is a place where she can thrive and she's not ready to go back home. I have to say, if I were stranded on a desert island with someone and I later found out they saw a boat and didn't say call out for help, I would be a little ticked off! 

When Bradley's leg gets better, Linda suggests they go for a walk for him to exercise his leg. She takes him up and around this very precarious path that is carved out on a cliff face. It is very steep and very narrow and very high up. I wouldn't want to walk that with two good legs, sheesh! There is no way you would get me to walk that path, I'll take the long way around, thank you very much! Bradley is hobbling around with a stick as a cane and I thought for sure (even though we were only halfway through the movie) Linda was going to push him off or he would fall to his death. But instead, she points out to a couple of large rocks in the distance and tells him to stay clear of that part of the island because it's covered with poison ivy or some kind of vegetation that will cause his skin to flare up. I knew she was lying and didn't want him there because that was the area of the island where she spotted the boat. I just assumed that was a part o
f the island where a boat could get close enough to land. She also points out some berries that they can eat and those that would be poisonous to them. When they're walking back across the cliff face, there's a piece of rock that's jutting out and when Linda steps on it, she falls. Of course I gasp! Bradley is able to grab her and pulls her up. They are high up! Again, I would avoid walking this cliff at all costs! 

One evening, Linda makes "wine" by fermenting some tropical fruits and they get drunk. I'm not really sure how she made it because she just tells him she made "toilet wine" (yuck!) and she had it ready. I think the script just wanted her to have an excuse to be drunk so she could reveal some dark secrets about herself. She tells Bradley she was married once, about ten years ago, but her husband died. He had been an alcoholic who wasn't a very nice person and whenever he got drunk, Linda would hide his keys so he couldn't drive. One time when he was being particularly cruel to her and asked for his keys, she took them out of her purse and laid them on the table. She tells Bradley that she poured her husband his last drink then after he took the keys, she never saw him alive again. 

Bradley is itching to get off the island. He has a beautiful fiancée, Zuri, back home, who Linda had met because when she barged into Bradley's office, Zuri came in a few minutes later wearing her humongous diamond engagement ring. He says it's been two weeks and there's been no sign of help so he wants to build a raft and find a ship, but Linda quickly nixes this idea. Again, if I were out there with her and found out she had already seen a boat, I would have throttled her. I don't think Linda is against the idea of making a raft for the same reason I would be: the ocean is a vast place. Trying to find a ship would be nearly impossible and the ocean is no place for a makeshift raft. But I'm guessing Linda just wants them to stay on the island. 

Bradley tells her he's made dinner for her. He wanted to do something nice for her since she's been making island life so easy. His intentions become clear when after a few bites, she collapses on the sand. He runs into the jungle and seconds later he reappears, dragging a wooden raft behind him. He shouts, "F*** you, Linda!" and hops onto his rickety raft. I honestly don't know what he's thinking. It's pitch black and the waves are rough. He's okay at first; the first two or three waves are rather gentle, but then the next wave he hits is large and crashes over him. He's relieved because his raft is still intact, but that doesn't last long and the next wave (even bigger than the one before) completely demolishes his raft. He really didn't put any thought in his escape plan. He is soon taken under the water. Linda, who has been poisoned by the berries she told him they couldn't eat, is throwing them up. She pulls Bradley from the water and while attempting to save him, keeps throwing up the berries in his face, so every thirty seconds this yellow goo keeps getting on his face. It was really gross, but also really funny. I mean, he kind of deserved it. She tells him he didn't serve her enough berries to kill her.

There's some tension between them the next morning and the tension will only rise. She offers him some octopus the next morning which he takes. Personally, I thought it looked disgusting You could see the tentacles. I feel confident that even if I were starving, there are some things I wouldn't eat, that included. She tells him she's still feeling queasy from the poisonous berries, so her stomach can't handle anything right now. It doesn't take long before he realizes something is wrong after he takes a bite of the (absolutely disgusting looking) octopus. (And it's not just that it looks disgusting, it looks like it would be chewy! Ugh! I guess what I'm saying is that I don't buy that anyone would voluntarily eat that!) Linda calmly informs him that he's just eaten blue-ringed octopus that has paralyzed him. She tells him it's not deadly and the effects will wear off in a couple of hours. She adds that he won't want to feel "this" and we see her put the knife in the fire to disinfect it. Immediately, I'm having images of Misery and I'm thinking for sure she's going to hack his foot off, though I'm not sure if that little knife can saw through bone, so maybe she's going to cut off a few of his toes so it's difficult to walk, therefore it will be difficult for him to try to escape again. But, no, that's not exactly what she has in mind. She tells him a story about how growing up, she used to have a dog who would keep running away and they solved that problem by having him "fixed." I was like, Oh no, she's not really going to - is she? We see a close up of his face (with tears streaming down) as she takes off his underwear (completely filthy; now I'm sure dirty underwear is the least of your worries if you're stranded on a desert island (and it certainly is the least of Bradley's worries at this very moment!), but eww! It would driver me crazy if I didn't have a clean change of underwear/clothes and had to wear the same thing days on end! :::shudder::: Again, another reason why I wouldn't be able to hack it alone on a deserted island!), then takes the knife. Even though I don't have the same anatomy as Bradley, I was squirming during this scene. We see blood cover his face (ughgughgh!) and Linda jokes that he's "a bleeder". Then she holds up a dead rat and it becomes apparent where the blood came from. She tells him the next time he tries to pull a stunt like the one from last night, "it won't be a rat." Yeah, I think both Bradley and the audience are relieved that she didn't go through with castrating him! 

No surprise, Bradley gives her the silent treatment after this! 

Okay, I may have bit a little bit spoiler-y in some of the things I already shared, but trust me, I'm about to spoil some major things so if you haven't seen this movie yet and do not want to be spoiled, don't read beyond this!

Spoilers ahoy! You have been warned! Don't say I didn't warn you! 

Linda is back in the area where she first saw a boat and lo and behold, she spots another boat! But this time she recognizes one of the people on it. It's Zuri, Bradley's fiancee (it's hard to miss that giant rock on her hand!) and she's with a Thai man who brought her on the boat. Linda doesn't have time to hide. Zuri is thrilled she's found her. She tells Linda the officials gave up the search a while ago, but she never gave up. I feel like the odds are one in a million that you would find someone like that. Unless there was only one island in that area where they could have washed up to, but I highly doubt that's the case. 

Immediately I know this is not good for Zuri and the Thai man. Zuri has already spotted Linda. We all know Linda doesn't want to be rescued (at least not yet!) and she can't just tell her two visitors to go on their merry way. When Zuri asks about Bradley, Linda tells her he's doing great and offers to take him to her. Linda has her handmade woven backpack with her (seriously, she could make a killing on Etsy selling those!) that she has put bananas and other fruit in. The man tells her there's plenty of food on the boat and she doesn't need to take that back, but she tells him she still wants to take it back. This probably should have been the first red flag for him and Zuri, but I can understand them for overlooking that. They're probably thinking Linda is just used to gathering and bringing back food; perhaps she's hasn't quite grasped the fact that she's being rescued!

However, when Linda asks them if anyone else knows that they're there, that should have been a huge red flag! Also, whenever somebody asks you this questions, even if it isn't true, always say yes! This goes into my life rules I learned from movies along with never help a stranger haul stuff into a van or never help somebody find their dog. They tell her exactly what she wants to hear: that nobody else knows they are here. 

Linda takes them on the perilous trek across the dangerous cliff face. Zuri does not seem like the type of girl who would be okay with this so I find it a little unrealistic she doesn't have qualms about this, but she must have been so relieved that she found her fiancé that she doesn't care she has to cross this scary path to get to him. Right before they get to the unsteady part of the path (you know, the one where Linda fell!), Linda bends down to tie her shoe (or pretend to tie!) and tells the others to go around her. They do and Zuri is the first to step on that piece of the path. Down she goes, but the man is able to grab her. He pleads for Linda to help him because he can't pull Zuri up on his own. 

The next scene is back at the camp. We didn't see the outcome, but considering that neither are with her, I think we all know what happened. It's this part of the movie where it's hard to root for Linda anymore; she just killed two innocent people. This is definitely weighing heavily on her conscious because she just sits around, not wanting to do anything. She tells Bradley she's sick and needs a day off from gathering food. That night, she hears a female voice moaning her name and when she walks towards the beach, she sees a tall, gangly figure emerge from the water. It's Zuri, hunched over, walking towards her asking her why she did it. I'm thinking, There's no way she could have survived that fall...and as soon as I think that, we see Linda wake up from her nightmare. But wait...she's still dreaming because we get a jump scare of Zuri as a zombie, THEN Linda finally wakes up. We will see what happened on the cliff later. Linda grabbed a rock and smashed the guy's head with it and he and Zuri fell to their deaths.

The next morning (or maybe it's a few days later...I'm kinda cloudy on how much time has passed), Bradley has seen a boar and decides he's gong to hunt it since it's been awhile since they ate meat. Ha! Good luck with that, I say. Linda had a hard enough time killing one and she is definitely more adapt at island life than he is. Bradley is sneaking up on the boar who is on the beach, sniffing at something and digging around at the sand. The boar hears Bradley and runs off. Bradley sees a hand sticking out of the sand with the glint of a giant diamond ring blinding him. He runs over to it, knowing immediately whose hand it is. He confronts Linda about it and she has to come clean and tell him that Zuri was on the island and that she accidentally slipped on the cliff. It's obvious he doesn't believe her. He asks her why she didn't tell him, which is a good point. 

This results in the two of them getting into a pretty nasty fight which you know was eventually going to happen. Linda had always kept the knife close to her, but while she was sleeping, Bradley had taken it. She runs into the woods and he follows her. I don't know how she had time, but she took off her shoes and unlaced them and when he found her shoes by a tree, she pops up behind him and starts to strangle him. He takes a big chunk of her hair and yanks so hard a part of her scalp falls off. Ughhh - ugh, no, just no. They continue to viciously fight until he runs off. He's headed towards the direction she told him not to go and instead of following him, she takes another way. (Presumably over the dangerous cliff which is a short cut.) 

Bradley keeps on running until he stumbles upon a huge house! Okay, that was a twist I did not see coming! Now I see why Linda didn't want him in that part of the island - it had nothing to do with seeing a boat! He runs up to the house and bangs on the door and window, but it's obvious no one's home. When he looks around there kitchen, he finds a fridge stocked with water and he notices there are no knives in the drawer. Hmm, I wonder where Linda got that knife! 

The movie goes back to the moment Linda saw the boat and this time we watch her watch the boat dock at the house and two men get out and stock the house with essentials (probably all that bottled water). She's close enough to see them punch in the numbers of to the door and now she's able to come and go as she pleases. Apparently some billionaire lives there and didn't notice when she disabled the security. She is talking to Bradley over the intercom. 

He walks cautiously around the house, trying to find her. He's in a room when she rounds the corner with a gun in tow. He holds up his hands in surrender and tells Linda his bs lie about how much he loves her and wants to stay on this island with her. She seems to believe him because she's crying and softening her defenses. I felt this was a little unrealistic that she would actually believe him after all that's happened. But then she notices a statue of a bull or something and it's missing its horns and she knows he has them. Bradley somehow gets the gun and when he turns it on her and pulls the trigger, nothing happens. She overpowers him, grabs a golf club and swings it, but before it reaches his head, we are now on a golf course with Linda dressed in a cute golf outfit with a stylish pony tail and visor. We learn that she was the "only survivor" who was rescued and has written a book about the ordeal. She tells the woman interviewing her, "No help is coming, so you'd better start saving yourself." 

I like the last shot of the movie which is her driving away in her convertible and she gives the camera - and the audience - a knowing look. I bet she would have been a shoo in to be on Survivor after all that! 

Sam Raimi directed this. He's probably best known for directing the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movies, but I really loved A Simple Plan. I haven't seen it in a while, but I remember thinking it was quite good. I'll have to review that movie in the future. 

This Stitch Has a Glitch

Lilo and Stitch  

Director: Dean Fleischer Camp

Cast: Maia Kealoha, Sydney Agudong, Zach Galifianakis, Billy Magnussen, Tia Carrere, Courtney B. Vance, Hannah Waddington, Chris Sanders

Released: May 23, 2025

Since I already reviewed the animated movie from 2002, I thought I would point out the differences in the live action movie and what worked and what didn't work. For the most part, the movie (like most live action Disney movies that are a take on their animated counterpart) follows the original almost exactly, with just a few tweaks. 

In my other review, I mentioned that Chris Sanders and Dean DuBlois, the directors of the original (and more superior) Lilo and Stitch also directed How To Train Your Dragon from 2010. Chris Sanders (remember, he's also the person who came up with the story for Lilo and Stitch) returns as the voice of Stitch. I bring this up because How To Train Your Dragon was also made into a live action movie that came out about a month after this one and that one was directed by Dean DuBlois. While I like the animated HTTYD better (than its live action counterpart), I think the live action HTTYD works better than the live action Lilo and Stitch. If neither of these movies existed in their animated forms (how sad!) and we only saw them in their live action forms, I could see a world where HTTYD could exist in live action without having an animated counterpart. But if you were to watch live action Lilo and Stitch without any context of the animated movie, it would just be odd. I was really invested in the story of these two orphaned sisters and how they would make ends meet, but when Stitch or the other aliens are on screen, it almost just takes me out of it. I think the 2002 movie works better because you can get away more with the absurdity of the story because it's an animation. When it's live action, you notice the absurdity a lot more and it doesn't fit within the world. If that makes sense.  

My TL;DR sentence: I think both Lilo and Stitch and How To Train Your Dragon work better as animated movies, but HTTYD also works as a live action movie while Lilo and Stitch just feels odd as a live action film. 

(Remember, I'm only comparing the two because both live action adaptions came out within a month of each other and the animated movies were directed by the same guys.)

Obviously, I need to compare and contrast the two titular characters. The gist of both of them is still the same: Lilo, an orphaned girl, befriends this strange "dog" she names Stitch. I know this may sound strange, but one of the things I noticed is that in the animated movie, Lilo and Stitch are the same height (Lilo is very short!). This is not the case in this movie; after all, it would be weird as hell if they made Stitch the same size as a six-year-old. (In the animated movie, I wasn't sure exactly how old Lilo was supposed to be, but in this movie, we get confirmation that she's six.) I feel this makes them almost seen as equals in the animated film while Stitch just feels like her pet (which, to be fair, is what he's supposed to be) in the newer movie. 

Lilo is played by newcomer Maia Kealoha and while she is very cute, she wasn't the best at acting. Look, the girl was probably only seven or eight when she filmed this so I wasn't expecting an Oscar-winning performance, but some of her lines sounded really stilted. I'm thinking in particular of the scene where she and Stitch are in this motorized child's vehicle  (which Stitch hijacked from some poor girl around Lilo's age) driving around the island (it's a Big Wheel in the animated movie!) and Lilo says, "Don't you love living on an island with no big cities? It's just miles and miles of water." The line reading just sounds so stiff; it's almost like they told her what to say right before the scene and she said it, but it came out like a line. Which, technically, it was, but the secret of acting is to make people believe you're not acting! In the animated movie, Lilo has a very similar line, only she says, "It's nice living on an island with no big cities." They probably should have just had live action Lilo (heh...Live Action Lilo...that sounds like a superhero name) say the exact same line and just try to capture Daveigh Chase's natural line reading. 

When Stitch lands on Earth, he comes across an outdoor wedding where "Uptown Funk" is playing and spotting a piece of cake on a table, Stitch uses a golf cart to transport himself there.

Uh...damn, I just realized I'm doing the same thing I did in my review of the originial movie where I refer to Stitch as "Stitch" before he's given the name. Just go with it. It's hard not to call him Stitch, you know?

Anyway, we get this ridiculous scene where the bride and groom are about to do a Dirty Dancing-type dance and before the bride leaps into the groom's arms, Stitch goes flying and ends up in his arms instead and of course the guys is freaked out. I think I would be too if this strange blue furry creature landed on me! Stitch starts running under the tables and people are screaming and freaked out (but not freaked out enough in my opinion! Like what do they think this odd creature is? Surely they know it's nothing of this world!). Someone is trying to smack him with a broom which made me chuckle. I did think it was insane that everyone at this HUGE wedding is looking for him and it seems to take awhile before someone finally notices that he's sitting in the punch bowl (EWWW) and then he jumps into the cake as the grand finale. If I were the bride, I would be PISSED! I will say the image of him having four pieces of cake in each of his hands is pretty funny.

We saw at least one person taking photos of him while he was being chased at the wedding. You would think this would go viral, but it never does. I don't really understand the point of this whole sequence (aside from the silly shenanigan) especially because Stitch will still get run over by a truck (in this case it's a trolley).

The live action movie introduces us to some new characters (and has subtracted at least one pretty big (no pun intended) character. I was okay with these new characters because they made sense in the context of the movie. The first is that Cobra Bubbles is not the social worker. Don't worry, he's still in the movie. Instead the social worker is a woman named Mrs. Kekoa and she's played by Tia Carrere, who was the original voice of Nani, Lilo's older sister. I love that they incorporated someone from the original movie into this one so I'm okay with the change and it was fun seeing the two Nanis interact. 

When Mrs. Kekoa (original Nani) visits the sisters for the first time, they do the similar scene in the 2002 movie where Nani (Sydney Agudong) asks the social worker to wait a minute (because Lilo has locked her out of the house) and she runs into the house (after pushing the back door so hard that the chain keeping it locked breaks) and the camera remains on the social workers as we hear some crashing and the record scratching and Lilo exclaiming, "Hey, don't touch that!" before the Elvis song stop playing. I appreciate that they try to replicate what they do in the animated movie, but it was just done so much better in the 2002 movie. It might have to do with the fact that it is probably easier to convey in an animated movie. 

Nani asks Mrs. Kekoa if she would like anything to drink and when she requests tea, Nani puts Capri Sun in a tea cup and microwaves it. Yuck! I did laugh when Mrs. Kekoa mentions the tea is "pretty sweet" and by the end of their meeting, she knows that it's just heated up Capri Sun. 

She tells Nani that things don't look good and that they "have a new director coming into town next week." When she mentioned that, I figured this must be Cobra Bubbles. She wants to come up with some goals with Nani for her and Lilo to achieve by then. These goals include cleaning the house (including laundry and stocking the fridge), paying all the bills, and filing for health insurance for both her and Lilo. Mrs. Kekoa wants Nani to get all these done by Friday. I'm not sure what day it is now, but I hope it's at least Monday to give her some time to get all this done. 

Another new character is the neighbor lady who almost acts like a grandmother figure to the two girls. At first I thought she was David's mom, but I don't think that's the case. She just seems to know David. But I was fine with this authority figure because that means at least the girls had one adult looking out for them. Although there are a few changes concerning her that irritated me. 

After her visit with Mrs. Kekoa, Nani is chatting with her neighbor and this is when we find out that Nani got accepted to her "dream school" which is UCSD which she wants to go there for marine biology? Uh, do they not have marine biology department at a Hawaiian school? It's Hawaii....I mean, you would think. Her neighbor encourages Nani to attend college, but Nani claims she can't go because she has to watch Lilo. Do these girls not have grandparents or aunts or uncles that can help out? I guess not. This was never really touched on in the animated movie either. It does seem pretty unfair for this eighteen-year-old girl to have to become her sister's mother as well....and we know that Lilo prefers her as a sister than a mom. 

In the animated movie, when Jumba and Pleakley are sent to Earth, they "disguise" themselves by wearing clothes and trying to hide their alien features (which doesn't exactly work), but because we're dealing with the (literal) real world in this movie, Jumba and Pleakley disguise themselves as humans. I'm okay with this change because while it was absurd and funny in the 2002 movie, it wouldn't work here. Even though we're dealing with a universe where aliens do exist, this movie does try to be as realistic as it can. However, the way they come by their disguises just baffled me.  

The two aliens are wearing trench coats and have scarfs and/or handkerchiefs wrapped around their faces, and are wearing big sunglasses and straw hats. They're walking down a busy tourist street with a "Federation-certified cloning device", looking for their prey. They're completely covered up,...except for their tails and Jumba's huge heavy elephant-thick legs. (Don't ask me how nobody noticed THAT!) They look absolutely ridiculous...there's no way they could keep up that disguise without looking suspicious. 

They find two guys (Zach Galifianakis and Billy Magnussen) walking towards them who "look like best friends just like us" according to Pleakley. He knocks over one of the guy's golf bags and helps him with it. He touches the human's arm with his green tentacle and the guys doesn't even seem to notice. Yeah, I call bs. This allows him to become cloned and Jumba does the same thing with the other guy. They have now become those humans...but what happened to the two guys? Are they just laying in the middle of the sidewalk? Did their bodies disappear? Have Pleakley and Jumba completely inhabited these humans? Yeah, they didn't really explain that very well. As far as I know, they just killed those two guys. It was amusing trying to watch them "walk" because they're not used to having human legs, though I would argue at least Pleakley had legs more similar to a human's while Jumba had these huge tree trunks for legs. I have to say, it does feel off Jumba not having a Russian accent, though if you think about it, aliens should not have any accent from this world, much less be able to speak English! When they check into the hotel, they're acting all weird, asking for a "hot tube" and when the receptionist asks where they're from they both reply "Earth" and Jumba adds, "We both grew up in Earth." Wait a sec...aren't you supposed to show some sort of identification (like a driver's license) when you're checking into a hotel? The way these two are acting, I'm surprised the receptionist wasn't a bit more suspicious. These two would have been red flags to me, but they just let it slide for the plot of the movie. 

Later, they see something on the news about a trolley that ran over an unusual creature and that it is recovering at the animal rescue. Video footage of Stitch taken at the wedding is shown, but I still think the whole wedding scene was unnecessary.  

The way Lilo acquires Stitch is a little bit different than the animated movie. She still gets him from the animal shelter, but it's her neighbor who takes her there while Nani is at work. They're actually at some outdoor market and the animal shelter is nearby and Lilo asks if she can look at the dogs. 

Before Lilo arrived, Stitch had escaped from his cage and went outside where he sees a sandwich in the garbage and when he goes to gobble it up, darts are shot at him. Jumba and Peakley had found him because he was wearing a tracking device on his collar. He uses the garbage lid to shield himself from the darts and goes back in through the front door where he walks on the ceiling while Lilo is talking to the girl at the front desk. 

It's the neighbor that allows Lilo to get her new blue "dog" after Lilo begs her. I can't believe she just bought a dog without Nani's permission. In the animated movie, it was Nani who took her to the animal shelter with the intention of getting her a dog. I'm not sure why they changed it. Obviously, when they get home, Nani is not happy about this new pet and I don't blame her one bit. An animal is a big responsibility and they already have enough to deal with. The neighbor tells her it was her idea to get Lilo the animal because "a pet might bring some joy." Okay, then maybe suggest that to Nani first, then let Nani take Lilo to the shelter to pick out a pet. 

Stitch being a lil sh*t #1

Lilo and her new pet are in the truck with Nani who's driving to work. (Another difference is that in the animated movie they walked everywhere while in this movie they have the convince of a car.) Stitch is just being an *$$h0le and going wild, messing around with the radio, honking the horn, taking out the CD (who still listens to CDs in cars? What is this? 2002?) and throwing it out the window where it hits the car behind them. Like, Stitch was annoying in the animated movie, but he's probably even more annoying in this one. He rips the fabric of the seat with his claw and Nani comments they'll have to stitch that up.

For some reason, this causes Lilo to scream bloody murder. Nani stops the car and asks, "What?", obviously concerned that something has happened. Lilo replies, "That's his name, Stitch!" Seriously, you screamed like you were getting murdered for that? Why? Anyway, I liked how Stitch got his name in the 2002 movie better. Lilo just straight up said "His name is Stitch" and that was it. Plus she didn't scream before she thought of it, so that's a plus. I don't know why they needed a reason for his name to be Stitch. Sometimes kids just think up a name for their pet as soon as they get them. 

When Nani starts the car, she almost hits the two aliens disguised as humans who are standing on a crosswalk. They know that Stitch knows he's safe as long as he's with Lilo because they can't be attacking him if he's near humans. Nani apologizes to them for almost hitting them and as she continues to drive, Jumba throws a tracking device which attaches itself underneath the car. (Stitch must have gotten rid of the collar with the tracking device earlier.) 

Stitch being a lil sh*t #2

While they're at the outdoor restaurant where Nani works at, Stitch continues to be super annoying. He goes over to this little kiosk that serves drinks and takes out a sprayer and shouts, "Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam!" before spraying Lilo with it and they get into a soda spraying fight. This is not in the animated movie and I have no doubt they wanted to add more obnoxious things for Stitch to do because the kids watching this movie would love it. 

During a fire twirling performance, Stitch decides to grab his own pair of fire sticks and starts twirling them. When he sees a security guard running towards him, he throws the sticks and one of them lands on a table and starts a fire. This is way worse than what happened in the animated movie. (He attacks Jumba and Pleakley who are not here.) The fire is put out, but Nani's boss gives her the death stare. Nani knows who did this and turns to give Lilo and Stitch the death stare of her own. 

Stitch continues to act like an @$$hole. He tries to high five Lilo, but even she knows the situation isn't good and refuses. 

Now we see Jumba and Pleakley show up just as the sisters are leaving. There is a funny scene of Jumba trying to drive a golf cart and he doesn't know how to start it because "there are no instruments." 

It's interesting that after animated Nani gets fired from her job, she doesn't blame it on Lilo, but when real girl Lilo makes a remark that Nani didn't even like that job, Nani snaps, "I don't want to hear it." (Though I certainly don't blame her for being pissed!) 

Stitch being a lil sh*t #3

I've already mentioned that they made Stitch way more annoying in this movie. Well, remember how bad he was the first time he's introduced to the house in the animated movie? He might be even worse during this scene in this movie. They try to give him a bath, but he ends up in the toilet, then goes to the kitchen and wipes his bum across the floor, ewww. He turns on the stove and he smacks Nani in the face (twice!) with the freezer door when he's holding on to the fridge handle and she's trying to grab him. Lilo pulls the "Ohana means family" guilt trip on her and that's how Stitch stays, but if I were Nani, I would tell Lilo, "F Ohana, we're taking this terror mutt back to the pound!" 

We do see Scrump (Lilo's ragdoll) when Lilo shows her to Stitch and tells him, "You can play with Scrump, but be nice." 

Okay, remember when Mrs. Kekoa told Nani that a new director was coming next week and I thought it would be Cobra Bubbles? Well, I was wrong. When we meet Special Agent Bubbles (Courtney B. Vance), he's in a field studying an odd vessel that crashed in a tree (clearly the spaceship Stitch crashed). He's with other agents and one of them tells him, "There's no sign of a pilot, no tracks, no trails." It turns out he bugged the home of the sisters (not sure when that happened) and when he heard a social worker would be coming to the house, he asked an agent for the social worker and remarked, "I'm going undercover." 

At the beach, during the surfing scene, Jumba and Peakley shoot darts at Stitch who falls into the water. He keeps scrambling on top of Lilo's head making her sink so he won't. While all this is going on, Cobra is on the beach and sees that he's not the only one after Stitch. 

Once Lilo gets back to shore, there is a big difference where Nani tells someone to call an ambulance after Lilo spits out some water. I'm not really 100% sure about water safety, but I feel like she's probably okay and the ambulance wasn't needed? Maybe? IDK? I mean, she spit out the water and is breathing okay. 

Looks like I'm right because at the hospital, the doctor pretty much tells Nani that Lilo's going to be okay. Stitch is there too, sitting on David's lap and I'm thinking, They're allowed to bring this animal in the hospital when the doctor asks, "Is that a-" and David says, "It's a service animal." Service animal, my ass! When the doctor mentions she can go up front where they can run her insurance, Nani has a look of horror on her face because there is no insurance. Again, why did you call the ambulance and bring her to the hospital when she was breathing on her own two seconds after getting pulled from the water? 

She must have called Mrs. Kekoa because in the next scene we see her sitting with Nani in the hospital hall, outside of Lilo's room. She tells her, "There's a way that the state will pay for all of this, but it means you have to official relinquish guardianship of Lilo." When Lilo is released from the hospital, Nani tells her they're going to "have to make some changes." 

There's a sweet moment where Lilo and Nani are cuddled on the hammock together singing a song while Nani strums a ukulele and Nani tells her, "I want you to know, whatever happens, I love you so much much."  While this is going on, Stitch leaves and ends up back at the animal shelter. 

The Ugly Duckling storyline is not in this movie which felt a little jarring since in the original film he feels lost like the duck and it was a great analogy. Instead, Lilo shows him a photo book of her family when her parents were alive. I mention this because in the animated film Lilo tells Stitch can go if he wants and he grabs the book before leaving.

The next morning, Mrs. Kekoa and Mr. Bubbles have come to get Lilo, but when Nani goes in her room, she isn't there. Instead, she is outside looking for Stitch. It's interesting that in the animated movie she gives permission for Stitch to go, so there's a big difference there. 

Like the 2002 movie, the Councilwoman checks in with Pleakley and Jumba from time to time. She is not happy that 626 hasn't been captured yet and basically gives Agent Pleakley the go ahead to arrest Jumba and bring him back to Turo, but Jumba has other plans. I mentioned earlier a pretty major character is missing and that is Gantu the humongous elephant/shark-like alien. Instead, they make Jumba the Big Bad of the movie. I don't love this change, but I do understand why they did it. When Lilo eventually finds Stitch at the animal shelter where he's back in his cage and after a heartfelt conversation, Jumba enters and chases them to Lilo's house. 

During the house raid, in front of Lilo, Jumba tells Stitch the only reason he manipulated  Lilo into choosing him at the animal shelter was for his own protection and if does care about Lilo, then he'll leave her here. Stitch surrenders and lets Jumba put the tracking collar on him and follows him to his spaceship. I should also mention that Jumba is now in his alien form during all this. 

We're about an hour and ten minutes into the movie at this point and I can't help but notice that Stitch knows quite a bit of English...more than he did in the animated movie. I don't remember him speaking in full sentences; I just remembered him maybe uttering a word or two in English to make his point so the humans could understand him, but here it seems like he's just having full blown conversations. 

So now we're to the part where the house has collapsed and Nani, David, Cobra, and the neighbor lady find the debris. Pleakley appears from a pile of rubble and tells them Lilo's not there, that she's on the space ship. That's another slight difference, In the 2002 movie, Gantu captured Lilo and Stitch and put them in the capsule attached to his space craft. Here, Jumba's only interested in Stitch and Lilo sneaks on the space ship. I don't remember how Pleakley knows this...I guess he saw her? 

This whole scene in the animated movie is pretty insane with Stitch trying to save Lilo and crashing and hijacking a semi truck and driving it into a volcano....the 2025 movie doesn't do any of that...probably because it's insane and would be a bitch to do all that. That said, it's still pretty crazy, just not crashing into a volcano crazy. 

Just before Jumba is about to put an end to Stitch, Lilo crawls out from her hiding space and distracts him long enough for Stitch to escape from his constraints. Lilo is way too laid back for the situation she's put herself into. She's not scared at all. She's calling Jumba names like Pizza Face and making cracks about him having a disco ball in his space ship. (What was that all about anyway?) Maybe she feels confident because she has Stitch on her side, but she doesn't seem to realize what she's gotten herself into. 

Jumba falls out of the ship and the vessel crashes into the ocean. Lilo is stuck under some wreckage and Stitch is able to lift it up (remember, he's super strong) so she can escape. She tries to save Stitch, but he's too heavy. I think one thing this movie does better than the animated movie is remind us that Stitch becomes super heavy when he gets wet because his molecular density is too great. In the animated movie, it's easy to forget about that because it's only mentioned once in the beginning and when David rescues him after the surfing incident, he doesn't seem to have any issue. Of course, in this movie, live action David does the same and doesn't seem to have any issues so David must have some super strength for a skinny guy. 

Nani puts Lilo on David's surfboard and Lilo begs her to save Stitch and reminds her about Ohana and asks, "What about nobody gets left behind?" They're probably about a half mile (or maybe closer to shore). Nani dives down and scoops up Stitch and walks across the ocean floor holding him like he's an anvil. This reminded me of that one Survivor challenge (don't ask me what season, but probably one in the late teens or early twenties) where the players had to dive down to the ocean floor and carry a heavy chest to the shore...of course they would come up with air and dive down again while Nani seems to do this in one go. I'm impressed she can hold her breath for that long. I'm also a little  skeptical she was able to do that. 

She makes it to the beach and they try to revive him, but it doesn't look like he's going to make it and there's sad music and everyone's sad. Like, who are we kidding here? It's f***ing Lilo and Stitch. We know he doesn't die in the original (spoiler alert!) so we know he'll make it. This felt a little like emotional manipulation.

Then the Councilwoman arrives to take 626 and we're back in sync with the 2002 movie, the only difference here is that they take out Stitch belonging to Lilo because she owns him since she paid for him. I guess we never saw her pay for her new pet in this movie (I'm guessing her neighbor bought him for her) so instead Cobra and Pleakley make a deal with her that Pleakley will watch over Stitch and Cobra will make sure this will never be found out and she seem satisfied with this. I guess they forgot about all those videos taken of Stitch at that wedding. 

There are a few loose ends that we need to tie up. The neighbor lady (you can probably tell that I don't remember her name) has offered to take in Lilo so she'll still be next door. Wouldn't have this been easier if she had just done this a long time ago? This just seems way too easy and it's a bit dumb they didn't think of this before. 

Nani ends up going to college in San Diego to study marine biology and after the ending montage set to "Burning Love" (it's not Elvis or Wynona singing it; it's two kids who are Bruno Mars' nephews (now I get why they had "Uptown Funk" playing during the wedding scene) and let's just say these kids didn't inherit their uncle's talent...I'll just leave it at that. 

The very last scene of the movie, we see Lilo talking to Nani on FaceTime and Nani tells her to "hold on a sec" and disappears from the frame. Lilo is asking her questions about her dorm room and college life, but Nani isn't responding and Lilo asks her where she went. We then see a light and a hand reaches out to touch Lilo's foot. It's Nani behind her and she's come through a portal with one of the ray guns the aliens brought with them. Oh, did I not mention these? They're laser guns you can shoot and it can make you go from one place to another in an instant. It's insane that the girls were able to keep this and I am 110% positive the only reason they had Nani go to college in San Diego was so they could have this asinine scene. 

It felt like they were trying to shove Stitch in our faces, like "Look how cute he is! You came to see this movie because you love Stitch!" There's even a scene where Pleakley mentions to Jumba how cute or adorable Stitch is (I can't remember the exact context) and it just felt like it was pandering to the Stitch Stans (heh). I don't even think this Stitch was even cute. I love animated Stitch, but CGI Stitch is f***ing annoying as hell. 

Skip this one and watch the animated movie.