Movies Opening This Week: Two Sequels Too Many

After success comes the part where makers have to exercise a certain amount of restraint. Do you rush out a dumb follow-up, kill the idea of a franchise, or take the time refining an idea for a sequel, even if it takes years?

Shrek Forever After
I'm not a big fan of the Shrek series, especially when the third one came out, and while Dreamworks cleaned a bit of its act with Kung Fu Panda and How to Train Your Dragon, this final hurrah to its cash cow doesn't really justify the good cred it's been getting lately.

Still, the animation company did take three years (more pre-production) to realize this final installment so maybe there will be something about this one that'll get the franchise going out with a bang.

Shrek is suddenly cursed and Far Far Away suddenly becomes this alternate reality that has Fiona going rogue, Puss going fat, and Donkey not even remembering him. A little interesting, but that doesn't really say much.

There's just something about the film that makes me happy, and it's only due to the fact that it's finally going away. I'm getting quite sick of the characters, and Mike Myers in general. The initial 20% rating of the movie in Rotten Tomatoes doesn't help one bit.

Maybe we can find solace in a little SNL movie called,

MacGruber
Who would've thought that a fairly brief recurring sketch in Saturday Night Live would be the sketch that would be popular enough to warrant a movie?

Will Forte marks the theatrical debut of the obvious MacGyver spoof character MacGruber to some rather surprisingly pleasant reviews, and to be quite frank, I find the trailers funny as well.

Even if it is quite juvenile, I actually find much about the conquest of MacGruber versus the megavillain Dieter von Cunth (yeah, that sophomoric) quite funny, and I don't want to make rash judgments here but this might quite likely be the first SNL movie I'll ever enjoy in my life.