Battleship (Available March 1)

Remember that period in the late ’00s and early ’10s when a whole bunch of blockbuster movies based on toys were coming out? All I remember about this one is that Rihanna was in it.

Despicable Me 2 (Available March 1)

“Disney adults” get a lot of bad press. But adults obsessed with the Despicable Me movies are even weirder, in my opinion. I guess the Minions are funny? Call me an ivory tower elite if you must.

Freddy Vs. Jason (Available March 1)

This movie has aged very poorly. But as long as I’m indulging in some nostalgia for the good old days of DVD, I should mention that the Freddy Vs. Jason disc came with “Jump To A Death,” “Kill All,” and “Random Death” options on the menu. And that “You wouldn’t steal a car” font in the trailer embedded above? Classic.

Free Willy 4: Escape From Pirate’s Cove (Leaving March 31)

We didn’t even review this one on The A.V. Club, but can you believe they made four fucking Free Willy movies?

Part four went direct to video, which makes it mildly interesting in a “how the sausage gets made” type of way that it’s streaming at all. Often, when a movie is inexplicably unavailable in a certain format, it’s because the producers of said film didn’t account for future technologies when negotiating and parceling out the rights. This is something I learned from the producer of Rad!, and just one example of the type of knowledge that will make me completely useless in the post-apocalypse.

King Of Thieves (Available March 1)

This one didn’t ring any bells when I first saw it on the list. But then I looked it up and found that not only had I seen this movie, I had written about it. That happens sometimes when you’ve been reviewing one or more films a week for seven years—the other day, I was cleaning out my desk at the office and found ticket stubs for several titles I forgot existed.

Anyway, I gave King Of Thieves a D, calling it “an embarrassing misstep for its stars, its director, and its writer.”

Lee Daniels’ The Butler (Available March 17)

Whenever the subject of my impending departure from The A.V. Club comes up in conversation, the first thing people do is ask if I’m going to stay in the media business. Any sane person would run in the opposite direction, given the low pay, unstable job prospects, and clueless executives who chase algorithms at the expense of journalistic standards. But I’m going to be honest with you, person who clicked through to slide No. 7: I have been doing this for so long, I have no idea what else to do with myself.

(The second thing people do is complain that we have too many slideshows on A.V. Club nowadays.)

London Has Fallen (Available March 1)

This movie’s a piece of shit, but it’s an enjoyable piece of shit. Back in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, Dowd and I recorded a podcast comparing this godawful sequel’s predecessor, Olympus Has Fallen, to White House Down. It was an audio version of the Premise Dome, an idea everyone on the staff thought was great but never really had time to develop to its full potential.

Texas Chainsaw 3D (Available March 1)

I give Dowd shit for being a Nightmare reboot apologist, but I have to admit that I enjoyed this late-period Texas Chainsaw sequel more than I initially let on. When Alexandra Daddario throws Leatherface a chainsaw and says, “Do your thing, cuz?” Now that’s entertainment!

Wild Wild West (Leaving March 31)

Well, here we are. If you told me two years ago that my last published piece for The A.V. Club would be a slideshow, I’d say, “We don’t do slideshows. Readers don’t like them.” How things change. But it’s been a weird, wonderful ride nevertheless.

I’m really not inclined to get too maudlin, given the way things have played out over the past couple of months. But I will say this. I’ve been thinking quite a bit about the current movement to reframe work, and the perils of tying your self-image to your career the way that I have over the past seven years. (If you’re also in a period of soul searching, I recommend reading Work Won’t Love You Back by Sarah Jaffe.)

But even when this job has pushed me past the brink of burnout, I’ve enjoyed the act of writing itself. I wouldn’t have stuck around as long as I have if I didn’t. And I’ve tried very hard to pass that satisfaction on to you: To craft words that bring you pleasure, to be honest about what I think, to introduce you to new favorites, and hopefully give you a fresh perspective on the media you love. That, at the end of my time here, makes it all worth it.

I still hate making slideshows, though.