Into Darkness, that colon-less second installment of New Trek kicking off the summer season is a lot of things, including plentifully humorous, bombastic, well-designed, and confused about its purpose. Like the villain that menaced us from all those teaser posters, Into Darkness makes us wonder what, ultimately, it’s up to. Identity is a key factor to wonder about as, two movies in, even casual Trekkie patience is worn thin by a stream of visual and idealistic incursions that belong to other films. Make no mistake; Into Darkness is a good popcorn-crunching experience, swift on its feet and full of action and jokes. It’s just not, like its predecessor, much of a Star Trek film.

Ensign, take us to SPOILERS.

“The world is getting weird,” declares faithful former bodyguard Happy (Jon Favreau) early in the first act of Iron Man 3. He’s not wrong. Everybody’s favorite genius billionare playboy philanthropist is back for a fourth round, facing a changing world, and a changing self. After the invasion of New York, and the start of the Avengers, there’s plenty on the table for Mr. Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) to handle, from terrorists to his mercurial relationship to his own obsessions. Fortunately for us, though, IM3 doesn’t take too steep of a dive into Tony’s demons. It stays at a neat cruising altitude: charming, effusive, with requisite explosions aplenty. Much like the most used and battered of Tony Stark’s suits, Iron Man 3 has some loose pieces that rattle, but it holds together for a fun, familiar ride.

Material under the cut contains arc-reactor-powered SPOILERS. Read at your own discretion.

When the tortured and bloodied bodies of adolescents strewn willy-nilly across a widescreen isn’t the thing making you uncomfortable in a theater, you know something, somewhere has gone wrong. Based on the camp classic original, (more about that in a moment) the new Evil Dead, in a surprising homage to the film that ‘inspired’ it, is a movie that isn’t aware that it’s bad. A tonal slog that’s a bare-faced unpleasant time (and in not the way it’s intended), Evil Dead has some good cringe-worthy moments, and some things about it that just made me cringe. Read on for a chilling tale of guts, gore, false advertising, VFX lauding, and how the tired trope of casual sexism can be a real bore.

Contains spoilers, as well as some specific mentions of R-rated gory violence. Chances are, if you weren’t going to watch the films for the sake of your tastes or stomach, you might not want to read this.

The BioShock games, says creative director Ken Levine, are a Rorschach test. What you see will depend on who you are and what you believe. There are no right answers. When I look at BioShock Infinite, I see three things. I see a masterpiece of video game storytelling. I see a woman who needs rescuing, and who challenges my expectations of what that means. And I see a risky, disturbing exploration of American racism, which led me to acknowledge how ill-equipped I am to say anything on that front at all.

I don’t know how to write about BioShock Infinite. The first two things, yes, I can muddle about those just fine. The third, however, is not a matter I have ever written on, and I doubt that I am the right person for the job. But to leave that aspect out of any discussion of this game would be missing the point entirely. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from BioShock Infinite, it’s that trying to avoid mistakes never ends well. So here goes.

(Minor spoilers ahead.)

(Minor spoilers ahead.)

Sarah Kerrigan sits in a high-security research lab, obediently following Prince Valerian’s instructions. To assess how much of the Zerg mutagen is left in her system, he asks her to psionically control a drone in a chamber nearby. This is, of course, the tutorial mission, but there’s more going on here than a lesson in unit control. Kerrigan does as she’s told, but her tone is dangerously apathetic. “You know this is going to end badly, right?” she says. There’s a hint of laughter in her words, condescending and bored. Valerian is not the one in control here.

When will these people ever learn that underestimating Kerrigan is a very stupid idea?

On Tuesday, I sat in front of my computer, not playing the new Tomb Raider. I had preloaded the game on Steam days before. I was wearing comfy pants. I had prepared some snacks. I was alone in my apartment. Nothing was preventing me from clicking “Play.” Yet my attention was focused away from the screen, just a few inches from my keyboard. You see, on my desk, I have five small pieces of artwork, each featuring a game character that serves as a touchstone for my personal history. The second of these is Lara Croft.

There are few video game characters from my formative years that I regard as highly as Kerrigan. She was complex and unforgettable, the sort of villain who makes you forget that you’re supposed to root for the good guys. To this day, I can’t help but feel awe when remembering the emergence of the Queen of Blades.

StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty, on the other hand, left me unimpressed. Naturally, the Zerg were going to get stomped, but to see that brilliant character stripped of her power, both literally and figuratively, then carried off into the sunset by her former boyfriend — come on. Kerrigan deserves better than that. The trailers for SCII’s upcoming expansion, Heart of the Swarm, seem to agree, pointing toward a vengeful reclamation of the leaderless broods. While the expansion’s release is still a few weeks out, tie-in novel StarCraft II: Flashpoint, written by Christie Golden, raises some interesting questions about how Kerrigan’s next chapter will unfold (minor spoilers ahead).

I know what you’re thinking. “Oh, dear God, why.” That is an excellent place to start from. Unfortunately, that’s just the start. H&G is, quite obvious to anyone who has so much as seen a billboard for it, DOA. This is not the part that is interesting; plenty of dead cinematic bodies show up in theaters every year, increasingly so in the empty, hollow months just following award-season cutoff. What is interesting is why such an obviously cold cadaver is showing up at all, even metaphorically. Such a crime of film is as apparent as any corporeal evidence; we cluster around the edges of the taped-off scene muttering amongst ourselves, ‘why, why did this happen?’

So, in the spirit of continued analogy, I am here to perform an autopsy on the long-dead corpse of Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters. This procedure is not due to a genetic lack of the “fun” gland in this anatomist’s body. On the contrary, “fun” is what Hansel & Gretel could have used a good deal more of, and what it so agonizingly lacks.

(Contained therein are a few spoilers. How much one might care about them we leave entirely to the reader’s discretion.)

The Cave is a game about terrible people. Yes, the artwork is charming and inviting. Yes, the oddball humor is every bit what you’d expect from a Ron Gilbert game. But underneath the surface lies a dark morality tale, where the faintest glimmer of redemption is mired in an Edward Gorey-like atmosphere of playful doom. The Cave itself — both the narrator and your host — disapproves of the sordid lives of the seven (technically eight) characters, but it does so with great relish.

Could it be that the Cave is purgatory? Are we facing judgment? Is it all — as I strongly suspect — a whimsical riff on the seven deadly sins? It doesn’t matter. What matters is that despite its imperfections, The Cave is a place well worth diving into.

Children are not to be trusted. At least, that’s what a lifetime of horror-movie ingestion has taught us. If it’s a child- or child-shaped – don’t go near it, and definitely, absolutely, do not adopt. Ever. But, tired as the demonic child archetype may seem, don’t let the marketing for Guillermo del Toro-produced horror flick MAMA fool you. Andres Muschietti’s debut mainstream feature is a classy, modern, often surprising take on the monster-in-the-house formula. Though it does nothing new where plot content is concerned, it gets points for style and execution. MAMA is a delicious morsel, to be sure, if not particularly substantial, delivering its goods in due course, with a few new ingredients. A new ice cream flavor is still ice cream, but we’ll take a new spin on a classic if it’s tasty.

(Contains less of what we might call “spoilers” and more “things that can be inferred from the trailer and promotional materials”. However, if being kept in the dark is important, proceed with caution.)