The 5 Biggest Movie Disappointments of 2014

There were some outstanding films released in 2014, and many of them lived up to or surpassed expectations. But there were also a handful of movies that had an incredible amount of hype around them that failed to leave a lasting impression. In no particular order, here are my five biggest movie disappointments of the last year.

Veronica Mars

I never watched Veronica Mars when it was originally on the air, but I caught up with the series on DVD and loved it (yes, even the third season). After creator Rob Thomas' Kickstarter campaign became a huge success, I was excited to see the character's adventures continue. But the final product simply didn't have the same spark that the TV series had. The always-charming Kristen Bell can still embody the role of Veronica, and it seems like everyone involved with the project had good intentions, but the end result just felt like a piece of fan fiction that never fully came together. All of the old characters you know and love from the show got their moment in the spotlight, but I think that very aspect is the thing that makes the movie feel more like fan service than an actual organic story in the Veronica Mars universe.

Sin City: A Dame to Kill For

Almost ten years after the first Sin City redefined what was possible with digital green screen filmmaking, the sequel finally hit theaters — unfortunately, it was probably about five or six years too late. And even more unfortunately, the movie wasn't worth the wait. Aside from Eva Green's captivating performance as the titular femme fatale, there really isn't anything worthwhile happening here. It's a retread of a lot of the same tough-guy noir stuff we've seen before, but the freshness of the black-and-white cinematography punctuated by snatches of color has completely worn off; this movie can't coast on style alone, and the narrative is depressingly average. Even with the addition of some new faces (like Joseph Gordon-Levitt), Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez can't create anything as cutting edge and vibrant as the original, and the film sinks under the weight of its mind-numbingly repetitive action sequences.

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit

I'm a big Chris Pine fan, and I like Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan character well enough from the multiple films that featured that character back in the '90s. Shadow Recruit was supposed to be a big comeback for the character, but this is such a lifeless movie that I'm guessing the series won't be moving forward again with this creative team any time soon. Pine isn't given anything to work with here, because the script (by Adam Cozad and David Koepp) treats Jack Ryan like a blank slate, never giving him any compelling characteristics whatsoever. Keira Knightley is godawful as Ryan's fiancee, and the listless dialogue and laughable decisions from many of the major players (including Kevin Costner) helped to ensure that this would be a huge disappointment.

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1

I thought the first Hunger Games film was OK, and Catching Fire was a big improvement. I was a little hesitant about Lionsgate splitting the final book into two films, but before seeing Mockingjay - Part 1, I'd heard early word that it worked well by itself and didn't necessarily feel like an Act 1 to a larger story. It turns out those early reports were completely wrong, because Mockingjay - Part 1 doesn't feel like a self-contained installment in this franchise in the least: it's very clearly the first part of a larger tale, and based on how little actually happens in this movie, it's obvious that the studio made this decision purely for financial reasons. Katniss Everdeen becomes a mouthpiece for the resistance against President Snow's Capitol forces, and... that's about it. This was an excruciatingly boring film in which most of the running time is spent following people in an underground bunker sitting around talking about strategy. Dull, inert, and incomplete, Mockingjay - Part 1 doesn't deserve the classification of a full movie.

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

To me, it seemed as if Peter Jackson was hate-directing certain sections of this third film in his Hobbit trilogy. If you've been following movie news for a while, you probably know that he had no plans to direct any of these films in the first place. Guillermo del Toro was originally slated to get behind the camera, but he left the project (after spending two years developing it) when the studio wouldn't give it a green light. Ultimately, Jackson stepped in and the financing was straightened out, and the planned two films were soon expanded into three. To anyone who read and loved Tolkien's original book, the problems with The Battle of the Five Armies were obvious from the start: The Hobbit is a one-movie story stretched thin over three films just to meet studio demands, and Battle may be the worst of the trilogy. There's action on a huge scale, but none of it has the same weight and reality that the original Lord of the Rings trilogy possessed since most of the orcs and creatures were created digitally this time around. The Hobbit is supposed to be Bilbo's story, but instead this trilogy is primarily about Thorin (Richard Armitage), a character I honestly couldn't care less about. I understand the concept of taking creative licenses with adaptations, but killing off some of the main characters for no reason (especially when the writers specifically created a character, Evangeline Lilly's Tauriel, who could have easily served that same narrative function), inexplicably shifting the tone (Gandalf smoking a pipe for laughs with Bilbo seconds after Bilbo's friend dies in his arms, for instance), and including a ton of eyeroll-worthy action movie cliches are among this film's worst offenses. These movies could have been special, but instead they tarnished the legacy of one of cinema's greatest trilogies.