Blu-ray Today: Ender’s Game, Young Detective Dee, Sherlock, More

Ender’s Game – Thrust into a top role in a space Battle School to which he comes prematurely, cheeky young Ender Wiggin must penetrate the defenses of alien buggers on a real bear of a mission. Ejecting all thoughts of compassion from his rod-like demeanor to make himself the kind of stiff, hard young adult this war demands, he will finally force his tougher superiors to see his manhood, before play on the greatest game of them all climaxes explosively, and his foes must eat the hot eruption of world-destroying firepower unleashed with a mere caress of his hands.

Also, I hear the dude who wrote the book is a real jerk-off.

Young Detective Dee: Rise of the Sea Dragon – Anyone who loves the Dee will get a real kick out of his rising dragon, no? So it’ll be a great double-feature with Ender’s Game. Actually, this action-crime-mystery-prequel directed by Tsui Hark is like an Imperial-era Sherlock Holmes meets Scooby-Doo…except maybe the monster isn’t so fake?

The Jungle Book: Diamond Edition – Oh, the things I could do with song lyrics like, ‘I wanna be a man, man-cub.” Must…not…besmirch…Disney…innocence…It’s been a long time since I saw the movie, but I remember liking it right up until the end, when Mowgli sees a terribly drawn girl singing an annoying song, and decides that hanging with her would be way better than living in the jungle with his awesome pals who’re a panther and a bear. Maybe he just finally needed a change of clothes – that one pair of orange underpants had to be kinda gross.

Sherlock: Season 3 – I finally started watching this and yes, it’s everything you all said it would be. Even jumping in at season 3, my, er, elementary knowledge of Sherlock Holmes made me feel right at home immediately, unlike in those Robert Downey Jr. movies. Julia only jumped in on the last episode, and now wants to see every other one. The power of Cumberbatch compels us.

The Adventurer: The Curse of the Midas Box – An innocuous and mostly inert attempt at starting a franchise based on young-adult novels in the Indiana Jones vein, with Sam Neill as a Victorian-era baddie searching for an ancient super-weapon, but reckoning without the meddling kids of the two museum employees he’s kidnapped and taken to his mysterious island hotel. It’s perfectly fine for children without being cloying, but just so you know, much of the plot depends upon nobody recognizing Michael Sheen when he dons a rubber nose and fake beard, and speaks in a bad Russian accent.

How I Live Now – Saoirse Ronan spends an idyllic summer in the English countryside, finding romance and gradually becoming a better person until World War III breaks out and fucks everything up, as it is wont to do.

Haunter – The director of Cube brings us a “reverse” ghost story, in which the ghost is the heroine, trying to warn a girl her own age about the deadly fate that may end up connecting them both. I haven’t heard great things, but at least it sounds like it’s trying.

Khumba – If you need proof that Liam Neeson will say yes to anything since the death of his wife, here you go.

Those are my top picks for today…what would you add to that?