Okay, so maybe I’m not done yet with the magician theme.

When I first saw this movie in the theater, I liked it. I didn’t love it, but it was fun, it was funny, I liked the characters and the plot made sense. Best part was that it turned out not to be a Nicholas Cage movie. He’s in it, he has a major role, but it’s really a Jay Baruchel movie and I like Jay.

Jays character of Dave Stutler is very similar to Hiccup, for whom he does the voice of in the How to Train Your Dragon series. Smart but awkward people who have trouble relating to others. I really wish there had been a sequel because I wanted to see where his character would go.

What really made me appreciate this movie more was watching it again after Marvels Dr. Strange. Now don’t get me wrong, I love Benedict Cumberbatch as Stephen Strange and he was even better in Avengers: Infinity War (which shows how important directors are), but the one thing that bothered me about the movie was how weak and unimaginative the “magic battles” were. Seriously, go watch the movie again, it’s great, but aside from the Inception like imagery, most of the fights between awesome wizards boils down to kung-fu with glowy weapons. Afterwards go watch The Sorcerers Apprentice and you’ll see the difference. The writers and director just let their imaginations off the leash. It’s even better (and you can just keep your outraged hate mail to yourself) than the fights in the Harry Potter movies.

It’s been eight years since the movie was released, so it seems unlikely there will be a follow up at this late a date. From all reports it cost $150 million to make and made more than that internationally, but only $64 million at the US box office. It seems like, despite it turning a profit, because it was not a smash success at home, the mouse house doesn’t want to continue the story, which is a shame.