Awkwafina Ranked

Welcome to "Ranked", a weekly series where I rank a franchise or filmography from worst to best and hand out assorted related superlatives. This week, I'm profiling the work of Awkwafina-whose latest project "Jackpot!" begins streaming on Prime Video tomorrow. 

Awkwafina's Filmography Ranked:

17.Raya and the Last Dragon (D+)

16.Storks (C)

15.Dude (C)

14.The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run (C+)

13.Migration (C+)

12.Breaking News in Yuba County (B-)

11.Kung Fu Panda 4 (B-)

10.Crazy Rich Asians (B-)

9.Quiz Lady (B-)

8.The Bad Guys (B)

7.Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising (B)

6.Ocean's 8 (B)

5.Renfield (B)

4.The Farewell (B)

3.IF (B+)

2.Jumanji: The Next Level (A-)

1.Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (A-)

Top Dog: Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021)

One of the clear top highlights of Marvel's embattled post-Endgame era, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings is a terrific mix of captivating superhero origin story and vintage Hong Kong martial arts saga. Tony Leung's The Mandarin is an excellent villain that is sympathetic without being fully redeemable, the fight sequences prior to the poor CGI clusterfuck finale are among the finest that have ever appeared in a superhero movie and there's a real emotional backbone here that makes it easy to get invested in these characters and their journey. Hopefully Kevin Feige will allow the sequel to happen at some point down the line.        

Bottom Feeder: Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)

Despite its intentions to be this grand fantasy adventure in the vein of their classic animated fare, Raya and the Last Dragon's storytelling is far too rudderless and limp to illicit any feelings of wonder or joy and the inclusion of Awkafina's goofy, quip-spewing Sisu (aka the titular Last Dragon) completely clashes with the dour tone of the rest of the film.   

Most Underrated: Jumanjii: The Next Level (2019)

Jumanjii: Welcome to the Jungle is a really clever, fun modern reimagining of Jumanji. The follow-up managed to be even better. The Next Level found a way to cleverly build on the body swap dynamics and themes of unlikely friendships/complicated familial relationships/power of teamwork that drove Welcome to the Jungle without ever feeling like a stale rehash. The new cast additions (Danny DeVito, Danny Glover, Awkwafina) seamlessly mesh with the returning core (Dwayne Johnson, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Karen Gillan, Nick Jonas), the expanded character development for the human characters (Alex Wolff, Morgan Turner, Ser'Darius Blain, Madison Iseman) that are behind the video game avatars provides this film with a considerably bigger heart than its predecessor and the laughs in this thing are damn near relentless-especially during the sections when Hart is playing Glover.  

Most Overrated: Raya and the Last Dragon (2021)

Overrated is arguably a stretch since Raya and the Last Dragon was released during the latter stages of the COVID lockdown and didn't have the impact of a typical Disney film because of it. But the film was nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Oscars and got great reviews, which is enough for me to give it the nod. As I touched on above, I found this to be an extremely dull, tonally confused film that is well below the standard that Disney has set for itself as a titan in the animation industry.