Last year, “Superman” gave us David Corenswet as an optimistic, trusting, honorable Boy Scout of a superhero, one who said that that was the real punk rock. And in a scene in the credits, we saw that his cousin Kara/Supergirl (Milly Alcock) is a complete mess and also very attached to superdog Krypto.

Now, in “Supergirl,” that is where we start, with Kara celebrating her 23rd birthday with an inter-planetary pub crawl. Every night is a different planet and a different bar and every morning is the same hangover. Throughout this film, Superman will try to get in touch with Kara and encourage her to come “home.” But she does not see Earth as home. We will learn more about her grief and the source of her trauma later. Unlike Superman, who was sent from the exploding Krypton as a baby and found a loving home on Earth, Kara was a teenager when she lost her home and parents and has severe PTSD.

Those who know the backstory of the refugees from Krypton will remember that one of the sources of their superpowers on earth is our yellow sun, instead of the red sun on Krypton. So when we see that she is getting drunk on a planet with a red sun we know that she does not have the super-strength, invulnerability, or laser vision she has on Earth or any other yellow sun planet. But, we will learn, she likes to drink on yellow sun planets because without superpowers she is more susceptible to the effects of alcohol.

I always say that superhero movies, and really most action movies, depend more on the bad guys than the good guys, and in this case our bad guy is the genuinely terrifying Krem of the Yellow Hills (Matthias Schoenaerts) an inter-planetary brigand with a face covered with studs who specializes in senseless violence, not so much because he enjoys it but because it is meaningless. We see him kill a modest man who is a legendary crafter of swords, along with his wife and son, even though they made no effort to keep him from stealing their cache of weapons. The young daughter, Ruthye (Eve Ridley) hides and sees it all. She is determined to kill Krem, so “True Grit”-style she goes to a bar full of rowdy, cut-throat outlaws to find someone to help her. This is not “Planet Hail Mary” so no one cares about details like whether the gravity and oxygen and language/communication and technology on other planets are all as easy to reach as the next stop on the subway and pretty much the same, aside from some “Star Wars” cantina-style creatures in the bar scenes.) Also, like Mattie in “True Grit,” she has an oddly formal, old-fashioned way of speaking, plus, for some reason, a British accent.

One of the bar creatures steals Ruthye’s sword, and Kara, drunk, without her powers, but perhaps identifying a little with the girl goes after the thief. It’s always good to see a fight scene that has a little extra zhuzh to it, and seeing Kara fight a gigantic, scary-looking guy without her powers and with impaired judgment adds interest. There’s nice zhuzh in some of the the other fights, another one with Kara impaired and especially when Kara fights three maurading women who have technology that enables them to disappear briefly and re-appear in another nearby location.

Even though Kara keeps telling Ruthye she will not help her, circumstances keep pushing them together. Krem takes Kara’s ship and shoots Krypto with a poison that takes three days to kill. This gives her a mission and a deadline. They also meet up with cigar-chompin’, motorcycle-ridin’, now it’s a party all-purpose ruffian Lobo (Jason Momoa) who shows up now and then, not to rescue Kara or Ruthye, just to join in.

It’s a little messy. But so is Kara, and her path to being a bit less messy by the end is worth watching.

NOTE: You do NOT need to stay to the end of the credits. No exta scenes.

Parents should know that this is a superhero film with constant comic-book-style action, peril and violence with many characters injured and killed and some graphic and disturbing images. Two young women lose their families. Young women are kidnapped with the intent to rape and impregnate them. Characters use strong language and Supergirl/Kara drinks to get drunk and numb her pain.

Family discussion: How did Ruthie change Kara’s ideas about herself? What is the difference between being nice and being good. What is the meaning of the moment when Kara decides to wear the uniform Superman gave her? Why is it SuperMAN and SuperGIRL?

If you like this try: “Superman” and the “Supergirl” television series.

In snowy December of 1944, Hitler launched his last big attack in the Ardennes Forest that runs through Belgium, France, and Luxembourg, in what became known as the Battle of the Bulge. It was a major turning point in the war in Europe that would end with Hitlere’s death and Germany’s surrender six months later. “Lucky Strike,” inspired by a true story, is about an injured US soldier who was caught behind enemy lines early in the battle and had to find his way back to his unit with the help of then-brand-new technology that allowed him to communicate his position.

Scott Eastwood plays Colonel John Castle, a man who chose to enlist even though he was exempt from the draft because he was an engineer who could contribute to the war effort on the home front. He is part of a dedicated but exhausted unit in Charlie Company, 324th Infantry Regiment,  part of the U.S. 44th Infantry Division.

Castle is assigned to oversee a small group directed to cut off the road the Germans are approaching, setting and firing off explosives to block them. They are warned that this Nazi division is ruthless, killing everying instead of taking prisoners. They are ambushed by the Nazi forces and everyone but Castle is killed.

With the new communications device, the size of a backpack and nicknamed “Lassie,” Castle learns that he is 30.5 km (about 19 miles) from a rendezvous spot and the overwhelmed soldiers do not have the resources to rescue him. Much of the film is about his near-escapes along the way and the way that Lassie keeps him connected. And we also see how he repaid the person who made sure that Lassie would survive the direst conditions, played by the always-magnificent Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor in a performance of endless dignity and grace.

The screenplay is co-written by “The Outpost’s” Rod Lurie, a West Point graduate with a deep understanding of the military and a superb eye for pacing and detail. Everything in the film is from Castle’s point of view. If people speak French or German, he does not understand them and so we do not get subtitles. There are some breathtaking “oners,” scenes that are all in one long take, which make Castle’s experiences extremely tense and intense. He has an eye for telling details. Castle removes the dog tags from his dead crew, and we glimpse the Star of David on one and the cross on another, connecting us to the soldiers who have just made the ultimate sacrifice and to the diversity of the country they were fighting for.

The cinematography by Lorenzo Senatore is stunning, with three different color palettes for different settings. It opens in black-and-white, emphasizing the fog and snow, with another scene of an American group being wiped out by Nazis. The scenes set in the US are warm and vibrant. In contrast, Castle’s mission and his long way back are more muted.

Lurie’s co-screenwriter is Marc Frydman, who went to school in France, where American veterans were honored by being invited to tell their stories. He was so struck by the one who sought out the person responsible for Lassie that he wanted to tell the story. The different dangers Castle faces along the way are well-crafted — a fight in the very close quarters of the front seat of a truck is especially exciting — and the scenes at the end (with a child who shares his name with Lurie’s late son), are meaningful.

Parents should know that this is a war story with many characters injured and killed, including civilians. There are guns and explosions. Character drink, smoke (see the movie’s title) and use some strong and crude language.

Family discussion: Why did Castle refuse the exemption and enlist? How did he decide who to trust? What technology is important to you and how could you thank the people responsible for it? What technology do you wish would be invented or would you like to invent?

If you like this, try: “To Hell and Back,” “Pressure,” “The Longest Day,” and “Dunkirk’

The toys are back in town! Thankfully, we may grow older, but they stay the same. Well, almost. It’s been 36 years since “Toy Story,” the first feature-length computer animated film, dazzled us with its technical brilliance but was unforgettable because of its heart and wit and irresistible characters. Remember that the reason Pixar’s first feature was about plastic toys was that smooth, shiny surfaces was pretty much the only thing they could create in those early years of digital animation. Even then, right at the very beginning, Pixar addressed the complications of changes in technology, in the potential replacement of a beloved cloth-covered cowboy toy who had a pull-string with a plastic space adventurer who had wings and a light-up wrist weapon. And even then, in what would become one of Pixar’s most perceptive and meaningful themes, the bittersweet changes that come with growing up. Endearingly, it is also about the beauty of imagination, with the series itself a perfect exemplar. I love Pixar’s love for the weirdos because they are the ones who grow up and create magic.

One of my favorite details from the first film was the difference in the way Andy wrote his name on the boots of the two toys. He got Woody (Tom Hanks) when he was younger, so the N was backwards. But he had learned more when he received Buzz, and wrote his name correctly. And one of my favorite details from the series overall is that the first film begins with a painted sky on Andy’s ceiling. Then, when he leaves for college, having given his toys to Bonnie, we see him leaving, with the real, endless sky above him. These show the care that goes into every detail and the vision that extends beyond each film.

Every move toward independence and adulthood means leaving something behind. The “Toy Story” series has served as something of a meta-measuring stick to help us consider our own changes, with the children who saw the first one in theaters now bringing their own children to part 5. And through the magic of animation, they are able to appreciate that Tom Hanks and Tim Allen may get older, but they are still our Woody and Buzz.

Now in the fifth episode, it is all about new technology, this time as a central theme, explored with insight, adventure, and hilarious jokes. At 8, Bonnie still loves playing with her toys, and the movie begins with a hilarious “wedding” between Forky (Tony Hale) and Karen Beverly (Knifey, voiced by Melissa Villaseñor) that is disrupted when the maid of honor, Rex the T-Rex (Wallace Shawn) is poisoned.

Two new children have moved in across the street, but Bonnie is more comfortable with imaginary friends than real ones and is too shy to ask them to play with her. Her classmates have given up toys to play with LilyPad (Greta Lee), and Bonnie’s parents think she might be able to connect with them virtually, so they get one for her.

At first, it seems to work well. Bonnie is accepted into the virtual friend group and loves playing games so much she all but forgets her analog toys. She is delighted when she is asked to a slumber party, but the girls make fun of her for bringing her Jessie (Joan Cusack) doll. Bonnie wants to be a part of the group so she pretends to be too grown-up for toys, leading to one of the best movie lines of the year. Rex says, “Extinction! Not again!”

The toys are devastated, and the story allows Woody and Duke Kaboom (Keanu Reeves) who in the last epsiode were off on their own, to come back for support. Jessie is the heart of this epsiode, though, and with her trusty horse Bullseye, she is the one who figures out how to get Bonnie a friend and leads the rest through their adventures. She also learns some important lessons that help her understand her value and heal some past hurts.

There are some new characters, including discarded toys with once state-of-the-art tech that is now charmingly nostalgic. They include a potty-training aid called Smarty Pants providing some poop humor (Conan O’Brien), a hippo-shaped map toy named Atlas (Craig Robinson), and a camera toy with pixels almost as big as a postage stamp called Snappy (Shelby Rabara). Even though we see him only briefly, I have to mention the plastic slice of pizza with sunglasses because he is voiced by Super Bowl superstar Bad Bunny.

Even Buzz gets an tech upgrade as we meet crates-full of new and improved Buzzes that have some cool new functions but just as much existential confusion as Buzz in the first movie.

As often happens in “Toy Story,” the characters get separated from their child and each other, so there is a lot of adventure along the way. And there are new human characters, including a horse-loving girl named Blaze (Mykal-Michelle Harris) who could also use a friend who shares her love of imagination. Past “Toy Story” villains have included Sid, who loved to take the toys apart and blow them up, and Al, who saw the value of toys only in what he could get from selling mint, never-played-with versions. The threat here, from LilyPad, who begins by feeling threatened herself by the analog toys and committed to helping Bonnie “reach all of her developmental goals,” is tempered by a thoughtful, nuanced exploration of what it means to be useful, and recognition that it is difficult to lose a child to aging out of the toy stage, but what you give them helps them forever.

NOTE: Stay through the credits for extra scenes.

Parents should know that this movie includes peril and action, with no serious injuries, as well as a sensitive exploration of issues of agency, identity, and loss. And some poop humor.

Family discussion: What is or was your favorite toy and why? Which is your favorite of Bonnie’s toys? When do you use your imagination?

If you like this try: The “Toy Story” series and all of the Pixar films

It’s not a spoiler; it’s right there in the title. Steven Spielberg’s latest film is not about whether there are aliens. There are. It’s about whether the government should tell us what it knows about them, and, if they don’t, whether someone should leak the information. And it is about empathy as the highest form of human — or other entity — communication, understanding, and evolution.

Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Connor) is the one who wants “disclosure day,” a global release of all the information. As the movie begins, his girlfriend, Jane (Eve Hewson) has been kidnapped by some very intense and well-equipped people who work for Wardex, the shadowy government contractor that keeps the secrets. It is led by Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth). They will echange her for the contents of Daniel’s backpack, thumb drives that contain the entire history of alien encounters and their technology, meaning that it’s also the history of the government secrets about them. Daniel arrives to make the exchange, turns over the thumb drives, and then he and Jane escape with the help of a mysterious sort of carved metallic slightly twisted block about the size of a small bluetooth speaker that must be handled very gently and carefully. It kind of looks like that thing Ryland grabs on his space walk in “Project Hail Mary.” Hmmm.

Meanwhile, television meterologist Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt) is talking to her boyfriend Jackson (Wyatt Russell) as they have breakfast and she gets ready to go to work. There’s a restlessness about her. She can’t seem to sit still, and Jackson complains that she always wants to move. And then things start to get strange. She gets stopped for speeding on the way to work and somehow when she looks the cop in his eyes she knows all the details about his morning and what he needs to do to take care of his wife and baby. And then, when she goes on camera to give the weather report, instead of words, gutteral clicks come out instead, and she collapses.

The rest of the story is about Noah trying to stop Daniel from going public, Margaret trying to figure out what is going on with her and how she suddenly knows all kinds of information from different languages to what the people in front of her are thinking and feeling to urgent messages about a man she has never heard of — Daniel.

It is unnecessary to say that Steven Spielberg is one of the most extraordinary masters of cinematic storytelling of all time, but it may be worth saying that he brings every bit of that plus the heart and wisdom of a man who will turn 80 later this year to this film, with a story he created as the final chapter that began with “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and continued with “E.T. The Extra-terrestrial.” The man whose company logo is a boy and his alien friend bicyling in front of a full moon has always looked to the skies and found it filled with wonder. (Yes, there were scary and desctructive aliens in Spielberg’s “War of the Worlds,” but he says that was more a reaction to 9/11 than a part of this vision.)

While “The Fablemans” was explicitly autobiographical, this film seems even more revealing about Spielberg’s perspective and values. Like most of his movies, the theme of home is central, with a return to a replica of a character’s childhood home is significant and deeply moving to the character and the audience. Anyone who saw “The Fablemans” will remember the impact a train crash scene the young Spielberg saw in “The Greatest Show on Earth” impressed him so viscerally he created it in the first footage he shot. Here, there is an extraordinary train scene, brilliantly shot and edited, harking back to that first moment that began his life as a filmmaker.

Spielberg says this film comes straight from his own beliefs and the consistenct reports from people who have seen…something…that may be known to authorities who do not share it. It also comes from his own spirit, his gorgeous sense of wonder and optimism and spacious humanity. It even encompasses faith. One of the most significant characters in the film is a nun, beautifully played by Elizabeth Marvel, and another character also has a strong connection to Catholicism. She is there to show Jane and us that faith and science are more than compatible; they support and enhance each other. The better we understand science and all aspects of reality, the better we understand that no matter what or how clear our concept of a diety is, science helps us embrace it with more clarity.

The movie rewards rewatching to be aware of all of the choices that went into every shot to tell us everything we need to know about the characters and what was happening but also to appreciate the bigger concepts, the challenge of being aware, the vital imporance of fearless curiosity, and above all, no matter how much our fragile hearts try to resist, the central purpose of finding understanding and connection.

Parents should know that this movie has some intense and exciting scenes of action and peril with chases, guns, and explosions. Characters use a few strong words.

Family discussion: If you met an extra-terrestrial, what would you say? What would you ask? Why was re-creating the childhood home so important? Who should decide what we know?

If you like this, try: “Close Encounters of the Third Kind, “E.T..” and “Project Hail Mary”

I’m not sure who the intended audience is for this new live-action version of the popular 1980s cartoon series based on, or, more accurately, intended to sell a group of Mattel action figures. I don’t think the filmmakers were sure who it was intended for, either. That is both the strength and the weakness of this big-budget adaptation from director Travis Knight, founder of LAIKA’s stop-motion animation studio and director of another toy-based live-action movie, 2018’s “Bumblebee,” about the most endearing of the Transformer, cars-into-robots characters.

The cartoon series was for children. This “Masters of the Universe” is rated PG-13 for action, peril, and violence, has a lot of air quotes and callbacks for the fans, and a surprising number of lightweight but unmistakable suggestive references. This indicates that the intended audience is the people who were children in the 80’s, like the woman in my row who brought her He-Man action figures to the theater and set them up on the balcony railing so they could watch the film. This is the group that yelped with pleasure when Dolph Lundgren, who played He-Man in a 1987, shows up to give the He-Man of this movie some advice, and applauded when Orko shows up at the end to explain what we learned from the story. It is also well over two hours, another reason this is less likely to appeal to children.

This is a story about a super-strong guy with huge, oiled muscles named He-Man and there’s a lot of “be a man” talk, meaning be tough, aggressive, fearless, and impervious to pain. But it also tries to deliver a message that it is fine to be sensitive, maybe as long as you have big muscles and skill with a sword.

But there are also elements of the story that are intended to bring in a new generation of young fans. When it starts to get too intense or scary, there is often a joke, sometimes a very silly one, sometimes more ironic, to break the tension. And after all, the story a very basic fairy tale (drawn from a hodge-podge of myths, legends, and fairy tales), with elements that have appealed to children for as long as there have been stories.

Those elements include the small child who fears he will not live up to the expectations of his father and community who is nevertheless the “chosen” one, signified by his being given the magical sword, physical transformation into an exaggerated, gendered, version of the character, and confrontation with a seemingly all-powerful antagonist.

We hear the story of Adam (played as a 10-year-old by Artie Wilkinson-Hunt), a prince of an idyllic planet called Eternia, known as “the heart of the universe.” His parents are King Randor (a regal James Purefoy) and Queen Marlena (Charlotte Riley). We see him being trained by super-soldier Duncan (Idris Elba). Well, Duncan is trying to train him. Adam is smaller, weaker, and less coordinated than the other young students, including Duncan’s daughter, Teela (Eire Farrell), who is a foot taller than he is, very good at fighting, and his closest friend. The King challenges Adam to a sword fight, and when Adam fails, the King does not hide his disappointment. (It turns out that the long voice-over is Adam telling a date his life story, which prompts her to walk out of the restaurant. This is just one example of trying to have it both ways, putting air quotes about the IP.)

Adam is still 10 years olf when the evil, skull-headed Skeletor (Jared Leto) arrives with his army of attackers and they take over Eternia, apparently killing Duncan and the king and queen. Adam escapes with the magical sword and we then see him ten years later, living in Oklahoma with a slacker roommate who does nothing but watch “The Notebook.” Adam (a buffed-up Nicholas Galitzine) is a middle manager working in human resources, drawing pictures of the characters he remembers, sometimes imperfectly, from Eternia, and obsessively doing internet searches for the sword.

One of those searches is successful, and he retrieves the sword just as Skeltor’s minions arrive to grab it, followed by now grown-up Teela, who gets Adam and the sword and “folds space” to get back to Eternia in just a few minutes. As the ensuing adventures and battles and discoveries and imprisonments and discoveries that characters thought to have been killed are still alive go on, Adam figures out the secret of he sword (you have to say, “By the power of Greyskull! I have the power!”) and becomes the Herculean body, loincloth-wearing, super-strong hero he thought he could never be.

As noted, the unevenness of the film’s tone is a strength in that it keeps things pleasantly surprising, but it is also a weakness because it keeps things confusing. It’s about half an hour too long, with some distracting choices, like an extended sequence with fantasy flashbacks combining Adam’s life in Oklahoma with characters from Eternia.

What does work well in the movie are the performances. Galitzine an exceptionally versitile up-and-coming actor (“Bottoms,” “The Sheep Detectives,” and “Red, White, and Royal Blue”) and here he is game and appealing. The stand-outs, perhaps because of the muddled messages about masculinity, are the women: Mendes as Teela, Sasheer Zamata as Adam’s jargon-loving, confrontation-hating Oklahoma boss in HR, Kristin Wiig as a robot, and Alison Brie having a blast as Skeletor’s enchantress sidekick, Evil-Lynn (names are not very creative in this universe). The production design is also very good, with some exceptionally imaginative details and flourishes in the characters and settings. As one might expect, the fight scenes are dynamic and exciting. It’s more likely to please the former 8 years olds who still have their action figures than newcomers of any age.

NOTE: Stay through the credits for extra scenes.

Parents should know that this film has extended and sometimes graphic violence, with swords, magic, explosives, crotch hit, and gun-like machines. Many characters are injured and killed, including a sad death of a parent. Characters use some strong language and there are several suggestive remarks and double entendres.

Family discussion: What do you think of Adam’s attempt to use his HR skills in Eternia? How are different ideas about what it means to be a man shown in this story?

If you like this, try: the animated series