Two totally different movies, both just happening to revolve around some apocalyptic scenario.
“This is the End” was very disappointing. I mean, I knew it was going to be dumb — that was the premise. But it was idiotic, and not particularly funny, unless you find the consumption of copious amounts of drugs to be inherently funny.
I mean, there are stoner flicks, where people get high and do dumb things have wacky adventures, and there are movies where drugs are part of the main plot, and there are movies where there is incidental drug use that’s about setting and character development, and of course, some overlap among those three categories. But the first, I dunno, twenty minutes or so of this film is basically and ode to recreational drugs, first and foremost weed, to little apparent cinematic end. Ok, coked-out Michael Cera was mildly amusing.
Seth Rogen smokes weed? You don’t say…
Anyway, the movie has its moments, but most of those were in the trailer. I give it a 3 on a 10-scale.
“World War Z” was about a 6.5 on a 10-scale. Disclaimer: I have had no exposure to the source material. As a basic horror film it was a little light on the gore. There is very little character development of anybody other than Brad Pitt, and not much there either.
The IDF chick is sorta cute despite the GI-Jane haircut. She sticks with Pitt longer than anybody else during his adventures, but we never really learn anything about her either.
Zombie films need to be either about (1) the interaction of the survivors, (2) the development of some sort of Christ-figure capable of saving everybody, or (3) pure gore and terror. WW-Z was light on all three.
To the extent that WW-Z was at all terrifying, it was through the use of not just fast-zombies, but crystal-meth fast zombies in the opening scene. I mean, it was practically a river of zekes flowing through the streets of Philadelphia. When you start questioning the plausibility of the zombie apocalypse scenario in a zombie film, that’s not exactly starting out on the right foot.
The end was anticlimactic. I suppose in this sense they were probably bound by the source material, but I really couldn’t know that for sure. If you like zombie movies, go see it, but if you’re on the fence about this one, just go ahead and skip it.
Anybody see Man of Steel?
doubleplusundead 
Man of Steel was a decent redo of the story. All the scenes of young Clark are flashbacks. The wife thought it was too violent, but he was battling Zod and his minions through a good part of the film. I’ld give it 3&1/2 out of 5.
There was a good analysis of Brad Pitt’s movies and the failure that is WWZ on PJMedia: http://pjmedia.com/lifestyle/2013/06/21/5-sure-signs-brad-pitt-is-in-paycheck-mode/
The trailer hints at the crystal-meth zombies and I had your reaction of questioning the plausibility right away.
I’ve heard good things about Man of Steel, but haven’t seen it myself.
“questioning the plausibility”
You questioned the plausibility of zombies? What is the world coming to if people can’t accept the idea of reanimated dead tissue that coan only be killed a second time by destroying it’s non-functional central nervous system. I mean if you can’t accept the sound scientific basis for something as basic as this how can you possible accept Megashark swimming at 300 knots and leaping 35,000 feet into the sky to pull down an airliner or Godzilla laying an egg in Yankee stadium.
That should tell you a little something about how ridonkulous it was.
I only start questioning the plausibility of zombies when people get upset about my thesis that the best defense against zombies is genetically engineered velociraptors. Apparently that is the line in the sand when it comes to surviving the zombie apocalypse.
Source material sucked too. I only read it because Max Brooks is the son of the great Mel Brooks. Now if Richard Pryor and Mel had written it… But Richie is gone and Mel is lightly animated these days.