We are just a couple of weeks away from the official kick off of the summer movie season. This year does not look as promising as last year or certainly next year but there are some movies I am super excited to see and several that I am cautiously optimistic about. It is always fun to look ahead before the season and talk about what you are looking forward to and then look back at the end and talk about what panned out and what didn’t. Feel free to comment below with the films you are looking forward to most so long as you don’t do it like an asshat. Posters and trailers are included where possible. Here we go.

10. Expendables 3

The second Expendables hit just the right sweet spot of silliness for what I was looking for from an 80’s style throwback where the first film was a bit too serious. I am hoping that the third installment is more of the former rather than the latter because the ever expanding cast is just straight crazy with the addition (finally) of Wesley Snipes, as well as Antonio Banderas, Harrison Ford and Mel Gibson. I am still not keen on Gibson in principle but he was fun in Machete Kills so hopefully it works out here. This series is a balancing act and you never know if each installment will keep its footing but I have cautiously high hopes.

9. Jupiter Ascending

Far from a sure bet, Jupiter Ascending is the new film by the Wachowski’s which looks amazing in the trailers but could easily fall apart. It is hard to give the Wachowski’s much leway as they have burned most of their post Matrix equity by delivering expensive nonsense that doesn’t connect with audiences but at the same time, the Matrix WAS amazing and I have a hard time believing that that is all the cool they had in them. With very solid cyberpunk roots, Jupiter Ascending looks like it could buck the trend and return the siblings to greatness. On the other hand it could also turn out to be this summer’s After Earth.

8. Amazing Spider-man 2

I doubted the last Amazing Spider-man just about as much as a person could and I ended up really liking it a lot. So I try to keep that in mind when I hear about all the villains getting crammed into this thing and see scenes of fights that look like straight up PS3 graphics. This movie sounds like it will have a ton of bloat and questionable design choices but at the same time I had huge misgivings about the last one and it panned out pretty well. This is the same creative team with great talent in front of the camera so I am going to give it the benefit of the doubt until I see it. It is the movie that kicks the season off so we won’t have to wait to long to see how well this is going to pan out.

7. Edge of Tomorrow

While I prefer the original title from the comic ‘All You Need Is Kill,’ I am still really interested to see how this turns out. It is essentially Groundhog Day for war and looks pretty intense. Tom Cruise struck out with his last sci-fi film, Oblivion, but he is still one of the most automatic action stars working today and there is a ton of potential here. I haven’t read the source material so I know nothing about how it all turns out but given the potential for existential drama in Groundhog Day it is cool to see that we have another chance to explore that in a serious war movie. Of course, it could just end up being a bunch of CGI and explosion. Time will tell.

6.Godzilla

Even 16 years later it is tough to get the Roland Emmerich film out of my head but so far everything I have seen about this new film by Monsters director Gareth Edwards looks solid as hell. With Bryan Cranston and Aaron Taylor-Johnson as the human focus I feel like I am in even better hands. So far the monster designs look right and the way the production looks to be approaching the material shows a much better understanding of the source material than that last film ever even hoped to have. Frankly the bar is pretty low to do better and is one that Godzilla should be able to step right over. I am really sorry for that hacky shit just now. Damn.

5. X-men Days of Future Past

A lot of what I said about Amazing Spider-man 2 applies here as well. First Class sounded like such a bad idea on paper when the details started coming out and I was thinking it would be shit until each trailer kept looking better and better. Now we have Days of Future Past and it looks like it is enormously bloated and some of the character design decisions (cough cough Quicksilver cough cough) look really poor but we also have Bryan Singer at the helm bringing the old cast together with the new cast and it is clear from the first two X-Men films and the Usual Suspects that he knows how to handle a big cast with a lot of moving parts. We also know from Jack the Giant Slayer that sometimes he can really fuck up special effects driven adventures.

4. Neighbors

Directed by Nicholas Stoller, who has become one of my absolute favorite comedy directors, and starring Seth Rogen, Rose Byrne, Zac Effron and Dave Franco, Neighbors looks to be incredibly funny if they haven’t blown all of the good stuff in the trailers. I strongly doubt they have given Stoller and it looks pretty awesome. The premise is simple, uptight new parents going to battle with an annoying frat that moves in next door, but it sets a solid stage for comedy and the trailers look like it will deliver. I am very hopeful for this one.

3. Sin City A Dame to Kill For

Finally releasing after years and years and some more years of pre-production, the sequel to the 2005 original film looks to return to the same gritty aesthetic and some of the same cast. Once again returning to the Frank Miller comic source material, A Dame to Kill For includes some stories from the comics as well as new material Miller created for the film. I love director Robert Rodriguez and he did a fantastic job the first time around so my hopes are very, very high for this installment.

2. 22 Jump Street

21 Jump Street was a fantastic surprise and Phil Lord and Christopher Miller hit another home run with the Lego Movie this year so 22 Jump Street is an automatic ticket purchase from me. At this point if the directors said they were going to make German scat porn starring Snuffaluffagus I would be in line to see it. Thankfully, that is not what they are doing and instead they are offering up a sequel to the best comedy of 2012. Yes please.

1. Guardians of the Galaxy

While it is kind of a risky move for Marvel with a property that is pretty obscure outside of comic fans, Guardians of the Galaxy looks pretty much perfect from the trailer and all the subsequent design decisions. Director James Gunn is an off beat talent and from what I have seen so far it looks like he has absolutely nailed the tone of the property. The casting is inspired as well with Chris Pratt in the lead as Star Lord, Lee Pace as Ronan the Accuser, Zoe Saldana as Gamora, Karen Gillan as Nebula, Bautista as Drax…the list goes on. If this isn’t the best popcorn movie/comic movie of the summer I am going to be absolutely shocked. Also, come on, Rocket Raccoon is awesome. Anyone who tells me that it isn’t badass to have a laser gun toting, profanity spewing anthropomorphic raccoon on screen has nothing in common with any of my values. I am very, very excited for this one.

And that is the list. There are some other movies I am looking forward to as well but these are my top favorites. Chime in below with your own list!