Club Benefits
When I’m not spending hours trying to climb the ranked ladder in a fighting game, rewatching classic World Championship Wrestling matches from the ’90s or flipping through my favorite Marvel Comics and DC Comics graphic novels, I’m usually watching movies.
Streaming services like Netflix, Max and Disney+ fuel that obsession by giving me an endless supply of movies to dive into. And because I’m the type of person who’ll randomly press play on a film I’ve never even heard of, discovering hidden gems — or complete disasters — is part of the fun.
Now that summer blockbuster season is kicking into high gear and theaters are finally pulling me away from the couch, I started putting together a watchlist of movies to revisit before the biggest releases arrive. Before I inevitably spend way too much money on popcorn during a midnight screening, I wanted to make better use of all the streaming services I already pay for and build the ultimate pre-summer movie marathon.
That’s where ChatGPT came in. I used the AI as a personal movie recommendation assistant to help curate a watchlist packed with films I already love, along with a few classics and overlooked picks I’ve somehow never seen before.
Prepping myself for the new He-Man movie
Once June enters the picture, I’m super excited to take my back row seat and watch the following 2026 summer blockbusters: Masters of the Universe, Disclosure Day, The Furious, Supergirl, Evil Dead Burn, The Odyssey, Spider-Man: Brand New Day, Insidious: Out of the Further and Coyote vs. Acme.
Once I asked ChatGPT to find a list of the best films to watch to get prepared for each of those picks, the chatbot ended up selecting five standout movies that were set up to build my anticipation even more.
For Masters of the Universe, ChatGPT offered me a collection of films that reflect the swords & sorcery mixed with sci-fi feel that the big-screen He-Man live-action adaptation is going for:
- Conan the Barbarian: The DNA of He-Man is all over this: giant muscles, fantasy warfare, metal album-cover energy.
- Flash Gordon: Pure colorful sci-fi fantasy camp. If the new movie embraces the weirdness, this is essential prep.
- Thor: Ragnarok: Cosmic fantasy with humor, neon visuals and god-tier action.
- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring: For the epic fantasy world-building you’ll probably crave beforehand.
- Masters of the Universe (1987): Frank Langella’s Skeletor performance alone is worth the watch.
From that list, I’ve already seen — and loved — "Conan the Barbarian", "The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring" and "Thor: Ragnarok."
But I’ve never actually sat down and watched "Flash Gordon" or the original Masters of the Universe from start to finish. I’ve only caught random scenes whenever they happened to pop up on one of my retro movie cable channels.
Now that a new big-screen version of "Masters of the Universe" is on the way, I’m making it a priority to finally check both of them off my watchlist before heading to the theater.
From an alien conspiracy to Looney Tunes
ChatGPT also made sure to lay out a bunch of movies I’d be wise to check out in preparation for the other 2026 summer blockbusters I’ve designated as must-see. I’m a huge fan of sci-fi stuff that dives into aliens, brutal martial-arts action, epic superhero escapades and more.
The chatbot took note of all that and led me to some decent to quality movie viewing with its picks:
- Disclosure Day: Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, War of the Worlds (2005), Arrival and Signs.
- The Furious: The Raid: Redemption, The Raid 2, The Forbidden City, The Villainess and John Wick.
- Supergirl: Superman: The Movie, Superman (2025), Guardians of the Galaxy, Logan and Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.
- Evil Dead Burn: The Evil Dead, Evil Dead II, Evil Dead Rise, Drag Me to Hell and The Cabin in the Woods.
- The Odyssey: Gladiator, Troy, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, Lawrence of Arabia and Interstellar.
- Spider-Man: Brand New Day: Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, The Amazing Spider-Man, Captain America: Civil War and Spider-Man: No Way Home.
- Insidious: Out of the Further: Insidious, Insiduous: Chapter 2, The Conjuring, Sinister and Poltergeist.
- Coyote vs. Acme: Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, Space Jam, Looney Tunes: Back in Action, The Bugs Bunny/Road Runner Movie and The Lego Movie.
The takeaway
ChatGPT became my digital movie recommendation tool and made sure I had a lot of fun pre-watching to do before I stepped into the theatre to watch all the major summer blockbusters I can’t wait to see. Now I have plenty of time before each film releases to sit in front of my fan, find out where each of these suggested films is playing across my streaming subscriptions and enjoy pure cinema.
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