- It's time to OWN UP TO those HEINOUS crimes you've been committing.
- It resembled a witty move in the beginning/initially appeared to be a witty move, but (it) turned into a rather risky ESCAPADE.
- At first sight a quirky campaign of 'selling' items GRATIS turned out to be an ingenious marketing move.
- For a couple of months they managed to SMUGGLE pounds of stolen coffee of the highest quality.
- The new Avatar film got fascinated responses/received fascinated reviews(?) for its CRACKERJACK visual effects. ["Fascinated" doesn't seem quite right here, but I'm not sure what the intended meaning is.]
- Although the principal of our school was harsh and quick on/with detentions for just a minute's late arrival, our physics teacher could even CONDONE us skipping lessons, provided that we were prepared for the tests.
- He disreputed [<-- incorrect usage of "disreputed". Perhaps "disrupted"?] our whole meeting with his SLEAZY speech.
- You may say, "don't touch what works," or "don't try to gild the lily," but there's still utterly no point in revising this script. [I'm not sure if "don't touch what works" is a common phrase, but "don't fix what isn't broken" is.]