Friday, November 25, 2011

Superhero Flicks, Part 3: Miscellaneous DCs.


Superman, Batman...and the rest, here on Gilligan's Isle.

Yeah, looking at these...Warners/DC had a helluva head start on Marvel with Donner-Supes, and Burton-Bats, and for a helluva while....but after those, their batting average has been pretty sloppy, and Marvel has more than caught up.
But, I'll deal with Marvel later...let's look at this spotty DC report card...


Swamp Thing


This overlapped with horror, so, the whole review can be read here.

The short and sweet of it, I loved it.
It's a cult classic, though.


Supergirl


The film-

The side-sequel to the Supermans.

For the longest time, I was kinda begrudgingly willing to call this "Superman 4", until "Quest For Peace", came along, then I was all like, "Yay! Real Superman 4!!".

*Sad comedy trumpet* wah-waaahhh.

As for the film?
Ehhhh......
It's heart was in the right place....but so was "quest for peace".

I hear this is up on the block for a remake/reboot.
But, isn't fucking everything?

The history-

My faint memories of it were pretty goofy, I haven't seen it since the 80's.

I do know I liked "quest..", better, back when I was young, and dumb, and liked it, so, that says something.
This was lamer than "quest"?
Owch.

I do remember this one went more into how The Phantom Zone worked, and what it looked like.
That was kinda neat.
I thought...but, again, I gotta see this again...


The Return Of Swamp Thing



The film-

Swampy-1 had some elements of humor, but they went full-on campy humor for this one.

I...go back and forth on this one.
Sometimes, I can go along with the camp, sometimes, it's an eye-roller.
All right, most times.
It's damned near a Troma movie.
Although, I haven't seen it in a helluva while...
Shit, not all through the 00's..that flew by...

The history-

Saw this the first time as a rental with Steve, and he knew we were in trouble when "born on the bayou", fired up for the theme song, he groaned out loud "ohh noo..it's a COMEDY sequel...".

I was like "gee whiz, give it a chance!".
*Steps inside own memory, and smacks self*


Steel


The film-

So....imagine War Machine from "Iron Man 2", take away his guns, give him a sledge hammer, cast him as Shaq, and make the film for a budget of thousands, and...yeah...

I haven't actually seen this, but the Youtube clips have been enough to ward me off.

"Ninja Turtles III: Turtles In Time", level bad.

This quite possibly killed superhero movies for the rest of the 90's, up to the 00's.
Nah, it did.

The history-

N/A


Catwoman


The film-

Another piece of crap.

Dumb guys were like "duhr, but you get to see Halle Berry slink around in a skimpy revealing outfit!".

Really? You're gonna reward Warners with ticket money for that?
You're that sexually constipated?
You DO know, you can ogle Halle in various states of undress for absolutely free with a Google Image search, right?
You don't have to suffer the anguish of a terrible movie just to get a weak shame-filled semi-chubby.
There's this thing called the internet, it's a handy new thing from scientists.
It's like living in space.
Check it out sometime.

The history-

Cable. Curiosity.
Worse than I imagined.


The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen


The Film-

Asscrap.

The history-

I read the books, they were good.
I saw the film, it wasn't.


Constantine


The film-

I was skeptical of an American brunette Constantine.
Even more skeptical still, once he was casted as Keanu.

I was right to be skeptical.

The history-

See Catwoman.


V for Vendetta


The film-

Well done for what it is, haven't seen the book for comparison.
It's an Alan Moore adaptation, so I can only assume it got butchered.

I can only rate the film on its own merits, and...it depressed the fuck out of me.

The tyrants will always keep shit-bubbling up from humanity, the cycle repeats again, and again, and again, America is gonna become a Nazi state, we're all gonna get tortured, I'm going to be murdered in the night like Stephen Fry's character for my subversive blog opinions, it's all gonna happen, nothing can stop it, and V blowing the bastards up at the end is small consolation, because it's just all gonna happen again, and again, and good people are going to keep being lambs for the slaughter.
Forever.
And ever and ever.

That was my take away from the piece.
Blood freezing, bone frosting, despair.
Wave after stifling pulsing wave of it.
Every time I see this thing, the ground turns to neutronium, and I'm flattened into a pancake for weeks.
I feel cold inside just talking about it.

Radical lefties, and hackers, apparently, find thrilling excitement and encouragement in there somewhere, cuz they use the V mask as a symbol.
They're clearly seeing something I'm not.
Or, they're stupid.
One of those.
Who knows?

Anyway, unlike fucking crybaby Ebert (see my Henry review), I won't piss on a film for saying things that don't make me happy.
It's a good job.
Thumbs up.

The history-

Cable. Curiosity. Wasn't disappointed.


The Spirit


The film-

Clutch your face in embarrassment bad.
Miller is off his rocker.
Sad.

The history-

Saw it on HD Showtime in HD 1080p LCD goodness.
As good as seeing it at the theater.
Didn't help.


Watchmen


The film-


From here...

Best thing made by human beings.
Oh, okay, thats the book, but this is close.

Yup.
This redeems this whole fucking entry.

The history-

Saw it at the theater.
Hard nailing down which was more fan-gasm-tastic, this, or "Dark Knight".

The trailer got me violently addicted to this song.
Muse- Take A Bow.


Jonah Hex


The film-

Haven't seen it, haven't heard a good thing about it, heard it unfavorably compared to some of the shitty films on this list, I'll give it a miss.

The history-

N/A


Green Lantern


The film-

From here...

Haven't seen it yet.
Critics and friends say it's not as good as "X-Men First Class", or even "Thor", but it's a decent summer flick.
Only "Captain America", to go...
This 10 or so years run of superhero flicks is destined to burn out someday, but it's been a great fucking run, and it'll be long remembered. :)

Still applies, Captain America has come out, and turned out to be the best of the batch of summer 2011, next to "X-Men First Class".

All three are at Redbox now, gotta check 'em out.

The history-

N/A


So...one cult classic (Swampy), one decent film-film (V for Vendetta), one true masterpiece (Watchmen), and one passable popcorn-flick (Green Lantern) amongst...a buncha crap.

4 out of 12, not so good, Warners...not so good...

Up next, ...I guess, Marvel...howabout..Spidey!

16 comments:

Diacanu said...

Seen Green Lantern now.

It was okay.

I don't get where Thor was supposed to be better, they're about tied as far as I can see.

Gotta see Cap, and XM-FC for the Marvel reviews next...

Hyla Tracy II said...

Ahhh . . . 'Swamp Thing'.

You are ama-zing. (Strike a nerve? Has your back untwisted from the spasms yet, or did that reference sail safely overhead? Myeh-heh-hehhh . . .)

I love that fucking movie. It recalls the glorious summer that it was played every frigging day on . . . either Cinemax or HBO (I'm leaning Cinemax) along with 'Stallone--Cobra', and I watched both movies numerous times whenever we visited over at the home of my cousin, who had those fabled primordial premium channels back in 1980-whatever-it-was.

I wonder how much about me the repeated childhood exposure to these films explains . . . ;(

Hyla Tracy II said...

AAA! Comment-jumped!

Howdy-do!

Diacanu said...

D'oh! Three more minutes!?!
I gave up, and booted down, and went to sleep!

Hyla Tracy II said...

Yep. I was mid-Swampy reminisce when you popped your Green Lantern comment.

Tied with Thor, huh? Well, I didn't think Thor was a GREAT movie, but I liked it at least as much as I liked Iron Man back in the day--it was good ol' fun, is what I'm saying. It was a movie about frigging Thor, you get what you pay for (you hearin' me, Ebert?)

Sooo . . . mebbe I give GL a whirl.

Diacanu said...

Ehh...Thor maayybe had a slightly bigger bang for your theater buck, and had more emotional meat for the actors to chew on, but...as comic issues, yeah, tied.

Hyla Tracy II said...

How was the cheese factor?

That was one of the things I actually dug about Thor, that it had a healthy humor component. Thor's one of those characters and concepts that becomes more ludicrous and stupid the more seriously you take it. Brannagh and gang did a great job balancing the celestial/mythic/operatic with the down-to-earth/silly/goofy, or at least I thought so (that flash of Thor's fake grinning ID photo frigging kills me).

But Ryan Reynolds in tights in space . . . vast potential for rank, indigestible cheese.

Diacanu said...

Hmm, well, I expected way more goofiness outta Reynolds, and there's a sprinkle of it, but he more often kinda puppy-dog-eyes acted his way through the mushy stuff, and the self-doubt stuff.

Once he goes to Oa, it plays out like a straight ahead CG-ed reboot issue of Green Lantern Corps.

Some nice stuff about overcoming fear for the kiddies, a nifty boogeyman to slay, s'alright.

A bit too much goes into the "save it for later", bin, like the fall of Sinestro, and now there won't be a sequel so, pppt.

Worth a buck outta Redbox, anyway.

Diacanu said...

Didja know back in the early 00's there was talk of Jack Black playing GL?
Yeah...that woulda been...absurd..

Hyla Tracy II said...

Yeah, I read about that. I think absurd was the idea, because GL's such a sideline character, why not use him for comedy fodder. Maybe they were thinking 'The Mask with a ring' or something.

'Think about it guys, his ring can make anything out of thin air--it's a prop comedy GOLDMINE!'

Oy.

Diacanu said...

Watchin' "First Class", right now.
Muuuuch better.

Hyla Tracy II said...

Yeah, saw that one in the theater. Dug it. Nice switch-up after X3 and the Wolv-abortion.

I had the score jammed into my head for weeks. Oop. It's back.

Diacanu said...

Ope, canon violation!
Xavier gets paralyzed in this one, but he's youth-ified Patrick Stewart standing up in Wolverine.

Diacanu said...

Eh, maybe Beast tested techno-trousers on him.

Then, a wheelchair turned out to be less dangerous than penguin hijacked techno-trousers.

Hyla Tracy II said...

Yeah, but . . . it was XO: Wolverine, so . . . fuck it.

They made a point of saying this movie was supposed to be in the same cinematic universe as the prior X movies and all, and that it wasn't a reboot . . . But, again: fuck it. Who are comic book fans to grouse over retcons, anyway? (what am I saying . . .)

Hyla Tracy II said...

OH! Follow-up to the Jack Black Green Lantern thing . . . for if they were going to use the ring constructs to perpetrate the prop comedy . . .

THEY COULD'VE YANKED RIP TAYLOR OUT OF MOTHBALLS TO PLAY SINESTRO!

I . . . actually would've paid to see that.

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