ZekeRage911 Reviews

Ultimate Spider-Man: Great Power (2012) Season 1, Episode 1

Just like my childhood, in that I feel like I keep getting punched in the face

[1/10 · 23 April 2012]

I don't know where to begin. This show...

Okay, I could take X-Men Evolution. I could even tolerate X-Men Origins: Wolverine. I made it all the way through the mid-90's Spider Man cartoon. I grew up watching the corny 70's Spider Man cartoons, including the 'Amazing Friends' one.

This show is so terrible, I COULD NOT WATCH IT!! It's like they decided to take everything likable about Spider Man and flush it away so they could cram in enough Avengers movie name-drops and Nick Fury screen time without actually making an Avengers or Nick Fury cartoon. Then they decided to give Peter Parker these exposition narratives with intentionally terrible animation and ungodly unfunny cartoon visuals. MJ has been replaced by a teenage Lois Lane. J. Jonah Jameson is Bill O'Reilly. The first super-villains we meet are lame even for Spider Man villains. And, the final slap in the face, Spider Man is leading a small team of teenage super heroes. The music is pretty stupid, the flashy animation attempts to mimic comic book style but only serves to bring the story to a screeching halt. I just... God, every time it looked like it might get better it derailed into pointless exposition and unfunny slapstick.

My childhood continues to be raped. Won't someone please abort this thing before it gets any worse?

Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982)

So terrible it's almost beautiful

[30 October 2011]

Very rarely can you find a movie that just gets absolutely everything wrong. It's a true gem when you find a movie so doomed from the very beginning that what comes after can only serve to heighten the experience of a terrible movie. The acting is awful, the story is garbage, the plot makes no sense, there's no witch, no real witchcraft. I mean... just wow. And all that said, this movie was a pleasure to watch if only because a movie this unintentionally bad is just so damn fascinating.

It feels like the filmmakers decided not to even bother trying to live up to the previous two films. So basically, here's the story. An old man comes into a hospital one night with serious injuries. He's terrified, incoherent, and his doctor does everything he can to care for the poor old man.

But, a bland man in a suit waltz's into the hospital, kills the old man, then walks out to his car and sets himself on fire. Where DOES one buy disposable assassins? Are they cheaper than assassins who plan on living after the job to spend their money? Or do they want full life insurance coverage? Anyway, so the Doctor is so intrigued by this mystery that he completely ignores it and goes to a bar. While here he sees a commercial for Silver Shamrock masks, and get used to this annoying commercial jingle, because you'll hear it about ninety times in this movie. Also, for some reason, there's a commercial for the first Halloween on television.

Why? Because the writer and director are openly mocking you. So anyway, Dr. Can't-Act is approached by the daughter of the old man who died, and she convinces him to help her investigate the murder. They see the last place he went to was the Silver Shamrock factory, and decide to go there. They get a lukewarm welcome from the locals, and decide to pose as buyers of Silver Shamrock masks, the most popular item this Halloween season. They start investigating the weird town run by Donal Cochran, the head of Silver Shamrock, and find that it's a strange kind of Big Brother controlled town.

A woman staying in the room next door finds a little Silver Shamrock coin in her mask that contains a microchip. She fiddles with it and for some reason, this causes a laser to shoot her in the head, killing her, and spawning a bug in her mouth.

Why? God only knows.

Welcome to our first stop on the train to WTF town. Trust me, you'll know when you've arrived. So after seeing the woman get carted away by, who else, Donal Cochran and his people from the factory, they decide it's time to dig a lot deeper since something's obviously weird about this place. No kidding? They start doing research on Cochran, but Cochran overhears their plans via the worst-placed listening device in cinema history, and sends his bland men to stop them. There's a fight, and the Doctor kills one of the bland men to find out he's a robot.

Robots. We have Robots in a movie called Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Just think about that.

So the girl is captured, the doctor goes to try and rescue her, but fails and is also captured. He is brought to the control room where Cochran begins explaining his evil plan. I hope you're wearing a helmet, because this just might blow your mind.

His plan: He's put little microchips in all his masks that, when given the appropriate signal, will transform the heads of anyone wearing them into piles of snakes and bugs. It kills them. Now... this would sound silly for even the sillier of the James Bond rogues gallery. We have now arrived at WTF town, your baggage has turned into a cat and your passengers are all wearing tutu's.

Why? f*^$ you, that's why! So Cochran ties up the Doc and puts a mask on him while delivering a villain speech that sounds like it was pieced together from a half-dozen other villain speeches. It makes no sense and gives us zero idea to what is motivation is. At one point he does say it's all a big joke, but I'm sorry, millions and millions of dollars into research for a scheme like this? I mean, do you set out saying 'I'm gonna change people's heads into bugs and snakes... WITH SCIENCE' or do you stumble upon such a thing accidentally and just roll with it?

And if you can change people into insects and snakes, why not turn all those children into wild dogs under your control? Or wolves? Or werewolves? SOMETHING that has SOMETHING to do with the horror genre?! Something that might even let you, I don't know, take over the world or something? No, snakes and bugs. So anyway, the Doctor escapes, frees the girl, and sabotages the factory by throwing a box of microchips down on the robots.

Why does this work? F*#$ if I know.

So the consoles all glow, turn into a big glowing ring, which zaps a big stone, which zaps Cochran, killing him...? The two escape, but surprise! The chick's been replaced by a robot. So the Doc defeats the fake love interest, gets to a convenience store, and starts calling TV stations begging them to pull the plug on the commercial that will send the evil signal.

Somehow, this works for two out of three stations, but the third one doesn't seem to listen. We cut to black on one of the least convincing "Noooooooo's..." in film history. And that's Season of the Witch.

It's like the writers all sat in different rooms in different cities and wrote different scripts, then randomly stapled the pages all together. See it just for the sheer WTF value alone!

Firefly (2002–2003)

Surprisingly not terrible!

[21 July 2011]

Let me preface: I dislike Joss Whedon. I don't hate him. I don't like him. I would be apathetic towards him except for things like Alien: Resurrection. Rumor has it he wrote it as a satire, but I have no evidence of this. His work is so hit-or-miss that it's hard not to ascribe most of his success to dumb luck. So, I was rather surprised to watch this 14 episode series run and not hate it.

In fact, it's kind of a guilty pleasure. The series is about a group of former rebels flying a starship and taking mercenary jobs to make ends meet in a galaxy colonized by humans. Because some outer worlds are poverty-stricken, they exist in wild-west type societies instead of, say, slums. The Sci-Western thing is hard to pull off and Firefly... it does not do it well. I'm sorry, but a sawed off shotgun with bits glued onto it STILL does not make 'pew-pew' noises. The episode where their cargo is cattle, and the doctor and his sister get accused of being witches... Um, yeah. I'm not buying that premise out of the bargain bin.

The characters themselves are fairly likable. The Captain is a somewhat reckless rebel who cares nothing for authority figures but cares everything for his crew. He's got his loyal, butt-kicking right-hand woman, his hired dumb tough-guy merc, his always peppy and upbeat mechanic chick, and the doctor with his trademark Whedon messed-up tough chick sister. And a preacher guy, for some reason. Oh, and the prostitute.

The stories usually aren't too bad, but they're often bogged down by someone seriously forgetting about where the HELL it all takes place. Oh, and people keep forgetting how physics works. One episode had the ship hurtling towards some trap that would roast them all alive. Their solution? Climb outside the ship and shoot it. Better solution? Open a vent for a half-second. It'll alter the ship's trajectory.

Other than a few glaring faults (Most of which are trademark Whedon-isms) the show itself seemed fairly well written... then I realized why. He didn't write the bulk of the series. Concept, design, themes, these are all Whedon's ideas. Even episode stories are largely his ideas. But in the hands of better writers, and a competent director, they actually become quite good. Like when the ship was disabled and we see flashbacks to how Malcolm Reynolds set up his little crew in the first place... that was well done. Joss didn't write it.

All in all, tone, style, and stories are slightly above average. I've seen better shows cancelled for worse reasons, so I don't think Firefly was treated unfairly. They even got a movie out of the deal, you can't say that for most sci-fi shows.

And now for the part of the show I liked to call: What did Joss Whedon rip off hoping no one would notice?!

Outlaw Star - Engineered super-girl in a box Cowboy Bebop - Crew of outlaws performing merc work and usually getting screwed Star Wars - Han Solo, his right-hand Wookie, skirting the law as lovable rogues Farscape - Crew of dysfunctional people evading capture and swearing in another language

And that's really the key to Joss Whedon. See something that's been done before, steal it, combine it with something else that works and see what happens. I guess with Dollhouse he read a lot of P.K. Dick and took a crack at cyberpunk... And crack is really the right word. But seriously, all in all, Firefly isn't a terrible show. It's an okay show. It's probably the best thing Joss has ever done.

Thor (2011)

Fun, but a bit silly

[7/10 · 20 May 2011]

I had my doubts when it seemed Marvel studios was going to follow up its successful and critically acclaimed Iron Man with the rest of the cast of the Avengers all getting their own movie culminating ultimately in the Avengers movie which will, of course, totally fail to live up to the buildup. Don't get me wrong, I want it to be a great movie, but I'm afraid I've been deluded and jaded by things like the 1979 Captain America, the two abysmal Fantastic Four movies, and a depressingly long list of incredibly bad movies done solely for the purposes of grabbing the rights to Marvel characters.

So, yes, I'm not expecting Shakespeare here, and it's a good thing, too.

Thor's not bad. Grading Marvel on a scale it easily falls closer to the 'good' spectrum, i.e. Iron Man, and a lot farther form the 'bad' spectrum, say, Spider Man 3. Here's the thing, Marvel has finally gotten the idea that 1. You can make money on a good movie just as well as you can on a bad, and 2. Making a good movie can actually make you MORE money. Just look at the difference between X-Men and X-Men Origins: Wolverine. You'd think they existed in completely different universes by how vast the gulf of stupid is between the competently told X-Men and... the other one. And box office returns reflect this.

I'm ranting. Fine. To the point: Thor is a competently told story of the Thunder God falling to Earth only to rise again through self-sacrifice and a shoehorned in romance with a clearly pregnant and hiding it Natalie Portman. It's fun. But more importantly, it is visually stunning. I don't even just mean in 3D, I mean entirely. The digital effects are (mostly) perfectly believable. The visuals of Asgard are breathtaking.

The fight scenes are... well, they're okay. Honestly, I'd rather have had a more clearly visible fight choreography, but I understand that when you're story is about Thor, God of Thunder, it's going to be very CG heavy.

SHIELD shows up an awful lot in this one, as the main driving force of the plot on Earth, though I'm still a little fuzzy on how exactly SHIELD has any idea that a weapon of the Gods has fallen to Earth suddenly, much less how they can get there so quickly to retrieve it.

The somewhat mangled love story is... well, it's a mangled love story because Hollywood doesn't understand how to make a movie that appeals to both sexes without cramming in a pointless romance. Can't we just see Thor hurling lightning at monsters? Does it have to be ruined by Natalie 'I'm not preggo, I just like to wear a big jacket in the desert' Portman staring at the hunky English Norseman with moony eyes? Okay, I unfairly picked on Nat there. Mea Culpa.

And speaking of inexplicably English Norsemen, what the living balls was Cary Elwes doing in this movie? Besides sporting a fake goatee and dancing around with a rapier? And the Asian Norseman? And the black Norseman? Not that I have a problem with diversity, and they all played their parts well. Maybe I just don't know the Thor mythos that well.

I nitpick, but ultimately, Thor is a fairly fun ride. It's a summer CG action movie that could have been better but in the end isn't really that bad at all. I recommend seeing it because we all know the new Pirates movie is going to be balls.

Avatar (2009)

Great special effects mask a lame, cliché' filled plot

[5/10 · 29 March 2011]

Okay... let's take it from the top.

The movie opens with some fairly direct and uninspiring narration. (Cliche count: 1) An ex-marine who's lost the use of his legs, and his twin brother, get sent to another planet for a fresh start. The planet Pandora contains some incredibly valuable resource that makes it worth the time and energy everyone expends to get there. There's an indigenous population that lives on top of a major deposit of this rare resource. (Cliche count: 2)

The Avatar program puts people's minds in the bodies of half-alien, half-human hybrids to better relate to the natives. Our hero is one of these people, and instantly goes bonkers-happy at being able to use his legs again. (Cliche count: 3)

The other characters include a nerdy little buddy who's excited about everything. (Cliche count: 4) The base commander, who's an irrepressible douche because he's a hardened marine with no emotion. (Cliche count: 5) There's lead scientist lady who's a bitch outwardly, but a bleeding-heart liberal inwardly. Not sure that's a cliché yet, so we'll let that slide. There's the hot, tough fighter pilot chick who says stuff like "five by five" and shows off cleavage at every possible opportunity. (Cliche count: 6)

Now here's where the movie really gets moving. Our hero, in his Avatar body, stumbles across a great big monster that makes him run away and get lost in the jungle. (Cliche count: 7) Where he is alone, unarmed, and is being watched by the natives. One of them takes aim at him with a bow and arrow, but decides to spare his life because a dandelion puff lands on the end of her bow. So, instead, she saves him from death, then treats him like garbage because he's an outsider who doesn't know the ways of the forest. (Cliche count: 8) She takes him back to her village. (Cliche count: 9) There, he finds out that she's the chief's daughter. (Cliche count:10) And she is next in line to be high priestess like her mother. (Cliche count:11) Her betrothed is an insufferable jackass to the outsider, and wants to kill him immediately, (Cliche count:12) but her mother intercedes and says that she must show him the ways of the tribe so he will understand them better. (Cliche count:13)

Well, when our hero wakes up, the General wants him to use his in to get Intel, the scientists want him to use his in to improve relations, and the annoying, one-dimensional corporate ass who runs the operation wants to just bulldoze the natives to grab his valuable rocks. (Cliche count: 14)

Ooookay... that takes us through the first 25 minutes. Only two hours more to go!! And it goes on like this. I invite you to watch this movie with a notepad and pen, and count the clichés. I cannot understand why this movie is so amazingly acclaimed. It it because it fills a plot we've already seem before with extraordinarily expensive, stunning visuals?

Anyway, I'm gonna rush through to the end here. Hero learns the way of the tribe, recreates the fairy sex scene from Ferngully, lands the chief's daughter, then tells them they have to leave as the bulldozers are on the way, they try to kill him, the marines try to kill him, the scientists try to help him. They end up in a cell, the pilot chick busts them out, Sigourney Weaver dies. They go back to the tribe, our hero bags and tames some giant pteradactle and earns their respect enough to lead the various clans in an epic battle against the evil humans... of which, he is one.

They fight. It looks pretty. The Marines lose. Our hero gets transferred into the body of his avatar permanently. He likes it. Everything works out fine for everyone...

Except the human beings.

My cliché counter explodes. The End.

Jumper (2008)

It's like X-Men, but without the X-Men

[5/10 · 11 February 2011]

LOOK!!! See, Hayden Christiansen can act!! Not particularly well and not overtly, but damnit, he CAN act!! So WHY OH WHY DIDN'T HE IN THE INFAMOUS PREQUELS?!?

Anyway, all this aside, Jumper is... well, kind of lame. There are these people born all over the world who randomly have the power to teleport anywhere they want. There are a group of bad guys led by a silver-haired (but always awesome) Samuel L. Jackson. They capture and kill these people.

That's really about it. Oh, the twist is pretty predictable.

Let's see... what else? The special effects are pretty decent. Yeah, I remember those were okay.

All in all, this movie is okay. It's not exactly an award-winning, set-the-standard for superhero movies kind of thing, but it could be so much worse. It could be Attack of the Clones or something.

Supernatural (2005–2020)

Worth checking out if you like horror... and comedy

[7/10 · 11 February 2011]

I'm a pretty picky fellow when it comes to my television viewing. Supernatural first piqued my interest when it promised to be a horror-themed television show that might actually be scary.

I don't mean the 'monster jumps out at you' scary, but that 'There could be monsters ready to jump out at me from everywhere' scary that leaves you immobile and huddling in the dark.

In this, the show tries, but doesn't quite get there, but I give it credit for getting halfway there. Having watched this show up to season 5, and suffered the tedious and possibly overzealous angels versus demons versus Sam versus Dean versus alien versus predator versus Evil Knievel... Sorry, got carried away... My point is the biblical storyline all-but consumes the story for over two seasons. It's not terrible and has a lot of insight on the nature of religion, blind faith, and what it means to be evil; but I can't help feeling the Apocalyptic end-is-nigh storyline was beaten to death back when Buffy was doing it.

But at least the show knows how to have fun with itself, too. After all, horror's other face is comedy, that relief of tension that allows tension to start building anew. There are a half dozen or so truly hysterically funny episodes sprinkled in to break things up.

My biggest problem with this show, though, is that virtually every hot woman featured either dies, needs to die, or should die. There's a strange misogynistic streak in this show, but then, since every single baddie on Charmed was a guy, I think we can call this a wash.

Salt (2010)

Nice action, but the plot is old news

[6/10 · 11 February 2011]

While both my wife and I eagerly look forward to every Jolie movie, and we both thoroughly enjoyed Salt, I couldn't help feeling that we needed some Tequila and Lime as well.

It's not a bad movie as such. It's got a lot going for it, great acting, amazing action scenes, and as usual, Jolie pulls off sexy badass just by existing. But the story was a strange sort of blend between the Manchurian Candidate and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The Russians apparently, back during the cold war, placed a number of specially trained children into American life as sleeper agents that would one day rise up, seize control of the American Nuclear Arsenal and... nuke it? Spark a war? I'm a little fuzzy about what the Endgame is really supposed to be, but apparently so is Evelyn Salt, since after her cover is blown and she is brought into the fold with her sleeper agent counterparts, they kill her none-the-wiser husband and she goes ballistic. Using her skills, she goes rogue and infiltrates her own infiltration program in order to kill everyone involved with it. She even jumps out of a helicopter at the end.

Again, despite the odd, cliché' ridden plot and the stretched believability of Russians starting anything more than an impolite dinner conversation these days, Salt is a fun movie.

As always, Jolie makes the character real. I heard the movie and the part was originally written for a male character, but they changed it to cast Jolie in the role. Probably because while straight women would have been drawn to a male lead, they needed Jolie to bring in the straight women AND the action-movie male crowd.

I would place this movie on the level of a Die Hard sequel. While the action is great, the tension is real, and the acting is perfect, the movie does have its flaws. It's still an enjoyable ride and if you're a fan of the Jolie-appeal, you should definitely check it out.

(P.S. When will bad guys learn not to kill helpless spouses? It never works in their favor.)

Burn Notice (2007–2013)

A glass of liquid Awesome!

[10/10 · 16 July 2010]

No show is perfect, but I think if any television show is close to perfect, it's Burn Notice. It's a descendant of the A-Team, Mission Impossible, MacGuyver, the Fugitive, and yet transcends its ancestors so thoroughly as to rise to a whole new level of eff-star-star-star-ing cool!

The show tells you its premise in the opening credits, and you can pick up any episode in any season and not be totally lost. The writers have a way of weaving the complex story into exposition dialog so seamlessly and effectively, that the actors have to do very little to make it convincing. Of course, the acting is so phenomenal that they make it totally convincing, and sometimes unnoticeable.

So what is Burn Notice? Michael Westen was a spy for the US, when for reasons unknown, he was blacklisted, or 'Burned.' He was dumped in his home town of Miami, disavowed, and alone. Somehow he managed to reconnect with his old girlfriend Fiona (An IRA guerrilla with a taste for explosives and reckless violence) and an old NAVY Seal buddy named Sam, played by Bruce Campbell in one of the best Bruce Campbell roles ever devised. While he spends his time trying to find out who burned him and get his old job back, he takes side jobs where he helps people who are in trouble, sometimes for money.

My description does this show no justice. Let me list a few things Michael Westen has done that are beyond awesome: Used spray cans and a microwave to make a quick bomb as an escape. Convinced a Bank Robber to run for his life by having Bruce Campbell convince him he was about to be killed. Super-glued a psychotic drug-lord in a drug lab in the middle of a firefight so the police could get him. While on the run, in a swamp, he set up an ambush and took out the hit squad trying to gun him down. Bullet-proofed a car with phone books. Jammed a long-range listening device with a vibrator taped to a window.

Of course, the leading lady, Fiona, played by Gabrielle Anwar, is no slouch herself. Not only can she easily and effectively match his on screen presence, sometimes she can overtake it. Not to mention, for a woman just turned 40, she's as sexy as sexy can get. Those desperate housewives, real life housewives, forget them. She blows them all away, possibly literally if she's got her sawed-off shotgun and C4. Any woman who can mix up molotov cocktails while sipping actual cocktails without batting an eye is perfect in my book.

Adding Bruce Campbell to the cast was a stroke of genius. He plays Sam Axe, a retired NAVY Seal and occasional spy who enjoys mojitos, beer, and the ladies. It's a perfect fit for Bruce. It just raises that level of awesome one more level.

Last but not least, there's Sharon Gless, who plays Michael Westen's mother. Though nagging and always disapproving, she is capable of being a formidable force herself. She was recently nominated for an Emmy for her role, and I hope she gets it. This show deserves awards. It might not be high art, but it does what it does better than anyone has ever done it before. It's intelligent, gripping, funny, serious, and such a well-rounded, well done show. I keep trying to think of criticisms, but even the things that seem like they would get annoying after a while keep getting turned and twisted in inventive ways, like the voice overs, or the names and titles of the secondary characters.

I'm very critical of a lot of things, but Burn Notice... Yes, I rate this as a perfect ten. Maybe because it's just my kind of show, but I could watch this show for days at a time and never get bored. To me, that's a perfect show. Even if you've seen it a thousand times, you still enjoy watching it, that's a perfect show.

White Collar (2009–2014)

It's... okay...

[5/10 · 16 July 2010]

The USA Network has long been known for putting on original series, and you can clearly tell when they care about something and when they're just going to toss it away. White Collar is part of their latest attempt to join the 'Leverage' movement in making a show about criminals who fight crime. While Leverage is a silly little show that knows exactly what it is, White Collar has me just a bit baffled. It's hard to tell if it's serious or not.

I watched several episodes, including the pilot, and I was angry that a lot of the things in the pilot seemed to get weeded out for the show, and then miraculously brought back at the end of the season, read; the lesbian assistant. Now I liked the concept of putting a gay woman next to the suave, blue-eyed man of mystery. It seemed like a great way to avoid the typical cliché of the thief working with a woman who eventually falls for him. Well, fear not, because the very first episode throws that cliché right in your face so gratuitously it might as well have taken off its bra. Out goes the assistant, and in comes some FBI woman with no personality who is a fan of our protagonists thief career and has a crush on him. Well, gee, I've never seen that before!

Oddly enough, they went to the trouble of throwing the cliché in and then never bothered to do anything with it. This makes me feel a little conflicted. It's almost like they were forced to listen to focus groups when writing the rest of the season, then got sick of them and tried to change the show back again.

Story-wise, the show is okay. It's not groundbreaking, but it's entertaining and not too over the top, if a little dull at times. I know there aren't going to be explosions going off constantly like on Burn Notice, and the drama is a little understated, but I guess it could be far far worse.

I guess what I'm saying is that the show is average. It's not going to win any Emmy's anytime soon, but it's something to watch in between Monk, Psych, Royal Pains, and Burn Notice. Maybe that was the idea all along.

The Dresden Files (2007–2008)

Read the books

[3/10 · 16 July 2010]

How to kill a show before it even begins 101: First and foremost, take an interesting and unique premise and water it down as much as humanly possible. Second, cut the special effects budget to the bare bones. Third, make sure you cast unlikeable and unappealing actors who have the on-screen chemistry of a pile of salt. Fourth, depart as much from the source material as you can get away with while still keeping the franchise rights, and finally, sixth, suck away all sense of atmosphere or depth by using as many directing clichés as possible.

Stars and Stones, no wonder this series died. Most people read the books and then are disappointed by the series, but I did this backwards. I was disappointed by the series, and then floored by the books. Not that Jim Butcher is the reincarnation of Hemingway or anything, but his stories are gripping, entertaining, and ruthlessly addictive. Every sentence moves the story along, which is a trick Stephanie Meyer and J.K. Rowling need to learn.

The plot centers around Harry Dresden, a wizard in modern day Chicago who battles supernatural threats. In the book it's a sort of urban fantasy noir kind of feeling with a nerdy, but likable protagonist. In the series, it's a kind of Charmed with no hot chicks, which is all that show had going for it for most of the run.

I don't care that they changed a lot of the details, what got to me was how incompetently the stories were told and how unlikeable and flat the characters were. I honestly had no emotional investment in the stories, which is the exact opposite of what Jim Butcher does in his work. I watched two episodes, the pilot "Storm Front" and the first episode, and I was pretty much done halfway through each.

Ignore the show. Read the books.

Doctor Who: The Big Bang (2010) Season 5, Episode 13

At last!

[10/10 · 27 June 2010]

Under Davies watch, Doctor Who became a mad rush of wackiness with incoherent stories and implausible deus ex machina endings.

Under Moffat, the series has improved significantly. Though they weren't all winners this season, Victory of the Daleks and the Upstairs Neighbor (I forget the exact title) were absolutely horrible, Moffat's finale' was absolutely perfect.

He tied in the entire series with things he's layered. He had a direction since the beginning, and followed it through competently.

While still maintaining a wackiness quota, Matt Smith's performance is stunning, and the finale shows us just how in deep he is with the character. You feel for the characters so much, and you want so BADLY to see the satisfying ending, and he gives it. He gives it without going over the top or pulling something out of his posterior.

I'm looking forward to next season, hoping they can overcome the rushed-out, hackneyed episodes that greatly suffered this otherwise great season. I foresee that the Doctor has nowhere to go but up after Davies, and with Moffat's brilliant storytelling, it WILL get better. It will.

Iron Man 2 (2010)

Pleasantly Surprised again

[8/10 · 1 June 2010]

When I saw the first Iron Man movie, I was surprised at just how competently filmed and well acted that movie was. When compared to all "Super Hero" movies before it, Iron Man was easily at the top. Then the Dark Knight came out and sent everyone else packing. Then Watchmen came out and everyone put their stuff away and went back to work.

In short, Iron Man is the story of a very intelligent, highly flawed man who can barely keep his life together while facing super-human threats. In other words, every other Marvel character out there. But The movie is so well acted, and the dialog so perfectly askew that you really feel drawn in. It's not over-dramatic (well, a few scenes) but overall it's a solid story. When I heard the sequel would feature A. Whiplash, B. Black Widow, C. War Machine, and D. An army of Iron Man knockoff robots, I was honestly skeptical as to how the movie could possibly not be stupid.

The movie was not stupid. A few parts where Tony is ruining his life because he thinks he's dying are, to be honest, a little irritating to watch. But by the end of the movie we really are on his side because he is such a likable character.

A lot of people complained about replacing Rhody. In the first movie he was played by Terrance Howard, and in the second by Don Cheadle. People were angry and wanted to know why. I will tell you why. Don Cheadle can act. Terrence Howard can't. Watch his scenes in the first movie, he's blowing his lines everywhere. He's wooden, and uninteresting. Now watch Don Cheadle in the second, he's intense, he's genuine, and he's grammatically correct. "An unfortunate training exercise occurred yesterday," is a line that logically makes no sense. The line is "An unfortunate INCIDENT occurred DURING a training exercise yesterday." If that's the take they kept, imagine what's on the cutting room floor, or more likely, ashes in Terrence Howard's agents office.

Now while the whole 'secret your father left you' angle is pretty cliché and ham-handed, we quickly forget this as Stark goes back to what he does best, which is wreck his house and build a thing. He's great at building things, and watching him build things makes every nerd giddy. It's like Mythbusters but with CGI effects.

Also, Jon Favreau is a very clever devil. Knowing that every fan-boy is looking for signs of the eventual Avengers movie, he coyly inserted a half-formed Captain America Shield into the 'building the thing' scene. Agent Colson picks it up, Tony Stark looks at it in wonder and says "Yes, that's exactly what I need!" and then uses it to prop up part of the thing he's built. Yes, friends, it's a meta-fan-boy joke.

Oh, and if you DON'T want to sit through the credits to see the secret scene at the end (and trust me, it's not worth it) I will SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT! Tell you what it is. It's a crater in the middle of the desert with Thor's Hammer sticking out of it. SPOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT! SPOILER ALERT!! So, ultimately, is this movie worth seeing? Yes. It's probably one of the better movies to come out this summer, but then I don't get out much, so I could be wrong, but it cleaned Robin Hood's clock. Say, didn't we HAVE a gritty Robin Hood movie come out already? Prince of something something? Not of Persia? Before I ramble on any more: Surprisingly solid story, well acted, gorgeous special effects, decent action scenes, and Scarlet Johanssen is so hot even my Girlfriend's jaw dropped. It surprised the HELL out of me, I thought she was more into Gweneth.

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008)

Kingdom of the Cryingly Dull

[4/10 · 7 April 2010]

All right, it's not a bad movie, but it's not a good movie either. Here's the thing, it's not an Indiana Jones movie. I don't care if Indiana Jones is in it, his name is in the title, and Harrison Ford plays the title character, it's NOT an Indiana Jones movie.

It all comes down to style. Indiana Jones had style. He was a rugged adventurer with grit, wit, and grim determination. He was clever, quick witted, and good in a fight. And to his credit, Harrison Ford plays an aged version of Indy very well, almost too well, to the point where I can't tell if it's a script line about him being tired of it all, or if he's actually griping about being in the movie.

But this movie has no style, and little substance. The plot reads like an X-Files adventure without the atmosphere. It's more like a sequel to the Mummy, or Tomb Raider. This is Indiana Flippin' Jones! If you can't be bothered to at least try, why should I be bothered to pay? This is the fundamental flaw in Hollywood. They don't understand bad from good.

Everything about this story is rushed together with little cohesion or intelligence. There's almost no detective work, no startling revelations, and the first ten minutes spends more time insulting my intelligence than entertaining me. Yes, I see the ark there, how clever. Oh, they stored it in Area 51, yes, cute. Oh, good, some barely mentioned subplot about Red Paranoia. And Indy survives a nuclear bomb test by hiding inside a fridge? This isn't Indiana Jones, this is asinine! Oh, and whoever cast Shia Lebouf as Indy's son (YES, INDIANA JONES'S SON!) should be beaten with a hammer.

Here's the problem, Indiana Jones is a legend in and of himself. Now I didn't expect this movie to be good, but I at least expected it to be an Indiana Jones movie. I don't even care about the aliens, the green screen special effects, or the Russians as the bad guys. Indiana Jones doesn't get married, he dies a heroes death like a real man would! He vanishes mysteriously leaving a long lost son/pupil/apprentice to find him and take the torch from. He doesn't marry the girl from the first movie just so we can rob the franchise of what little dignity it had left after the LEGO version. This is not an Indiana Jones movie, and both Spielberg and Lucas should have their money taken away until they sit down and make this movie properly.

Twilight (I) (2008)

Don't let your daughters watch this crap

[2/10 · 7 April 2010]

I like vampires. I like the night predator aspect, the lurking in the dark danger, and I get the tall dark stranger sex appeal. With this in mind, Twilight wanted me to put a wooden stake in my face!

The story centers around Bella, that's Isabella, but why nitpick about names, they're all pretty ridiculous. She moves from sunny Arizona to rainy, gloomy Washington State, and contrary to the way the REAL world works, is instantly accepted into the popular niche'. She becomes fascinated with Edward Cullen, who is a vampire. Although the fact that no one knows that he and his family are vampires goes to show the entire town must be drinking lead tea to wash down their bowls of stupid. The Cullen family are all pale, don't come out when it's sunny, keep to themselves, and never seem to age. Their eyes are weird looking, and apparently nobody put two and bloody two together. While we're on the subject, why would a vampire hang around high school? Ed the vampire is over a hundred years old, what's he doing in high school? I didn't want to be in high school when I WAS in high school, I sure as hell wouldn't spend the rest of eternity in it!!

Anyway, Bella becomes obsessed with Edward, who is already obsessed with her, and I'm already bored. There's some hints of a plot about unexplained animal attack killings, but it's hidden under a thick, heavy, moldy blanket of boring teen melodrama. This is what girls want to see? Two people who can't get their dialogue right, both apparently born without personalities fumbling into a nonsensical romance just because... actually, that's a good question, WHY the hell are they attracted to each other? Maybe it's because they share an absolute aversion to being interesting. For the two main characters, they're the least interesting in the entire story. I even found myself wanting to know more about the rest of the school's gossip simply because it seemed mildly more interesting.

Eventually, and I can't believe I'm writing this, Edward takes Bella with his family to play a kind of super-powered baseball, and that's when the bad vampires show up. Who are they? More interesting characters that have appeared out of nowhere. Well, the Cullens try to hide Bella, but she's functionally retarded, so she falls for a very simple ploy and is lured into the clutches of the bad vampires. An extremely dull fight scene results, Bella is bitten, but before she's turned into a vampire, Ed sucks the poison out. Oh good, for a moment I thought something interesting might happen like CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT!

This is what we're letting teen girls watch? Some people compare this story to Romeo and Juliet, but they're clearly on crack. While admittedly the characters are just as flat as Romeo and Juliet, the story is absolute drivel.

And now for the elephant in the room: Sparkly vampires. Are you kidding me? How is a night predator supposed to hunt anything when his body glitters like he's in a stage show in Las Vegas? When did vampires become so weak and ineffectual? Spending all their time seducing jailbait or moping about their lot in unlife, give these vampires a pair... of FANGS!

In short, bad message for girls, bad story, and you know the entire concept of pacing? Well the director doesn't because there ISN'T ANY!! It just sort of meanders from one scene to the next with no cohesion or tension. I care more about the lint on my rug than the fate of these kids. As a writer/director/living person THIS IS A BAD THING FOR YOUR MOVIE!!!

Though Alice is pretty cute.

The House Bunny (2008)

Unless you ARE as dumb as the main character...

[2/10 · 6 January 2010]

Where do I begin? Dear lord, WHERE do I begin? Okay, first off: Gross and embarrassing does NOT equal funny. If all you have for jokes are combining disgust and humiliation, you're not funny, you're Rob Schneider. And isn't HE just so successful these days? Second: Characters have to be, in some sense, believable. Wrangling stereotypes together and making them swallow this ridiculous premise isn't making a movie, much less a comedy. It's a bad SNL sketch. I mean a REALLY bad SNL sketch. Having characters that despise each other just work together for story convenience is bad directing on top of bad writing.

Third: If you start your movie with hot chicks, and the story is about turning cows into hot chicks (sexist, I know, but that's the writer, NOT me) then the transition should make me want to laugh, not cringe. Though I'll admit, the metal detector-piercings gag was pretty funny, it was the ONLY joke in the movie that made me even chuckle.

Fourth: Love interests have to have something called chemistry, even in THIS little turd of a movie. Aside from Anna Faris, was there even a casting director in sight of this thing? Were there even auditions, or did they just collect a bunch of people waiting for the bus. Which brings me to my next point: Fifth: Acting. Regular acting is hard enough. Comedic acting requires that you actually be funny, AND an actor! Just because Jerry Seinfeld got away with just being a comedian doesn't mean you can, too. For that matter, none of the characters in this movie seem to be comedians OR actors with the exception of the lead, and she's not exactly in top form. Even she seems to be wondering why she's in this dump of a movie.

Sixth through one-hundred-seventy-five: Just to sum up, I'll do it this way: Talentless writing combined with talentless directing combined with talentless acting combined with mediocre sets, unconvincing motivations, bad pacing, bad dialogue... It's just bad. Maybe vapid valley girls think it's a cute movie, but honest to god, I haven't seen a fustercluck of a movie like this since Mortal Kombat: Annihilation. MAKE SENSE! FOR GOD'S SAKE, MAKE SENSE! I'M BEGGING YOU!!

Superman/Batman: Public Enemies (2009 Video)

Just read the book

[3/10 · 6 October 2009]

Kevin Conroy as Batman, Tim Daly as Superman, in an animated film based on one of my favorite graphic novels. Pity the execution falls so short it doesn't even look like it tried to jump.

This is the story of Lex Luthor as president of the United States, most of America presumably having suffered amnesia, who frames Superman for murder in order to turn the public and his friends against him while a giant Kryptonite meteor plummets towards Earth. I know that doesn't sound like a highly complex plot, but the devil's in the details of this story. However, for the slightly over 60 minute animated version, much of the details have been tossed aside. The story is rushed, compressed, and partially re-written to cut out a lot of the deeper ideas, like Metallo possibly being the killer of Batman's parents, or Lex Luthor's struggle to remain credible despite the outrageous nature of his claims, and of course Superman dealing with the people he's sworn to protect turning against him. Oh, but of course they kept the giant robot, the only part of the story I truly hated. And in the end everyone lives happily ever after and Lex Luthor goes to jail. If I wanted to watch "Batman and Superman beat the bad guys" I think there's enough of that back in the old Superfriends cartoon. Granted they don't have Kevin Conroy doing the voice of Batman, but the devil of the details is that without even an adequate foundation, it doesn't matter how pretty your wallpaper is, because you're wall's on the ground, outside, in the rain and bugs are getting into your house. I think I'm stretching the metaphor, but since I don't really care, I'm just going to keep doing it. Oh, and the artwork. It seems the artists were paying just a little too much attention to everyone's pectoral muscles and not nearly enough to Power Girl's chest. Or, for that matter, any sort of sense of atmosphere. The incessant DC villain cameos was also just a bit pointless. It works in the book, but in the movie they're there for four minutes as a minor obstacle, then the story (such as it is) moves on. The whole thing feels rushed. It's as if they didn't have enough money left to finish it, so they just slapped most of their scenes together, filled it in with action shots, then begged Kevin Conroy to do Batman to attract all the nerds and fanboys... like me. Boy I'm stupid.

G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra (2009)

If only something could suck out the poison...

[2/10 · 3 September 2009]

No. No, I won't do it. I'm not going to see this movie, and you can't - *Is abducted by a tribe of Turbonerds and forced to watch the movie. Returns an hour later, gagging*

Oh sweet melting Kubrick, I never thought it would be THAT bad. Excuse me, it's not even noon yet and I need to start drinking.

All right. I'm going to desperately try to put my thoughts in order here.

Whew.

GI Joe, the Rise of Cobra, is the story of Dr. Who #9, mangling a Scottish accent, and creating nanomites of mass destruction, then tries to steal them from himself so the evil organization Cobra can use them to take over the world.

Ow. Ow. Ow.

It hurts already. Guarding the shipment is Duke, and his politically correct Black Friend, and a team of redshirts that get killed in the resulting assault from a piece of CGI containing the movie's main piece of tail, 'The Baroness.' Who apparently Duke has met before, fell in love with her, knows everything about her from before she went evil and discovered black hair die and push up bras.

Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow.

So then... Duke is saved miraculously by Go Joe, the ultra-secret GI Joe team who is so classified, unless you really want to know, then they'll tell you... but they don't have to kill you for it, apparently, because this is the worst kept secret in the world with 23 countries joining this elite team with super comic book tech and a secret base in flipping Egypt with hoverplanes, stealth suits, and other special toys... Ow.

Owowowowowowowow!!!

It's a multinational organization in order to get around the typical American flag-waving ultra-nationalism...

*Deep breath*

And apparently Cobra is ready to fire their nanomite metal-eaters all over the world... In some attempt to bring order to the chaos of the world... because of course destroying major cities always pacifies a panicked populace...

*Passes out*

Okay. This was just the first forty minutes. I even stayed through Transformers 2. This movie isn't just bad, it's worse than Michael Bay bad. It's almost Ewe Boll bad. I didn't even get to the 'accelerator suits' they touted in the trailer, and good thing, because I think it actually would have given me a fatal dose of stupid. It's LESS moronic than the cartoon! At least the cartoon knew what it was. It was a silly little half-hour toy commercial that, half the time, tried to teach an important life lesson. It was pure 80's cheese. This movie isn't even cheeze-whiz. It's milk left out in the sun in August until it turns into a nest of larvae and anthrax.

I need a drink. Good day, sirs.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)

Oh for the love of God, please make it stop...

[4/10 · 3 September 2009]

Okay... I'm going to TRY to do this. *Deep breath*

Wolverine is, by far, one of the most popular and iconic characters in Marvel. He is one of my favorite, and the mythos about him has been batted back and forth so much, you can pretty much pick and choose what you put in a particular origin story. As for X-Men Origins: Wolverine's origin story, the first hour or so of this movie actually was going well. Maybe a little more than an hour. That's when my cliché' alarm started to ring.

Because soon after giving Wolverine his Adamantium skeleton (from Colonel 'Let's stick Adamantium in it and call it a day' Striker) the movie suddenly starts tumbling down a hill of pointless plot twists, gratuitous Marvel Character cameos (Not that it wasn't gratuitous before) that makes X-Men: Evolution look like a finely crafted epic poem. I don't care that it's not in comic book continuity, or they screwed up little details. That doesn't bother me. It didn't bother me in the original X-Men movies, and it doesn't bother me now. What does bother me is the way the movie both races towards the finish line, and unnecessarily draws the plot out. It's like listening to ten year olds play with action figures. No, actually, it's more like watching a bad video game that SOMEONE ELSE is playing, complete with a boss fight at the end! That's right, a boss fight. For all you nerds that haven't seen it, in the end, Wolvering fights Deadpool. But not the real Deadpool, the teleporting, eye-blasting, adamantium-infused, pseudo-mutant Deadpool with no mouth. The only good point of that character is sewn shut before it begins. Brilliant, thanks a bunch for that boss fight. You can play as either Wolverine or Sabertooth, who isn't Sabertooth, but is. And his love interest is dead, only she isn't, it was all a trick, so she can come back at the end to... what, keep Logan's interest? Get him ticked off? Stop him from killing his brother? None of that appeals to me, he should kill the bastard completing the Cain and Abel parallel. Or is that too deep for you?

There's a desperate feeling in this movie to make a very R-rated character very PG-13, but I'm not on board with that. My feeling is if you're telling a story about a guy who goes ballistic with knives sticking out of his hand, there'd better be some limbs chopped off, and I want to see every gory second.

This was a movie written by a committee looking up Marvel Characters in Wikipedia and hammering out a script over the weekend. Then at the end they forgot 'Oh yeah, Logan's got amnesia, we need a plot device to explain that' and decided not to go with the quadrillions of Marvel Characters than can erase memories, and shot him with an Adamantium bullet. I wish I was making this up. Wait, no I don't, because it's retarded. There's a brief Patrick Stewart cameo in there for no reason other than yet another gratuitous 'Hey, nerds, look at this' moment. Also, why did they advertise the woman with diamond skin as the White Queen? More pointless name dropping? I'm genuinely surprised there isn't a slew of action figures and 'Wolverine cereal with little marshmallow Deadpools' to round out this fustercluck of marketing and nerditude. If you paid to see this, get half your money back. If you didn't, bravo. Neither did I.

Star Trek (2009)

I laughed, I cried, then I saw the movie.

[7/10 · 8 August 2009]

I kid, of course, I actually liked this movie. Even though the story is absolute kack, the acting at times is stiff and uninspired, the sets look more like the background of Willy Wonka's factory than a starship in space, and the dialog was sometimes insipidly stupid, for all those flaws, this was a fun movie.

First of all, it's less a Star Trek movie, and more of a Star Trek spoof. Fans of Star Trek (like myself, yes I'm that much of a nerd) will find this movie absolutely hysterical. Unfortunately the plot is rather serious and over-dramatic, but who cares. I mean they blew up (SPOILER ALERT) the planet Vulcan, killed Spock's Mom, and crumpled up the Trek Timeline and tossed it out the window. It's like a strange attempt at DC's Crisis events, except they were too lazy to try and make it work. But that's okay, through accident or intention, they've made an excellently funny movie. From Kirk getting caught with the green girl to Simon Pegg playing Mr. Scott, this is comedy gold from start to finish. Sometimes it does get a bit silly, but then, the movie couldn't quite figure itself out from the start anyway, so once you've established that this silliness can go anywhere, it's time to sit back, relax, and laugh yourself stupid. er. Stupider... What?

Iron Man (2008)

I actually liked this!

[9/10 · 5 August 2009]

I'm often a very cynical, skeptical, pessimistic SOB when it comes to movies, having been horribly disappointed by virtually every comic book movie adaptation to date, so when Iron Man came out, I was prepared for another long camp-fest full of impressive special effects and the sound of Stan Lee stroking himself in the background.

Boy was I wrong! Iron man is at times gritty, and at times beautiful, and it blends together so seamlessly you wouldn't think this was a superhero movie. In fact, it's not a super hero movie, it's a movie about a flawed character who realizes he's been a total dupe, and a complete ass, and is so horrified by the consequences of his own ignorance and arrogance that he sets out to try and change things. This is the sort of story that's at the heart of every Marvel Superhero, really, but it's often told so badly that you never really get the point.

Spider Man and Spider Man 2 got very close to this, and even went so far as to show that most people are complete ingrates when you go around saving their lives, especially in New York, which might be why Tony Stark lives in Malibu.

Robert Downey Junior, a functional alcoholic, falls into the role brilliantly, what with the role being that of a functional alcoholic, and his performance is both charismatic and gripping, making you care about a man you also want to punch out.

Jeff Bridges plays Obadiah Stane, read: The Bad Guy, and he's got smarmy, greedy bastard practically tattooed on his forehead from shot one. But that doesn't detract from the movie, actually, it feels perfectly natural. Plus he gets points for zooming around on a segue at one point, in a segue scene, oh Jon Favreau, you cheeky son of a...

All in all, this is a great movie. It's not Oscar winner material or anything, but I'll watch it any day, over and over, than six minutes of the Phantom Menace.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009)

Plot holes you can drive a transforming truck through

[3/10 · 1 August 2009]

I was horribly bored one night with my girlfriend out of town, my friends all at work, and nothing else to do but sit around my apartment and drink, so I decided I'd instead go see a movie, but the only one I was even remotely interested in seeing, tragically, was Transformers 2.

The first Transformers was a slightly confusing, often annoying, and thoroughly overblown shiny toy commercial that was upgraded into a shiny car commercial, because let's face it, product placement is everything, with a somewhat silly, but at least cohesive story. Shia Lebouf was annoying, Megan Fox was hot, the robot action was gritty, though a bit confusing because the camera angles always seemed to by just a few degrees off center, which is difficult to do when you consider they're using bloody computers to make this film, and whatever depth the movie might have had was sucked out by a horrific soundtrack, annoying characters, and the slight undertone of racism when Jazz, the black transformer, died at the end.

Transformers 2 took all of the faults of the first movie, put them in a can, and rattled them around for a while, then added more and dumped it out onto the screen. The action scenes seem to take place on a camera that's being swung around by an epileptic monkey, and while the visual effects are impressive, they're somewhat diminished by the fact that you can't tell what the HELL is going on. Even in hi def, the robots all look the same but for the accessories pasted to their robot bodies, and the story is so disjointed it reeks of multiple writers that didn't even consult each other when putting the script together. Apparently there's this guy, the Fallen, the original Decepticon, and everyone who picks up on the vaguely religious aspect, congratulations, now go change your diaper. Anyway, this Fallen is the secret leader, he's looking for energon, and the only place to get it, apparently, is by blowing up the sun with a big secret machine buried in the pyramids of Egypt. I guess a sufficiently advanced race of aliens can only power themselves slightly better than a kid with two photovoltaic cells in a science fair. Anyway, Shia Lebouf returns, only more annoying than ever. But apparently he wasn't annoying enough so they tacked on a pair of 'Ghetto bots' that are like a pair of Jar-Jar's made of metal that continue to raise the undertones of racism to new lows. I know that's contradictory, and I don't care. Megan Fox also returns, the true highlight of the movie, because she's the hottest piece of (actress) this side of a young unviolated Angelina Jolie. In fact she's so hot, even the robots are humping her in this movie, which makes me think the script really was written by eight different thirteen year olds. This movie takes us around the world, introduces a bunch of new characters, then kills them off (except for the Ghetto bots, and that might be borderline racist to some, but honestly, they're so bad, I think it's racist NOT to kill them and bring Jazz back to life with an improbable plot device of some kind, and there's no shortage of those.)

Even though I beat relentlessly on this movie, there were parts that were fun... for a while. But the end is so needlessly drawn out I was genuinely looking at my watch two hours into the film wondering why we hadn't even approached a conclusion yet, and how much longer we had to wait for them to bring Optimus back to bloody life and save the bloody day so the bloody bad robots (who seem to have legions at their command, yet keep losing badly) can go away at last. Drawn out battle scenes only work at a certain level of tension, but the longer it goes on, your adrenaline burns out, you crash, and wonder why you should even give two Shia's about the outcome. But then, Michael Bay probably just needs some Ritalyn and everything will be fine.

Watchmen (2009)

Zack Snyder is a 13 year old boy

[4/10 · 2 July 2009]

I held off on watching Watchmen for a long time. This is Alan Moore's epic, and you'd think that having a storyboard already worked out for you would help even a hack like Snyder get it right. With three hours to work with, even this complicated epic should be able to be competently told.

The first five minutes included an unnecessary fight scene. Then there was the opening title that went on forever with a song that served to insult the intelligence of anyone over fourteen years old. The soundtrack is hideous, completely failing to capture the mood of any scene. Scenes that should have been subtle and understated were overblown and expanded. Scenes that were expanded and intense were shortened and robbed of depth.

The rape scene was extended for no visible purpose other than, apparently, to beat a woman up. The single coolest moment in Rorschach's history was changed to be more brutal, and less intelligent. In the first two hours of this movie, a full forty minutes could have been cut and nothing would have been lost.

Too much emphasis was put on sex, gore, visual effects, 'cool' shots, and insulting our intelligence with extra scenes and back story that changed a LOT of the characters motivations. Important lines and scenes were left out.

I give this movie a 4 out of ten for at least getting the basic story right, and giving good visuals to some scenes that actually do make an impact. But overall... don't watch the Watchmen. Read the graphic novel. Ironically... it's less graphic. But it has a better ending.

Dollhouse (2009–2010)

If Eliza Dushku wasn't so incredibly hot...

[4/10 · 28 March 2009]

As a writer, I can usually see what a writer is aiming for when I watch a scene in television or a movie. When I look at Dollhouse, I see a really excellent premise ruined by Joss Whedon's fanboy-like mentality, and televisions typical fear of depth. Think of it as Neuromancer meets My Own Worst Enemy meets a Clockwork Orange, but it's too busy mashing all these things together to pick up on the underlying themes or develop a cohesive structure. Eliza Dushku plays Echo, formerly Caroline, who got into some severe trouble with debt, or identity theft, or some other plainly transparent attempt at metaphor so that she signs up with the Dollhouse, a secret organization that mind-wipes people, then implants memories from other people to give them artificial personalities for each job they are assigned to. They do mercenary work, as well as high-class pimping, in order to fund this bizarre organization. The clients always seem to be some screwed up rich idiot who either wants to hunt Echo, screw her, abuse her, or play house with her. All this would be enough for a show, if you actually went into depth with it, but there's also this FBI agent who's trying to prove the Dollhouse is real, and is guilty of human trafficking.

The show plays up the science, often going into Trek-talk, and seems to prefer brief episodic adventures as opposed to a real ongoing story. The only highlight, as I mentioned, is Eliza Dushku gets to be incredibly hot, often half-dressed. I was puzzled by this, seeing as how she's the executive producer (Not bad if you can get it) but then I realized, even if the show tanks, she's playing a different character every week, so she has a perfect test reel for any future gigs. She gets to work on acting, look incredibly hot, get a bunch of attention, and can use the show to show off her versatility as an actress. Well played, my dear. Well played. Though, in the future, call Bryan Fuller, not Joss Whedon.

Overall, this show isn't painful to watch, but it's not fantastic either. It's equally good with the sound off as it is on.

The Dark Knight (2008)

See this movie! But not the kids.

[9/10 · 18 July 2008]

I am a skeptical critic who is rarely impressed by movies anymore. This was a happy exception.

I went to see this movie with my brother, a film student, and by the end we were just both blown away. This is NOT a superhero movie. This is NOT a kids movie. This is NOT a happy-happy joy-joy wisecracking action flick with a smarmy, charming good guy and a hammed up over-the-top bad guy. This was a study of several incredible characters scraping against each other in a desperate quest of heavily flawed people trying to do the right thing.

Now, there were a few 'comic book' moments. Like after the Batmobile gets blasted, and our hero 'ejects' into a motorcycle type pod from the blown-up car. That one almost lost me. Or when the Joker tells the sad tale of his demented dad, which turns out to be just a fantasy anyway because he tells a different origin story later. So that one kind of redeemed itself. And, I'm sorry... Ms. Gyllenhall... I don't find this woman attractive at all. Her face is like Droopy Dog met Kirsten Dunst. I know, it's harsh, but really, it did kinda ruin a little of the film for me. Her acting was perfectly fine. But she just isn't good looking at all. Aaron Eckhart, Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman, Gary Oldman and, of course, Heath Ledger were all PERFECT. The acting compliments this movie so well, you'll believe that these characters could be out on the streets. The story itself is more like a novel. It seems as if it struggles to find it's way for the first two acts, but by the end, everything fits together. It underscores a message of dark reality versus striving ideology in a world where corruption is rampant and a handful of dedicated people try to stop it. Amidst it all, is the Joker, the element of chaos ripping both systems apart.

Now let's shoot the elephant in the room. Heath Ledger is dead. His performance was so incredible, so believable, and so darkly disturbing, that this movie is definitely NOT for kids. People think "Oh, it's Batman, my kid will love it." Stop being an idiot. The movie is called "THE DARK KNIGHT" The Joker kills one person by slamming his head over a pencil and driving it into his brain. Getting back to the elephant... Yes, I believe Heath Ledger deserves an Oscar Nom for his performance. I'm not saying this because he's dead. I'm saying this because his performance was THAT good.

The movie is like watching a novel, which is my favorite kind of movie. There are stories within stories adding a rich complexity. My favorite scene is when the hardened criminal throws the detonator out the window. You'll know it when you see it. I loved that.

This is easily the best movie I've seen since Iron Man, and Iron Man was f-ing good! This movie made Batman Begins look shallow and empty. Not that Batman Begins was brilliant, but for a 'superhero' movie, it was good. The 'Dark Knight' is a good MOVIE period. See it. But leave the kids at home. This isn't 'biff! pow! thud!' Batman. This is dark, gritty, disturbing, gripping, enthralling and powerful. See. It.