The Expendables

I... I don't even know where to start here. Ok. Let's get one thing straight RIGHT OFF THE BAT. This is not, repeat, NOT an attempted satire of old, cheesy, bad 80s action flicks. It just plain IS a cheesy, bad action flick. Here, from the mind of Sylvester Stallone (God help us all. When his credit came up for screenwriter at the beginning. I sat forward with my face in my hands for about a minute and a half.) we have a movie for idiotic gun-fetishists, BY idiotic gun fetishists. This movie made me sad, REALLY sad. Because the combined action talent here is astounding. But they don't DO anything with it. You have Statham, Stallone, Rourke, Willis, and the MOTHERF*CKING TERMINATOR! How the hell do you mess that up? Well they do. Because what you have here is a macho, testosterone-filled shit movie. Yeah, it's shit. It's "Transformers" Bad.... yeah, THAT bad. What's sad is the directing sucks, the camera guy has AHDH apparently, the writing is sloppy, the story is nonexistant, the romance between Stallone (yes, he's the character that develops a romance, he wrote the movie too, coincidence? I think not. Statham is already in one but that's barely focused on except for one, admittedly, kinda cool action seen in which he beats up an abusive boyfriend and stabs a basketball with a knife with the line "Next time I'll deflate all your balls.") with the General's Daughter (who is the EXACT model of a Damsel-In-Distress type movie leading lady) is LAUGHABLE at BEST. Oh, and the action? It's terrible. Guns get shot, guys fall over, pyro blows, that's about it. Occasionally there's an uninteresting fight scene. Remember all that glorious ultra-gore in "Rambo?" Yeah, not here. It was obviously shot with one eye on a potential PG-13, so it's all quick hits and blink-and-you-miss-it inserts. The movie is straight testosterone. No emotion at all. Which should be expected from a Stallone flick, but come on guys. Rourke has one scene where he tells a story about being back in a war, and being shot up bad with stallone, and not thinking he was going to make it and that he got drunk and saw a woman about to jump off a bridge and he could've saved her but he didn't. And the ENTIRE time you're thinking, "Jesus Christ, why couldn't we be seeing THIS movie. THis sounds a LOT more interesting." and it's the only time in the movie that a preformance is, well, believable! Mickey Rourke is amazing in this movie, and the character they gave him was underplayed to a degree that quite frankly offends me. His preformance actually gives the scene emotion, and it gives his character a depth that they never play on. In summary. Expendables is shit. s-h-i-t. and for all the Macho, Explosion-wanking, stallone fans out there asking if they should like it because It has all the big action stars... Short answer: No. Long answer: No and go fuck yourselves you miserable, misinformed, cockbags.

I'm sorry

I won't be updating this blog until I have something to say. Which will probably take a while. I might just delete it, I don't know. Not like I get any readers anyway.

Wow

It's been a while since I've posted on here. Maybe because I haven't had anything to say. I'll have stuff up here later on maybe but for now this update's all you're going to get.

Three Reasons for Robin

Three weeks ago, when composing a review for The Losers, I found myself in a critic's conundrum: I had nothing to say. The movie wasn't just bad, it was boring, and I'd exhausted my supply of witty observations only to find myself running a bit short for time and devoid of anything much interesting - at least from my perspective - for the viewer to chew on. Long story short, I decided to tack a post script relating to the previous week's review of Kick Ass on to the beginning, relating to a contention of mine that the character of Hit-Girl can serve as evidence that kid sidekicks in superhero movies aren't as bad an idea as everyone has been conditioned to accept that they are. Or, in summary, I'd like to see Robin turn up in the next Batman movie. My operating logic was simple: nobody seems to care about The Losers, people do seem to care about the then week-old Kick-Ass, everybody seems to care about the next Batman movie. That episode drew about 160 comments in the The Escapist Forums. Of that 160, about 130 wanted to talk about the under-one-minute bit about Robin, as opposed to the several minutes devoted to The Losers. Of that 130, I think all of two people didn't think I'd taken leave of my senses. I'd be lying if I said I knew (or even figured) that the response would be any different if I suggested the same in any other context. It's a running theme when it comes to my relationship with the Batman movies: Everyone hates Robin, except me. Why am I alone on this? Granted, I'm the guy who wants more color 'n' crazy when it comes to genre film and superheroes in particular. If Warner Bros. handed me $100 million and final cut, the first thing you'd see in a new Superman movie would be Krypto the Superdog (he wouldn't talk, though). But Robin isn't just some random offbeat side character, he's the second most important figure in the Batman mythos! The only fixtures of Batman that have been around longer are Alfred and The Joker. Well, let it never be said that MovieBob doesn't relish the opportunity to explain himself. Here's what I'll call three good reasons that the Boy Wonder ought to turn up in the next Bat-film, although hopefully they won't call him that. #1. He Belongs There. To my mind, this is probably the most prominent rationale anyone could make: Robin is one of the key components of the Batman franchise, and has been for about 99% of its existence. Batman is about 70 years old, Robin is about 69. Do the math. You wouldn't make a Sherlock Holmes movie without Watson, right? King Arthur without Merlin? The Lone Ranger without Tonto? And if you did, it would be patently obvious that their absence was temporary or plot-specific - you wouldn't simply leave them out. And yet this has been the default approach for Batman adaptations in the modern era, mostly owing to the period in which they started up. The original run of big-budget Batman movies ran concurrent with the 90s, the era when comic publishers first fully realized there was a (temporary) goldmine in tailoring the material toward 30-something hardcore fans rather than the younger audience that had typically sustained them. "Grim 'n' Gritty" books doing weak imitations of Watchmen were in, anything that reminded "mature" fans of the material's inherent juvenility were out ... so if you're trying to re-imagine the Caped Crusader as a one-dimensional Ball-Of-Angry, the humanizing element of a teenaged sidekick is the first thing you ditch. (For those keeping track, the Grim 'n' Gritty 90s had the secondary effect of essentially destroying the American comic book industry.) So, I get it. Thanks to the Burton movies and their subsequent ripple effect, there's basically one or two generations of fans for whom Batman has always been this solitary character while Robin is this other thing that doesn't quite fit, but keeps turning up anyway. I get that, I just don't agree. Batman existed as an on-his-own character for barely a year before the first Robin turned up, and he's been around in some form ever since. Batman and Robin are the franchise, and even in the best of cases (read: The Dark Knight) I can't help but feel like there's an awkward empty spot somewhere to the left of Batman where the Boy Wonder ought to be standing; his absence is as palpable as would be the absence of Alfred or the Bat-Signal. #2. He Makes Sense Theoretical question: Aside from playing "guess the villain," where do you expect the story of the current Batman movies to go after Dark Knight? Hell, where can it go? Despite the upbeat (for a Batman movie) music cue and the hopeful narration from Gary Oldman, TDK ends on the most downer note possible: The bad guy won. Yes, fine, those people on the boats did the right thing(s), but Joker's broader scheme to undo order in the city and (more specifically) to prove that his "everyone is one step away from being ME" philosophy was correct by flipping Harvey Dent's crazy switch was an unqualified success - to the extent that the only way to avoid Armageddon is for the good guys to lie and pretend that they won via Batman framing himself for multiple murder. Looking at that, does anyone think the sequel is simply going to skew darker? I mean, the only way it could even get darker is if the movie ends with Batman slitting his wrists in the bathtub while listening to a vinyl of Die Fledermousse. Now, I could be completely wrong, but it seems logical that Batman 3 will probably be about Batman coming back from the brink. Some kind of redemption, stabilization, personal growth story. Y'know what's good for redemption? Transitioning from one's own personal quest for vengeance to helping someone else. This couldn't make more sense from a character perspective: Bruce Wayne's issue is essentially arrested development - his emotional growth stopped when his parents died, and Batman is basically an adult-sized ten year-old boy taking out his angst on random muggers. Having to get over himself and move from being an angry kid who misses his daddy to a present father-figure to a real kid is the stuff of genuine character development. (Not that it's exactly the same thing, but remember how well the dynamic of Bruce Wayne and a younger hero-in-training worked for Batman Beyond?) Plus, on a more practical/mechanical level, he could potentially solve some of the nagging issues of the franchise (yes, even TDK.) A younger, more agile partner with an acrobatics background would add dynamic oomph to fight scenes that - let's face it - aren't exactly terrific thanks to the insistence on the armored Batsuit look. He gives Batman someone to talk to in person instead of always being on the Bat-Bluetooth with Alfred. He lets you extend the reach of Batman's presence throughout the story without Batman himself having to always show up, which helps blunt the problem of Batman sometimes seeming like the lone weird visitor in an otherwise ordinary crime movie. And, not for nothing, but would it be so bad for there to be one person in these movies who acknowledges that superheroism is, y'know, fun to do? #3. Dark is Dead I say again: Part of what made The Dark Knight such a great work was that it was willing to go all the way in its commitment to the downbeat - the bad guy wins, the love interest dies and the good guy winds up a wanted felon on what amounts to a suicide mission. Since you don't get much darker than that without sending Batman off to fight that guy from The Human Centipede, is it fair to wonder if TDK is the peak for grim, pitch-dark superheroes? Consider: In the same year that Batman was reaching this (potential) nadir of gritty angst, the rest of the genre was taking its first steps in the opposite direction with the breezy, gee-isn't-this-stuff-fun Iron Man and the unapologetic paean to adolescent monster movie worship that was The Incredible Hulk. Set to follow are films based on Captain America - a regular Mr. Sunshine - and Thor - a swords and sorcery pic. And, of course, The Avengers, where all these colorful oddballs will be hanging out together. On TV, Batman himself headlines The Brave & The Bold, a love-letter to sunny, Silver Age DC adventure stories, and on the comic side line-wide events like Marvel's Heroic Age and DC's Brightest Day are launching with the specific purpose of bringing the joy and glory back to the cape and cowl set. That Captain America movie I mentioned? They've opted to keep Bucky Barnes, their equivalent to Robin, while rumblings from the gaming world suggest that Robin himself may turn up in the sequel to Arkham Asylum. Maybe it's time for Robin? Maybe the pop culture pendulum is swinging back away from "Grim 'n' Gritty" to quirky and colorful? Is Batman's third outing going to be ironically behind the times when it finally comes out - like people who sold off old Nintendo stocks right before the Wii came out? I'm picturing Captain America knocking back brews at a party, boastfully regaling his entourage with tales of recent success: "Y'know what're great? Teen sidekicks! Your action gets better, you have someone to shoot the breeze with, can't go wrong! Bruce knows what I'm talking about, right Bruce?" - and Batman is sitting over in a booth grumbling about firing his agent over a rum and coke and a plate of sliders; wistfully watching Kick-Ass on his Bat-iPhone and wondering why even Iron Man can move around in-costume better than he can ... ... alright, that might be pushing it. But you get the idea.

Wakka Wakka

Wakka. *Nom*

"Kick-Ass" Superhero movies you might've missed

Kick-Ass is one part spoof and one part celebration of superhero movies. The fact that it exists at all, in the form it does, is in itself a testament to just how pervasive costumed crimefighters have become in modern movies. When Kick-Ass is in only the third week of its theatrical run, the second Iron Man movie will be opening while movies based on Thor, Captain America and The Green Lantern will be in production on all over the world. As it happens, by now there've probably been so many superhero movies that plenty have essentially vanished from the public consciousness. Here's a brief collection - in no particular order - of noteworthy movies about bold men doing brave things in silly outfits, some of which you may have forgotten and (hopefully) a few of which you might never have heard of. (As before, the majority of titles are available on DVD to the best of my knowledge unless otherwise noted, though availability may differ by region.) Sidekick (2005) Here's a great Canadian indie that I'm really amazed never got much attention - hell, I'd never have heard of it if not for a Netflix recommendation - a great example of how much can be accomplished with a handful of actors, sparse locations and a solid script. Shy, comic-loving office drone Norman Neale (Perry Mucci) discovers that his slick, ladies-man coworker Victor Ventura (David Ingram) possesses nascent telekinetic superpowers and offers to help him train, imagining that he can help give the world its first real-life superhero. Just one problem: In real life, not everyone with a gift wants to use it to help people, and Norman must confront the realization that he may have unwittingly unleashed a - now very, very dangerous - supervillain on the world. It's a character piece (it could've been done as a stage play, easily) focused on the familiar frustrations of watching someone waste or even abuse a gift you'd kill to have. Seek this one out. Zebraman (2004) Japanese yakuza/horror specialist Takeshi Miike too his first stab at "family fare" (sort of) with this warped but big-hearted love letter to Japanese superhero shows of the 60s and 70s. Encouraged by a young boy who's obsessed with an obscure superhero series from his own childhood, an introverted teacher dons his homemade ZebraMan suit and - since this is a Takeshi Miike movie - immediately gets wrapped up in a conspiracy involving prophetic TV screenplays and alien cover-ups. If I told you how this movie ended, you would not believe me. Blankman (1994) For awhile there were more superhero spoofs than there were superheroes, and this is one of the funniest, courtesy of the Wayans Brothers and underrated director Mike Binder (Reign Over Me.) Damon Wayans is an eccentric inventor who uses his wacky gadgets to become a costumed vigilante and battle a crime boss, in a funny and ultra-quotable spoof that was also ahead of its time in treating Adam West's Batman as a source of nostalgia and inspiration when, at the time, it was trendy to bash it in favor of the "grim 'n' gritty" Frank Miller/Tim Burton take on the character. Mercury Man (2006) Quick: If I said there was a recent movie where a patriotic firefighter becomes a superhero and takes on a Jihadist terrorist group led by a villain named - I kid you not - Osama Bin-Ali, you'd guess it was from the U.S., right? Well, you'd be wrong. Mercury Man is from Thailand. Visually, it's a Spider-Man knockoff (MM basically wears a black Spidey suit with Thai Buddhist designs instead of a web pattern) but imbued with the gleeful kitchen-sink inventiveness we've come to expect from modern Thai action-cinema. I should mention it also comes complete with the unabashed nationalism that many have found somewhat uncomfortable in modern Thai action-cinema: The bad guys' evil scheme is converting magical Buddhist relics into Weapons of Mass Destruction, and the running subtext frames the conflict as a clash of worldviews between the Mercury Man's Buddhism and the unspecified (but presumably Islamic) monotheism of the bad guys. "The Thai believe in life ... we believe in death!" says Bin-Ali in his why-we'll-win bad guy speech. Yikes! Still, the action scenes are awesome (the final fight is easily one of the best superpower battles I've ever seen) and the plot embraces its own inherent fantasy in a way most Western superhero movies would do well to imitate. Meteor Man (1993) Writer/director Robert Townsend is best known for movie and TV projects made with sincerity and admirable motives that just don't work as well as you'd want them to. This is one of those, an obviously heartfelt and welcome attempt to create a wholly-new counterpart to Superman for African American kids to call their own. (Interestingly, Milestone Comics, created with a similar mission to create an entire universe of minority heroes, launched the same year.) Townsend is the title character, an inner-city teacher who's struck by a meteor and gains all the usual Superman powers plus some nifty new ones - he can talk to animals and absorb knowledge by touching books - which he uses to rally his community against the local drug gang. Bill Cosby, James Earl Jones, Robert Guillame, Sinbad, Don Cheadle and a young Eddie Griffin all pitch in to help, and in the end the nobility of the effort helps elevate what's otherwise a pretty average movie. Good intentions count, sometimes. Mister Freedom (1969) You wanna talk obscure? Here's an absurdist French political parody from American expatriate filmmaker William Klein (best known, if at all, in the states for Who Are You, Polly Magoo?) in which a bigoted right-wing American "patriotic" superhero is dispatched to halt the rising tide of left-wing political thought in France. When he discovers that the French citizenry aren't feeling all that threatened and don't want him around, Mister Freedom - who dresses like a football player and acts like people who don't know much about Captain America tend to imagine Captain America acts - loses it and things start to get out of hand. The heavy-handed satire of Cold War posturing is, of course, dated and the movie isn't exactly Dr. Strangelove, but it does feature a bellowing idiot in patriotic football gear arguing with Red China Man - a gigantic talking balloon - and I'm positive you've never seen that before. The Guyver (1991) Occuring as it did before the advent of digital distribution or even the internet itself, the "anime boom" in America in the early 90s was probably the last cross-cultural phenomenon to bubble up in awkward fits and starts - the only climate in which something as weird as this live-action reimagining of Yoshiki Takaya's legendary Manga hero: It's one-part fan-film, one-part crass Americanization and one-part Cronenbergian body horror. An American kung fu student becomes host to an alien symbiote, which turns him into a bio-mechanical armored hero to do battle with alien Zoanoids who want the armor for themselves. Famed Special FX pros Steve Wang and Screaming Mad George (yes, that is how he's credited) created the slimy, creepy creature effects, including the truly spectacular Guyver suit, and the overall effect is like the grossest episode of Power Rangers (or maybe Kamen Rider) you've ever seen. Oh, and Mark Hamill morphs into a giant grasshopper. Seriously. A more faithful sequel came next, which threw out the American-style comedy but replaced it with the international language of boring. Supaidaman, aka "Japanese Spider-Man" (1970s) Okay, "forgotten" is pushing it, but too wild not to include. The next time you complain about the Americanization of Asian or European characters, remember that the reverse has happened plenty of times, too. Case in point: In 1978, Marvel licensed its characters to Toei for use in Japanese TV shows. The result was this series, which made Spider-Man Japanese to a vastly greater degree than even Dragonball: Evolution made Goku American. Supaidaman gets his powers from aliens, battles the minions of Professor Monster, rides a motorcycle and summons a spaceship that transforms into a giant robot when he's really in a fix. No, really. Sadly, you can't get this (officially) on DVD in most of the Western world, though you can watch episodes on Marvel's website: Yes, this is a real thing. Although, if you want to really blow your mind, hunt down the Turkish cult-classic 3 Dev Adam, in which Captain America and El Santo (yes, the Lucha Libre wrestler) team up to fight the evil.. um... Spider-Man. All unauthorized, of course. Believe it or not, Captain America being the hero of a Turkish action movie is the least bizarre thing that happens.

V for Vendetta

Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran, cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a by-gone vexation, stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin van-guarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition. The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta, held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it's my very good honor to meet you and you may call me V.