Author Archives: Bubbawheat
Flash Gordon The Greatest Adventure of All
Flash Gordon The Greatest Adventure of All 1982
I only have one other animated movie to cover after this before I have watched every one that I’m aware of out there which gets me one step closer to my goal of watching every superhero and comic book movie ever made. This film was actually made a few years before it was ever shown. It was initially created as a TV movie by Filmation, the animation studio behind such 80’s staples as He-Man, and many of the DC shows that weren’t produced by Hanna-Barbera, but it was quickly retooled into a TV series. It wasn’t until after the show had been cancelled that they went back to the original footage and aired it as a TV movie as it was intended. It has yet to receive an official release, but it did get a home video release in Japan where it can currently be found online with Japanese subtitles. I was never a big connoisseur of Filmation shows aside from vague memories of He-Man, She-Ra, Bravestarr, and Fat Albert. Watching this I could see the appeal, and it actually felt much more adult than most of what they were known for. There were obvious cost-cutting techniques and rotoscoping, but there was a level of faithfulness that didn’t quite ever come across in the live-action movie. They were able to pull off more monstrous looking creatures within the world and overall more of a sci-fi vibe to it. For me, it didn’t quite come to the fun and campy level that the live-action movie did, it felt like it took the material more seriously, but the quality just wasn’t quite enough for it to be a truly great film.
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Turok: Son of Stone
Turok: Son of Stone 2008
It’s always interesting to me when I discover films that I previously hadn’t heard about across my nearly five years of running this site. I was vaguely aware of the Turok video game series from the late 90’s, but I never knew that it was based on a comic book. I also never knew that it was turned into an animated movie around the same time as the last installment of the game series in 2008. This film generally ignores most of the video game series and goes back to the roots of the comics to tell an origin story of sorts for Turok and his journey to the Land of the Lost more or less. It’s filled with plenty of blood and action, attempts at being culturally sensitive rather than playing into Native American stereotypes, but in the end it didn’t quite accomplish the most important thing that it should have done. It never really made Turok feel like a real character instead of an action hero stereotype.
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Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo
Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo 2006
This month of animation is almost over and with this movie I have now officially seen every single DC Animated movie ever made, not counting some multi-part TV episodes that were later released as a movie. This was the last film before transitioning into their Warner Premier made-for-home-video and it also happened to come right at the end of the Teen Titans run. I’ve only seen a handful of Teen Titans episodes, and quite a bit more of the later series Teen Titans Go, and honestly this felt a little bit like a transitional moment between the two series even though it was hot off the heels of the first series and years before the second. While the overall story was serious, there were plenty of moments that used a very anime style of comedy in the animation, something that is widely used in Go, but I don’t recall it being used much in the original Teen Titans. The movie was fun, the villain was interesting, but my biggest complaint was that it only used the Tokyo setting for a large number of cliched stereotypical jokes without any real respect to the culture.
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Batman: The Killing Joke
Batman: The Killing Joke 2016
Part of the reason why I decided to watch a bunch of animated movies during July was because I knew that Batman: The Killing Joke was coming out this month and there weren’t any other theatrical releases until August. What ultimately made this more special was that this film was something that I specifically called for almost 3 years ago, even calling for the R rating to separate it from the family fare. What’s probably most interesting about all this is that I haven’t actually read the Killing Joke myself. I’m acutely aware of it, not just for its critical praise and commercial success, but also for some of the more negative critics, specifically for its depictions and/or implications of violence against women and a piece of the large trend of Women in refrigerators. Even as fans started discussing this specific movie, there were also criticisms aimed against it for its new opening act that wasn’t a part of the original story. But for my part, I generally enjoyed the film but I can see some of the weak points in the story.
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Superman: Braniac Attacks
Superman: Braniac Attacks 2006
I’m down to the second to last DC Animated movie and I hope the last one doesn’t end up on a down note like this one did. This came out in a bit of an odd timeline. It was six years after the end of the Superman animated series and right around the end of Justice League Unlimited, and while they brought back Tim Daly and Dana Delaney as the voices of Superman and Lois Lane, they replaced Clancy Brown’s Lex Luthor with Powers Booth and brought in Lance Henrickson for Brainiac. Overall, the movie felt like it was intended for a younger audience and spent much of its hour and seventeen minute run time packed with fight scenes. There were a few moments here and there that made me laugh or surprised me, but overall it felt like a bit of a letdown.
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Superhero Podcast Review: Superheroes, Movies, and Superhero Movies
I’m back with another edition of my Superhero Podcast Review series where I take a listen to a superhero-centric podcast, or at least a few episodes of it, break down their format, share my thoughts, and hopefully introduce them to at least one new listener. My final verdict comes down to three choices: Subscribe, Unsubscribe, or Selected Episodes which would be somewhere inbetween. If you host or listen to another podcast that focuses on superhero movies, or even superheroes in general, make sure you send them my way so I can share them on a future edition. You can reach me by leaving a comment, talking to me on Twitter @Bubbawheat or sending me an e-mail at Bubbawheat@msn.com. Enough talk, let’s get to today’s podcast.
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The Batman vs Dracula
The Batman vs Dracula 2005
While I watched most of the run of the first incarnation of Batman: The Animated Series, I didn’t follow it with any of the later series including the one simply called The Batman. I don’t really know much about it at all, reading up on it it seems like it was intended to be a Batman for slightly younger audiences than the original series, but it found its footing a little bit better in later seasons. The first thing that struck me was the incredibly different and jarring design for the Joker. But as for looking at the movie as a whole, it didn’t have too much of a kid-friendly vibe to me. It got surprisingly dark in places, but it was mostly superficial. It’s a fun film that seems like a perfect movie to throw on for Halloween if you’re also a fan of Batman.
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Phantom Boy
Phantom Boy 2016
I can almost see the end of this month of animated superhero and comic book movies as I tackle this French animated film that has just now gotten a full blown English dub from GKids who also did the English dub for Wrinkles which I watched earlier this month, they were also gracious enough to send me a screener. I had caught wind of this film several months ago around when it was announced that GKids would be handling the English distribution, but I was unclear as to whether or not I would consider it to be a superhero movie or not. And while it does have a kid with super powers, it doesn’t really play like any superhero movie before it, but what does push it just over the top is the very theatrical and comic book styled mobster villain named the Face. It deals with plenty of non-superhero issues and also plays with a few of the villain tropes in a fun way. It does cop out a little bit with the ending, but overall I really enjoyed this film.
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Filmwhys #73 Lost in Translation and The Mask
The Why Haven’t You Seen This Film Podcast where my guest is Lights Camera Jackson from Lights-Camera-Jackson.com who is currently raising money for the Make-A-Wish Foundation through his fundraising page right here who asks me why I hadn’t seen Lost in Translation, one of Bill Murray’s most acclaimed turns at a mostly dramatic role from director Sofia Coppola along with a great early performance from Scarlett Johansson. And in return, I ask him why he hadn’t seen the Mask, one of Jim Carrey’s biggest hits during his breakout year in 1994 that catapulted him into super stardom and introduced the world to Cameron Diaz.
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Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman
Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman 2003
It feels like animation month here is already starting to wind down and as I write this, the month isn’t even half over yet. While I’ve hit a bit of a rough patch in some of the more grown up animation as well as the previous Batman animation, this was a much more welcome return to form. Mystery of the Batwoman was essentially the last project to come out of the Batman: The Animated Series era that more or less bridges a bit of the gap between the New Batman Adventures and Batman Beyond even though both of them had been off the air for a couple years before this project was completed. At its heart, like the title says it’s a mystery where Batman as well as the villains try to figure out who this Batwoman is, and as I always do I will be discussing her identity so here’s your spoiler warning.
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Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights 