Author Archives: Bubbawheat
Iron Man and Hulk: Heroes United
Iron Man and Hulk: Heroes United 2013
It’s the start of December, nearing the end of 2013 and this is the last superhero movie release of the year. It’s also the first straight-to-video release from Marvel using CGI animation rather than the mix of traditional and CG that they’ve used for their past releases. It ends up looking much better than many of the cheap and/or old CGI cartoons of past home video releases and TV shows, but it’s still quite obviously far from the level of a theatrical release and the cheapness of the animation does show. It also felt like it’s aimed at a younger audience with a lot of humor that tends to focus more on slapstick and childish attitudes. Even the voice work has an air of cheapness that doesn’t quite capture the essence of either of the characters. There are some fun moments in the movie enough that I don’t regret watching it, but it really felt a lot more mediocre than I was expecting in more ways than one.
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Am I Getting Tired Of Superhero Movies Yet?
It’s been a while since I’ve written one of these more free flowing blog posts and one that’s been rattling around in my mind for a while is the question if I’m getting tired of superhero movies yet. I’ve been doing this site for almost two years now and superhero and comic book movies make up around half of my overall movie watching nowadays more or less. There’s often the theory that they are all pretty much the same kind of movie, a sci-fi fantasy action movie with a hero in a costume and half the time it’s essentially the same origin story, especially when they keep rebooting the franchise every few years. So what is it that keeps me from getting bored with superhero movies, or am I actually getting bored with them, hence the frequent lack of actual movie reviews around here for stretches at a time. The short answer is no, I’m not tired of this blog, these movies, or anything else surrounding it.
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Superhero Shorts: Punisher No Mercy
Superhero Shorts: Punisher No Mercy
Welcome to another edition of Superhero Shorts where I feature a superhero themed short film and ask a few questions from the filmmakers. This time around I’m talking with director Jason Ambrus and producer/writer/actor Shawn Baichoo and their Punisher short where he takes on a small group of mob bosses and also faces off against Elektra. As usual, you can watch it below or you can view it on their YouTube channel and you can also visit their Facebook page.
TV Nights: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. #9
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Week 9
Episode: Repairs
Original airdate: 11-26-13
Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I’m done with my turkey lunch, had only a five minute drive to my sisters where the rest of my family came together and am starting on a nice and relaxing 11 days off of work. And I’m ready to do some writing and movie watching. But first off it’s time to talk about this week’s episode of S.H.I.E.L.D. where it tries to take a bit of a creepy tone with some ghosts and another almost tie-in with Thor. The episode takes a closer look at Melinda Mays’ backstory and adds a little to several of the other characters as well. But I didn’t think the attempt at bringing a thriller/horror element to the show worked very well and it had a very annoying character that they were trying to help. The character moments were great, but the rest was quite lacking.
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My Top 10 DC Animated Movies
After watching and reviewing Justice League: The New Frontier, I thought I had finished watching and reviewing all of the DC Animated movies that have been currently released. After writing this list, I realized I still have one to review (Public Enemies), but I have seen it before so whatever. I’ve always enjoyed watching these animated movies from Marvel, DC, and even some of the other non-affiliated animated movies like Bolt, the Incredibles, or Megamind. But even though these are all released direct-to-DVD and have never gotten a theatrical run since going way back to the Batman: The Animated series spin-off movie Mask of the Phantasm (which I sadly have yet to see, but also don’t include in this series of Warner Premier original DC Animated movies), they are all done with quality writing, are often based on acclaimed comic book runs, have excellent voice casts, and high quality-within-a-budget animation. And what better way to wrap up these movies, so to speak, than with a list of my favorites, which started as just a top 5 list and when I kept finding titles I just couldn’t exclude, grew into a top 10 list, which is a bit over half of the currently 17 released titles with 2-3 new ones coming out every year. So, without ado…
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Filmwhys #18 The Mexican and Thor the Dark World
Apologies for the delayed post, but I’m excited to bring a slight change-up to my normal Filmwhys format. Instead of having my guest introduce me to one of their favorite movies that I’ve never seen, I decided it was time to share one of my favorite non-superhero movies to my guest that they’ve never seen. And this time around my guest is the Vern from Vern’s Video Vanguard and a few other sites and I ask him why he hasn’t seen the Mexican, one of Gore Verbinski’s earlier movies before he went on to direct the Pirates of Caribean movies with Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, James Gandolfini, and a really sweet looking classic pistol. And we both watch the current theatrical release Thor The Dark World.
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TV Nights: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. #8
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Week 8
Episode: The Well
Original airdate: 11-19-13
The lead up to this episode from what I read about was a big deal that it was the tie-in episode to the theatrical release of Thor: The Dark World. I wasn’t really expecting something huge like a cameo from Chris Hemsworth or Tom Hiddleston, or even Kat Dennings though that could have been more likely. What could have been a possibility was something to do with the beast that was let loose in England during the battle. They might not be able to use the full quality as in the movie, but one might think that they could use it in some lower res capacity. What we got instead is a completely unrelated story about an Asgardian who came to Earth in the distant past and left an ancient relic that has been found. The tie in is mainly just a very brief montage of quick clips from the first two movies as well as starting the episode with the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents cleaning up a little bit of the mess left in England from the climax of the Dark World. As far as a “tie-in” goes, it was a bit of a let down. Looking at the episode apart from the marketing and it’s another fairly solid episode with a surprising guest appearance by Peter MacNicol, and finally a little bit of depth to Ward’s character.
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Justice League: The New Frontier
Justice League: The New Frontier 2008
I think one of the hardest part about watching and reviewing some of these DC titles is the fact that so many of them are in different, overlapping continuities and when there is that continuity that connects in a great way then it’s that much harder to connect with any different continuity. And that’s really my biggest problem with The New Frontier. It was one of the earlier efforts by DC Animation coming out after Doomsday and even though I watched it fairly early on it didn’t really connect with me then. And watching it again, there have been a few other animated projects that did connect strongly with me that now that I’m finishing my run of the currently released DC Animated movies, this is the one that tends to fall flat with me considering that almost all of the members of the Justice League represented in this movie except for possibly Martian Manhunter, I can think of another movie that represents what I think of as the definitive version of that character. But considering that this is one of the earlier movies, it still holds up well and has a lot more violence in it than I remembered it having, and yet still nothing near what has been in some of the most recent titles. It could be considered a sort of origin story for this incarnation of the Justice League, even though there is mention of the breakdown of the Justice Society, and there are a few origin stories laced throughout the movie for some of the individual members, but there’s also an underlying theme of trust and coming together for the good of us all.
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League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen 2003
I had heard a lot of the behind the scenes stories about this movie, it’s Sean Connery’s last on-screen role before going into retirement, and there were a lot of struggles between him and the director. It got a lot of negative press after it came out because the source material is very literate while the movie is much more of a dumbed down action movie that spells out any references it makes so that more people will catch the reference, like when they make the Around the World in 80 Days reference, and then points out exactly where it came from. But I did enjoy the movie then, and I still mostly enjoyed it now even though I recognize a lot more of the flaws in it this time around. I think it helps that I’m not actually familiar with the source material comic. It’s not an incredibly deep movie by any means, but it does have some fun bits inbetween the ridiculous moments.
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Superhero Shorts: Dark Knight Legacy
Welcome to another edition of Superhero Shorts where I showcase a superhero themed short film and ask a few questions of the creator. This time around I’m talking with Cris Landa and his Nolan inspired short film that takes place after the Dark Knight Rises where someone needs to fill the void left behind by the absence of Batman and in his place comes The Red Hood and Night wing who differ on their opinions on how to deal with the criminal element. As usual, you can watch the video below or on the Machinima YouTube channel.
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Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights 