Bad Planet, and it’s been a good week
First off, I’d just like to say that in general, it’s been a really great week for me. There’s been a lot of good stuff coming my way and I really appreciate all of it. One of the biggest surprises came when I actually managed to reach the biggest name I’ve ever tried for with this site. If you follow me on Twitter, you know who it is, for everyone else I will reveal it farther down this post. On top of that, I got tagged with a couple blog awards that have been making there way around this neck of the blogosphere. Thanks very much Cinematic Katzenjammer and Two Tickets For… for passing on the Liebster Award to me.
Stan Lee’s Mutants, Monsters, & Marvels
Stan Lee’s Mutants, Monsters, & Marvels 2002
After watching Confessions of a Superhero, I thought it would be a good idea to watch a couple more superhero themed documentaries, and since I actually own this one, I figured it was a no-brainer. It’s not a traditional documentary, in fact it’s almost more of a bonus disc to a non-specific movie. It was released right around the time Spider-Man came out in theaters, and the first part of the film is strictly about Spider-Man. It’s basically just director slash writer slash podcaster Kevin Smith, interviewing the father of Marvel comics, Stan Lee. As I mentioned, the first part of the interview is all about Spider-Man, and the second part covers pretty much the rest of his career. It’s quite interesting, as both Lee and Smith are both great speakers, even though it’s essentially just the two of them sitting down talking to each other for about an hour and a half.
FTMN Poll: What’s your favorite type of Superhero?
So what’s your favorite type of Superhero? Do you enjoy the more sci-fi aspects of heroes like Superman, Green Lantern, and the Avengers? Or do you enjoy the more grounded in reality heroes like Batman? There’s also the attempts at more realism like in Unbreakable, Super, Chronicle, or the first half of Hancock. Or do you prefer fantasy heroes like Percy Jackson, or going farther back to Greek Mythology and Hercules or Jason and the Argonauts? Let me know.
I also wanted to take a moment to direct you to the site of the artist who originally created all of the minimalist posters I featured on Facebook this Monday thru Friday, you can find him at deviantArt, so be sure to check out some of his other stuff. He’s done a lot of minimalist posters for video games and some other movies I didn’t use.
Confessions of A Superhero
Confessions of a Superhero 2007
I was asked by Dusty of Dusty On Movies to write a guest review for his Quirky Documentary Series. I had heard a little bit about this film, Confessions of a Superhero, but when Dusty asked me to review it, I thought it was a good change of pace. It’s presented by Morgan Spurlock, of Super Size Me fame, but he doesn’t really have anything to do with the documentary. The main focus is on four Hollywood street performers, although performers is kind of a strong word for what they do. They dress up as superheroes, pose for pictures, and take tips. The four heroes featured in this movie are Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and the Hulk. Although Superman seems to get the most screen time out of the four. They all claim to be actors who just haven’t gotten a gig yet, and they’re all varying degrees of normal.
Superhero Shorts: Death of Spider-Man
Death of Spider-Man Motion Comic
Welcome to this week’s edition of Superhero Shorts where I take a look at a different superhero themed short film and get the creator of the film to answer a few interview questions. This week I’m talking with Andrew Bates and Drew Lawson who came up with their own motion comic for Ultimate Spider-Man #158-160 written by Brian Bendis where Peter Parker dies. It’s very high quality both in terms of the animation as well as the voice work, it’s on par if not better than the few professional motion comics I’ve seen before. It’s a bit longer than many of the shorts I feature here with a runtime of just over 20 minutes, but it’s worth the watch.
Follow Friday: The Velvet Café
Follow Friday: The Velvet Café
Welcome to another edition of Follow Friday where each week I feature and interview a fellow blogger and follow their suggestion to another blog to feature next week. I prefer this over a blogroll because it gives each blog their own time to shine, plus I personally rarely click on blogrolls so why would I expect you to? Not only that, but I get the chance to check out some great blogs I might not have found otherwise found, talk to some great people, and share the conversation with you. Of course, if you would rather see something like a blogroll, I have collected all of my previous Follow Friday sites in list form which you can find right at the top of the page. This week I was directed by Scott over at Front Room Cinema to check out The Velvet Café. But since she was on vacation last week, I held it over and am featuring it this week.
Almost Super: Mortal Kombat
Mortal Kombat 1995
I hit a little bit of a movie block this past week, possibly due to watching The Dark Knight Rises, also possibly due to a couple movies that I plan on watching but haven’t been in the mood for. That, and I’ve been under the weather for the past few days and haven’t been in the mood for much of anything. So I put a call out on Twitter, and the only suggestion was Mortal Kombat. I was a big fan of both the game and the movie when it first came out, but haven’t watched it again in years. I believe the last game I played was Mortal Kombat 4, and didn’t play very much of that. The movie tosses in a ton of references to the game, which isn’t always a good thing, the fight scenes were pretty well done, and while it’s a little bit more campy than I remember, it’s still a pretty fun watch. Especially if you’re a fan of the Mortal Kombat games.
My Movie Confessions
Before I get to my confessional post, I’d like to mention that I’m in the process of putting together a podcast. I will do my best to bring the superhero love when and where I can, but I thought it would be easiest to round up some other movie bloggers to have a general movie podcast. As of right now, it seems to be between me, Nick over at Cinematic Katzenjammer, Joe over at Two Dude Review, and Vern over at The Vern’s Videovangaurd, with a couple others possibly joining up. We’re all fairly new to the podcasting game, so we’re taking it slow. I hope to have the first episode up by the middle of August and will be trying for a new episode every two weeks at first. As for today’s post, I’ve had a few ideas rolling around in my head, I know I want to do a post about the actors who double dip in the superhero pool, but I haven’t done the planning needed for that one yet. In the end, I took the easy way out and joined a fun little blogathon headed up by Nostra of My Film Views called Movie Confessions. I figured that I ask so many questions of others, it’s time to answer a few myself.
The Dark Knight Rises
The Dark Knight Rises 2012
I have to start off by mentioning that this is turning out to be one of the harder reviews I’ve had to write. I actually ended up seeing it by myself in the local theater at a late Saturday night showing, largely because I got the chance to participate in my first podcast for the Lamb which I believe will be posted this weekend. I jumped at the chance when the Dark Knight Rises episode went up for grabs, and even though it got filled before I got to put my name in the hat, a couple people dropped out so I snuck my way into the pod. And then I realized I would have to do something I have almost never done before: see the movie opening weekend, and see it by myself. I am a very shy person, and I dislike crowds of any kind. I was worried that the theater would be crowded, especially when I got to the theater at 9:25 and saw that the 9:30 show was flashing “sold out”. But luckily for me, the theater was only about two thirds full for the ten o’clock showing. I ended up having a good theater experience, sitting with empty chairs on either side of me, and near complete silence during the entire movie, the only crowd reaction was for the line “So that’s how it feels”. And since watching the movie, I’ve gone through and read many different reviews and takes on the movie, which has made it a little bit harder to sort out my own opinions from those of others. But I will say that Dark Knight Rises is an epic end to the best superhero trilogies of all time, even if it doesn’t have much competition in that category. I’ll even say that it’s one of the best movie trilogies of all time.
FTMN Poll: Best poster of the week?
I haven’t decided for sure yet, but instead of the usual poll, I may use these Monday posts to highlight the minimalist posters I use in my daily Facebook game. If you haven’t visited our Facebook Page yet, be sure to check it often. I post a new minimalist poster almost every day with the title removed, and it’s your job to guess what movie the poster is for. There’s some great designs, good ones, tough ones, and some not-so-great ones. There’s only been a couple stumpers including one from this week, though there’s still not a ton of people playing. So which one’s your favorite from this week’s batch, and why?
Also, the current leaderboard:
David – 4
Jason – 3
Morgan – 2
Dust Raven – 2
Dusty – 2
Keith – 2
No One – 2
Dylan – 1
Silver Emulsion – 1
Rob – 1
Fog’s – 1
Tygenco – 1
Nick – 1
Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights 