Justice League
Justice League 2017
I’m not entirely sure what bug got into me, but I’ve been full speed ahead trying to catch up on the year (more or less) that I’ve missed writing on this site. This is one of the biggest films that I missed from last year and while it made a decent amount of money, it was a pretty big disappointment for what a Justice League movie could have made. Out of the major superhero movie releases of the year, it was the second lowest grossing film just above Logan which was R-rated and it was the lowest grossing film of the entire DCEU. It was plagued by some behind the scenes nightmares like the tragic loss of Zack Snyder’s daughter midway through filming so that the film was finished by Joss Whedon. There was also the well documented issue with Henry Cavill being unable to shave his mustache for reshoots while filming the latest Mission Impossible which created some unnerving scenes of CGI hair-removal. The resulting chaos resulted in a rather chaotic movie that shifted in tone from the more serious and dramatic Zack Snyder films that came before it, and the more irreverent humor associated with Joss Whedon with a lack of overall cohesion. Some moments worked, but the team never quite came together as a whole.
Batman vs Two-Face
Batman vs Two-Face 2017
One of the most difficult things about falling behind over the past year is the continued break-neck pace that DC puts out their animated direct-to-home-video movies. There’s 3-4 in their regular animated line, 2-3 Lego versions, a couple Superhero Girl movies, and occasionally a few others like this one. This is the sequel to the previous year’s Return of the Caped Crusaders, an animated continuation of the Adam West Batman series from the 60’s with Adam West, Burt Ward, and Julie Newmar returning to voice their characters. This time around they also add William Shatner as the voice of Two-Face and the Batman movie’s Catwoman Lee Meriwether. This also happens to the be the last film of Adam West before he passed away. Similar to the previous film, this was a lot of fun. It also took a slightly different direction to not overly homage previous incarnations and simply tell a new story in a similarly comedic fashion to the 60’s series with a more modern sensibility.
I Kill Giants
I Kill Giants 2018
It’s been a long while since I’ve sat down and written a movie review. This past year I’ve tried and gotten through the opening paragraph twice, but haven’t been able to finish one out just yet. But I’m trying to revitalize my interest in this site. Or let me rephrase that, my interest has not gone away for this site, just the ability to give it the time that I want to. But things are starting to change and as I’ve started to prepare for the new year, I’ve been getting a jump start by trying to catch up on what I’ve missed. The first one that I decided to grab was something that I always enjoy doing for this site, a lesser known comic book movie that’s not really about superheroes at all. This is a family fantasy drama adapted from the Image comic by Joe Kelly and Ken Niimura released in 2008 about a young girl who appropriately kills giants. It comes close to being a cliched version of the outcast/weird girl living in her own fantasy world to escape reality, but there’s enough different about this to make it stand out.
Excelsior!
It’s not an uncommon occurrence for celebrity deaths to pop up here and there and it’s extremely rare for one to affect me in any way. But as you can probably tell by the title of this post and the news in general that I felt like I had to comment on this one. Stan Lee, the voice and face of Marvel comics has passed away at the age of 95. And not only has he been a massive presence in the history of Marvel comics and even comics in general, he has also been a near constant presence in the Marvel movies themselves with his frequent-yet-brief cameoes. His presence will definitely be missed moving forward.
FTMN Update
I know that this site has been dark for quite a while, I have fallen prey to something that has befallen many different bloggers: life. I won’t go into details, and things aren’t exactly better just yet, but I’m trying to make more time doing something that I love, which is writing for this site. But recently I put a call out for someone to join the site to help give me an excuse to watch more movies and write about them. I’ll give him a full introduction before long, but for the moment I’m going to hold off on getting back into the swing of things until after the holidays since the new year tends to be a good time to start or restart things. I haven’t fully fallen off the wagon of superhero movies. I have watched a few of the new ones and a couple old ones, but I never quite made it past writing the first paragraph for Split and Avengers: Infinity War, I didn’t even write anything on Deadpool 2 and completely missed Teen Titans Go to the Movies. But coming into the new year, I’ll be getting back to catching up on this past year’s movies, trying to keep up with next year’s movies, and continuing to explore the obscurities that I haven’t gotten around do. And I’ll also be revisiting some of the more important movies that I’ve already covered, but I’ll get to more details on that a bit later. For the moment, I do have the first article written in this new series, and I’ve got two movies rented this weekend to hopefully start writing the next two. Look out for the official introduction to this new series soon, and hopefully I can keep up with weekly posts starting in the next year. Until next time, this has been Bubbawheat for Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights.
Bubbawheat guesting
As I haven’t been as active as I should be here lately, I wanted to make a quick post before I finish writing up my long-past-due review of Avengers: Infinity War which I did watch on opening weekend, to share a couple podcasts that I guested on in the past couple weeks. First up is a frequent haunt of mine where I discussed the previously mentioned movie over at the Lambcast, though sadly (not too sadly considering my expectations for the movie) I never did get around to watching Bad Kids of Crestview Academy before having to return it to the library, and a week late at that. But besides that, I also made a guest appearance on a fairly new podcast out there called Men N Tights where we discussed the recent superhero movie news like the Ant Man and the Wasp trailer, Deadpool 2, before getting around to the main discussion where we speculate where the future of the MCU in general is going. Be sure to check it out and subscribe. Meanwhile, I’ll hopefully be back quite soon with my full, written review of Avengers: Infinity War and more movies soon after. Until next time, this has been Bubbawheat for Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights.
Surge of Power: Revenge of the Sequel
Surge of Power: Revenge of the Sequel 2018
An interesting thing happened the other day, I had a Facebook memory reminding me that a year ago I was contacted by an indie filmmaker who discovered my site and reached out to me to request a review for their movie. And that actually happened yet again this year. Justin Cook sent me a screener of his superhero spoof sequel, though I originally thought that the whole “Revenge of the Sequel” was part of the whole spoof concept. It also boasts being the first out gay superhero. On top of that, it’s filled with literally dozens of cameoes from superhero and sci-fi history including plenty of Star Trek actors. Not to rain on anyone’s parade, but even though most of the cameoes felt like they were pulled from various convention circuits, it was still a treat for someone like me who recognized plenty of stars from films like the 70’s motorcycle riding Captain America or the unreleased Roger Corman’s Fantastic Four. It felt like a cheesy road trip movie with a gay superhero twist that had some fun moments here and there.
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Atomic Blonde
Atomic Blonde 2017
Still trying to catch up on some of last year’s superhero and comic book movie offerings I managed to get around to one that I didn’t know much about but I had heard good things. Even when I checked it out from the library, the librarian recommended it as a good movie. I’m a fan of Charlize Theron in general as well as action movies with female leads as there are so few of them, and this movie delivered pretty much everything that I could have expected. Especially considering that the director’s previous effort was John Wick which I have heard nothing but good things about. And in case you didn’t know, this film was based on the graphic novel The Coldest City. The film has a lot of rawness, sex, great action scenes, bright colors, and a decent 80’s vibe but while it was a fun watch, there was just something missing so that it didn’t quite become an absolute favorite of mine immediately.
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Spider-Man: Homecoming
Spider-Man: Homecoming 2017
Still finding it difficult to get back into the swing of watching superhero movies and writing on this site, but this past weekend I managed to watch one of the MCU movies that I missed last year even though it took me nearly a week having it from the library before actually watching it. Which is a little odd since I’ve heard almost nothing but good things about the latest Spider-Man even though it’s been such a quick reboot since the last iteration. I did quite enjoy Tom Holland’s full-fledged entry into the MCU but there were a couple things that I noticed while watching the film. First is how often the film side-steps many of the traditional superhero movie tropes. But on the other side of things, while it isn’t an origin story, it actually still manages to hit a lot of the origin story beats that we’re used to, just with a slight adjustment to them.
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Black Panther
Black Panther 2018
I’m still working on getting back into the swing of things here but I did manage to get out to the theaters to see the latest Marvel movie even though I missed the last two. Luckily, this falls in line with the end of the previous phase where Ant-Man came out just before Avengers: Age of Ultron and also had little to do with the overall phase’s arc, instead it’s a mostly stand-alone film with just a few ties to the rest of the movies. Notably Civil War where T’Challa made his debut. Honestly, the movie this reminds me the most of is Wonder Woman as it is very important for its cultural impact in the realm of superhero movies as this does for the Black community what Wonder Woman did for women. The main difference is that where Wonder Woman was weakest in the third act, Black Panther’s weakness lies in its overall lack of strong action set pieces. But what it lacks in action, it more than makes up for with strong characters, themes, and gorgeous visuals. And just for full disclosure, I am a middle aged white guy from the suburbs and I will get into spoilers.
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Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights 