Assault on Arkham
Batman: Assault on Arkham 2014
There were two straight-to-home-video superhero movies from the two big comic book companies that came out about the same time on streaming services, and depending on how you look at it I chose poorly by watching Iron Man and Captain America: Heroes United first, or just saved the best one for last. The only thing I knew about this movie was that it was based on the recent Arkham video game series which I haven’t played. I had no idea that it was more specifically about the Suicide Squad which I had only just heard about earlier this year when they were teased in an episode of Arrow. Many of these DC Animated movies have been getting darker and darker, and while this movie has plenty of moments that border on the “R” side of its “PG-13” rating, they are handled with a lot of fun. It also helps to set the tone right from the beginning with the introduction to the suicide squad themselves that feels like it could have been pulled from a 70’s cop show. I loved this movie from start to finish and it’s another quality title in the series.
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Top 10 Guilty Pleasure Superhero Movies
It feels like I’ve been running or planning my own blogathons quite a bit around here, I thought it was only fair to finally take part in some other blogathons. One I ran across just today was a fun little blogathon called Guilty Pleasure Movies over at Flick Chicks. And even though I did recently take part in a Guilty Pleasures Lambcast, I didn’t mention too many superhero movies and I knew I could easily come up with a whole top 10 list of Guilty Pleasure Superhero movies. These aren’t some of the best movies out there, and I’m sure I might catch some flak from true superhero fans for liking these, but there’s just something about them that I happen to like.
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Iron Man and Captain America: Heroes United
Iron Man and Captain America: Heroes United
It seems like it happens quite often when a straight to home video release catches me unaware until it is actually released as is the case with this movie which is a pseudo-sequel to Iron Man and Hulk: Heroes United from last year. It has the same kinda cell shaded CGI animation style and the same voice actors for Iron Man and Hulk, though it doesn’t quite feel as young skewed as the previous attempt, it’s not too deep either. And similar to Iron Man and Hulk, I didn’t really connect with this movie aside from a couple fights and a couple laughs, it was too simple, too silly, and didn’t really feel connected with anything. Even my daughter Jena didn’t give this one a whole lot of interest. It’s interesting that while Marvel is dominating the box office, and has quite a few TV shows out there, but its home video animated movies are severely lacking.
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Guesting at the Matineecast, aka “The Circle is Complete”
While I do get the occasional chance to make a guest appearance on other people’s podcasts, I don’t always feel the need to share them here on this site, especially when I get the rare chance to talk about movies that aren’t superhero movies. But this past weekend I got the chance to make an appearance on the podcast that really inspired my Filmwhys podcast, especially as far as his format goes where he has a single guest, opens up with some movie-related questions before digging into some no-nonsense talk about a new release and two other movies that connect to the new release in some way, one chosen by himself and the other chosen by his guest. If you have listened to Filmwhys, I’m sure you can tell which parts I cribbed off of his notes and where I spun it in my own direction. Anyway, since I did make it out to the theater opening weekend for Guardians of the Galaxy, I was happy to come onto his show to discuss the new release. And for my Other Side, I chose a James Gunn written superhero movie that’s even more lesser known than Super, which is the Specials. So make sure you go and visit theMatinee.ca for Matineecast episode 118 and hear our thoughts on Guardians of the Galaxy, the Specials, and some other movie from another director known for superhero movies about a group of misfits banding together. You’ve probably never heard of it.
The 10 Best Superhero Movies of All Time Blog Relay
I’ve always been a fan of blogathons and there’s one type of blogathon that has really captured my imagination as far as ways to make it a bit more interesting for me. Some may say that I like to overcomplicate things, but when it comes to these relays there is the idea that it becomes this ever-changing list, but there are some items that stick around for a long time, and others that come in a go out a bit more often. I wanted to take this concept of a blog relay and twist it in such a way that it has a definitive ending. That when all is said and done, there is a single top 10 list that is agreed upon by the most members. But before I get into the rules and what not, I will start out with my own list that’s not specifically just my favorites, but what I think are the best superhero movies of all time.
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy 2014
There are a few things that I don’t do lightly, one of them is to go to the movie theater not just on opening weekend, but on opening night. Of course, it does help that these days opening night isn’t the midnight showing, I was able to catch a nice early 8pm showing and it wasn’t even the first one. But the reason why I ventured out to do this is because I was really excited to see this movie and my usual time to go on Saturday morning wasn’t nearly as early as I would have liked. But that’s all beside the point, I’ve been excited to see Guardians of the Galaxy from the first teaser and the fact that it’s directed by James Gunn. While he doesn’t have a perfect track record, I could really get behind what he’s trying to sell here. I wasn’t a huge fan of the Specials, but Tromeo and Juliet was my first Troma film, I enjoyed the live action Scooby-Doo movie for what it was, and I’m a big fan of his Super. It’s still crazy to think how Gunn was chosen for this movie in the first place, but I’m glad he was. The humor hit in all the right places for me, the soundtrack was amazing, and the ecclectic cast somehow managed to mesh in just the right ways. I don’t think it’s the Star Wars or Empire Strikes Back of the Marvel Universe as I’ve heard it called, but it’s another well placed entry in the universe.
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Pizza Man
Pizza Man 2011
This is another one of those lesser known, indie superhero movies that flew under the radar for me. And to be honest, I don’t often go digging for these gems, but I always keep an eye out for them to cross my path and this one did through one of my favorite movie sites to read Today I Watched a Movie who picked this up at Wal-Mart and gave it such high praise that I had to check it out, and so I picked it up for myself a few days later and it sat on my DVD shelf for a couple months before my wife finally put it in our DVD player for us to watch. I’m not as fully sold as TIWAM was, but it’s still a solid superhero send-up with a fun plot and quite a few recognizable characters.
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Filmwhys #33 The Graduate and All-Star Superman
Episode 33 of the Why Haven’t You Seen This Film Podcast where my guest is Bruce Leslie from the Heroes and Villains Podcast and the Hero Movie Podcast who asks me why I haven’t seen the Graduate, the classic comedy that gave Dustin Hoffman his breakout role and made the name Mrs. Robinson famous. And in return, I ask him why he hasn’t seen All-Star Superman, the DC Animation adaptation from a well known comic book story arc about Superman’s last days on Earth from writer Grant Morrison.
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100 Essential Superhero Movies
After spending a couple months going through my own choices as well as the polls for some of the outliers I finally have a full list of 100 movies that I think are essential for a true fan of superhero movies. There are many good ones, and some bad ones, but there is something noteworthy among every single one of them either due to the character, the circumstances around the movie, or simply the merits of the movie itself. I’d like to thank everyone for their contributions and support throughout making this list, I really appreciate it. Now without further ado, let’s get on to the list itself.
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TV Nights: The Flash Series
With the new Flash TV show on the horizon I thought it would be a good idea to do something that I’ve wanted to do for a while here but never really had the time for it, watch a TV season to review here. If you’re a regular visitor and noticed a lack of regular posts lately, this is why. Instead of watching a 75-120+ minute movie to review, I bunkered in for the long haul to watch 22 episodes of the Flash, and did make a little time for a movie here and there between episodes. I watched a lot of television when I was younger and I’m certain that I watched the entire run of the Flash back in 1990 when I would have been the ripe age of 10 years old. Twenty four years later and the only thing that had stuck with me was a scene involving Barry alphabetizing books on a shelf as a test for his powers which ended up being in one of the last two episodes. Exciting, I know. But looking back on the show, it’s definitely dated and covers a lot of the typical sci-fi/superhero cliched storylines in it, but aside from that it was quite an enjoyable watch and it’s disappointing that it didn’t find an audience back in 1990. I can only hope that the new series lives up to the standard that this episode has set for it in my eyes.
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