Blog Archives

This Week In Superhero TV: 10/20 – 10/21

Another short week before Constantine’s pilot comes out at the end of this week and I have no idea when I’m going to get around to watching it. I am also running behind on watching Tales From the Crypt season 3 so it won’t be up tomorrow, though I hope I will be able to finish it by the end of Saturday. Anyway on to the actual television episodes that I will be talking about here. After a good showing by Gotham last week, it’s back down into the dumps again, but Flash and S.H.I.E.L.D. are both going very strong. Flash is really starting to remind me of a more superheroic version of Buffy which is funny because S.H.I.E.L.D. is the one that’s helmed by Buffy alums, or at least Whedon team members. Still, overall it was a good week and I’m interested in seeing what Constantine has to offer tomorrow and if I can keep up with watching four shows a week and still have time to watch movies. Here goes!
Read the rest of this entry

Filmwhys #39 Mad Max and the Dark Knight Rises

Episode 39 of the Why Haven’t You Seen This Film Podcast where my guest is Shane McFilm from The Cinematic Katzenjammer who asks me why I haven’t seen Mad Max, the low budget Australian movie that introduced Mel Gibson to the masses and spawned a franchise. And in return, I ask him why he hasn’t seen the Dark Knight Rises, the final film in the much hailed Christopher Nolan Batman trilogy.
Read the rest of this entry

TV Nights: This Week in Superhero TV 10/13 – 10/14

Yes, I know it’s a short week based on the title of this article but I’m technically only covering the shows that came out on Monday and Tuesday as I haven’t caught up with Arrow and Constantine doesn’t start until next week. Instead of cluttering my site with all of these shorter articles covering the superhero TV shows that are coming out this year, I decided to put my thoughts on all of them in a single post. Though Constantine’s pilot will get its own post next week. It’s been a good week with all the shows firing on all cylinders for the most part, either continuing their high standards, or in the case of Gotham showing some improvement. It’s a close call as to which show I like the most as both the Flash and Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. are really nailing what it means to be a superhero television show.
Read the rest of this entry

Filmwhys #38 Perfect Blue and the Dark Knight

Welcome back to another Batman themed episode, and one of only a small handful of times where I can arguably have the better argument of a movie that someone should have seen by now. Episode 38 of the Why Haven’t You Seen This Film Podcast where my guest is Elwood Jones from From the Depths of DVD Hell who asks me why I haven’t seen Perfect Blue, one of the older and well respected anime movies that was a strong influence on Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan. And in return, I get to ask him why he hasn’t seen arguably the greatest superhero movie of all time, the Dark Knight.
Read the rest of this entry

TV Nights: Gotham #3

Gotham Week 3

Episode: Balloonman
Original Airdate: 10-6-2014

This will be the last week where I post my thoughts on each episode on its own post. Starting next week, I’ll be discussing Gotham, S.H.I.E.L.D., the Flash, and eventually Constantine on a combined post covering all the shows until I decide to stop watching some of them. But Gotham has been a strange creature these past few weeks. Each time I watch the show, I do enjoy it quite a bit. But then after the credits roll and I begin to think about it a bit in order to write my thoughts on it, I start poking holes in it. Whether it’s the Penguin, or Fish Mooney, or Jim Gordon himself, there’s a lot of elements of the show that just rub me the wrong way as it pertains to the Batman mythos, at least the corner of the mythos that I know about. This was the first episode where I started poking holes in the show as I was watching it, but at this point there is still enough good in the show for me to latch onto to stick with it for a while longer at least.
Read the rest of this entry

TV Nights: Gotham #2

Gotham Week 2

Episode: Selina Kyle
Original Airdate: 9-29-2014

After getting through the first episode of Gotham I thought that it had some promise but ultimately suffered from Pilot Syndrome. It had too many plots, too many characters, and too many potential Batman villains that they introduced. But the potential was there, there are some great characters like Donal Logue’s Harvey Bullock, and the look of the show has a great feel to it. This second episode gave the show a chance to dial things back a little bit and bring things into a tighter focus. And while it was still drawing a few too many threads across Gotham, the overall quality of the episode was much better than the Pilot and I’m looking forward to seeing what Gotham will bring in the future.
Read the rest of this entry

Filmwhys Extra #15 Batman Quadrilogy

Episode 15 of the Why Haven’t You Seen This Film Podcast show between the shows, an extra episode where we are talking about the Tim Burton and Joel Schumacher Batman films. With my are guests Jason Soto from Your Face!, The Vern from Vern’s Video Vortex, and Will Kouf from Silver Emulsion.
Read the rest of this entry

TV Nights: Gotham #1

TV Nights: Gotham

Episode: Pilot
Original Airdate: 9-22-14

It’s time to start the biggest superhero and comic book TV seasons in many years if not ever and Gotham is the first one out of the gate, though I’m probably one of the last ones out of the gate to get a post written about it. Based on the trailer, and what the show was going for I had high hopes for this show. I thought it could be an interesting take on the superhero trend, something along the lines of how Lois and Clark focused more on the relationship between the two rather than the superhero aspect. This show is supposedly going to take a closer look at the Gotham PD side of the equation rather than the supervillain side of things. And since this takes place when Bruce Wayne is still a boy and there is no such thing as Batman there should also be no such thing as supervillains yet. Instead, they are all still merely criminals before crossing the line once the door has been opened for the overly theatrical. Though it wouldn’t surprise me if they delve into some early theatrics later in the season, especially if they start struggling in the ratings department. Overall, I initially liked what I saw, but as I started reading other people’s negative reactions, I started to see more of the holes in the show and am actually a little glad that I have waited so long before writing this.
Read the rest of this entry

Filmwhys #37 When Harry Met Sally… and Batman Begins

Welcome back to another episode of Filmwhys starting off my first event here on the show. For the next five weeks I’ll be taking a look at plenty of Batman, and what better place to start then at the beginning. At least the beginning of Christopher Nolan’s trilogy. My guest is Jess from French Toast Sunday who asks me why I haven’t seen the classic romantic comedy for people who don’t necessarily like romantic comedies When Harry Met Sally… and in return I ask her why she hasn’t seen the beginning of Christopher Nolan’s epic Dark Knight Trilogy, Batman Begins.
Read the rest of this entry

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.
Read the rest of this entry