Blog Archives
Batman & Robin
Batman & Robin 1997
I decided to watch this as part of the ipc’s Shitfest 2013 so keep an eye out for a slightly different version of this review over there. When Batman & Robin first came out it was pretty anticipated. While Arnold Shwarzenegger wasn’t the most obvious choice for Mr. Freeze, he did at least look the part in the trailers, somewhat. I wish I could remember what my initial reaction to the movie was, but if I had to guess I would say that I enjoyed it but also noticed a few things that weren’t quite right with the movie. The puns that crept into the last movie have steamrolled into this one full force. The action became more cartoonish, and the neon visuals were bigger and more colorful. This movie seemed to have taken on a life of its own, and when all was said and done, it almost no longer resembled Batman outside of the costumes.
Superman Unbound
Superman Unbound 2013
This is the latest DC Animation home video release coming May 7th. I’ve been a fan of every one of these movies that I’ve seen and I’m still dying to get around to the handful I haven’t seen yet. This one continues their run of quality releases following the Dark Knight Returns, though it didn’t quite win me over as much as that one did. This follows Superman and his cousin Kara and their struggle with the Brain Interactive Construct that’s going through collecting the information of the universe as well as cities he keeps as souvenirs including Krypton’s capital city of Kandor, and now he has his sights set on Earth. Superman is the only one that can save the planet and he needs the help of his cousin. The quality of animation and voicework were spot on as usual, but there was just something in it that just wasn’t quite the story I was interested in.
Batman Forever
Batman Forever 1995
It’s been a while since I’ve seen this movie, though I remember loving it when it first came out. I was 15 at the time and remember going to Six Flags that summer and getting that question mark logo you see in the poster below on a t-shirt that I wore quite often for probably a year or more afterwards. I also find it somewhat interesting that there are actually several inside jokes that I don’t think I ever got when I was younger because I wasn’t that knowledgeable about the Batman universe outside of the movies or the animated series. There’s a brief reference to Nightwing, and at the end the psychologist’s name is Burton. After the very dark and gothic version of Gotham from Tim Burton, Joel Schumacher took over the reigns and lightened it up both in terms of his garish neon lighting as well as his pun-filled humor. None of this really sat well with me and it only portends things to come in the next movie Batman and Robin. It was filled with too many jokes and silliness that it barely felt like a Batman movie. While there are still some decent action sequences and other moments here and there, it’s a far cry from the quality seen in the Burton movies previously.
Comic Strip Double Dip Blogathon: James Marsden
James Marsden Double Dip
Cyclops / Richard White
There’s still a couple more weeks left in this blogathon before I call it to a close and I’d say it was pretty good for my first one. If you haven’t done your article yet, be sure to get it in. There were another two entries these past couple weeks so head over to the blogathon main page to go see them. For my third entry in this blogathon I chose another member of the X-Men who followed Byran Singer to his other superhero project and played both Cyclops and Richard White. I’m talking about James Marsden.
Wonder Women!
Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroes 2013
Wonder Women is more or less a documentary about the history of Wonder Woman and her effect on feminism in America. It’s interesting how closely Wonder Woman has been connected to the feminist movement throughout the years. The documentary is presented as a series of interviews with both figures connected with the Wonder Woman character, like comic writer Gail Simone and actress Lynda Carter, as well as figures prominent in the feminist movement like Gloria Steinem and the lead singer of Bikini Kill. All of the people represented in this doc are interesting to listen to and presented a lot of information I never knew about. And all of it is connected with plenty of artwork from Wonder Woman comics animated in a somewhat motion comic-esque way.
The Invincible Iron Man
The Invincible Iron Man 2007
Over a year before Iron Man hit theaters welcoming our Marvel Studios overlords they released another origin movie for ol’ Shellhead direct to DVD. There are honestly very few similarities to the two movies, and this is only the third animated Marvel movie after the Ultimate Avengers 1 & 2 and honestly it shows. After seeing what Robert Downey Jr. and Jon Favreau did with the character in the years that followed, it feels so weird to go back to the totally selfish, uncaring playboy shown here. The other characters also feel much more shallow than they have become with Rhodey being the only character to come off as good or better than he’s seen in the movies so far, though he disappears halfway through the movie. It’s interesting to see a different take on the origin story, and they do even introduce the Mandarin, though I highly doubt there will be any connecting thread between this Mandarin and the one in Iron Man 3, but there are so many better versions of Iron Man to watch out there.
Read the rest of this entry
Iron Man Rise of Technovore
Iron Man Rise of Technovore
This is a home video animation produced by a collaboration between Sony Pictures Entertainment and anime studio Madhouse. It’s a follow up to the 12 episode Iron Man anime series, though it’s a stand alone story that I was able to follow without having seen any of the previous episodes. There were four different Marvel properties that were turned into anime series, though I think Iron Man seems like it would be the easiest transition from Western Animation to Japanese Animation considering anime has a prevalence of mecha similar to Iron Man and some of his enemies. It ended up being an interesting mix of the two mediums with the obvious Japanese style combined with some of the more American personalities. I loved it for the most part, although I thought some of the philosophizing was a little slow and overly cerebral.
Comic Strip Double Dip Blogathon: Halle Berry
Halle Berry Double Dip
Catwoman / Storm
I’d like to thank everyone for their support so far in my first blogathon, it’s going at a nice steady pace and I hope it keeps up through the next four weeks through to the end. We’ve got two new entries this past week so be sure to check out the blogathon main page to go see them, and there’s still plenty of room and time to sign up for the blogathon yourself. But as for my own entry this week, I went with one on the lower end of the spectrum, considering one of the roles is in what’s often considered the worst comic book movie of all time, I’m talking about Halle Berry who starred in the pseudo-Batman spinoff Catwoman, and also played a small-yet-ever-growing role as Storm in the X-Men series.
UHF
UHF 1989
This is one of my favorite movies from when I was younger. I grew up listening to Weird Al’s parodies and when I saw that he had made a movie, I just had to see it. I was expecting a movie parodying movies just like his songs parodied songs. What I wasn’t expecting was a superhero movie. Weird Al plays George Newman, someone who can alter reality to suit his own means, and he uses his powers to defeat the evil head of the C8 corporation, R. J. Fletcher, a mastermind enemy with his cadre of henchmen trying to eliminate George’s base of operations, his UHF headquarters.
Read the rest of this entry
The Adventures of the American Rabbit
The Adventures of the American Rabbit 1986
On this Easter Sunday, after my daughter’s romp through the house finding all of her Angry Bird eggs I decided to kill two birds with one stone by putting on a somewhat Easter themed superhero movie. It’s got to be Easter themed since it has rabbits in it, right? Anyway I actually vaguely remember watching this movie when I was a kid but man does it totally not hold up in any way shape or form. Even Jena herself got bored with the movie when it was about halfway through and it’s only 80 minutes long. I thought it was great because I recognized a few voices from my childhood viewing, like the voice of The American Rabbit was Barry Gordon who also voiced Donatello in the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and a smaller part, the gorilla Ping Pong was played by Lorenzo Music who voiced Garfield for a long time, though his voice here reminded me a lot more of Tummy Gummy from the Adventures of the Gummi Bears. But even viewing this movie through a soft haze of nostalgia wasn’t able to save it from the ludicrous plots of villainy and barely there presence of the hero himself.
Read the rest of this entry
Flights, Tights, and Movie Nights 