Mutant Reviewers From Hell » Drew

Even More Indie Comics That Should Be Movies

Drew — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 11:47:37 +0000

Greetings, cinemaphiles! Because you demanded it, I’m back with yet another list of independent comics that would make for good movies. Even though this is my third go-around, the problem once again wasn’t finding enough indie comics that could make the transition, it was narrowing down the list. Some were easy to discount, like Whiteout, a thriller about a U.S. marshal stationed in Antarctica investigating a series of grisly murders among scientists at research bases. Why didn’t it make the list? One reason and one reason only: it’s already a movie, opening this September. (I have high hopes, even though they prettied up the homely protagonist by casting Kate Beckinsale and replaced her female British spy cohort with a male love interest.) Or Wildguard, a comic about an American Idol-esque reality show where rookie superheroes compete to join a new superteam. Great premise, but I honestly think it’d work better as a TV show than a movie. Other choices weren’t so easy to weed out, but weed them out I did so that I could bring you the following: five more indie comics that could be turned into terrific films.

STRANGERS IN PARADISE

To sum up Strangers in Paradise is no easy task, but in essence it’s a love story that also happens to be a crime thriller. Except instead of a hardboiled private eye, our hero(ine) is Katchoo, a blonde artist who looks like a model but takes no crap from ANYONE, including you, mister. She also happens to be hopelessly in love with best friend Francine and makes no secret of it; however, Francine loves Katchoo as a friend but is avowedly straight, not at all interested in the love that dare not speak its name. Things get complex when art student David enters their lives and falls head over heels for Katchoo, who for her part couldn’t be less interested. But David isn’t about to let a little thing like sexual orientation stand in the way of true love, and meanwhile Francine doesn’t think David is such a bad catch himself. Everything heats up when Katchoo’s past catches up to her, as we learn she once worked as a high-priced escort/bodyguard for Darcy Parker, one of the biggest crimelords in America, and may have stolen quite a bit of money on her way out. That’s just the tip of the iceberg, though, and before the series is over all of the characters will go through their share of humor, heartbreak, and intrigue.

Much like the comic Blue Monday that I described previously, SiP has nary a cape or supernatural element in sight, taking place in a world that could just as well be our own. (Okay, there’s one superhero parody and one Xena parody, but they’re both dream sequences.) What gives it life, and why it could easily be a great movie, is the characters with all their individual flaws and foibles. Some of those are physical- while Katchoo is a twig, Francine struggles with her weight throughout the series, and while not obese, is never what one would call skinny either. But creator Terry Moore makes it clear through numerous would-be paramours (Katchoo foremost among them) that Francine’s inner beauty shines through and makes her remarkably attractive, in large part due to her compassion and loving personality. (Granted, the boobs don’t hurt either.) Far more interesting, though, are the characters’ personality flaws. While generally good people, all of them have skeletons in their closets and something they’re unwilling to let go of, whether it’s the dream of a relationship with Francine, or Katchoo, or Mr. Right, or something else entirely. The series also does an excellent job of portraying both straight and gay relationships in a highly realistic manner, earning it numerous awards from GLAAD in addition to its Eisner Award for Best Serialized Story.

For all that I love SiP, I do have a few tiny complaints, primarily stemming from the intense “making it up as he goes along” vibe that pervades the series. On multiple occasions we’re given glimpses of the future only to have later events preclude things from actually happening that way, and the series introduces more characters and subplots that are dropped without explanation than any other I’ve ever read. (Wasn’t Katchoo a recovering alcoholic at one point?) I realize this is a backhanded complaint, but Moore brings so much vitality and depth to his characters that when they suddenly disappear without explanation, it’s jarring. Maybe it’s some meta-commentary on how people drift in and out of your life without warning, but by the end you’ll find yourself wondering why minor characters who appear for two issues are developed better than Brad, a major plot-driving character for over half the series. On a related note, the cycle of endless fights and reconciliations gets so repetitive that the characters themselves are forced to address it eventually. And while Katchoo is Moore’s pet character, I’ll admit that for most of the series she was my least favorite. Yes, she’s creative, witty, capable of extreme kindness… she’s also ungodly temperamental, borderline abusive, and (intentionally or not) shows David juuuust enough affection to keep him around while always leaving him wanting more. I know she’s had a tough life and she does improve near the end of the series, but more than once I found myself wishing David would shake off his Katchoo obsession and notice the attractive, stable brunette sitting next to him.

But in the end, those are minor quibbles about a truly remarkable series. If you’re someone who, even with the silly masks and codenames removed, just can’t bring yourself to read any comic involving fantastic powers or situations, do yourself a huge favor and check out Strangers in Paradise. If you don’t believe me, you can take bestselling author and snappy dresser Neil Gaiman’s word for it: “What most people don’t know about love, sex, and relations with other human beings would fill a book. Strangers in Paradise is that book.” ‘Nuff said.

“One man by himself is nothing. Two people who belong together make a world.”

PLANETARY

If your idea of a good time is raiding tombs or lost arks and learning the history of something that never was, have I got the series for you. Elijah Snow, Jakita Wagner, and the Drummer (first name “The,” last name “Drummer”) collectively comprise the field team of Planetary, who bill themselves as “Archaeologists of the Impossible.” Their self-imposed mission is to investigate and document the secret history of the world, all those things that have either through circumstance or careful manipulation remained hidden from the rest of us. In practice, this is an excuse for writer Warren Ellis to play around with the tropes and genre expectations of fiction and plumb just how deep the rabbit hole goes. No corner of literature, cinema, or comics is safe from Planetary’s investigations, and all of them come across looking more interesting than you might originally have thought.

Need an example of what to expect? Elijah Snow’s first mission with the group involves a secret alliance of pulp heroes (thinly-veiled versions of the Shadow, Tarzan, Fu Manchu, Doc Savage, and more) who invented a computer that uses alternate realities to predict the future, only to give their lives fighting off an invasion of Justice League analogues from one of the realities. Later cases include a mysterious island near Japan where giant monsters suddenly appeared in 1950 only to die out by the mid-70s, and a Hong Kong cop who was killed by his partner, but whose ghost appears every night to avenge murders with phantom (but very real) guns until someone else is betrayed and murdered to take his place. As the series progresses the intrigue only deepens, because it turns out Planetary doesn’t just investigate mysteries, they ARE one. Who’s the mysterious “Fourth Man” who funds their operations? Why did they choose to recruit Elijah, and what happened to the previous Third Man? (Killed while investigating the government’s ill-fated attempt at sending a crew into an entirely fictional universe.) And how can they possibly stand against the Four, amoral versions of the Fantastic Four who serve as the dark counterpoint to Planetary’s efforts, explorers who keep their discoveries only for themselves and actively work to cover up or annihilate supernatural beings and occurrences.

If you’ve ever lamented that the two X-Files movies weren’t that great, take note: Planetary is everything the X-Files wanted to be and more. Instead of a gullible wiener who’s a little too fixated on his sister and a bitchy skeptic, you get a century-old newbie, a sardonic British woman who can drop kick a rhino across the Grand Canyon, and a slightly insane young man who would really, really like to be alone with that sexy television of yours. (Okay, Jakita’s also kind of bitchy, but she looks better in leather than Scully.) Rather than bring locked into investigating an alien/mutation/urban legend every week, the comic’s broad remit allows Ellis to explore any genre he wants, and he has quite a vivid imagination. Ergo, a film version could feature Elijah’s recruitment and the pulp hero case to get him up to speed, but then transition into Planetary’s attempts to shut down the Four while Elijah slowly starts to recover his memories… including being trained by Sherlock Holmes and his unrevealed prior connection to Planetary. This movie needs to happen, if only to show that a film version of a comic devoted to exploring the realms of fiction can actually be done right, rather than… well.

”These people need putting down. And you’re getting this briefing now for three reasons. You’re a cranky son of a bitch and no-one really likes you — but we trust you now. You’re always complaining that we never do anything proactive. And we just found out where the Four are. You want to go get them?”

HITMAN

Yet again I’m cheating a bit, in the sense that Hitman was published by DC, one of the big two comic companies. Since it skated along for five years on the outskirts of the DC universe with only rare appearances by superheroes, I’m giving it a pass… besides, it has way more in common with Garth Ennis’ other infamous series, Preacher. Both feature healthy doses of ultra-violence, heroes who don’t take crap from anyone, and philosophical musings hidden between hilariously bizarre scenarios, but Hitman is both slightly more restrained (no cursing or nudity to be found) and played more for laughs. It’s also considered by some to be the better of the two series; that’s debatable, but what’s not is that it’s a hella funny comic with gratuitous violence, outre situations, characters with actual depth, and a surprising amount of heart. Like a Quentin Tarantino flick without the unearned sense of artistic smugness.

Hitman tells the story of Tommy Monaghan, a professional contract killer who accidentally acquires x-ray vision and low-level telepathy and decides to use them to specialize in killing superhuman and paranormal targets… for a modest fee, of course. The thing is, Tommy’s powers are entirely incidental to most stories and, like his codename, are almost forgotten about as the series progresses. Instead, the draw of Hitman is Tommy himself, a smart, funny, and — there’s no way around it — likable professional assassin. Like John Cusack’s character in Grosse Pointe Blank, Tommy has a way of making us empathize with him even as he ends people’s lives, and Ennis writes a poor Irish Catholic son-of-an-immigrant as only an Irishman can. It’s one of life’s great ironies that foreign writers are often the most gifted at articulating exactly what makes this the land of opportunity, and Ennis is one of the best at capturing the greatness of America’s melting pot without glossing over the country’s flaws. As well, there’s the fact that Tommy’s personal ethics lead him to only accept contracts on people who are killers themselves or otherwise (in his mind at least) deserve to die. It doesn’t make it right to cheer him on, of course, but damned if you won’t anyway. It’s an incredibly funny series, but Ennis also knows exactly when to pause the laughs and remind you that, hey- at the end of the day, this man kills people for money. And one of Hitman’s best moments occurs when best friend Natt the Hatt confronts Tommy with the hypocrisy of his self-imposed moral code.

There’s no shortage of great Hitman stories to translate to the silver screen, as Tommy and his assassin pals got themselves into one impossible scrape after another. A personal favorite is a night job at Gotham Aquarium where a chemical spill has mutated the sealife into zombie penguins and dolphins and harp seals; it’s like Evil Dead 2 meets, I don’t know, pixie farts. Something. Anyway, just cast a charming rogue who can pull off an Irish accent but who isn’t a d-bag (not so fast, Colin Farrell) and give Ennis the writing reins. I will caution, however, that one inclusion in the movie is non-negotiable. You see, the success of Hitman can be traced to exactly one thing, which is that it introduced the world to the single greatest superhero to ever grace the printed page: Dogwelder. The result of a bar bet between Garth Ennis and a friend that no one could come up with a stupider superhero name than “Green Lantern,” Dogwelder’s schtick is that he… well, he welds dead dogs to criminals’ faces. This is wonderful and magic. If you do not see the beauty in Dogwelder, stop reading my article immediately.

“You know you my best friend in the entire world, Tommy. Hell, you my brother. I got your back from now ’til the day we both be checkin’ out. But sometimes you so full of it you make me wanna throw up, man. This whole thing you got, this line you draw — like you ain’t gonna shoot anyone good? Who the hell are you to judge that? Like you don’t mind wastin’ wiseguys an’ gangstas by the dozen, but you ain’t gonna kill no cop? What if he’s on the take? Or he likes beatin’ on any brother looks at him funny? You don’t know! An’ I mean what you talkin’ about now, like you gotta atone or somethin’? You a hitman, Tommy! You kill for money! Live wit’ it! You know it an’ I know it, an’ pullin’ crap like showin’ mercy to Big Ears over there — that ain’t gonna change it for a instant.“

MADMAN

If you ever watched the Saturday morning cartoon “Freakazoid!” back in the day, you’re at least slightly familiar with Madman, whose protagonist served as its inspiration. Following in a proud fictional tradition, Frank Einstein (get it?) is a man searching for his past. Unlike most of his forebears, the reason Frank has to search is that he’s a patchwork corpse stitched back up and reanimated by two benevolently mad scientists. Naming him after their two heroes (Frank Sinatra and Albert Einstein), the scientists don’t have time to educate Frank properly because they borrowed heavily from a mafia boss to finance their experiments, and it turns out mobsters aren’t the patient type. Finding his resurrection left him with no memories but imbued him with enhanced reflexes and agility, as well as psychic sensitivity, Frank creates a costume to hide his hideous appearance modeled after the one thing he remembers liking in his past life, a comic book superhero. Thus properly attired, he sets out on a mission to save his creators and ultimately figure out for what higher purpose he’s been given a new lease on life.

Reading over the above description, it sounds pretty melodramatic and serious, but nothing could be further from the truth. In actuality, Madman is all about brightness and pop fun, a lighthearted romp through the surreal side of life. Naturally there’s danger to overcome and villains to be defeated, but Frank’s adventures have an airy quality to them, and the character himself is genuinely a nice, down-to-earth guy… whether he’s having a leisurely picnic with girlfriend Joe or clashing with a gang of mutant street beatniks, Frank always looks on the bright side of life. He doesn’t even have a secret identity- the mask is simply to cover his scars, and while newspapers call him “the Madman of Snap City,” to friends he’s just Frank (and anyone who wants to be is his friend). Creator Mike Allred is indisputably one of the most talented artists in comics — while on the surface Madman’s art may seem plain, it’s refreshing to see clean lines without the need for excessive detail at times, and it perfectly suits the tone of the comic. (That said, one of Allred’s greatest strengths is the ability to replicate nearly any drawing style. One Madman story saw the characters drawn differently in nearly every single panel, each one mimicking the artistic style of a popular comic or children’s book. You haven’t lived till you’ve seen Frank with Popeye arms or in the style of Peanuts characters.) That tone is escapism, by the by, mixed with a healthy dose of existentialism. My one criticism of the book is that it delves a little too deeply into philosophical musings at times, but you can’t come down on it too hard for being both fun to read and overly smart… would that more comics were like that.

I’m not going to lie, you probably couldn’t capture everything that makes Madman so ginchy keen in a film, but that doesn’t mean it’s not worth trying. It would have to be animated, as I don’t see Frank’s hyper-colored escapades translating well to real life. That was tried once before with a low-budget live action adaptation of one of Allred’s other creations, the G-Men From Hell, with decidedly mixed results. No, animation is the way to truly do justice to the world’s snappiest comic magazine. Traditional cel animation would do the trick nicely, but The Incredibles proved that CGI is up to the task of handling the hyper-kinetic pop sensibilities of the superhero, so perhaps Frank’s destiny lies in that direction. Either way, Mike Allred (and ideally wife/colorist Laura Allred) has to be onboard as at least Art Director, or we’re not interested, Hollywood. Make a note of that.

“Meanies never win. And you can quote me on that.”

Our fifth entry was going to be Jonah Hex, the legendary scarred gunfighter who was a hero to some, a villain to others, and wherever he rode people spoke his name in whispers. As every man, woman or child knows, he had no friends, this Jonah Hex, but he did have two companions — one was death itself… the other, the acrid smell of gunsmoke. It was going to be Hex, but while doing research for this article I learned that the previously in-limbo Hex movie is now officially set for release in 2010. So, no go. (Although you should still check Jonah Hex out, he’s great.) In its place, we’re going to take a look at the first manga to grace this list:

MAIL ORDER NINJA

I usually steer well clear of manga, but I’m making an exception for Mail Order Ninja because it is quite literally made of awesome. It’s also all-ages, so a movie adaptation would be a great family film in the Pixar mold, aimed toward kids but with jokes that appeal to adults. M.O.N. puts us in the shoes of Timmy McCallister, your average fifth-grader at L. Frank Baum Elementary School. Timmy’s a nice young kid who digs ninjas and ~~comics~~ graphic novels, but he’s sick of getting pushed around by everyone, from rich girl Felicity Huffington to school bully Brock, who’s formed an unholy alliance with Timmy’s bratty sister Lindsay. Fed up, Timmy enters a contest to gain the exclusive services of world famous ninja Yoshida Jiro for a year, and (since it wouldn’t be much of a story otherwise) wins! Soon things are a bit different around school, where Brock’s American Bullying Association license is permanently revoked. With the halls safe for normal kids to walk without fear for their lunch money, Timmy beats out Felicity for class president in a landslide, and plans to celebrate his victory with an immense party after the school dance. But Felicity isn’t ready to cede control without a fight, importing Jiro’s nemesis Nobunaga and the entire White Dragon Clan to help her regain power. Something tells me this school dance is about to get totally ninja…

It’s hard to describe what makes M.O.N. so great, aside from the cliche that author Joshua Elder really does have a great grasp on the voice and motivations of a 10-year-old. The book is crammed with funny asides, many in the form of text boxes that crop up next to characters at random times, pop-up video style. Elder is clearly a Generation Y-er who grew up on the same stuff we did and loves paying homage to it; a perfect example is Timmy’s graphic novel about Jiro’s adventures, where both the dialogue and action mirror Optimus Prime’s assault on Megatron in the 1986 Transformers movie. Occasionally the references feel a bit ham-fisted (”There’ll be no more dark sarcasm in this classroom!” “Hey, teacher! Leave them kids alone.”), but they’re nearly always funny, which excuses a lot. The story itself is kid friendly, by which I mean there won’t be any plot points you don’t see coming, but A) it’s written for young adults, and B) it packs enough laughs that odds are you won’t care. The violence is cartoony, and the stories themselves are quick reads. (Two volumes are out so far; a third was due earlier this year but has been pushed back to November.) I don’t really have much else to add- farm M.O.N. out to Dreamworks or Pixar and let them do what they do best. This one’s got my personal guarantee, you can’t go wrong.

“Son, owning a ninja is a big responsibility. Remember what happened with the iguana?”

As a special bonus, here’s one indie comic that definitely should NOT be made into a movie:

FLAMING CARROT

The Flaming Carrot’s origins are shrouded in mystery. Some say he was once an ordinary man who went insane after reading 5000 comics in one sitting to win a bet. One thing is certain: for reasons all his own, he took to wearing a giant fiery carrot mask and flippers (in case he has to swim) and dispensing two-fisted justice to anyone who threatens Palookaville, a suburb of Iron City. Occasionally taking direction from a mysterious speaker he found implanted in his chest after awaking from a three-day bender, the Carrot is a hard-hitting, hard-living, hard-loving hero who likes his drinks stiff and his women loose. With his trademark battle cry of “Ut!”, he wages lethal yet comedic war on any evildoer who’s man enough to take him on.

I actually really dig the Carrot, but that doesn’t mean I’m ready to see him on celluloid anytime soon. The problem is that essentially all of the humor in FC’s adventures is based on surreality. That’s fine as far as it goes, but the surreality isn’t a vehicle for the humor, it IS the humor. For instance, while wandering through a dreamlike dimension, the Carrot might pass by a woman breastfeeding a dictionary. That’s slightly funny from an oddity standpoint, but it’s not the setup for a gag… that IS the gag. With the Carrot’s habit of talking almost exclusively in non-sequiturs, some of them zen but most of them just nonsense, you really have to have a high tolerance for absurdist humor to get much out of his adventures. They’re usually best in small doses, and I definitely can’t see many members of your average audience getting into the Carrot’s vibe. Ultimately, this one’s better left on the comic page.

Interestingly, FC almost, sort of was the inspiration for a movie. See, the Carrot was a founding member of the Mysterymen, a group of working-class heroes with the highest mortality rate of any superteam in history. Alongside members like the Shoveler, Jumpin’ Jehosaphat, and Mr. Furious, who gets so mad at crime he becomes bulletproof, FC battled such menaces as an army of Hitler’s cloned feet. The Mysterymen (with a space added into their name) ultimately did get a movie, but the Carrot was rudely not included, perhaps because ’90s special effects weren’t capable of doing justice to a 5′ carrot mask with flames perpetually shooting out the top. Maybe it’s for the best — the film didn’t have much in common with its avant garde source material, and the world may not be ready for FC’s bizarre brand of vigilantism. But know that whenever evil threatens hot women, the Carrot will be leading the charge on his nuclear-powered pogo stick, ready to win the day through his peculiar blend of raw grit, blinding stupidity, and dumb luck.

Ut!

Drew does Green Lantern: First Flight

Drew — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 04:20:56 +0000

“In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil’s might, beware my power… Green Lantern’s light!”

The Scoop: 2009 PG-13, directed by Lauren Montgomery and starring Christopher Meloni, Victor Garber and Michael Madsen

Tagline: Beware His Power

Summary Capsule: Fearless test pilot Hal Jordan inherits a power ring that lets him do damn near anything, but first must undergo training with shifty hardass Sinestro. Nothing bad could possibly happen.

Drew’s Rating: “And I shall shed my light over dark evil, for the dark things cannot stand the light, the light of the Green Lantern!”

Drew’s Review: Historically, Green Lantern has been one of DC Comics’ foremost b-listers. You have the Big 3 (Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman), who are untouchable and will never die or go away for long. Beyond them lie the second tier characters like Aquaman and Green Arrow, the ones whose names are recognizable but who aren’t as sacred cows, meaning they can actually die, lose limbs, or be replaced for extended periods of time. Sitting at the very top of that list have traditionally been two names: Green Lantern and the Flash. The Brave and the Bold. In recent years DC has made a major push to have Green Lantern take his place with the big boys in hopes of creating another franchise character, and as part of that we have Green Lantern: First Flight, GL’s first animated movie. (Incidentally, the Flash has just started what looks to be a similar revitalization, so don’t be surprised if 2011 brings us “The Flash: Starting Line” or something.)

Obligatory background: Green Lantern was one of DC’s first superheroes, but the end of the ’40s saw all of them except Supes, Bats, and Wondy cease publication. A decade later, someone at DC decided to borrow the names of the old “mystery men” and update them into streamlined, space age heroes for a new generation, giving us sleek police scientist the Flash, shrinking physicist the Atom, aliens Hawkman and Hawkgirl… and Green Lantern, a test pilot who was chosen to join a galactic police force run by the Guardians, immortal aliens dedicated to keeping peace throughout the universe. By charging his power ring once every 24 hours, Hal Jordan could fly and create anything his mind could imagine, but the ring carried an impurity that made it vulnerable to the color yellow. Periodically other Green Lanterns would temporarily replace Hal: John Stewart, the token angry black guy who overcame his 2-dimensional roots to become a well-rounded character. Guy Gardner, who damaged the part of his brain that controls how much of a douchebag you are and at one point had the bright idea to take the most powerful weapon in the universe off his finger and challenge Batman to a fist fight. (Hint: this became known as the “one punch” incident.) Kyle Rayner, the lucky punk who inherited a magic ring by accident when Hal went insane, but (some would say) eventually rose to the challenge. All did respectable tours of duty, but the best known and most popular Lantern remains Hal, and he’s the focus of our movie.

Like any superhero with five decades of history, Hal’s early days have been retold many times and altered by degrees along the way, like a literary version of Telephone. What Green Lantern: First Flight tries to do is simplify things, jettisoning the parts that don’t work and dispensing with his origin within the first 5 minutes, allowing the rest of the film to focus on his training and early struggles in the Green Lantern Corps. Thus the movie plays out like a hodge podge of several early GL stories, with rookie Hal assigned to veteran Sinestro, the greatest Green Lantern of all, to learn the ropes of ring slinging and investigate his predecessor’s murder. Yes, that’s right – the Guardians, displaying the infinite wisdom accrued over countless millennia, have elected to put a guy named “Sinestro” in charge of the most powerful army in the universe, presumably because there’s no way that could backfire. Surprisingly it does, as Hal discovers that Sinestro maintains order with an iron fist and secretly despises the Guardians, thinking them too weak to truly effect change. After obtaining a yellow ring (and a power battery shaped like the Death Star), Sinestro openly defies the Guardians and lays waste to the Corps. All seems lost, but if only there were some brash young hotshot who’s a bit of a rebel himself, but with enough morality to still fight for what’s right. Wait, you don’t think…?

In a rare moment of frankness, I’ll just come out with it: I thought the film was pretty good, but definitely started stronger than it finished. This is largely due to its strange habit of oversimplifying some elements of the Green Lantern mythos while simultaneously overcomplicating others. Why would Sinestro bring his power battery into battle with him rather than hiding it somewhere safe, since he can create any weapon he wants with his ring? (For that matter, why does it bear a black GL symbol? Sinestro’s not a Lantern anymore, and his uniform gets a new emblem.) We don’t ever see the Green Lanterns recharging their rings before the climax, so the concept of them running out of juice may come out of left field for some viewers. And good grief, could the Guardians be bigger pusses? These are the immortal demigods who power 3600 interstellar policemen, and the best they can do is shoot some vaguely wavy energy and save their own useless troops from falling to their deaths? Why does Hal want to join these losers again? Go back to the Air Force, Jordan, they have REAL badasses there.

I realize this “review” has been about 60% history lesson, 40% actual review, and I don’t know, maybe I’m just burned out on animated superhero movies. (It’s not just me, there have there been a lot of them lately, right?) Regardless, First Flight was enjoyable but just didn’t bring it home at the end. It hurts to say that because I have a lot of time for Hal as a character, but this is not his best story. Like I said, it isn’t a bad film – the animation is impressive, they got some really talented voice actors, and the first 2/3rds really works for me. But it doesn’t capture the mood and intensity of the Batman animated features, nor the grandeur of the Justice League cartoon. It also invites unfavorable comparisons to both the “In Brightest Day” episode of the Superman cartoon, which told a Green Lantern origin story that’s nearly as thrilling in a third of the time, and Justice League: The New Frontier, which depicts the origin of a more fleshed-out Hal, but set against the backdrop of the greater DC universe. Stacked up against those examples, First Flight unfortunately falls a bit short. I’d still recommend you see it, but maybe as more of a rental or a discount buy. So says the Green Lantern!

Didja Notice?

It is maybe the coolest thing ever that Ch’p, the squirrel Green Lantern, made it into the movie. The only thing better would’ve been G’Nort, the incompetent dog… thing.
Arisia appears in a minor role, seemingly an adult. In the comics, Arisia (a humanoid alien) became a Green Lantern at age 13, but due to having a crush on Hal Jordan, subconsciously used her power ring to age herself to full adulthood, and she and Hal eventually dated. It was exactly as creepy as it sounds.
I know it’s just a cartoon, but the scene where Sinestro basically forces drugs on an alien prostitute to make her talk is still pretty uncomfortable.
Anyone notice how similar Sinestro’s philosophy is to Sean Connery’s from The Untouchables? “They pull a blaster, you pull a power ring. They send one of yours to the hospital, you send one of theirs to the morgue. That’s the Korugar way.”
Hey, Red from That ’70s Show is Kanjar Ro! “Sinestro, I swear, if you betray me I’ll put my foot so far up your ass…”
Wow… they actually showed a guy getting sucked out into the vacuum of space through a tiny hole. No blood, but still.
Okay, so there is some blood. This movie is definitely for teenagers, not kids. In the comics Green Lantern rings were until recently programmed not to allow the use of lethal force, but clearly that’s not the case here.
The part where Sinestro reanimates a dead corpse and plies it for information is also quite creepy. Way to earn that PG-13!
Scratch that again, there’s a LOT of blood. We’re a long way from the days when a trickle of AB positive from Batman’s mouth was all the blood the Animated Series team was allowed to use for an entire season.
Apparently to staff their ultimate police force, the Guardians have been recruiting heavily from preschools, ladies’ auxilary clubs, and chess teams. Seriously, one dude makes 20 Green Lanterns look like total chumps? Sinestro’s supposed to be the best Green Lantern, sure, but better than all of the others combined?
The whole levitating rocks thing isn’t helping people not compare you to Yoda, Ganthet.
What does it say about me that I’m more surprised by the use of the word “bastard” than all the violence and blood?
I could live without the heavy anime influence. Getting pwned with just your “regular” superpowers and having to absorb a mysterious energy source to turbocharge you is a little too Voltron, and there’s no reason Hal freakin’ Jordan should be doing a power ring Hadoken in space. Giant green boxing gloves will do just fine, thank you.

Now you've seen what countless naive young secretaries have seen: Hal Jordan's O face

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

Nope.

Intermission!

That’s

It isn’t really made clear in the film, but in the DC Universe green is the color of willpower, which is what Green Lanterns draw on to make their rings work. The rings are vulnerable to yellow because it represents fear, which is what every Green Lantern must be able to overcome. In recent years Sinestro has created his own Corps to oppose the Lanterns, armed with yellow rings like his own. While Green Lanterns are chosen based on their ability to overcome great fear, Sinestro Corps rings are given to beings capable of instilling great fear in others. One yellow ring sought out Batman, who rejected it; another was offered to the Scarecrow, but Batman and Green Lantern prevented it just in time. The Sinestro Corps displayed their originality in coming up with the following oath:

In blackest day, in brightest night,
Beware your fears made into light
Let those who try to stop what’s right
Burn like his power… Sinestro’s might!

Groovy Quotes

Ranakar: I’m afraid the human race of Earth does not have the most stellar reputation. The fact is humans are crude, base, fearful and untrustworthy.
Random Guardian: And then there’s the smell…

Hal: So what now?
Sinestro: Now, I own your ass.

Sinestro: Unlike the others, I like humans. I admire their spirit, and their natural contempt for authority. It’s well founded here.

Sinestro: You defied me!
Hal: You could’ve killed her.
Sinestro: Let me tell you, “friend.” The only way to operate out here is by fear. They hit, I hit harder. They attack, I annihilate. I am the one constant, unassailable force against their chaos, and you made them forget that!

Ganthet: The Green Lantern Corps is an ideal, Sinestro. You don’t save it by ignoring what it stands for.

Sinestro: I could use someone like you who has the stones to get things done. While the gnomes banish you, I offer you power, more power than you can imagine. All I ask for is your loyalty.
Hal: Now, you see, you had me… right up until that last part.

Weaponeer of Qward: The weapon is a mighty force. The most powerful and absolute in your universe. With one exception. One… slight… imperfection.
Sinestro: What?
Weaponeer: The imperfection every weapon has. Its user.

Sinestro: Frankly, Kilowog, you weren’t going to survive this anyway.

Hal: In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil’s might, beware my power… Green Lantern’s light!

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Drew does The Incredibles

Drew — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 11:21:48 +0000

“No school like the old school.”

The Scoop: 2004 PG, directed by Brad Bird and starring Craig T. Nelson, Holly Hunter and Jason Lee

Tagline: Save The Day

Summary Capsule: More than a decade after superheroes went into hiding to avoid litigation and public condemnation, one super-powered family is forced to save the world, and in doing so teach us all what it means to be a superhero.

Drew’s Rating: In fairness, Kid Miracleman did the “sidekick gone bad” schtick years ago. Of course, he destroyed London; Syndrome will just give you a chocolate-covered pretzel and a lecture about karma.

Drew’s Review: In a recent article, Lissa made the quite accurate observation that as a group, the Mutant Reviewers have… well, gotten older. Oh, I like to think we still skew toward a younger audience, and thank God for that, because who else is going to influence the Plan 9 From Outer Space-watching cult fans of the future? Harry Knowles? Don’t make me laugh. And we keep a few youngsters on staff at all times for Kyle to leer at. But it’s an inescapable fact that the site begun by two college students now has a median staff age in the late 20s if not early 30s. New father Justin barely has time to crank out three reviews a week anymore. Lissa ceased watching horror films, her favorite genre, and now reviews solely Pixar movies and anything that can be DVRed. And no one’s seen PoolMan since his retirement, though the MRFH kitchen is always well stocked with soylent green.

So it got me thinking about the changes in my own life since coming on board. When I became a staff member I’d been dating a girl from work for less than a year, with college just barely in the rearview mirror. These days I still say “dude” a lot and wear my hat backwards, but my girlfriend is now my wife of three years, we have a 9-month-old daughter, and even though I’m still young (28, thank you very much) and most of my friends remain single and jobless, there’s no denying that my circumstances have changed.

Which brings us in a roundabout way to The Incredibles. In 2004, I saw the movie because I like the Fantastic Four and because Pixar can always be counted on for an entertaining movie. And I was entertained, but I walked out of the theater without feeling a particular connection to any of the characters. They were perfectly likable, they just didn’t especially embody anything I was going through. But a funny thing happened when I watched the film again recently: I found myself identifying with Mr. Incredible. Sure, our situations aren’t identical: I only have one child and she’s Jack-Jack’s age, rather than Bob’s brood of three. Despite averaging 10 pounds heavier than in my college swimming prime, I don’t think anyone would call me fat. And there’s the minor “no superpowers” angle, if you insist on bringing it up. But if I’m not exactly in Mr. Incredible’s shoes yet, I can at least view them in the not-too-distant horizon.

And what are Mr. Incredible’s circumstances? Simply put, a world that seems to have passed him by. The man who once jokingly griped that he wishes the planet could just stay saved for a while is now faced with forced retirement… and even worse, a world that hasn’t ended without him. As much as he might complain about how hard he works in practices and games, no player wants to be put out to pasture before he’s darn well ready, and Bob isn’t. He loves his family, but wife Helen seems far too accepting of their new status quo, daughter Violet echoes the classic teenage girl refrain of just wanting to fit in, and son Dash bristles over not being allowed to use his powers in everyday life. What’s a former all-star to do with his whole life ahead of him and no outlet for his talents? For most of us the answer is, “Hang out with old teammates, relive the glory days over a few beers, and play some increasingly pathetic pickup games.” So it is with Bob as well, but when an opportunity arises to get back in the game, he grabs it… an opportunity that before it’s finished will drag his wife and kids into the fray as well. But you know what they say: the family that combats the forces of evil together, stays together.

There’s not a lot I can say that hasn’t been covered by the other Mutants, so I’ll just reiterate that the animation is superb, everything you’d expect from Pixar. Likewise, the voice casting is pitch perfect- I never once heard Coach Hayden Fox coming out of Mr. Incredible’s mouth, Craig T. Nelson really makes the role his own. Holly Hunter does that spirited but pragmatic wife routine even better than in Raising Arizona, and I hope whoever thought of casting Jason Lee as the smarmy, thinks-he’s-cleverer-than-everyone villain got a large bonus. Samuel L. Jackson sounds a little weird not swearing every fifth word, but I’ll give him a pass. The film moves along at a pretty good pace, and the final action piece excites even if the antagonist itself is a bit underwhelming, just a robot sphere with tentacles. By the way, you can tell I’m a superhero geek because during the final fight, my mind wouldn’t stop coming up with ways for the good guys to destroy it given the powers at their disposal. (Violet creates a force field inside the robot then expands it outward, crushing the internal mechanisms. Dash tries every combination of buttons on the remote in half a second. Frozone freezes the robot’s metal outer layer, making it brittle enough for Mr. Incredible to shatter with one punch. Dash grabs his mom and winds her around the robot’s tentacles, making it topple like an AT-AT.)

As I mentioned, I liked but didn’t love The Incredibles when it first came out because it entertained but seemed lacking in as resonant a theme as some of Pixar’s past offerings. What a difference a few years makes, because I now think that theme is one I just wasn’t in a place to appreciate back then. It’s still not my absolute favorite of the company’s movies, but it’s one I eagerly look forward to watching with my daughter and any other children I may someday be blessed with, as I start them on the long road to datelessness and comic collecting. (You laugh, but if your daughter were as cute as mine, you’d be looking for ways to keep her dateless too.) And for any college students reading this and scoffing at old man Drew, here’s a sobering calculation for you: elapsed turnaround time from graduation to meeting soulmate, getting hitched, and ultimately becoming a parent? 6 years, 5 months, 15 days. Tick, tick, tick…

Drew, this is your life

Didja Notice?

Mirage tells Mr. Incredible that he’ll be briefed on his second mission in conference room A-113. The number A-113 is a frequent Pixar in-joke based on one of the room numbers for the animation program at Cal Arts.
Syndrome’s facial features are based on those of the film’s director, Brad Bird.
In the beginning of the film, when a robber is going through a woman’s purse on the roof of a building, a Mr. Incredible Pez dispenser can be seen among the items scattered on the ground.
Inside Bob’s cubicle is a “danger” sign. The image is the lightning bolt of Captain Marvel (SHAZAM!), using the red of his uniform instead of the gold. It is in the distinctive shape of the Marvel family (Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel, Captain Marvel Jr., and Black Adam), not that of the various Flash costumes. When Mr. Incredible gets his fancy new car, the emblem on the hood is in the triangular shape of the Golden Age Superman’s symbol. The black ray-like vehicle that delivers Mr. Incredible to the island is a reference to the Black Manta, an enemy of Aquaman and member of the Legion of Doom. And Gazer-Beam is a direct reference to Cyclops of the X-Men.
The story takes place in a city called “Metroville”. It’s a combination of “Metropolis” and “Smallville,” respectively the cities where Superman lives and was raised.
The ending scene – with the Underminer emerging from the earth – is an homage to the Fantastic Four’s first enemy, the Mole Man.
Among the superheroes shown listed in the Kronos database are Universal Man, Psycwave, Everseer, Macroburst, Phylange, Blazestone, Downburst, Hyper Shock, Apogee, Blitzerman, Tradewind, Vectress, Gazerbeam, Gamma Jack, ElastiGirl, Frozone, and Mr. Incredible.
Syndrome’s unusual way of walking was supposedly inspired by a Pixar employee who someone had noticed had a very strange walk and commented on it. His or her attempts to curb the strange walk were the basis of Syndrome and his “purposeful” walking style.
When Mr. Incredible first meets Buddy he struggles to remember his name, calling him Brodie at first. Jason Lee, who voices Syndrome, made his big screen debut playing comic book-obsessed character Brodie Bruce in Mallrats.
The whole anti-capes joke may be a nod to a flashback in Watchmen, where Dollar Bill got his cape caught in a revolving door at a bank robbery and was gunned down.
Wallace Shawn (Mr. Huph) and John Ratzenburger (The Underminer) both make it into the movie in small roles. They’ve both been in every Pixar movie to date (with the exception that Shawn was not in Finding Nemo).
So… where did all the supervillains go when the heroes were forced underground?
Definitely Pixar’s most violent movie to date. Several henchmen and at least one major character die over the course of the film.
The move Bob and Helen use to save Jack-Jack is called the Fastball Special. It was pioneered by Wolverine and Colossus of the X-Men, wherein the latter would pick the former up and hurl him at an enemy.

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

They certainly look cool, with lots of stylish superhero-esque figures appearing and stirring music playing. Sure, what, are you in a hurry or something?

Intermission!

John Barry was originally hired to score the film but left the project after recording only a few demo themes.

In order to give Dash a realistic out-of-breath voice, Brad Bird made Spencer Fox run laps around the studio.

The little boy on the tricycle is named Rusty, this is never revealed in the film except for the credits and a comic in Disney Adventures Magazine.

This is the first time Pixar has used only human characters in a film.

The theme from the James Bond film On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, composed by John Barry, is used in the previews for this film. The version used in the first trailer is from the CD “Bond: Back in Action” (Escape From Piz Gloria and Ski Chase). The second trailer uses the remix by David Arnold featuring The Propellerheads as it appears on the 1997 albums “Shaken and Stirred – The David Arnold James Bond Project” and “Decksanddrumsandrockandroll”; this second trailer also uses the song “The Planet Plan” from the album “3rd Perspective” by United Future Organization.

Edna, the costume lady, is based on Edith Head, who worked as a studio costume designer on hundreds of movies over more than fifty years.

Brad Bird originally conceived this as a conventional cel-animated film when he pitched it. The cel-animated sequences seen in the End Credits are a representation of his original concept.

I know they're meant to be heroic, but God help me, those black masks make them look like 1) raccoons, and 2) criminals. Maybe something in red?

Groovy Quotes

Mr. Incredible: Bomb Voyage.
Bomb Voyage: Monsieur Incroyable!

Helen: I love you, but if we’re going to make this work, you have to be more than Mr. Incredible.

Violet: Normal? What do you know about normal? What does anyone in this family know about normal?
Helen: Now wait a minute, young lady-
Violet: We act normal, Mom, I want to be normal! The only normal one is Jack-Jack, and he’s not even toilet trained!

Lucius: So now I’m in deep trouble. I mean, one more jolt of this death ray and I’m an epitaph. Somehow I manage to find cover and what does Baron von Ruthless do?
Bob [laughing]: He starts monologuing.
Lucius: He starts monologuing! He starts this, like, prepared speech about how feeble I am compared to him, how inevitable my defeat is, how the world will soon be his, yadda yadda yadda.

Bob: What are YOU waiting for?
Little Boy on Tricycle: I don’t know. Something amazing, I guess.
Bob: Me too, kid.

Bob: It’s not a graduation. He’s moving from the 4th grade to the 5th grade.
Helen: It’s a ceremony.
Bob: It’s psychotic! They keep creating new ways to celebrate mediocrity.

Bob: Are you saying that we shouldn’t help our customers?
Mr. Huph: The law requires that I answer “no.”

Edna [to Mr. Incredible]: My God, you’ve gotten fat.

Mr. Incredible: You mean you killed off real heroes so that you could pretend to be one?
Syndrome: Oh, I’m real all right. Real enough to defeat you! And I did it without your precious gifts. Your oh-so-special powers. I’ll give them heroics. I’ll give them the most spectacular heroics the world has ever seen! And when I’m old and I’ve had my fun, I’ll sell my inventions so that everyone can have powers. Everyone can be Super! And when everyone’s Super… no one will be.

Edna: Supermodels. Hah! Nothing “super” about them – spoiled, stupid little stick figures with poofy lips who think only about themselves. Feh! I used to design for GODS!

Syndrome: Oh no! Elastigirl? You married ELASTIGIRL?!? [sees kids] And got biz-ZAY!

Lucius: Honey? Where’s my super suit?
Honey: What?
Lucius: Where – is – my – super – suit?
Honey: I, uh, put it away.
Lucius: Where?
Honey: Why… do you need to know?
Lucius: I need it!
Honey: Don’t you think about running off doing no derrin’-do. We’ve been planning this dinner for two months!
Lucius: The public is in danger!
Honey: My evening’s in danger!
Lucius: You tell me where my suit is, woman! We are talking about the greater good!
Honey: Greater good? I am your wife! I’m the greatest good you are ever gonna get!

Evil Henchman Watching TV News: Every time they run, we do a shot!

Old Man #1: Did you see that? That’s the way to do it. That’s old school!
Old Man #2: Yeah. No school like the old school.

Underminer: Behold, the Underminer! I’m always beneath you, but nothing is beneath me! I hereby declare war on peace and happiness! Soon, all will tremble before me!

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Drew does Undeclared: The Complete Series

Drew — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 03:30:58 +0000

Fair warning: I’m going to admit something that will immediately alienate at least half of you and possibly make you swear off my reviews forever. Ready?

I like Undeclared better than Freaks and Geeks.

Sorry. I know I just invalidated the entire rest of this article for many of you, but I gotta be me. And “me” is a guy who likes about a 90/10 split between his comedy and drama. There’s no denying that Freaks was an excellent show with more than its share of funny moments, but the focus on laughs over all else makes Undeclared the preferred Judd Apatow vehicle in my eyes. I hope I have not brought shame on my family, and that you will continue reading on through your disgust.

The obligatory background: after critical darling Freaks and Geeks met with a much-lamented cancellation, creator Judd Apatow decided to spearhead a new show, this time about college life. After pouring his heart and soul into Freaks and having them crushed, his intent was to make a breezy comedy that he wouldn’t have to stress about, a half hour show to Freaks’ hour because clearly that would only be half the work. This failed miserably on all levels. As Apatow humorously reflects in his introduction to the Undeclared DVD, “I worked more hours than ever. I quickly learned that a half hour comedy is way harder to produce than an hour drama. With Freaks, if a scene wasn’t funny, we called it drama. With Undeclared, if it wasn’t funny, it just wasn’t funny.” Throw in major casting issues — the plan was to bring in numerous Freaks alums as main cast members, but only one (Seth Rogen) was approved by network execs, though many others became guest stars — and you can understand Apatow’s frustration. Add to that the fact that it STILL didn’t work, with Undeclared being canceled after one season just like its predecessor, and is it any wonder Apatow made the leap to cinema and hasn’t looked back? Probably not… but at least he left us with two great albeit shortlived shows before he did. Well, and the knowledge that he sent FOX executives a note reading, “How can you #?!* me in the @##$!?% again when your =%!# is still in there from last time?” Which, as far as I’m concerned, is just icing on the cake. But enough history, what’s this show all about?

Like most of us, Steven Karp (Jay Baruchel) has decided he is absolutely going to be cooler in college than he was in high school. And like some of us, he appears to be succeeding, at least at first: partnered with handsome British roommate Lloyd (Charlie Hunnam), who drops skirts with a single toss of his flowing locks, Steven attends a party and even loses his virginity his first night on campus. For her part, devirginizer Lizzie (cute-as-a-button Carla Gallo, known to Superbad fans) was just looking to cut loose and mentally free herself from clingy boyfriend Eric (Jason Segal, in a hilarious and fortunately recurring guest role), but now finds herself the target of a puppy dog crush. Of course, Steven’s other roommates Ron (Rogen) and Marshall (Timm Sharp) have their own ideas about how to make this the best freshman year ever, none of which include letting Steven’s recently-separated dad Hal (Loudon Wainwright III) crash on their couch. Oh well… maybe Steven can be cool sophomore year.

It’s trite to say so, but a big part of what makes Undeclared work is that, much like Freaks did for high school, it actually feels like college. Beyond the obligatory unrealistically large dorm rooms (a necessity if you want more than two camera angles), it’s the realistic little touches that make it – things like the girls going to class in sweatpants and no makeup, or the guys playing 4-player video games and cursing each other out. This is stuff we all went through in college, whether it’s being sexiled from your room, or getting a credit card and immediately overspending, or ~~stealing~~ liberating food from the dining hall. Apatow has lamented that the reason most college shows suck is because the things people actually experiment with in college — drugs, alcohol, sex — aren’t network friendly, leading to watered-down dreck. I don’t doubt that’s true, but I will say that Undeclared doesn’t gloss over the drinking and sex, at least. And while I never pledged a fraternity or worked a campus job in college, I don’t doubt for a minute that the experiences as portrayed in Undeclared are spot-on; and this from a man who HAS swallowed a live goldfish before, thank you very much.

Of course, it helps that the characters are mostly engaging and three dimensional. Jay Baruchel is endearingly awkward as Steven and pulls off the “geek trying to go against the grain” vibe well, and my main complaint about Seth Rogen from Freaks (that his character didn’t get enough to do) is eliminated here, as Ron gets several plotlines focusing on him and some of the best lines to boot. I’ll offer that it’s a good thing Carla Gallo is cute, because between sleeping around on all of her love interests and unintentionally manipulating them, Lizzie isn’t always the most likable of characters, but it’s hard to stay mad at her. Marshall and especially Rachel sadly feel the most underdeveloped as characters, a situation that might have been rectified in the second season, but alas, we’ll never know.

I promise not to ramble on, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t briefly mention the outstanding guest stars. For a single season they really packed ‘em in, building episodes around major names like Adam Sandler (and his perennial entourage), Will Ferrell, and Ted Nugent, as well as giving recurring guest roles to Amy Poehler and most of the Freaks cast. (In one episode where Samm Levine guest stars as a fraternity president, the frat vandalizes the guys’ room, and the words “Greeks Not Freaks” can be seen spray-painted on the wall.) Even stars-to-be like Tom “Smallville” Welling and a pre-The Office Jenna Fischer appear in bit parts. As a final act of rebellion after learning they were cancelled, the writers decided to barely feature the main cast in the final episode and instead devoted much of it to Lizzie’s ex-boyfriend Eric (Jason Segal) and his Copy Shop coworkers David “10 Things I Hate About You” Krumholz and Kyle “Tenacious D” Gass, as well as Eric’s stepdad Ben “prototype for my character in Dodgeball” Stiller. That’s cheeky, and I dig it.

The DVD set contains a few choice goodies, including auditions, rehearsals, and a script planned for season 2, but the best special feature is the booklet that comes with it, a guide to the 17 episodes (plus a heavily reworked version of one) that features members of the cast and crew weighing in on every episode. Seth Rogen’s entries alone are worth the price of the set, like when he describes getting crap for writing himself a make-out scene with guest star Busy Phillips, and then accidentally getting an erection. (Look for it.) It’s also a fascinating peek into the creative process, as Brent Forrester describes late night writing sessions at Judd Apatow’s house where they delay work as long as possible by eating junk food and Apatow gradually gets more and more intense, saying things like, “Are you ready for the magic? A little more cake, and I am going to bring it.” For some reason I find that hilarious. Almost as hilarious as Jay Baruchel’s insistence that his character wear jean shorts, because c’mon… jorts!

So that is why I thoroughly enjoy Undeclared. You may never agree with me that it’s a better show than Freaks and Geeks, and I can live with that — I’ve long since accepted I’m in the minority on that one. But hopefully I’ve at least convinced you that it’s worth checking out. The DVD set isn’t too expensive, and even though Wikipedia would have you believe the episodes are arranged out of order on the DVDs, that is a damn lie. For shame, Wikipedia. (The booklet lists them in improper order, but they’re correct on the discs themselves, so maybe it was a running change.) Anyway, that’s all I’ve got. I realize it’s kind of an abrupt ending, but in proper college spirit, it’s beer o’clock and I’ve got to be drunk by beer thirty. See ya!

Hilarious Quotes:

Professor Duggan: When I’m lecturing I expect you to listen. This is not high school. You’re paying good money for an education.
Marshall: Well, yeah. That’s the whole point. I am paying good money, and I think you should try to be less boring.

Steven: I thought I saw an ad for a job at an art supply store.
Perry: That job doesn’t exist. For some reason hot girls like art, so I just put that in there to get numbers. My palm pilot is bursting.

Lloyd: Alright, Mr. Magoo, time to leave. Rebecca’s going to be here any second.
Steven: Okay, well, have fun, and in case you need me I’ll be sleeping on that disgusting-ass little couch right there that Ron puked on the other night. Thanks.

Marshall: You’re really smart.
Rachel: Thanks.
Marshall: And you’re pretty. You’re smart and pretty. Like a dolphin.
Rachel: Thanks.

School Video Show Guy: Coming up next we have a generic R&B video. I don’t know who it’s by, but I bet they’ll have a shot of a guy without his shirt on spinning around in the rain.

Steven: Excuse me. Am I like interrupting a slumber party or something?
Nicola: No. Our roommates are having sex. How about you?
Steven: Yeah. He is.

Lizzie: What do you think?
Ron: Is that… as big as your boobs get?
Lizzie: Oh! I have a shirt for that.
Ron: Ah. I knew you would.

Ron: She’ll tell her friends across the pond and my name will be like the secret inside joke for bad sex. “How was your shag?” “Oh, I got Ronned! He Ronned me! It was terrible.”

Lloyd: In every man resides a fighter, Steven.
Steven: Where? Does he hide in my ass?

Perry: I cannot believe Steven is joining those guys. That kid could not become a bigger dork if he went on the road following the Dave Matthews Band.

Marshall: Every night after Ron falls asleep, I ah… ah, do what young men do. In my bed.
Ron: You do it after I go to sleep?
Marshall: Yeah.
Ron: I do it every night after you go to sleep!
Marshall: But you’re snoring by the time I’m doing it.
Ron: I’m pretending to snore so you don’t think that I’m doing it!
Marshall: God, Ron!
Ron: So we’re doing it at the same time?
Marshall: That’s horrible, Ron!

Marshall: That was awesome!
Ron: That was pretty cool.
Lloyd: Awesome that was not.
Marshall: Why not? Why wasn’t it?
Lloyd: I’ve been thinking this might happen for awhile, but this is sooner than I thought. We have become their brothers.
Marshall: So?
Lloyd: So I understand where you’re from, being someone’s brother may not necessarily eliminate sexual possibilities. For Ron, myself and Steven, this spells trouble.

Marshall: Dude, get out of here.
Ron: Why?
Marshall: Because Lloyd’s about to pick a girl, then the others are going to disperse, and then I’m gonna get the slowest and the weakest one, now go, he’s about to pick one!

Lloyd: What if this is the perfect girl? They all might be the one, and you don’t know until you sleep with them. All of them.

Drew does That Thing You Do!

Drew — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 04:06:57 +0000

“I led you here, sir, for I am Spartacus.”

The Scoop: 1996 PG, directed by Tom Hanks and starring Tom Hanks, Liv Tyler and Tom Hanks’ younger clone (er, Tom Everett Scott)

Tagline: In every life there comes a time when that dream you dream becomes that thing you do.

Summary Capsule: The ~~Oneders~~ Wonders, a group of young musicians in the mid 60s, record a hit tune and skyrocket to fame… maybe a bit too quickly. Can the band work out their differences, or will they end up as the one-hit Wonders?

Drew’s Rating: I don’t say this to every girl, but I. Am. Spartacus.

Drew’s Review: Like most people, I usually identify with the heroes of films. I don’t think that’s the result of massive ego on my part (well, not entirely) so much as the fact that filmmakers work hard to make protagonists relatable and engaging. With the exception of horror movies and some indie films, if the audience doesn’t like the main character, they don’t like the movie. I bring that up because while I do relate to Guy, the protagonist of feel-good period comedy That Thing You Do!, my favorite character is easily Lenny, the smart aleck who doesn’t take anything seriously and is prone to dropping random quips at any given time. Like Lenny, I too know the pain of making hilarious comments (shut up, they are so) to people who aren’t expecting them and don’t know how to react. This often leads to silence and incredulous “son, do you ride the short bus?” stares, but who cares as long as you and the invisible audience are amused? Of course, Lenny’s invisible audience actually exists, plus he’s slightly dim and a borderline pervert, so I am now starting to regret comparing myself to him. Let’s move on, shall we?

Our film begins with appliance salesman/drum enthusiast Guy Patterson (Scott) being asked by friends to play new song “That Thing You Do” at a talent show, in the wake of their original drummer breaking his arm. Guy agrees, then makes the rather ballsy decision to speed up the tempo of the song he didn’t write, by the band he’s not technically a member of, with people who are essentially paying him for his time. To his great fortune, rather than ruining the tune and getting everyone pissed, the crowd loves it. Soon Guy and the Oneders (that’s as in the number one), with lead singer Jimmy’s girlfriend Faye (Tyler) along for the ride, are playing at local bars and cutting a record. But after signing with manager Mr. White (Hanks), tensions mount for the newly rechristened Wonders even as “That Thing You Do” blazes up the charts. Jimmy wants to concentrate on more serious songs and make another record; their bass player (Ethan Embry) enlisted in the Marines and will be leaving soon; and smartass Lenny (Steve Zahn) is just looking to tune some pretty young thing’s guitar. If you can decipher my cryptic innuendo. Wink wink. With a TV appearance coming up that could launch them into national stardom, the boys have a choice: shape up or break up. Care to place your bets?

Confession time: I’ve been meaning to review TTYD! for years, but I could never figure out quite what to say. I think the issue is that while I really like the movie, it’s hard to put into words what I love about it. If pressed, I guess I’d point to the way the film portrays the boys’ totally unironic enthusiasm over their meteoric rise to fame. In his debut directorial effort, Tom Hanks does a nice job of getting performances out of his actors that convince the audience that yes, these are really clean-cut, naive youngsters who just stumbled onto a Billboard hit and are enjoying the hell out of it. I have to think that any musician, no matter how jaded or above-it-all he may be, experiences a hushed moment of disbelief upon seeing his first record. I’ll bet even Sid Vicious got choked up for a second before he went back to shooting up whatever was laying around. What TTYD! does and does well is to keep that feeling going, bringing you along for the ride with these small town kids who literally can’t believe this is all happening to them. There’s a wide-eyed innocence to the whole thing that appeals to me, and I’m guessing to the optimist in all of us… I don’t know many people who don’t like this movie.

Of course, you can’t achieve that effect without actors who can convincingly pull off awestruck joy, and it’s here that Tom Hanks made some really smart decisions. Sure, Tom Everett Scott pulls off the aw shucks leading man amiability, but it’s costar Johnathon Schaech who impresses by hitting all the right rod-up-his-buttons… with due respect, the guy just looks like a pretentious, artistic twit, doesn’t he? Compared to Reality Bites, it’s great to see a movie where Steve Zahn is really allowed to shine in that smartass way of his, and in anything he’s in, I will always see Ethan Embry as the boyish, slightly gawky nameless guy. What works is that these four guys have chemistry together, and — particularly in the extended scenes, see below — they actually seem like friends. As for my darling Liv, I find it ironic that Steven Tyler’s daughter always ends up playing the totally pure, innocent characters, whether it’s Corey in Empire Records or Faye here or Arwen in Lord of the Rings. Still, she has the looks for it, and mostly manages to pull off girl-next-door status. (I say mostly because there’s no one in the world who chases after a cougar when he’s got Liv Tyler waiting at home for him. That’s like stepping out on Scarlett Johansson so you can date Julia Roberts. Not happening.)

So there you have it- That Thing You Do! Combine the ’60s pop sensibilities of A Hard Day’s Night with the “hometown boy joins band and makes it big” vibe of Rock Star, strip all the sex and drugs cautionary elements from the latter, and you’re left with a funny, lighthearted romp that won’t blow your mind but probably won’t bore you to tears with the predictability of it all. It doesn’t aim to be the greatest movie ever, and it isn’t; but that said, far lesser films try to accomplish a great deal more all the time and fail miserably. TTYD! knows what it is, and what it is is a fun little movie you put on every so often to appeal to the hopeful kid in all of us. I will caution you that between the various snippets, you’ll probably hear the title song at least 4 times in total before the film’s over. Assuming you can handle that, there’s no reason not to see That Thing at least once.

Didja Notice?

In a running gag, Ethan Embry’s character is never named, being referred to throughout the movie simply as “our bass player.” Even in the text segment at the end he’s listed as “T.B. Player.”
The movie features numerous cameos: among them, Guy’s Uncle Bob is Chris Isaak, “Boss Vic Koss” is Kevin Pollak, and Ron Howard’s brother Clint plays the disc jockey. Two of director Tom Hanks’ family members also make cameos- son Colin escorts Liv Tyler to her seat at the Hollywood Showcase, and wife Rita Wilson is a waitress at The Blue Spot named Marguerite. (In reality, Wilson’s birth name is Margarita Ibrahimova.)
There are numerous references to Apollo 13, including Jimmy and Lenny’s last names being borrowed from astronauts Ken Mattingly and Fred Haise. Also, a marquee sign in Pittsburgh touts “Marilyn Lovell and the Geminis.” In real life, Marilyn Lovell was the wife of Jim Lovell from Apollo 13.
SPOILER! This might be total coincidence, but: the Bryan Adams song “Summer of ‘69″ talks about a band breaking up when “Jimmy quit, Jody got married.” In TTYD!, Mr. White says the words “Jimmy just quit” and then asks where Lenny is; this is immediately followed by a shot of Lenny getting married.

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

No, but right before the credits, brief text pieces explain what happened to each of the band members plus Faye.

: Guy: That’s right, smirk, you cocky bastard. Lenny: A face only a milk carton could love. Jimmy: Dude, look gayer. T.B. Player: I’d be nervous too if Jimmy were looking at me like that.

Intermission!

That Thing You Do!

TTYD! parallels the career of the Beatles in many ways, from the music-themed spelling of their name to the message flashed on screen during their first TV appearance. (For Jimmy it’s “Careful girls, he’s engaged”; for John Lennon on the Ed Sullivan Show it was “Sorry girls, he’s married”.) Also, the Beatles’ first hit was a sped-up version of a slower ballad, “Please Please Me.” The scene where the band members are escorted into a limo and Faye is almost left behind was inspired by an incident that occurred in New York where a security guard refused to believe Cynthia Lennon was John’s wife and wouldn’t let her past to join them on a train. However, in real life the band didn’t notice Cynthia was left behind and she missed the train.

Supposedly Tom Hanks conceived the idea for the movie when he learned that the Beatles replaced a sick Ringo Starr with another drummer while touring Japan and Australia, and wondered what those three weeks were like for that drummer. The title song was written by Adam Schlesinger, bassist for Fountains of Wayne, as the result of a contest held by the studio.

Groovy Quotes

Jimmy: No, look — “The Oneders.” Lenny.
Lenny: Yeah, it looks like the O’Needers.
Jimmy: No, the… the Oneders.
Lenny: Got it. Looks like the O’Needers.

Villapiano: Know what that is?
Lenny: …Presidential flash cards?
Villapiano: A bonus. You know why?
Lenny: I have no idea.
Villapiano: To entice you back! The word is out on you O’Needers.
Lenny: Hey, that’s O’Nedders.

Lenny: Hi! I’m Lenny.
Female Fan: Hi.
Lenny: What’s your name?
Female Fan: Chrissy.
Lenny: Yeah, he’s got a very pretty girlfriend, doesn’t he?
Chrissy: Is it serious, do you know?
Lenny: Very serious. I’m single!
Chrissy: What about the bass player?
Lenny: He’s married!

Mr. White: Next, this “Oneders” with the O-N-E? It doesn’t work. It’s confusing. From now on you boys’ll just be… simply the Wonders.
Lenny: As in, I wonder what happened to the O’Needers?
Mr. White: That’s right.

Lenny: Diane Dane! Diane Dane! I had my first boy-girl thing I ev- it was for a picture of you on a record sleeve!
Diane: Yeah, charming.

TV Reporter: The biggest state fair in the entire world! Ah, talk about this latest record.
Jimmy: It’s our first record, we wrote it in my garage in Erie, Pennsylvania.
TV Reporter: I’ll wager that the kids and fellas here, and all the folks at the fair, are showing you a time like you never had.
Lenny: Oh, I’m not here with these fellas… I got a pig in competition over at the livestock pavilion, and I am gonna win that blue ribbon!

Lenny: So, how long have you, uh, worked here at Play-Tone?
Kitty: How long you been wearin’ such tight pants?

Jimmy: Diane Dane said, “Never trust a label,” and I’m beginning to believe her.
Lenny: Oh, I agree. I mean c’mon, they put us up in a first-class hotel, all expenses paid, while our record climbs the charts… buncha lying snakes.
Jimmy: I’m sorry I’m bugging you. I guess I’m alone in my principles.
Lenny: Come on! There he goes, off to his room to write that hit song, “Alone In My Principles.”

Lenny: Skitch… how did we get here?
Guy: I led you here, sir, for I am Spartacus.

Jimmy: Which one of you butts said we were engaged?
Mr. White: The same person who said you had class, Jimmy

Mr. White: You know Guy, Horace was right about you, you are the smart one. Lenny is the fool, Jimmy is the talent, Faye is… well now Faye is special, isn’t she? And you are the smart one. That’s what I think, anyway.

Faye: You know that, um, none of this would have happened if you hadn’t joined the band. And I mean that in a good way.

If You Liked This Movie, Try These:

Rock Star

This Is Spinal Tap

Hairspray

Drew does Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Drew — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 03:37:48 +0000

“My father was a wheel! The first wheel! And do you know what he transformed into? Nothing! But he did it with honor!”

The Scoop: 2009 PG-13, directed by Michael Bay and starring Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox, and Megan Fox’s breasts in slow motion

Tagline: Revenge is coming.

Summary Capsule: Special effects gurus secure themselves an Oscar nomination by hiding Megan Fox’s tattoos for 2 1/2 hours. Also, giant transforming robots.

Drew’s Rating: Because “Transformers: The Decepticons Strike Back” would’ve been a little too on the nose.

Drew’s Review: My children, I come bearing good news and bad news. Before we get into that, recall that in my review of Michael Bay’s first Transformers movie, I opined that those looking for an explosive action flick who had no prior connection to the Transformers might well enjoy it, but anyone with an attachment to the source material should steer clear at all costs. (I was happy to later learn that I’m not alone in that assessment, warning: naughty language.) Obviously quite a few of you fell into the first category since the film garnered eleventy jillion dollars, so here we are two years later with the inevitable sequel, which brings us to the aforementioned news. The good news is: if you are one of those people who don’t care about the Transformers, this movie is exactly like the first one, only bigger. The bad news is: if you’re someone who does care about the Transformers, this movie is exactly like the first one, only bigger. Get the picture?

Let’s talk plot, because there actually is a plot, just a bit of one. It’s two years later and the Autobots are working with the U.S. military to find and destroy rogue Decepticons hiding on Earth. Certain politicians think the ‘cons are only here to continue the war and thus want the Autobots to leave, but certain politicians are wrong – the Decepticons are actually searching for an ancient device that will generate limitless energon (hey, remember that episode where the Decepticons all got drunk on energon? How great was that?) by destroying the sun. The machine was created by a legendary Decepticon known only as “the Fallen” thousands of years ago and then lost; but when Spike (LaBeouf) accidentally finds a sliver of the AllSpark remaining on his old shirt right before heading off to college, he again finds himself caught up in the war between Autobots and Decepticons. Before long Spike and Mikaela (Fox) are racing to find the device before a revived Megatron can help the Fallen to unearth it and have his revenge. And then? Lots of stuff ’splodes.

Before we go any further, let me clarify a point: much ado has been made about the supposedly racial stereotype Autobot brothers, but having seen the movie, I can safely say… it’s exactly as offensive as you’ve heard. Two robots who, among other things, don’t like to read, have gold teef, and call each other “p***y” (and a society of primarily male robots even knows what one of those is how, exactly?) — seriously, they’re one step away from telling the old Cybertronian fable of Br’er Dinobot and the tar baby. I’m honestly surprised Michael Bay didn’t include a Decepticon with slanted optical receptors who bows and says, “Ah no, Meesa Megatlon, stupid Autobots escape. Me so velly solly, it no happen again.” Then he transforms into a car and swerves all over the road. I’m being slightly facetious, but they’re certainly the worst racial stereotypes since The Phantom Menace and will make you nostalgic for the enlightened days of “What’s crackin’, little bitches?” What indeed, Jazz?

Lest I present an unbalanced viewpoint, there were some good elements too. Maybe Bay’s best move was bringing Frank Welker back from the old cartoon to voice Soundwave. Hearing that inhuman, modulated voice intone “Decepticons, mobilize” will really grip your spit in a way the rest of the movie mostly fails to do. The fight scenes are more hit than miss, including a cool forest battle where Optimus Prime takes on Megatron, Starscream, and one of those other interchangeable bad guys from the first movie. Plus, while my brain tells me the idea of an aged Transformer with whiskers who needs a cane to walk is ludicrous, somehow I can’t bring myself to dislike Jetfire, and the idea of making him an SR-71 Blackbird was inspired. And while I’m not sure this really qualifies as “good,” the movie’s Joe Pesci version of Wheelie is every bit as annoying as that little rhyming bastard from the cartoon. God, you just wanted to punch and punch and punch him…

*ahem* Where was I? Positives aside, for the second time running it’s not so much the plot that sinks the movie, even though Mr. Burns was a more credible threat to the sun than these guys. Don’t get me wrong, the plot’s not great, it has plenty of holes (Starscream was growing new Transformers in pods, like they’re peas or something?), but whatever, so did the old series. Instead, the disastrous element is Bay’s stubborn insistence on injecting “humor” into a movie that doesn’t need it. If you tell me the concept of ancient warring robots who change into things and fight isn’t enough to carry a movie by itself, you are dumb. If you tell me said concept can only be improved by the addition of humping dogs, horny mini-Transformers who are attracted to humans, a mom who gets stoned on pot brownies, and bumbling robot blackface minstrels, you are really, really dumb. And I know you, you’re not dumb… in which case, you see our problem. Sure, the action sequences are choppy at times, the story’s thinner than Kate Moss, and Megatron still doesn’t transform into a gun, but all that stuff’s incidental. The biggest error remains the addition of fifth-grade humor to a franchise that didn’t even feature that in its first incarnation, when it was actually aimed at children.

And so, here we are. Once again I’m left vowing that if they ever release an edited version of the film that splices out all the failed attempts at comedy and the unnecessary human interaction (read: 90% of it), I will gladly plop down my money for at least a rental. Until then, I have to advise steering clear. You’re going to see it anyway, of course — hell, everyone went to the first one — but please, at least wait until it comes out on DVD. I promise you, it’s less than meets the eye.

Little do you know, her boobs transform into an extra $1.5 million per picture

Didja Notice?

The college scenes were shot at the University of Pennsylvania (meh) and Princeton University (woo!). Oddly, I didn’t recognize any of the architecture from Princeton. If I ever decide to see the movie again, I’ll have to look for it.
Aaron the long-suffering presidential bodyguard from 24 is the general. Has Glenn Morshower ever played a civilian?
There’s something profoundly wrong about an Autobot ice cream truck with a decal reading “Decepticons, suck my popsicle.”
For the second movie running, they don’t explain why the Allspark only creates evil robots.
Spike’s pretty grateful to Bumblebee for saving his, Sparkplug’s and Judy’s lives. “Get in the garage!”
Remember kids, that’s S-T-A-T-E F-A-R-M. Be sure to tell mommy and daddy!
I always wondered whether Spike’s mom heard him losing his virginity. Good to finally have that answered.
College has changed in the last seven years. Back then girls didn’t start dancing on tables until the end of the night, and it wasn’t the attractive ones.
It is pretty hilarious that Megatron boasts to Starscream, “Even in death, there is no command but mine”… and then literally ten seconds later, calls the Fallen “my master.”
Bad Boys II, Michael Bay? If you have to endlessly reference your own movies, keep it to the better ones, huh? Ain’t nothing wrong with Bad Boys I.
If it’s so important that Spike be kept alive, you’d think the Decepticons might be a bit more careful than, you know, dropping him from several stories up. On purpose.
PRIIIIIIIIIME!!!
I’m sorry, I’m sorry… the government just supposedly covered up the events of the last movie from the general public? I guess as far as all-out assaults on L.A. in front of thousands of witnesses go, it was pretty discreet.
The Autobot base is in New Jersey? Hell yeah.
Bumblebee’s got a real fondness for Tom Hanks.
Yeah, it’s probably pretty easy to drive a Camaro through the desert.
No car chase is complete unless a fruit stand gets destroyed. I think it’s union regulations or something.
Is it even possible for anyone born after 1978 to see a neon green dump truck and not immediately think “Devastator”?
Arise, ~~Rodimus~~ Optimus Prime!

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

There are two scenes, both of them at the beginning of the credits. Mikaela kisses Spike and rides off on a motorcycle, and Spike gets welcomed back to his Astronomy class.

Intermission!

In this film, Megatron still transforms into a Cybertronian jet but also displays a tank form, a nod to the original toy line. Initially Megatron changed into a very realistic-looking Walther P38 handgun. However, after toy laws became more stringent in the late 80’s, lifelike toy guns could no longer be sold. Thus, when the Transformers toy line was revived in 1993, he was re-envisioned as an M1 Abrams tank. (The comic storyline accompanying this explained that Megatron’s original body was destroyed and, in a Transformers/G.I. Joe crossover, Cobra found his remains and constructed a new body for him.)

In the original cartoon, Soundwave (whose face the Decepticon logo is based on) transformed into a cassette player, and Ravage was one of his tapes that transformed into a jaguar. For the movie, Soundwave was reimagined as an orbiting satellite, but in a nod to his original form, he still fires Ravage out of his chest.

The cartoon version of Arcee was a female Autobot, introduced in the animated movie and featured prominently in the third season. In the comic continuity, Optimus Prime had her created on Earth as an attempt to appease angry feminists accusing the all-male Transformers of sexism. (The protestors ultimately viewed Arcee as a token gesture and remained upset anyway, but the story’s worth it just to hear Jazz describe the difference between genders as “it appears to be something to do with the upper chassis design…”) For RotF, Arcee was reimagined as a trio of motorcycles/robots who share a 3-in-1 hive mind.

The Fallen’s origins lie with a comic miniseries from 2003 that told stories set in the Transformers’ past on Cybertron. He was one of the original thirteen Transformers, but rebelled against his creator Primus to ally with Primus’ enemy Unicron.

Groovy Quotes

him?

Galloway: Soldier, you’re paid to shoot, not talk.
Epps: Don’t tempt me.

Bumblebee: Houston, we have a problem.

Wheelie [about Mikaela]: You’re hot, but you ain’t too bright.

Megatron: Is the future of our race not worth a single human life?
Optimus Prime: You’ll never stop at one.

Spike: Can you read this?
Skids: Read? Unh-uh.
Mudflap: We don’t… we don’t really do much reading.

Simmons: What you’re about to see is top secret. Do NOT tell my mother.

Jetfire: My father was a wheel! The first wheel! And do you know what he transformed into? Nothing! But he did it with honor!

Starscream: Not to call you a coward, master… but, sometimes, cowards do survive.

If You Liked This Movie, Try These:

Drew does Reality Bites

Drew — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 12:09:28 +0000

“He’s weird, he’s strange, he’s sloppy, he’s a total nightmare for women… I can’t believe I haven’t slept with him yet.”

The Scoop: 1994 R, directed by Ben Stiller and starring Winona Ryder, Ethan Hawke and Ben Stiller

Tagline: A comedy about love in the 90’s.

Summary Capsule: If you’ve never seen a mid-90’s movie, allow me to summarize for you: a group of twentysomething friends live, philosophize and sleep together while damning the Man and avoiding work. Set to a good soundtrack.

Drew’s Rating: Really, that’s the best tagline they could come up with? I mean, for true?

Drew’s Review: You can always tell a movie made by Gen Xers, can’t you? They all feature tragically hip, ironic people hanging around coffeehouses, smoking cigarettes and doing the exact opposite of whatever a character in an 80’s movie would do. If an 80’s character would concoct a kooky scheme to dump liquid heat on the principal’s head while keeping developers from bulldozing the local hangout, a 90’s character will happily drop out of school, write a soulful guitar ballad about how the system’s keeping him down, then watch the hangout get demolished and promise the owner he’ll rebuild it using the money he makes opening for Nirvana. I’m not saying one’s better or worse than the other, but Reality Bites is unequivocally a 90’s movie, one of the cornerstones of the genre. Don’t expect to see anyone having a montage or wearing bras on their heads, is what I’m saying.

Recent valedictorian Lelaina (Ryder) wants to be a filmmaker but is stuck as a lowly production assistant, nursing a growing suspicion that academic excellence means exactly squat in the real world. Vickie, by virtue of being played by Janeane Garofalo, is her cynical, too-cool-for-school best friend who keeps a written tally of every guy she shtoinks. (Current score: 66, a higher total than some entire soccer teams I’ve known, not that I am judging.) Meanwhile, Troy (Hawke) epitomizes Gen X as the brilliant slacker who reads advanced psychology texts while manning a newsstand, and who just might turn his mutual attraction with Laina into something if he were only capable of not being an ass for five minutes. And Sammy is… uh, also in the movie. (Sorry, I love Steve Zahn, but it’s a pointless role.) Our story really kicks off when Laina meets and begins dating Michael (Stiller), a thoughtful if not terribly bright TV executive who is everything Troy isn’t — nice, motivated, successful, well groomed. Suddenly Troy is even snarkier than usual, while Laina has to deal with not only his jealousy, but also figuring out whether she’ll actually be able to make a difference by 23. (If so, she’s got me beat… I didn’t become a Mutant Reviewer til I was 24.)

So, Reality Bites. One of those movies you know by name and strongly suspect everyone but you has seen, but just never got around to. In my case, it sat in my DVR unwatched for almost a year. (It’s the entry right before Michael Phelps’ races from Beijing, if that tells you anything.) It took being unemployed to finally bring me around to watching it, and now that I have, I can safely report: yeah, it’s not bad. That probably sounds underwhelming, but honestly, it is a decent movie. It just doesn’t pack the humor of a Clerks or (stepping back a decade) the depth of a Breakfast Club, and that’s kind of what I was expecting, so it suffers a bit in the comparison. Taken as its own movie, though, you could do a lot worse. If nothing else, it’s an excellent case study on the fashions and attitudes of the early to mid-90’s.

My biggest problem with Reality Bites is the whole Lelaina/Michael/Troy love triangle, which unfortunately is the driving force of the film. More specifically it’s that for 95% of the movie, we never, ever see Troy do anything nice. Yes, it’s 1994 and he has greasy long hair and plays guitar, so naturally he can bed any woman he wants, but we’re given to understand that Laina is above all that. Believe me, I understand not wanting to be with someone who isn’t as bright as you- I once dated a very sweet girl who was cute and affectionate and came from a good family, but who I had to explain every joke to, and it just never would have worked. (As opposed to my wife, who gets the jokes but just doesn’t think they’re funny.) But Laina’s problem with Michael doesn’t seem to be that he isn’t smart, simply that he isn’t Troy. I know, the heart wants what it wants, and I give them credit for not making Michael, symbol of ladder-climbing corporate consumerism, secretly a jerk while the free thinking, brilliant-but-unmotivated Troy is really a teddy bear underneath all his cynicism. But it does make it hard for me to root for Troy and the life of missed job interviews and lung cancer and unpaid rent he can offer Lelaina, as opposed to the awkward, dopey but dependable Michael. Which, I suppose, highlights the difference between the early 90’s mindset and today.

But when all’s said and done, it’s a fairly ordinary romantic comedy that breaks the mold just a bit through the inclusion of the gay friend, the slutty friend, the douchebag love interest, and various other 90’s trappings. Take it for what it is, a somewhat interesting reminder of the Generation X mentality circa 15 years ago, and try not to think too hard about where Troy would be right now. (Filling up your tank at the local Gas N’ Go and bitching about his dolt of a manager, John Bender.) It doesn’t take as many risks as some of its 90’s brethren, but there are some good lines and you probably won’t hate most of the characters, though you may wish some of them had gotten more screen time. I know that sounds like damning with faint praise, but that’s the way it goes. Reality doesn’t bite, but it doesn’t knock it out of the park either.

Didja Notice?

Am I the only one who looked at Vickie’s sexual tally and immediately thought of Mallrats? Too bad you didn’t include rankings, Vick, or that could’ve been a book deal.
Cameo alert: Ben Stiller’s sister voices the phone psychic, and Soul Asylum frontman Dave Piner (Ryder’s boyfriend at the time) appears briefly in the background of Laina’s documentary.
Cameo alert 2: Renee Zellweger makes her film debut in a minor role.
I know you’ll join me in condemning the filmmakers for unforgivable sloppiness over the fact that the characters are shown drinking Big Gulps, but there weren’t any 7-11’s in Houston in 1994. Amateurs.

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

There’s one funny scene that plays midway through the credits, which shows Laina’s documentary reinterpreted by Michael’s network, Melrose Place-style.

Intermission!

This is Ben Stiller’s directorial debut. The scriptwriter, Helen Childress, wrote it while still in college. In France it was retitled “Generation 90.” Aaaand… that’s all I got.

The real mystery is how Garofalo managed to find 66 dudes willing to do her with that hair.

Groovy Quotes

Lelaina: Oh yeah, look who’s mocking. All you do around here, Troy, is eat and couch and fondle the remote control.
Troy: I am not under any orders to make the world a better place.
Lelaina: Well, then what good are you?
Troy: You’re a pathological optimist.
Lelaina: You’re pathological.
Vickie: Oh, why don’t you guys just do it and get it over with, I’m starving.

Troy: There’s no point to any of this. It’s all just a… a random lottery of meaningless tragedy and a series of near escapes. So I take pleasure in the details. You know… a quarter pounder with cheese, those are good. The sky about ten minutes before it starts to rain. The moment where your laughter becomes a cackle. And I sit back and I smoke my Camel Straights and I ride my own melt.

Vickie: All right, we’re just trying to pay bills here, okay? So Troy, if you’ve got any money…
Lelaina: Money? Oh, but what’s money to an artist? To a philosopher? It’s just green-colored paper that floats in and out of his life like snow. It’s not anything you actually have to, I don’t know, work for, is it Troy?
Troy: No, not if you have daddy’s little gas card.
Lelaina: You shut up, I busted my ass to find a job, any job. You won’t even bother showing up for interviews.
Troy: What is it that you want from me, huh? You want me to get a job on the line for the next 20 years til I’m granted leave with my gold-plated watch and my balls full of tumors because I surrendered the one thing that means [crap] to me? Well, you can just exhale because it’s not gonna happen, not in this lifetime!

Vickie: He’s weird, he’s strange, he’s sloppy, he’s a total nightmare for women… I can’t believe I haven’t slept with him yet.

Sammy: Ma!
Vickie: I’m right here, son.
Sammy: Ma, I have to tell you some… thing. I am a homos-… sexual.
Vickie: Oh… Christ. Is there a support group that I can join to help me come to terms with my own homophobia?
Sammy: Yes, there is a group which is named PFLAG. Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays.
Vickie: Oh… oh, PFLAG. I’m beginning to like the sound of that.
Sammy: What you just witnessed here is a preenactment of events that are about to take place.

Michael: Have I stepped over some line in the sand of coolness with you? Because excuse me if somebody doesn’t know the secret handshake with you.
Troy: There’s no secret handshake. There’s an IQ prerequisite, but there’s no secret handshake.

Troy: Besides, everyone dies all by himself.
Michael: If you really believe that, who are you looking for out here?

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Saturday Roundtable – Childish Things

Justin — Sat, 30 May 2009 12:53:25 +0000

The topic on the table today is this: What movies were so cool to you as a kid, but now you are embarrassed to be in the same room as them?

Let’s hear what the Mutants have to say!

Mike: It’s funny, a friend of mine actually coined a term for this phenomena: Darkman Syndrome. It’s a weird category here. Mortal Kombat at the time it came out was the coolest thing I’d ever seen, and upon seeing it more recently I literally cringed at the crappy CGI, atrocious dialogue, and wooden acting, but alternatively, Howard the Duck has only improved in my estimation. Go fig.

Lissa: I’ll take your word on Howard the Duck, because there’s no WAY I am EVER watching that again. The once from my childhood was enough, thanks, and there’s not enough booze in the world for me to recant that.

It’s been mentioned before in reviews, but The Neverending Story is one that just doesn’t age well. Which is sad, because the book is even cooler than I remember it, especially with its colored text. But the movie… yeah. Wish dragons aren’t as awesome as I remember.

Heather: Um…it’s a luck dragon, Lissa. Get your outdated 80’s icons right, won’t ‘ya? Sheesh! Well as I’ve just made painfully obvious I can still stomach Neverending Story (and love to dance to the theme on DDR Extreme). What really wrenched my childhood memories on the rewatch is Flight Of The Navigator. That was my favorite movie of all time and I spent countless hours in front of the television watching it whenever it ran on The Disney Channel. I only wish it were half as amazing to me now as it was then. “Get around, ’round, ’round, I get around!”

Mike: That’s funny! My four-year-old nephew just now picked that movie out of my DVD collection. Also, did you know it looks as though Disney is remaking it? I’m still kinda blown away by the space ship design, if a tad underwhelmed by some effects and Joey Cramer’s performance (and yes, I had to look him up). PS – I’m not saying Howard the Duck isn’t a miserable, poorly written failure, I’m just saying it’s the kind of miserable failure I can get into…for free…on Hulu.

Lissa: Luck dragon, wish dragon… either way it doesn’t breathe fire and smite its enemies, and therefore it has now become lame (says the woman who reviews any princess movie that comes out). You know, speaking of Disney, there’s a category in itself. I used to love all things Disney. Still do like a lot of it, but now that I’m being forced to rewatch much of the collection, I’m rather amazed that I was as devoted to some of the older movies as I was. (Although I still love the Prince John song from Robin Hood, and always will. Phil Harris = one of the best voices EVER in animation.)

Drew: Any movie I dragged my poor mother to in the theater. Mom, I’m so sorry. Masters of the Universe was not worth coming back to the next day because the projector broke in the middle of the film. And that one about the kid who gets a blank check and cashes it for a million dollars? Ugh. Home Alone, of course. Oh, and The Wizard — in those pre-Internet days, we would have paid $6 just for a glimpse of Super Mario 3 ahead of time. The rest of the movie was superfluous… but, much like the Power Glove, so bad.

Justin: One of my nephews’ name is Lucas, and every time I see him, I make a Power Glove joke (much to the dismay of his parents).

There were a ton of movies we watched repeatedly “back in the day” that aren’t worth spit to me now. Neverending Story, yes, although it’s iconic enough to still be useful. Lots of Disney movies come to mind — Sword in the Stone, Great Mouse Detective, The Rescuers (that was Disney, right?). My brothers and I also watched this TV movie called “The Rescue”, which was a highly-laughable ripoff of (of all things) Iron Eagle — Navy SEALS are captured during a dangerous mission, and it’s only up to their kids to invade (I think) North Korea to bust them out of jail.

Oh, and Short Circuit 2… yeah, I wouldn’t give it the time of day right now, but I must’ve memorized it way back when.

Drew does Angel Heart

Drew — Thu, 28 May 2009 12:02:17 +0000

“However cleverly you sneak up on a mirror, your reflection always looks you straight in the eye.”

The Scoop: 1987 R, directed by Alan Parker, starring Mickey Rourke, Robert DeNiro and Lisa Bonet

Tagline: Harry Angel has been hired to search for the truth… pray he doesn’t find it.

Summary Capsule: If we were to combine Noir Week and Stephen King Week, this is the film we’d review.

Drew’s Rating: Don’t tell your parents, but this movie just took your mind’s virginity. And it wasn’t gentle.

Drew’s Review: I’m not usually one for buying into signs. It’s not that I don’t have a spiritual side, I just tend to think a lot of the coincidences we encounter in life are just that- coincidences. But when, within the course of a week, I encountered references to a movie I’d never heard of from two completely different sources, I figured maybe, just maybe, the universe was trying to nudge me in the direction of my next review. I’m glad I listened.

It’s 1955 and Harry Angel (Mickey Rourke) is a dick — that’s private detective to you — who’s just been retained by a mysterious gentleman named Louis Cyphre (Robert DeNiro). It seems Johnny Favorite, a popular crooner from the ’40s, owed an unspecified debt to Cyphre only to disappear in the wake of World War II. Naturally Cyphre would like him found if he’s still alive, so Harry is on the case, one that will take him from the grimy streets of Brooklyn to the haunting tapestry that is New Orleans. The main problem along the way is that every lead Harry meets with seems to turn up dead immediately after. His only chance to clear his name is to find Favorite, who all signs point toward having been a real S.O.B., and hope that doing so brings some answers. And it just might at that, but will they be answers Harry wants to hear?

Rather than dancing around the issue, let’s confront it head on: Angel Heart has a unique ending, one that I’m going to take pains not to spoil. Naturally you can head right over to Wikipedia to check it out, but I’d advise against it… this is the type of reveal that carries more weight when experienced firsthand. That said, the rest of the movie does a nice job of building up to it, creating a slowly mounting sense of dread until everything erupts in the denouement. For all his occasional wisecracks, Rourke does well in making Harry Angel seem like a pretty bleak guy at his core, never fully connecting to the people with whom he interacts. He’s entertaining without being overwhelmingly likable, a noir trademark. Speaking of which, the character is actually shown to be a pretty good detective, whether it’s wiping down everything he touched after finding a dead source (simple, but so often overlooked), or deducing that a transfer order was doctored because ballpoint pens didn’t exist in 1943.

Of course, for all his underrated talent, Rourke can’t carry the movie alone, and he’s fortunate that DeNiro is on board to play off of. Ol’ Bobby D (he likes when I call him that) takes a character who could easily be viewed as over the top and instills him with an air of subtle but constant menace. The fingernails are a bit much, but otherwise Cyphre just seems like a soft-spoken man whom it’s clear you Do Not Want To Mess With. As for Epiphany Proudfoot… well, it helps the character that Lisa Bonet always seems a bit wispy to me. I don’t mean physically, but even when she’s talking, she gives off this slightly disengaged vibe like she’s really thinking about some dream she had last night, y’know? As such, it’s an inspired casting choice for Epiphany, and I guess my only criticism is that I don’t really feel the chemistry between her and Harry.

At least, not until that one infamous scene, and I don’t think it’s spoiling much to mention that the sex scene between Harry and Epiphany is not just graphic (read: don’t watch with your mom around), but also freaky as hell. You’ll probably be turned on in the early stages, but if your engine’s still running by the end, I’d consider seeking professional help. It’s also fitting, as Harry’s frantic, um, movements underscore the fact that we’re rapidly approaching the film’s climax, and by this point you’re hopefully as eager for resolution to the case as Harry himself is.

It’s sometimes hard to know what to make of genre-crossing films because they have to be judged by two sets of criteria. Angel Heart is more noir than horror in that we see the aftermath of deaths rather than watching them occur in front of us. Still, there is definite psychological terror building throughout and (spoiler!) even a little supernatural flavor before all’s said and done. In that vein, I’m sad to report that limited 1980’s technology lends just a whiff of cheesiness to an otherwise truly satisfying conclusion. Nonetheless, it’s a movie that will leave you feeling entertained, if more than a bit disturbed. Assuming you’re a fan of detective fiction and/or horror, you owe it to yourself to find out what happened to Johnny Favorite.

That seems like a recipe for splinters in some uncomfortable places.

Didja Notice?

Angel Heart is based on the novel “Falling Angel” by William Hjortsberg.
Harry can be quite the charmer when he wants to be.
Louis Cyphre is, ah, not exactly subtle in advertising himself.
What kind of cop brings a child into a room where his mother is lying dead?

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

Yes – the credits are interspersed with brief scenes showing the final fate of Johnny Favorite.

Intermission!

The Cosby Show

Groovy Quotes

who

Harry: Listen, what do you do around here in the summertime?
Izzy: I bite the heads off of rats.
Harry: What do you do in the winter?
Izzy: Same.

Epiphany: Hey, what are you after him for? Johnny Favorite?
Harry: I’m not really after him. I’m just being paid to find out where he is.
Epiphany: He could be six feet under.
Harry: Then I’ll have to buy a shovel.

Toots: I remember Spider. He used to play them drums like two jackrabbits [screwin'].

Harry: How did he die?
Cop: Technically? Asphyxiation by his own genitalia.
Harry: But not so technically?
Cop: Somebody cut his [manhood] off, stuffed it in his mouth and choked him to death.

Cyphre: They say there’s just enough religion in the world to make men hate one another, but not enough to make them love.

Cyphre: Are you an atheist?
Harry: Yes, I am. I’m from Brooklyn.

Cyphre: Alas. How terrible is wisdom when it brings no profit to the wise.

Cyphre: However cleverly you sneak up on a mirror, your reflection always looks you straight in the eye.

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Drew does Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster

Drew — Fri, 15 May 2009 10:21:35 +0000

“Ahhh, these monsters are as stupid as human beings!”

The Scoop: 1964, directed by Ishiro Honda and starring Haruo Nakajima, Katsumi Tezuka and Shoichi Hirose

Tagline: The Three-Headed Monster battles Godzilla, Mothra and Rodan for the world!

Summary Capsule: Giant monsters fight, then unite against a common foe as the series takes its first steps toward humanizing its star.

Drew’s Rating: If you think “Hey baby, how’d you like to meet my three-headed monster?” is a good way to pick up women, then you are wrong. Dead wrong.

Drew’s Review: I was a stupid kid, apparently. I didn’t think so at the time; if anything I remember being a bit overly confident in my intelligence, a trend that continues to this day. But that’s the only explanation I can think of for the fact that I devoured Godzilla movies one after another in my youth, whereas now I can’t sit through a single one without falling asleep or needing to be doing something else at the same time. I still like the Transformers, so what gives? My slow slide into antiquity notwithstanding, Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster has a reputation as one of the most famous and enjoyable of the Godzilla oeuvre, so let’s see if I can muster up the energy to get through a full review.

The plot is typical 1960s Japanese craziness: a meteor crashes to Earth just as a foreign princess is seemingly assassinated en route to Japan. Before long a woman matching her description appears wandering the streets, claiming to be a Martian and warning of the Earth’s imminent destruction. Meanwhile, Rodan escapes his volcanic prison and Godzilla rises again from the sea, and immediately begin battling each other because why the hell not? As a police officer and his sister try to guard the princess/Martian from further assassination attempts, the meteor opens to release space dragon Ghidorah (AKA Ghidrah, AKA King Ghidorah, AKA Bitch, Where’s My Money?), who immediately sets upon Japan and starts wrecking stuff up. With three marauding monsters at large, the land of the rising sun is well and truly boned until the humans recruit Mothra to, um, talk to Godzilla and Rodan and convince them to xenophobically unite against this alien monster who’s destroying the buildings they’re supposed to destroy. Look, just roll with it, okay?

Depending on what you’re expecting, you may be in for a bit of a surprise here. In many ways GtTHM pounds the final nail into the coffin of the early, more serious Godzilla movies and officially kicks off the bizarre highjinx that will comprise the big G’s next decade. No more will the camera give us low shots of colossal titans from the human viewpoint… from here on out it’s all MEL (Monster Eye Level). Any social commentary is gone, replaced by a broad slapstick element at play for the first time, including Godzilla getting dropped testicles-first onto an electricity tower (ouch) and grabbing his rear after it’s singed by Ghidorah’s gravity beams. Then there’s the volleyball match Godzilla and Rodan have with boulders, capped off by three giant monsters having a screeching conversation with each other, which incidentally sounds exactly like my six-month-old when she talks to herself. While not bad necessarily, this is a far cry from the mindless engine of destruction from the original film, so if you like your Godzilla dark, titanic and terrible, you should have stopped with Mothra vs. Godzilla. Whereas if you have an ironic appreciation for giant lizards busting a move and roughhousing like 300-foot toddlers, this is where the series truly begins for you.

To be fair, it’s not all giant kaiju battling, and the human plotline is more engaging than some later entries. The actors seem to do a good job, though my appreciation is obviously limited a bit by the fact that all of their dialogue is dubbed. There’s an espionage angle at play in Shindo’s efforts to safeguard the princess from her would-be killers, leading to a couple of slightly tense standoffs. It’s a little hard to care about people who might be trampled or accidentally eaten any second, but give them points for trying. Shindo definitely should’ve gotten that kiss at the end, though.

Final verdict? Not bad, though not as great as I remembered. (Ain’t that always the way?) I still have some of that cheesy appreciation in me, and I hope I never lose it; but I’m finding that these days, a little ‘zilla goes a long way. While I have no doubt Kyle will eventually review every James Bond movie, don’t look for Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster to be popping up on MRFH anytime soon. Unless Gigan’s in it, because dude, that guy is harsh.

Three enemies, three heads... what's the problem?

Didja Notice?

Previously depicted as a mindless force of nature, this is the first film in which Godzilla displays human characteristics like talking, laughing, and knowing kung fu.
The planet the priestess is from, the one Ghidorah had previously razed, is Venus in the original Japanese film but changed to Mars in the English translation.
Godzilla’s radioactive breath attack, formerly fire and later an atomic ray, here appears to be just, uh, steam. Lame.
The previous film in the series, Mothra vs. Godzilla, ended with two surviving Mothra larvae. In this movie, the fairy princesses mention that one of the larvae died, leaving the remaining one as the sole living Mothra.
The only thing stupider than Godzilla and Rodan laughing at each other while covered in silk is the victory dance Godzilla does in the sequel, Invasion of Astro-Monster.
How Mothra’s entire strategy was “grab onto his tail and hang on”? Brilliant tactics, larvae.

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

It doesn’t say “And Godzoooooky!” if that’s what you’re wondering.

Intermission!

GtTHM

Largely in response to this, Ghidorah would take on the villain role that had previously been Godzilla’s in several later films in the series. He remains one of Toho’s most popular monsters and consistently ranks as Godzilla’s #1 opponent among fans of the franchise. Interestingly, this is the only movie in the original series where Ghidorah acts of his own accord rather than being controlled by aliens.

Groovy Quotes

Shobijin: Oh Godzilla, such terrible language!

Shindo: Ahhh, these monsters are as stupid as human beings!

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Drew does Miller’s Crossing

Drew — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 23:15:51 +0000

“Nobody knows anybody. Not that well.”

The Scoop: 1990 R, directed by Joel Coen and starring Gabriel Byrne, Albert Finney and Marcia Gay Harden.

Tagline: Up is down, black is white, and nothing is what it seems.

Summary Capsule: Gabriel Byrne stretches his acting chops to play an Irish criminal who gets entangled in a complex web of deceit and betrayal.

Drew’s Rating: If they made a movie about where I kill people, it would be called “In The Study With A Lead Pipe.”

Drew’s Review: You’re reading this because of a comic book.

Perhaps I should clarify. I’m a huge fan of Y: The Last Man, the story of Yorick Brown, who becomes the sole survivor of a plague that kills every other male on earth. As the series begins, Yorick is about to propose to his longtime girlfriend Beth, and one of the things he mentions loving about her is that her favorite film is Miller’s Crossing. Yorick usually has pretty good taste, so I figure if it’s good enough for his girl, it’s good enough for you and me. Let’s see if reality bears that out.

Tom Reagan (Gabriel Byrne) is right hand man and adviser (but not enforcer) to Leo (Albert Finney), the crime boss of a large Prohibition-era city. But as always, a dame with a pretty face brings complications- Leo takes up with Verna Bernbaum (Marcia Gay Harden), who continues seeing him in exchange for protection for her brother Bernie (John Turturro). But when Bernie pisses off Johnny Caspar (Jon Polito), Leo’s closest rival for control of the city, gang war is threatened. Tom is in favor of handing over Bernie to keep the peace, but Leo won’t allow it; and to complicate matters, Tom himself is sleeping with Verna on the side. When Leo discovers this, Tom’s only option is to switch sides and begin working for Caspar, where his first assignment is simple: kill Bernie. But what side is Tom really playing, and how will the cards fall when everything is said and done?

Set in the bad old days of Prohibition and corrupt politicians (wait…), it features a story that’s nothing you haven’t seen before: a lone, smart individual plays two opposing sides of a gang war against each other for his own ends. Simple, right? In a way it is; but then, is anything truly simple when money, sex, and family come into the picture? The Coens do a nice job of adding numerous twists and turns into the story to keep the audience engaged — it’s not a whodunnit mystery, but you definitely will wonder who’s going to discover whose lies and double crosses first.

But if the story is effective, the acting is far more than that. Gabriel Byrne’s Tom is laconic, cynical, and functionally amoral — even his best friend he’s not loyal enough to to not sleep with his girl, while still badmouthing her all the while — so it’s hard to exactly root for him, but he definitely keeps you engaged with his easy quips and masterful manipulation. The viewer may walk away wondering whether Tom’s pacifism is due to squeamishness or possessing more sentiment than he admits to, and the fact that it’s even a question is a tribute to Byrne’s performance. Turturro plays Bernie effectively as a weasely little con artist who nonetheless is smarter than he normally lets on, and as for Albert Finney, well, Leo is a crime boss who’s such a tough and lovable bastard that you can’t help but feel bad for him that his best friend and dame are stepping out on him. The rest of the cast is solid, and while Verna doesn’t appear too often, Harden makes her seem like the kind of girl who can keep up with Tom while simultaneously stringing Leo along.

I’m still not sure how I feel about the ending — I’ve watched it twice now, and when I figure out whether I liked it or not, I’ll let you know. But it does bring resolution to a satisfying story, and when you get right down to it, that’s what matters, not whether I would have made the same choices as some of the characters. I can definitely recommend this movie — certainly you’ll get more out of it if you, like the Coens, are a fan of hardboiled mysteries and film noir, but even if you normally aren’t, there’s plenty of good character study and intrigue to be had. Take a tip from me (and Beth), and make a trip to Miller’s Crossing.

Yeah, I'm pretty tough too when I've got five guys with shotguns behind me.

Didja Notice?

How the submachine gun Leo steals from a gunman holds four times the bullets of any tommy gun ever created?
Sam Raimi makes a cameo as a laughing gunman during the attack on the Sons of Erin social club.
Every time the bartender appeared, I remember thinking, “Yeah, that actor’s okay… but man, Bruce Campbell would’ve been even better!”
Miller’s Crossing contains several references to the Coen brothers’ next film, Barton Fink, which they took three weeks off from writing Crossing to pen. Among them, Tom lives at Barton Arms apartments, and a newspaper headline reads “Seven Dead In Hotel Fire.”

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

Only if you’re a fan of Irish folk music. Begorrah.

Intermission!

Miller’s Crossing

Yojimbo

A Fistful of Dollars

Raising Arizona

Groovy Quotes

Leo: But maybe you’re wrong about this. You don’t know what’s in Verna’s heart.
Tom: Leo, if she’s such an angel, why are you lookin’ for her at 4:00 in the morning?

Tom: You’re a fickle boy, Mink. If Eddie Dane finds out that you got another “amigo”… well, I don’t peg him for the understanding type.
Mink: Find out? How’s he gonna find out? Damn it, Tom, you and me ain’t even been talkin’!

Adolph: Tommy, the way you’re going — hey, horses got knees?
Tom: I don’t know. Fetlocks.
Adolph: Well if I was a horse I’d be down on my fetlocks praying you don’t bet on me.

Verna: I barely knew the gentleman.
Tom: Rug? A bit of a shakedown artist, not above the occasional grift. Bet you’d understand that. All in all, not a bad guy, if looks, brains, and personality don’t count.
Verna: You better hope they don’t.

Verna: You think I murdered someone? Come on, Tom. You know me a little.
Tom: Nobody knows anybody. Not that well.

Bernie: How’d you know it was me?
Tom: You’re the only one I know who’d knock and then break in.
Bernie: Your other friends wouldn’t break in, huh?
Tom: My other friends want to kill me, so they wouldn’t knock.

Tom: I figure a thousand bucks is reasonable, so I want two.

The Dane: I followed you this afternoon, and I wondered why Einstein would wanna talk to a gorilla. So I grabbed the gorilla, and I beat it out of him. You give me a big guy every time, they break easy. Not like you.

Verna: What are you doing?
Tom: Walking.
Verna: Don’t let on any more than you have to.
Tom: In the rain.

Bernie: Look in your heart.
Tom: What heart?

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Part of

Death and Mutants: A Bedtime Story

Justin — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 16:30:51 +0000

It was a shadowy night of inky pitch black mirth. I sat back in my rickety office chair and made a bet with my liver over a fifth of scotch that rested in the bottle. The koala bears of my subconscious wrestled with the sheer pointlessness of my being, but I didn’t mind. At least they took a bath once in a while.

Suddenly, a knock invaded my privacy and jangled my nerves. I looked up, the weight of the world pressing down on my bloodshot eyeballs, and she walked in.

“I hear you help the helpless.” She spoke without moving a muscle, her words drifting into my ears with the help of a city gone hush, to bed.

I leaned forward. “The helpless usually don’t have enough scratch to cover a date with a bottle of Jack. Now, the hopeless… there we can do business.”

“Fair enough,” she said, crossing the room to sit in my only other chair, an antique from an old case that netted me a bullet wound in my shoulder and a curse in my heart. “I need you to tail my boss, Big City Carl. I think he’s been stealing from the nursing homes he manages, and I can’t stands it no longer. I want him to be hung out to dry–”

“–leaving you with clean laundry?” I mused. “Fine. I charge a Grant a day, plus expenses. And stop flicking cigarette ash everywhere, it’s bad for my cat.”

The next day I hopscotched over to the East River, not as hoity-toity as some parts of the city but certainly a step up from the dive that I scuttled to every night. There I found him, Big City Carl, in the process of shaking down a retired geezer for his lunch money.

“There’s a particularly nasty kindergarten I know where you’d fit in perfectly,” I drawled. Carl froze, face scrunched up with the effort of composing sentences out of rogue subjects, verbs and conjunctions.

“Beat it, ya palooka,” he barked, but his hands betrayed his gruffness — the old fella fell out of his grasp and stumbled away.

I drew Francine, the only girlfriend I’d ever had who didn’t kiss and tell. “Bank’s closed, pal.” I didn’t hesitate to let her kiss Carl on the first date either, not when he reached for the hand-cannon strapped underneath one sweaty armpit. He went down like a sack of extremely rotten tomatoes.

That was that. A day’s honest work, as long as your boss was the devil himself.

She saw me later, her eyes reaching into my soul but finding only the low-hanging clouds of loneliness. “Everything’s Jake,” I lied, collecting my fee. Pocketing it, I stumbled into the darkness and pulled it like covers over my head for the night.

Part of

Veronica Mars: Season 1

Drew — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 11:12:01 +0000

It’s a Raymond Chandler evening
At the end of someone’s day
And I’m standing in my pocket
And I’m slowly turning grey

It’s rare I’ll let the back of a DVD box do my job for me, but this once I’m going to make an exception, because it tells you exactly what you need to know about Veronica Mars: “A little bit Buffy. A little bit Bogart. A dash of Nancy Drew.” That won’t stop me from filling another six paragraphs, of course, but it’s a nice starting point. Yet it doesn’t fully do the character justice because Veronica Mars is far more than the sum of her forebears- smarter than the Hardy Boys, sassier than Nancy Drew, looks waaay better in a miniskirt than that chump Encyclopedia Brown. But a person could be forgiven their skepticism because let’s face it: when boiled down to a one-sentence description, the idea of a high school girl solving mysteries sounds nearly as inane as… well, the idea of a high school girl fighting demons. To get around that, let’s take a closer look at just who this girl is, shall we?

Veronica Mars used to have everything: a place in the in crowd, the richest boyfriend in school, his sister Lilly for a best friend, and a happy home life with her father as sheriff. That all came crashing down the day Lilly was murdered, setting off a chain of events that culminated in Keith Mars being drummed out of office, Veronica’s mother skipping town, and Veronica herself becoming the school pariah. Less than a year later we’re introduced to a wiser, tougher Veronica struggling to help her father with his fledgling detective agency and to solve a few cases of her own, all while enduring abuse from her former friends and returning it in spades. Looming behind it all is the specter of Lilly Kane’s murder, the solution to which has the power to either vindicate or damn Keith’s suspicions and allow Veronica to finally lay her friend to rest. Aided by her only friend Wallace, ignored by former boyfriend Duncan, and tormented by Lilly’s ex and psychotic jackass Logan, it’s going to be a busy year for Veronica Mars. And if you’re a fan of intelligent, entertaining TV, you wouldn’t have it any other way.

I remember what I told you
But I can’t remember why
And the yellow leaves are falling
In a spiral from the sky

I mentioned Buffy earlier, and not to belabor the point, but the two shows do have a lot in common, starting with how they begin: a cute, formerly popular teenage girl suddenly finds herself ostracized and forced to rebuild her life from scratch. On the other hand, a wittier writer than I observed the irony of VM’s theme song containing the lines “A long time ago, we used to be friends, but I haven’t thought of you lately at all”… because, after suffering through the last two seasons of Buffy, a blonde spitfire who kicked evil’s ass without benefit of superpowers swooped in and stole my heart, and I’ve barely thought of the Slayer since. Heresy, I know, but if we were all on The Bachelor, Veronica would most definitely get a rose; Buffy might not. (Note: I do not watch The Bachelor.) While I love the first few seasons of BtVS, Veronica grafts Buffy’s attitude onto Willow’s character and ditches the self-pity, with a definite emphasis on brains over brawn. Still, fans of one show will almost certainly appreciate the other, as they touch on many of the same themes set against a high school backdrop. One final comparison: channeling Spike, the character of Logan was originally intended as a recurring antagonist and pain in Veronica’s ass but interacted so well with the rest of the cast that his role was expanded, creating a much more rounded character.

One of the key areas in which Veronica Mars sets itself apart is its willingness to tackle tough issues and darker themes. Make no mistake- VM may take place in high school, but it’s far more The Shield than Dawson’s Creek. That’s apparent from the very first episode, where we learn that Veronica’s sole attempt to rejoin the in crowd following Lilly’s death ended with her being drugged and raped at a party. Terrible occurrences like these aren’t glossed over or trivialized in a melodramatic “tonight, on a very special Veronica Mars” way; rather, they’re presented as an unfortunate consequence of the world the characters inhabit, one that is often enjoyable but sometimes horribly unfair. Veronica and Keith usually solve the case, but that doesn’t mean they all end well, which is precisely how things should be in noir. Don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty of humor to go around and more than a few happy endings, but you should never take it for granted from one episode to another.

There’s a body on the railings
That I can’t identify
And I’d like to reassure you but
I’m not that kind of guy

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what makes VM work because every aspect of the show works in tandem to create a greater whole. Certainly the writing is sharp, particularly in season 1, full of strong character arcs and a satisfying conclusion. Creator Rob Thomas cites Twin Peaks as a huge influence but claims Laura Palmer taught him an important lesson: if you’re going to introduce a huge mystery to the audience, you have to eventually solve it. I forget whether prior to this I thought Kristen Bell was great or just great looking, but either way, she does an excellent job of spearheading the cast. It would be easy for the character to become a stereotypical “sassy girl hurting on the inside,” but Bell never lets Veronica become a cliché and shows acting range far beyond her years. Likewise, Enrico Colatoni (known to all you Galaxy Quest fans) is outstanding, and his and Veronica’s interactions just might go down as the best parent-child relationship in television history. By turns supportive, suspicious, joking, protective, competent, and always, always loving, Keith is the kind of TV dad we need to see more of; in some episodes with particularly heavy Keith/Veronica interaction, the rest of the cast might as well not exist.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the stellar guest stars (mostly, Paris Hilton) who manage to support the main cast without overshadowing them. Prominent names include Joss Whedon, Kevin Smith, Paul Rudd, Michael Cera and Alia Shawkat, Ralph “The Todd” Maschio, Alyson Hannigan, and Charisma Carpenter, the latter two even getting to share a scene together. (Good news for Buffy fans who always wanted to see Willow out-bitch Cordelia.) In a similar vein, what helps keep the “mystery of the week” format from getting stale is that minor characters often return in later episodes, reinforcing the notion of a cohesive universe; some, like Tina Majorino’s Mac, even join the main cast in later seasons. And while the show has a few flaws, in the first season at least they tend to be fairly minor. For instance, the constant jokes about Veronica being flat-chested wear thin quickly… Kristin Bell isn’t stacked, but she’s not exactly surfboarding it either, unless the girl’s got one hell of a water bra. Likewise, Veronica’s voiceovers are often clever but sometimes feel redundant.

I could go on, but it boils down to one thing, and it doesn’t matter whether you’re a fan of detective fiction or not: Veronica Mars is television for smart people. It doesn’t spoonfeed you answers, it doesn’t make you wonder if the writers think you’re an idiot — it trusts you to make intuitive leaps and see how things connect yourself. If that sounds like your kind of show, if you like the idea of a spunky heroine with a brain in her head and a terrific supporting cast, then there’s no mystery: you owe it to yourself to give Veronica Mars a try.

It’s a Raymond Chandler evening
And the pavements are all wet
And I’m lurking in the shadows
‘Cause it hasn’t happened…

…yet.

Part of

Drew does Miller’s Crossing

Drew — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 04:00:45 +0000

“Nobody knows anybody. Not that well.”

The Scoop: 1990 R, directed by Joel Coen and starring Gabriel Byrne, Albert Finney and Marcia Gay Harden.

Tagline: Up is down, black is white, and nothing is what it seems.

Summary Capsule: Gabriel Byrne stretches his acting chops to play an Irish criminal who gets entangled in a complex web of deceit and betrayal.

Drew’s Rating: If they made a movie about where I kill people, it would be called “In The Study With A Lead Pipe.”

Drew’s Review: You’re reading this because of a comic book.

The Coen brothers are major fans of film noir and detective fiction, and it shows in most of their movies… even those that aren’t directly about crime, like Raising Arizona, still usually involve unsavory types wielding guns and planning heists, femme fatales seducing saps, or a mystery to unravel. Hell, The Big Lebowski, ostensibly a stoner film about slackers who like to go bowling, is nothing more than one giant love letter to Raymond Chandler when you actually look at the plot. But like the bulk of the neo-noir movies of the ’80s and ’90s, most of the Coens’ films bring hardboiled fiction trappings into the modern day… but then there’s Miller’s Crossing. Set in the bad old days of Prohibition and corrupt politicians (wait…), it features a story that’s nothing you haven’t seen before: a lone, smart individual plays two opposing sides of a gang war against each other for his own ends. Simple, right? In a way it is; but then, is anything truly simple when money, sex, and family come into the picture? The Coens do a nice job of adding numerous twists and turns into the story to keep the audience engaged — it’s not a whodunnit mystery, but you definitely will wonder who’s going to discover whose lies and double crosses first.

I’m still not sure how I feel about the ending- I’ve watched it twice now, and when I figure out whether I liked it or not, I’ll let you know. But it does bring resolution to a satisfying story, and when you get right down to it, that’s what matters, not whether I would have made the same choices as some of the characters. I can definitely recommend this movie — certainly you’ll get more out of it if you, like the Coens, are a fan of hardboiled mysteries and film noir, but even if you normally aren’t, there’s plenty of good character study and intrigue to be had. Take a tip from me (and Beth), and make a trip to Miller’s Crossing.

Yeah, I'm pretty tough too when I've got five guys with shotguns behind me.

Didja Notice?

How the submachine gun Leo steals from a gunman holds four times the bullets of any tommy gun ever created?
Sam Raimi makes a cameo as a laughing gunman during the attack on the Sons of Erin social club.
Every time the bartender appeared, I remember thinking, “Yeah, that actor’s okay… but man, Bruce Campbell would’ve been even better!”
Miller’s Crossing contains several references to the Coen brothers’ next film, Barton Fink, which they took three weeks off from writing Crossing to pen. Among them, Tom lives at Barton Arms apartments, and a newspaper headline reads “Seven Dead In Hotel Fire.”

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

Only if you’re a fan of Irish folk music. Begorrah.

Intermission!

Miller’s Crossing

Yojimbo

A Fistful of Dollars

Several roles had to be recast- Leo was originally to be played by Trey Wilson, who portrayed Nathan Arizona Sr. in Raising Arizona, but he died before filming started. In addition, Peter Stormare was supposed to play “The Swede,” but he was appearing as Hamlet on Broadway and thus unavailable, so Eddie Freeman was brought in and the character renamed “The Dane.”

Groovy Quotes

Leo: But maybe you’re wrong about this. You don’t know what’s in Verna’s heart.
Tom: Leo, if she’s such an angel, why are you lookin’ for her at 4:00 in the morning?

Adolph: Tommy, the way you’re going- hey, horses got knees?
Tom: I don’t know. Fetlocks.
Adolph: Well if I was a horse I’d be down on my fetlocks praying you don’t bet on me.

Verna: You think I murdered someone? Come on, Tom. You know me a little.
Tom: Nobody knows anybody. Not that well.

Tom: I figure a thousand bucks is reasonable, so I want two.

Verna: What are you doing?
Tom: Walking.
Verna: Don’t let on any more than you have to.
Tom: In the rain.

Bernie: Look in your heart.
Tom: What heart?

If You Liked This Movie, Try These:

Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8: The Chain

Drew — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 05:00:42 +0000

As some of you may recall, last year’s Whedon Week put me in a quandary: I try to contribute to all our theme weeks, but a bad roommate experience soured me on all things Buffy and I wasn’t really into anything else Joss did. I was ready to bow out with a graceful “So long, chumps!” when Justin suggested I take a look at the recently-begun comic continuation of Buffy. Reasoning that if nothing else, a recap of season 8 by someone who hadn’t seen an episode since season 3 would be good for a few laughs, I agreed, but after submitting the article figured that was the end of it. Flash forward one year and seven DVD sets later. Overcoming my aversion, I got into Buffy in a big way – I cherished seasons 1 through 3, enjoyed seasons 4 and 5, suffered through seasons 6 and 7. And make no mistake, they were BAD — I’ve been an apologist defender of many a shark jumper in my day, but even I can’t overlook the misery of season 6, or season 7 starting strong only to tank. And yet… and yet, from my uninformed perspective, the first storyline of season 8 hadn’t been half bad. Was there a chance for Buffy to return to its former glory? I don’t know, but I figure it’s time to revisit the series and find out. Join me, won’t you?

Before we begin, a word about “canon.” In the years the show was on and since, there’ve been no end of Buffy spinoffs, from novels to video games. Dark Horse published a comic from 1998-2003 that ran 63 issues, plus various and sundry miniseries and one-shots, telling stories set throughout the show’s timeline. While all of these projects are officially licensed, they’re considered at best sort of apocryphal Buffy tales. Basically, the only stories that “count” are those Joss Whedon has personally decreed so; according to the man himself, “Canon is key, as is continuity. If you are a massive nerd. Which I am. I believe there’s a demarcation between the creation and ancillary creations by different people. I’m all for that stuff, just like fanfic, but I like to know that there’s an absolutely official story-so-far, especially when something changes mediums, which my stuff seems to do a lot.”

So for your edification, here’s a listing of all the canon Buffyverse material, from Joss’ mouth to your ears:

-Every episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel
-BtVS Season 8 comic
-Angel: After the Fall comic (essentially Angel Season 6) and Spike: After the Fall miniseries
-Tales of the Slayers miniseries (stories about various Slayers throughout history)
-Tales of the Vampires miniseries (stories about various vampires throughout history)
-Fray miniseries (Whedon’s comic about a Slayer in the far future)
-The Origin miniseries (a comic intended to retell the events of the original movie to bring it more in line with the show. Of it, Whedon has said, “The Origin comic, though I have issues with it, CAN pretty much be accepted as canonical. They did a cool job of combining the movie script (the SCRIPT) with the series, that was nice, and using the series Merrick.”)

With that out of the way, let’s move on to “The Chain.” This is a Whedon-penned story from issue 5, immediately following The Long Way Home. That, by the way, is apparently going to be the structure of Season 8… a longer multi-issue arc, followed by a done-in-one issue. Let’s see what the first has to offer:

We open with a horned demon looking at me and growling, “Buffy Summers…” Nice try, demon guy, but being blonde, asskickers, and dynamite in the sack are where the similarities between Buffy and myself end. Ah, never mind- our beastie Yamanh, who enjoys pillaging, snarling, and speaking in the third person, proclaims Buffy dead while hoisting her body over his head for emphasis. While he’s yammering, “Buffy”’s internal monologue tells us the funny part of all this, namely that she’s never even met Buffy. Flashback: a fairy (the creepy kind, not the Tinkerbell variety) is telling notBuffy she needs to leave immediately. Oh, and they’re underground. notBuffy says she can’t, she has to stop Yamanh’s army from storming the surface. Another flashback takes us to lunchtime at a Catholic school. Several girls are complaining about everyone getting detention because one classmate is a ho, when one of them suddenly chokes and flies back from her seat. Those peanut allergies are a bitch.

We then jump settings AGAIN, this time to Giles (yay!) saying now he’ll tell us about the chain. Which he spectacularly fails to do, as the very next panel has our unnamed protagonist telling us being awakened as a Slayer was like having your ear bitten off by Mike Tyson. (Honey, considering how Tyson usually treats women, consider yourself lucky.) Cue a television commercial starring Andrew and one of the season 7 newbies whose name I can’t recall because only like three of them had personalities. It’s a lot like the cheesy commercial from Ghostbusters, except this one is promoting a “1-800-CHOSEN-1″ hotline for girls who are having strange dreams and breaking vases to call. It’s… too awesome to put into words, especially Andrew’s 1950s sweater vest and pipe.

Cut to our (brunette) heroine being briefed by Rona on being a Slayer, followed by 2-page training montage. Narration confirms that our girl is a Slayer who was chosen for the worst celebrity impersonation gig ever, namely distracting bad guys from the real Buffy’s whereabouts. She mentions another imposter is on assignment partying in Rome and dating “the Immortal,” which internet research tells me is a nod to an Angel episode. And may I just offer that if I’m one of two impersonators and I spend my days fighting demons underground while my counterpart Lohans it up in Rome, I’m putting in for an immediate transfer.

Back in the caves, our protagonist cuts a random demon’s hand off, magnanimously adding that she left him one to wipe with. Forget wiping, what if that was his “me time” hand? That’s cold. She tells him to warn Yamanh that Buffy is coming, which in most cases would constitute what we call “piss poor strategy.” But since we know her job is to intimidate malcontents by pretending to be the real deal, it makes sense. More random cuts: Giles explaining that a chain connects Slayers throughout the world and history, followed by some noobs being surrounded by vampires. Our girl punches a vamp who’s about to bite one of her teammates but gets bitten herself for her trouble. Still, they manage to dust him before being drained, while a teammate named Simone whines about wanting a gun. notBuffy and friend commiserate over their shaky start.

Next: Rona gets to the point, namely that our protagonist could pass for Buffy if she dyes her hair and pads her bra. (And on a show where Sarah Michelle Gellar was rarely the chestiest female in any given season, ouch.) She clarifies that it’s deep cover and unbelievably dangerous and adds that notBuffy may be wondering, why her… because she’s strong enough to handle it, or so weak that she won’t be missed? Rona’s comforting non-answer is that there is no truth, just what notBuffy chooses to believe. So… the weak one, then. Cut to our heroine in the caves passing a test by some Futurama-looking slug creatures, and it’s worth noting that the “test” consists of them crawling all over her naked body, then proclaiming she passed once they finish copping a feel. I understand that’s how the DMV does it too. Blah blah, the fairies and the “slimefolk” don’t get along, but notBuffy Aragorns them that if they don’t learn to work together, they will surely fall to Saur-… uh, Yamanh.

Troops sufficiently rallied, we now see the brunette lying on the ground immediately post-activation. As her classmates check to see if she’s alright, a semi (accidentally?) drives through the outdoor lunch area. notBuffy kicks her friends out of the way only to be hit and thrown a Wile E. Coyote-esque distance away. In case we haven’t gotten the theme of the issue yet, someone skips over “Do you need an ambulance?” to immediately ask “Who the hell ARE you?” At that, we’re back in the caves a final time. The fairies, slugs, and others are battling demon hordes while Yamanh kicks the crap out of notBuffy. Her internal monologue notes that famous names can invoke both great and terrible things, but in reality millions of unnamed people go into making one particular person known. As Yamanh lifts her above his head in triumph (catching up to the beginning of the issue), a band of Slayers rapels down from the surface to help. Tossed aside, our heroine reflects that names aren’t important, it’s the chain that connects each of us — you either feel its tug or you ignore it. notBuffy doesn’t care that she be remembered, and we still don’t know who she is… but eyes closing for the final time, she reminds us what’s truly important: she knows who she is.

Final reaction: I hate to say it after the fairly strong opening storyline, but this one’s a bit of a mess. It’s a shame because there’s a good germ of an idea at the core, and it clearly wants to end on a poignant note, but the execution is lacking. I think the problem is that there’s too much going on for one issue to contain. A nameless girl being trained to impersonate a famous leader; philosophical musings about the chain that binds together all Slayers; a demon uprising threatening to spill over into the outside world; an underground world of various creatures who have to learn to cooperate? All good-to-decent ideas, but trying to fit all of them into 22 pages leads to a thousand abrupt cuts between scenes- before we start getting invested in one we’re jerked off to another, set at a completely different time with only a vague theme tying them together. None of it’s bad, but it needed another issue or two to breathe; imagine “Graduation Day,” one of the best 2-part episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, compressed down to 30 minutes. That’s “The Chain.” It really does have a pretty emotional ending… more’s the pity the rest of the issue doesn’t live up to it.

****************

As a bonus, here’s a recap of “Antique,” a story from the Tales of the Vampires miniseries. To date it’s the only canonical story to take place between the end of the TV series and the beginning of Season 8.

We open with Dracula (last seen in season 5 episode “Buffy vs. Dracula”) speaking to an unseen person. As you’d expect if you’ve read or seen ANY story with Dracula in it, the gist of it is “I’m so cool and terrifying and powerful, fear me if you dare.” He concludes by reassuring his audience they won’t be harmed, so not to be afraid. The fact that the response is “We’re not” should give you an idea of just who those “guests” are. And yep… Drac is irked to hear it. Throwing in a free display of shape changing (the standard bat-wolf-fog combo), he concludes that as three helpless young women, of course they must be lying. At this point we finally see Dracula’s audience, which to no one’s surprise is Buffy and two rookies. It’s interesting to note that while past Slayers have tended to be both young and attractive, the activating of all potentials seems to have lifted that restriction, because one of them looks okay but the other is in definite fug territory. I’m actually surprised Dracula let her in his castle.

Still miffed that he’s not throwing the fear of Satan into these cocky wenches, Dracula keeps talking until the ugly stepslayer interrupts, causing him to use the Force to make her parrot back whatever he says. The writer seems to be making the point that homely chicks are susceptible to manipulation by handsome men, which… duh. Alcohol helps too. Anyway, the art briefly changes, showing Drac as a balding, white-haired old man, a fact Buffy throws in his face. The hypnotized uggo babbles about how letting people finish talking shows respect, which: hee. Buffy exposits that the Count has something of hers and she wants it back. Dracula (handsome again) claims not to know what she’s talking about but is interrupted by a voice asking, “Master, have they gone yet?”

Yep- it’s Xander, decked out in his finest Renfield servant gear. Dracula laments that he told his “manservant” to wait with the brides, but Xanfield complains that they’re scary. Buffy demands Xander get over here, which the enthralled minion is having none of. Finally Drac offers a compromise, and the compromise is this: Buffy and friends allow Xander to remain, and in return Dracula will make their deaths as painless as possible.

Oh good, fighty time! As horse face continues babbling in the background, Dracula tackles Buffy out a window, and the ensuing full-page shot of his castle is pretty impressive… you half expect to see Simon Belmont fighting skeletons on a turret somewhere. As they fall, Drac warns Buffy that these children follow her now, but soon enough they’ll start to see her as ancient and obsolete. Hmm, projecting much? He cautions, “Overstay your welcome, and you’ll become a tall tale for children. Fodder for terrible films and television serials. All because you committed the one cardinal sin – you aged.”

Buffy is, as always, irritatingly dismissive of anyone telling her the truth, delivering a head lock (to… someone who can turn into mist?) while boasting that only old people talk about aging. Luckily she’s interrupted by Xanfield slapping her in the face. Irritated, she asks whether Dracula taught him that, to which he replies “No. I believe that is his natural instinct.” Bwa-ha-ha! Anyway, she accuses Drac of keeping Xander as part of some midlife crisis and again demands his release. The Lord of Vampires balks, but then remembers his hot wives, and castle, and garden, and shipping company, and finally acknowledges he can afford to lose his manservant. Oh, Xander… even when you’re evil, you get no respect.

As Xanfield blathers on that Bela Lugosi’s hair is ridiculous and in no way resembles his master’s (heh), the Count asks for a moment to say goodbye. Against all odds, it’s strangely touching as Dracula thanks him for being there, and listening to him when no one else would, and teaching him to ride a motorbike. He invites Xander to visit anytime he wishes, then watches forlornly as his manservant shuffles off to become Buffy’s manservant again. Taking a seat on a bench, Dracula again allows his illusion of handsomeness to drop, exposing us to an aging, decrepit, and above all sad old man. And with that, we’re out.

In my opinion, quite a good story, especially for only being 10 pages. It’s impressive for a writer to make us empathize more with the homicidal monster than the selfless heroine, but Drew Goddard (stellar first name, DG) pulls it off. Buffy actually is pretty unlikeable (when she says “You have something of mine,” do you get the sense she’s exaggerating? I don’t), and you sort of feel like hypnotized thrall or not, Dracula actually appreciates Xander more than Buffy has in ages. Hell, if he’s been there a year, why is she just getting around to rescuing him now? Letting the ultimate evil enslave your friend for three months is fine, six months okay, but a year? That’s pushing it. My guess is that Buffy just got tired of Willow nagging her. As one does. Anyway, a fun story (which you can read for free HERE) that supposedly sets the stage for one of Season 8’s arcs. Here’s looking forward to it!

Drew does Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder

Drew — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 13:27:43 +0000

“Into the breach, meatbags.”

The Scoop: 2009, directed by Peter Avanzino, starring Billy West, Katey Sagal, and John Di Maggio

Summary Capsule: The Planet Express crew splits down gender lines over Amy’s dad’s attempt to destroy a star system brimming with life to build the galaxy’s largest mini-golf course. Meanwhile, Fry shtupping his own grandmother again puts him in the unlikely position of potential universe savior.

Drew’s Rating: Have you ever noticed how every significant event in a Matt Groening production centers around miniature golf?

Drew’s Review: Well, here we are again, old friends- the (possible) end of Futurama. It seems like only yesterday I was eagerly awaiting the release of the first direct-to-DVD movie, and now the final act is here. After this, the show’s future is uncertain, so one question looms above all others: does it receive a proper sendoff? Can Into the Wild Green Yonder compete with “The Devil’s Hands Are Idle Playthings,” the last episode of the TV series, in terms of emotional impact, or is it… well, The Matrix Revolutions? And the answer is: more of the former than the latter, thank Atheismo.

Their potentially final adventure finds the Planet Express crew watching Leo Wong demolish the old Mars Vegas to build a newer, more extravagant version. In the process, ecosystems are ravaged and species driven to extinction, but payoffs to environmental scientist Professor Farnsworth ensure zero repercussions. Leo’s only opponents are the Feministas, eco-terrorists who fight for both gender equality and the preservation of nature. But when their attack results in Fry gaining the power to read minds, he’s approached by the Legion of Madfellows, an ancient organization devoted to protecting the universe from the Dark Ones, creatures who wish to destroy all life. A violet dwarf star may hold the key to reviving hundreds of extinct species, but Leo Wong plans to destroy it to build an immense miniature golf course, a plan the Dark Ones hope to see come to fruition. While Leela joins the Feministas, Fry goes undercover as Leo’s security guard in an effort to ferret out the Dark Ones and save the dwarf star. But with Leela unaware of Fry’s plan and the male Planet Expressers firmly on Leo’s side (and Bender working for himself, as always), the company threatens to tear itself apart. Can anything bring them together in time to possibly go away forever?

While some people have loved the Futurama movies, others have complained that they don’t live up to the show at its peak, so let’s get it out of the way first: I’m glad to report that Into the Wild Green Yonder is without question the funniest of the four films. It’s weird… I remember liking the previous three when they came out, but they definitely suffer in comparison with Yonder, which reminds you of just how many good lines the show used to pack into each episode. The plot is likewise enjoyable on the whole- while one or two subplots peter out (Bender’s affair with the Donbot’s wife, I’m looking at you), overall it’s fairly coherent by Futurama standards. Yet another longstanding series mystery is resolved (who’s the man in the number 9 shirt who appears in crowd scenes throughout the series?), mmmmostly satisfactorily, and the writing staff gets to take another jab at industrialization while poking gentle fun at the environmentalists who oppose it. Most of the main characters get a chance to shine, though there could always be a little more Zoidberg maybe, and the series continues its trend of unlikely guest stars with Tha Doggfather himself. It’s easy to take the animation for granted because we’ve gotten used to it by this point, but it’s clean and impressive as always.

The few complaints are familiar ones, mostly having to do with consistent characterization (in a cartoon, I know, but still). Fry and Leela are yet again back to mooning over each other, meaning you could pretty much pretend the last three movies never happened and Yonder continues directly from the show. Having recently rewatched classic episodes like “The Sting” where the pair clearly have feelings for each other, I found it hard enough to see them back to being just friends without explanation, but the constant back-and-forth needs to stop. Personally I like their relationship because I’m a giant romantic softie (shhh… don’t tell anyone), but they’re threatening to overtake Ross and Rachel for most drawn out non-relationship on TV, and brother, that’s not a good place to be. Also, the movie format seems to goad the writers into producing more “epic” stories, with three of the four films dealing with galaxy-shaking events. I can understand why they felt the need to amp up the drama, but some of my favorite Futurama episodes were of the quieter, more personal variety that get shoved to the wayside whenever the universe is in danger. No biggie, but if the show ever returns we could use a few episodes where the crew are solely responsible for saving themselves.

Aaaand… there’s really not much else to say. If you’re a diehard Futurama fan, you probably already own this DVD and are mentally composing your rebuttal to me this very moment. (Remember, it’s getbent@whinyfanboy.com.) But if you’re a more casual fan who was thinking of maybe picking up one a them DVD movies and wants to know which to choose, hopefully this answered your question- it’s Yonder. Is it perfect? No. Is it quite as witty as the best episodes of the show? Uh-uh. But does it leave me wanting more and praying Fox sees fit to revive the show again in another format? You bet your shiny-…

Well, you know the rest.

Didja Notice?

The Simpsons/Futurama and Family Guy teams often poke fun at each other on their shows, but apparently it’s all in good fun, since Seth MacFarlane sings the opening Vegas-style song.
Sadly, I think New Vegas’s motto — “What you don’t know about your bedspread won’t hurt you” — could just as easily be applied to Las Vegas. I’ve watched C.S.I.
As a nice callback to the last movie, where dark matter became obsolete, we learn that whale oil is the new fuel source.
Every environmentally-themed episode of Futurama features a member of the Waterfall family, and Yonder is no exception with Hutch and his sister Frida.
Snoop Dogg as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court? Fo’ rizzle, y’all.
The other justices include Scalia, Ginsberg, Thomas, Paula Abdul, Bjorn Bjork, Janeane Garofalo, and a brunette named “Sagal,” a cute nod to Katey Sagal, the voice of Leela.
If you ever wondered what makes Bender’s ass shiny and metal, wonder no longer: it’s his vanity plate reading “1 DVS BSTD”.

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

Well, there’s nothing extra, but considering it could be the last time you’ll ever hear that sweet Futurama theme song? Yep.

Intermission!

Into the Wild Green Yonder

Futurama

The Yonder DVD has a ton of special features, including commentary, deleted scenes, a tutorial on how to draw Futurama in 10 very difficult steps, animatics, a spoof featurette about how Futurama is made, Penn Jillette talking about his experience recording his lines, a random mini-documentary about Matt Groening and David X. Cohen going on a Zero-G flight experience, a short featurette made up of clips from past episodes called Bender’s Movie Theater Etiquette, and of course, Zapp Brannigan’s Guide to Making Love at a Woman. (It’s pretty much the same as making love *to* a woman except… uh, never mind. Not going there.) Perhaps the weirdest feature is a brief animation of Bender chugging beers, drawn entirely on toilet paper squares and animated by, well, spinning the roll. Yeah.

Okay, the secret's out- Leela and Bender hook up. Damn, I still can't believe that.

Groovy Quotes

Bender: Man, I’m worried about him. But not enough to stop gambling for even a single second!

Fry: Sign me up for the tournament, please!
Attendant: Okey-doke, Jiffy Pop. Entry fee’s 50,000 smackers.
Fry: 50,000?! Drat, all I have is my life savings and a token for free admission to this poker tournament.
Attendant: Close enough.

Penn: Welcome, viewers who fell asleep with the TV on! It’s the 3009 No-Limit Hold ‘Em Championship. I’m the massive head of Penn Jillette, and here with the color commentary, my partner Teller! …Our act really didn’t change much when he died.

Fry: Bite my shiny metal hat!

Penn: Looks like Boobs Vanderbilt has a decent pair. Also, she’s got two eights.

Hutch: Sorry I bashed your head in, buddy, but I had to. Y’see, the fate of the universe depends on you.
Fry: Yeah, I get that a lot.

Zapp: Bender here has identified the femdito commander as my ex-lover Turanga Leela, whom I once made love at.
Nixon: And he’s willing to fink her out for a few simoleons?
Bender: It’s not about the money, Nixon, though I’d like much more. It’s ’cause Leela’s a threat- a threat to my reputation! She’s committed 30 felonies in 12 star systems. If no one stops her, she’ll break my record for longest rap sheet!
Nixon: Aroooo! That’s a despicable motive, Bender, and I respect it.

Farnsworth: Well, this is it, old friends. Planet Express is done for, what with our delivery crew missing and the abysmal sales of Tickle-Me Bender.
Doll: Teeheehee! Quit touchin’ my junk, pervert!

Zapp: Kif, set coordinates 36, 24, 36. AKA… Leela.

Number 9 Man: As my colleague indicated, the plan cannot come from us, Fry. We were counting on you and your unreadable brain to come up with something.
Fry: That was a mistake.
Number 9 Man: I see that now.

Leela: Wormhole!
Hermes: Sweet topology of cosmology, it’s huge!
Farnsworth: If we fly into it, it could take us trillions of light years away. There’s no knowing if we’ll ever return.
Fry: What do we do? Should we go for it?
Bender: Into the breach, meatbags. Or not. Eh, whatever.

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Drew does Unforgiven

Drew — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 14:29:39 +0000

“It’s a hell of a thing, killing a man. You take away all he’s got, and all he’s ever gonna have.”

The Scoop: 1992 R, directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, and Morgan Freeman

Summary Capsule: A reformed outlaw is tasked with carrying out two more murders, of men who arguably deserve killing. Can he pull it off while still holding on to his newfound morality?

Drew’s Rating: Get three stars ready. My mistake… four stars.

Drew’s Review: I’ve mentioned this in past reviews, but little of what we commonly associate with westerns is representative of the true “Old West.” As Garth Ennis espoused in his introduction to the fourth volume of Preacher, a real cowboy was more likely to be killed by syphillis or his horse than a bullet, and if he did die by gunplay it was probably because someone snuck up behind him with a shotgun. John Wayne westerns from the 50s aren’t exactly noted for their realism, a situation partially remedied by the down ‘n dirty spaghetti westerns pioneered by Sergio Leone in the 70s. Even so, there’s still the nigh-superhuman gunplay of the Man with No Name; who, moral ambiguity notwithstanding, generally ended up protecting the weak and punishing the wicked. All of which is a roundabout way of bringing us to Unforgiven, an attempt to present an even harder, less fanciful take on the true Old West. It’s fitting that director Eastwood is also the star, because in many ways it serves as a bookend to the spaghetti westerns Clint starred in years earlier, albeit not an uplifting one. In short, it’s not difficult to imagine William Munny as an aged Man with No Name or Outlaw Josey Wales, one whose mythic nature faded away with his youth, leaving him older, sadder, and merely mortal.

William Munny is a retired thief and gunfighter who gave up his violent ways for the sake of his wife. Dead now, she left him with two children and a quiet life of farming, which suits Will fine. But events conspire against his peaceful existence when a cowboy viciously scars a prostitute’s face for giggling at his “teensy little pecker.” (And ladies, while that’s unconscionable, do learn the lesson: just lie and say it’s the biggest ever. Really.) When the cowboy and his friend are let off with a slap on the wrist by town sheriff Little Bill (Gene Hackman), Delilah’s fellow prostitutes offer a $1000 bounty for anyone willing to kill the pair. This draws the attention of the Schofield Kid (Jaimz Woolvett), a young punk who fancies himself a killer and who offers to split the bounty with Will in exchange for his assistance. Highly reluctant but needing the money (and rationalizing that anyone who cuts a woman deserves killing), Will recruits his old partner Ned (Morgan Freeman) to help, and the trio set off to earn the reward. But Little Bill is determined to maintain order in his town at all costs and to stop anyone foolish enough to try for that thousand dollars… with extreme prejudice, if necessary. Of course, that’s assuming the older, mellower Will and Ned are still capable of the murders they so callously performed in their younger days.

A word of warning before I go any further — it’s hard to discuss this movie without giving away major plot points. Therefore I recommend, if you haven’t seen it yet, that you stop reading now and go rent the movie, because it is definitely worth it. Anyone who continues reading from this point on does so at their own discretion.

If you haven’t guessed from the title, Unforgiven is a bleak movie. It’s very good and powerful — great acting, won tons of awards — but it is not full of heartening moments and happy endings. More than any film I’ve ever seen, it highlights the reality of the Old West, how there were no “good guys.” No character behaves to the moral standards we as moviegoers expect out of even our most grizzled anti-heroes, be it sadistic sheriff Little Bill, married Ned taking advances on the reward in terms of “services rendered” by the prostitutes, or the biographer who attaches himself to whomever the reigning alpha dog is. Nor is this limited to the characters themselves, as Unforgiven also highlights the brutal reality of gunplay in a way few movies do. It’s easy for us to become inured to violence when every villain meets their end with a puff of smoke from the hero’s gun, a quick grunt, and a fall away from the camera. Done, and who cares, right? They’re evil. But it’s something different entirely when we’re forced to listen to a man’s agonized moans as he dies slowly from a painful gutshot, when we’re confronted with the fact that even villains have real human emotions and fears of dying. Takes a little bit of the luster out of killing in the name of “justice”… and if nothing else, that’s something we could all stand to be reminded of from time to time.

While not a sentimental movie, Unforgiven does offer one emotional scene that’s heartbreaking to watch, as the scarred Delilah offers Will a “free one,” similar to those that Ned and the Kid have been collecting from her friends, as an advance on killing her attacker. Determined not to dishonor his wife’s memory, Will demures, and naturally the damaged girl takes it the only way anyone could in such circumstances, trying to cover up how deeply his refusal hurts her. Yet the gentleness in Will’s voice as he realizes his mistake and clumsily tries to explain that it’s not because of her scars… really, the scene serves as a perfect counterpoint to the climax in the bar, highlighting the constant struggle in Will’s personality between what he was and what he’s tried to become.

Ultimately the point Unforgiven makes — and it’s a grim and discomforting one, but not necessarily untrue — is that you can try like hell to change who you really are, but all it takes is one unfortunate event to bring your real self thundering back to the forefront. At its core, it’s the story of a man trying desperately to escape his past, a man who spends 95% of the movie telling anyone who’ll listen how he’s changed, how he ain’t like that anymore; who, even when pulled back into old habits, attempts to rationalize his actions and cling to some semblance of his hard-won morality. And a man who, in one dark, terrible, blood-soaked moment, throws it all away and embraces his true nature, and in so doing damns himself for all eternity. I mentioned earlier that Unforgiven is not a happy movie, and so it isn’t. But it’s a film rife with great performances, a more accurate depiction of history than you’ll find many places, and most importantly, something to say. Perhaps it’s not the most uplifting message, but it’s one you need to hear at least once, and you’d be hard-pressed to find a better vehicle for it than Unforgiven. Don’t hesitate to check it out.

What NRA members think of to achieve orgasm.

Didja Notice?

Unforgiven is the third western to ever win a Best Picture Oscar, following Cimarron in 1931 and Dances with Wolves in 1990.
Just as William Munny descends from Clint Eastwood’s earlier western characters, so too did he directly influence the creation of the Saint of Killers, a major villain from Garth Ennis’s acclaimed Preacher.
I always felt bad for the other cowboy, the one who didn’t scar Delilah. Granted he’s got crappy taste in friends, but is that really worth killing him over? He did try to make amends.
The irony of Will taking Ned’s rifle with the words “I ain’t very good with one of these” is nice, contrasting with the Man with No Name’s ability to sever a rope with a bullet from hundreds of yards away.
While Will’s first drink of whisky after years of sobriety is a pivotal moment — it, not the killing of Davey, is the true sign that he’s re-embraced his old ways — it’s handled so subtlely that at first I didn’t even notice it happening.

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

After the credits it reads “Dedicated to Sergio and Don,” a reference to Eastwood’s directorial mentors Sergio Leone and Don Siegel.

Intermission!

The Outlaw Josey Wales

Will Penny

True Grit

Groovy Quotes

Andy: Clyde, you got three pistols and you only got one arm!
Clyde: I just don’t wanna get killed for lack of shooting back.

English Bob: Well actually, what I heard was that you fell off your horse… drunk, of course… and that you broke your bloody neck.
Little Bill: I heard that one myself, Bob. Hell, I even thought I was dead, ’til I found out it was just that I was in Nebraska.

Little Bill: Being a good shot and being quick with a pistol, that don’t do no harm, but it don’t mean much next to being cool-headed. A man who’ll keep his head, not get rattled under fire, like as not he’ll kill you.

Will: It’s a hell of a thing, killing a man. You take away all he’s got, and all he’s ever gonna have.
Schofield Kid: Yeah. Well, I guess they had it coming.
Will: We all have it coming, kid.

Little Bill: Well, sir, you are a cowardly son of a bitch. You just shot an unarmed man.
Will: He should’ve armed himself if he’s going to decorate his saloon with my friend.

Little Bill: You’d be William Munny out of Missouri, killer of women and children.
Will: That’s right. I’ve killed women and children. I’ve killed just about everything that walks or crawls at one time or another. And I’m here to kill you, Little Bill, for what you did to Ned.

Little Bill: I don’t deserve this… to die like this. I was building a house.
Will: “Deserve”’s got nothing to do with it.
Little Bill: I’ll see you in hell, William Munny.
Will: …Yeah.

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Drew does Hellboy II: The Golden Army

Drew — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 14:00:44 +0000

“Sit down! Proud, empty, hollow things that you are. Let this remind you why you once feared the dark.”

The Scoop:

Tagline: Saving the world is a hell of a job.

Summary Capsule: The best damn demon hunter in the world (sorry, Buffy) has to contend with an uptight new boss, an indestructible army, and a hormonal girlfriend. Guess which one he’s dreading most?

Drew’s Rating: Like what would happen if George Lucas and Barry Sonnenfeld had a baby. (And, ew.)

Drew’s Review: For a filmmaker, there’s only one way to guarantee yourself a sequel: make the first one profitable. Right or wrong, studios care about the bottom line, period. You can drop the biggest cinematic deuce ever committed to celluloid, but if people go see it in droves, rest assured you’ll be making Scary/Date/Epic/Disaster Movies until the end of time. Whereas if you create a masterpiece that makes Roger Ebert cry but that just breaks even, the studio will congratulate you heartily and let you know that your story has reached its logical conclusion. It’s scary but true – if Star Wars had tanked, there never would have been an Empire Strikes Back. Think about it.

But there are rare exceptions to that rule, which almost always boil down to two things: goodwill and respect for the director, and sheer force of will on the part of those trying to get the sequel made. Which brings us to Hellboy II and Guillermo del Toro, acclaimed filmmaker and avowed Hellboy fan. del Toro has never made a secret of his love for Mike Mignola’s creation, and while the first Hellboy movie wasn’t a flop, neither was it the Spider-Man-esque hit studios were hoping for. It took a good few years and more than a little effort to get a sequel made, but it finally arrived with del Toro at the helm, promising to deliver the same horrific fairy tale creatures seen in Pan’s Labyrinth. Ah, but in what context?

'Don't look at me, Abe, that's what your mom said would happen.'

A young Hellboy once heard tell about a war between men and elves, in which the elves created 70 times 70 indestructible mechanical soldiers to decimate their enemies. Horrified by the ensuing carnage, the Elf King made peace with mankind, hid away the golden army, and broke the crown needed to control them into three pieces. And so the story passed into myth until the present day, when one of the pieces is discovered, drawing the king’s son Nuada out of exile. Fed up with the way humans have despoiled the planet while the people of the earth — elves, faeries, goblins, and the like — have been driven underground, he sets out to reclaim the other pieces, revive the golden army, and lay waste to the race of men. Standing in his way? His twin sister Nuala, the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, and one pissed-off, cigar-chomping demon with a gun. It’s a bad day to be a bad guy.

Let’s get it out of the way: if your favorite part of Star Wars was the cantina scene, you’re not going to be disappointed. Hellboy II answers back with a lengthy scene set in a troll market, and the numerous beasties Nuada throws at our heroes (including, spoiler, the golden army itself) can’t fail to impress with their unique and bizarre looks. From the bustling activity of the market to the helmet of new hero Johann Krauss, del Toro clearly subscribes to the theory that there should always be some random machinery or creatures in motion at all times. Speaking of Krauss, Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane makes his motion picture debut as Hellboy’s officious new boss who happens to consist of ectoplasm occupying a containment suit. I have no idea how accurate MacFarlane’s accent might be, but he’s both amusing and reasonably restrained, something I wasn’t sure he could pull off. Perlman is great once again as Hellboy, striking the pitch perfect notes of the working man’s demon smasher, while Doug Jones gets a chance to shine as Abe Sapien, this time with more to do. Selma Blair is fine as Liz, but doesn’t get to emote as much this time around… ironic, given her circumstances. That said, the heavy makeup and prosthetics of the elf twins means Nuada never seems as angry as he should, and the tenderness Nuala is supposed to be showing is always tempered by a slight ick factor. But maybe that’s what del Toro was going for… they are outcasts, after all.

While Hellboy II gets a lot of things right, I think in one area it reaches a bit further than it probably should have. We all saw the first Hellboy movie, and more importantly we saw X-Men… the notion of a hero protecting a world that fears and hates him is old hat. One of the things I like about the Hellboy comics is that his existence has always been public, so nobody bats an eye at the giant devil creature standing next to them. Here we’re treated to more of the standard “once the novelty wears off, people start to hate him because he looks different” vibe, and it just feels so tired. I know they’re building up the theme of Hellboy having more in common with his enemies than those he protects (see also: the first movie), but did we really need the angry mob who turn on him for rescuing a baby? I expected more subtlety from a director of del Toro’s ability; as is, it’s so over the top that HB might as well be bellowing “Fire bad!” at the top of his lungs. (Mind, they actually do show a clip from The Bride of Frankenstein on a TV in the background of the very next scene. Y’know, in case you didn’t get it.)

That’s a relatively minor complaint, though, and Hellboy II does far more right than wrong. Granted, I’m a little disturbed that both Abe and Liz make decisions to save their loved ones at the theoretical expense of the rest of the world — so much for the greater good, I guess — but if you’re a romantic at heart, you’ll probably appreciate a movie filled with so many pariahs in love. On the other hand, if you’re someone like me who just likes watching gruff heroes take on mad (but slightly sympathetic) villains who respond by unleashing a cavalcade of horrors on them, this film has got you covered. We may never know exactly what convinced movie execs to take another chance on Hellboy, but be glad they did, and hope that someday Hellboy III is just as strong of an effort.

If anyone yells 'Go team!', I'm leaving.

Didja Notice?

Young Hellboy is… terrifying, frankly. Guess he grew into those ears and teeth, huh?
Agent Myers from the first Hellboy movie doesn’t appear because the actor who played him, Rupert Evans, was committed to appearing in a play in London. He’s mentioned in passing, Hellboy claiming to have had him transferred to Antarctica.
I’ll admit it’s kind of badass, but the twirling blade thing is so overplayed, don’t you think?
The Elf King’s guards remind me of Pyramid Head from Silent Hill.
In the first Hellboy movie, all of HB’s fellow agents were named after things found in the earth: Lime, Moss, Quarry, Stone, and Clay. The Golden Army continues the trend, with the agents named after slightly tougher materials: Marble, Flint, and Steel.
At one point a theater marquee can be seen reading “See You Next n sday”. This is a nod to John Landis, who references the fictional film “See You Next Wednesday” in all of his movies.
When Hellboy holds a baby he’s rescuing with his tail and comments “First piece of tail, kid,” my DVD subtitles interpreted that as “First praise the tail, kid.” Which is good advice for everyone, really.
In the comics, Hellboy is simply said to be the son of *a* high-ranking devil; The Golden Army takes this one step further, labeling him as the son of the Fallen One.

Is It Worth Staying Through The End Credits?

Nah.

Intermission!

In Hellboy, Abe Sapien was physically played by Doug Jones, but voiced by an uncredited David Hyde Pierce. Jones would go on to voice Abe in the two animated Hellboy movies, and in The Golden Army he portrays Abe both physically and vocally. Jones also played the Angel of Deat h- the vocal effect was achieved by him recording each line twice, once in a high-pitched voice and once lower-pitched, and overlaying the two.

Nuada’s henchman, the one-eyed troll Mr. Wink, was named after Selma Blair’s one-eyed dog Wink.

She's certainly no uggo, but with all respect, I'll still take Liv Tyler, thanks.

Groovy Quotes

Manning: Officially we do not exist, you see. So that’s the problem when we get these. Subway. Highway. Ah, park. And he posed for this one and gave an autograph. I suppress each photo. Cell phone videos. They cost me a fortune and they show up on YouTube! God, I hate YouTube.

Liz: We have no survivors, no bodies.
Hellboy: Same story here, babe.
Liz: Don’t call me “babe.”
Hellboy: “Abe,” I said. “Abe.” Wrong channel. *flips button* Phew. Abe, I think Liz is still mad at me.
Liz: Still the same channel.

Abe: There are no corpses because there are no leftovers. Have you noticed the floor?
Hellboy: Aw, crap.
Abe: Precisely. All these things do is eat and eat, then poop, and then eat again.
Liz: Remind you of anyone?

Johann: Nice baby!
“Infant”: I’m not a baby, I’m a tumor.

Johann: You will learn to obey me, follow protocol, and stay focused at all times.
Hellboy: Oh, that word, “fockused”? Yeah, with your accent, I wouldn’t use it that much.

Hellboy: You’re in love. Have a beer.
Abe: Oh, my body’s a temple.
Hellboy: Well, now it’s an amusement park.

Liz: We are looking for Prince Nuada.
Goblin: Ah, him I know. Trade me something and I’ll take you to him.
Liz: Here- I have a shiny belt.
Goblin: But I have no pants.
Liz: Look! A wonderful set of magic eyes.
Goblin: I already have binoculars.

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The MRFH Revue 2008 – Drew!

Justin — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 16:52:49 +0000

2008… it’s been an interesting year, to say the least. I’ll leave it to my fellow Mutants to talk about all the dying, instead veering toward the other end of the spectrum with the following advice: if you or your wife are planning on becoming pregnant, make sure the third trimester/due date are in the fall, winter, or early spring. I can’t stress that enough. I was lucky… through nearly the entire summer blockbuster season, my wife was feeling comparatively good and didn’t mind a quick jaunt to the theater. But once that due date starts being measured in days and weeks rather than months, you’d best lay in the Netflix subscription, my friends, because your ass? Not going anywhere.

Speaking of which, what a summer it was, eh? For a comic junkie like me, it would be hard to imagine a better year than 2008. It’s strange to say so in a year with nary a Spider-Man or X-Men film to be found, but what can I say – it was the year of the lesser knowns. I don’t think anyone was expecting much out of Iron Man, but it kicked off the season and completely blew us out of the water… and with its sneaky post-credits scene, whet our appetites for more. The Incredible Hulk followed soon after, and while not quite as universally lauded, still managed to impress most of us and keep the ball rolling. Next we hopped a train to Indietown with Wanted and Hellboy II, both based on more esoteric properties that nonetheless managed to impress critics and attract audiences.

But of course, the 900 lb. juggernaut of the summer was The Dark Knight, which crushed both critical expectations and box office records wherever it roamed. Which was everywhere. Chalk it up to a good story with engaging characters or credit Heath Ledger’s unfortunate passing, but any way you slice it, Batman and co. were unquestionably THE movie to see this year. But proving that karma is more than what ran over my dogma, the tail end of ‘08 restored universal balance with Frank Miller’s interpretation of The Spirit, showing that a talented writer adapting a legendarily acclaimed comic can create a film almost universally derided. I haven’t seen it yet myself, but the previews sure didn’t impress. We’ll see.

Which brings us to 2009 and Watchmen, arguably trumping even The Dark Knight in terms of most anticipated comic movies. Long thought unfilmable due to its incredibly dense story laden with symbolism, director Zack Snyder has decided to have a go at it; we’ll all find out if he succeeded on 03/06/09. (Not a coincidence… one of the story’s repeating motifs is a doomsday clock ticking towards midnight.)

Aside from Watchmen, it’s poised to be a quieter year for comic fans, with no Bat, Super, or Spider-films on the horizon. However, Hugh Jackman will reprise his most famous role in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, bringing back Sabretooth and introducing popular-in-the-90s character Gambit and the merc with a mouth, Deadpool. I’m not sure how cool a Wolverine movie can be that features the Blob and Beak, but time will tell. The real test, of course, will be to see if it can keep the Marvel train rolling. Right now fanboys are salivating over the foreshadowing in Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk of an Avengers movie, but 2011 is a long way off… they’re going to have to really impress with Thor in 2010 if they want to keep the momentum rolling. And on the indie front, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, based on a highly popular (and excellent) series of graphic novels, is tentatively scheduled for 2009 release with Michael Cera starring.

So there you have it. Between comic films galore and, oh, creating new life, 2008 will go down as a memorable year for me, and I hope yours was just as enjoyable. Can 2009 possibly top it? Who knows… but with an upgraded format and two brand spanking new Mutants, we’re up to the challenge of telling you which movies kick ass and which of them suck it. Here’s to another great year!

Drew does Futurama: Bender’s Game

Drew — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 12:33:20 +0000

“Bender, no! When will young people learn that Dungeons & Dragons won’t make you cool?”

The Scoop: 2008 NR, directed by Dwayne Carey-Hill and starring Billy West, Katey Sagal and John Di Maggio.

Summary Capsule: The Planet Express crew attempts to solve the world’s fuel crisis (by… destroying all the world’s fuel), but accidentally gets transported to a land of swords and sorcery. In flagrant violation of alternate universe protocol, no one sports evil goatees.

Drew’s Rating: Okay, I admit it — I fell in with the wrong crowd and played Magic: The Gathering for two years in high school. Dammit, must I be haunted by my mistakes forever? A man can change!

Drew’s Review: If you’re any kind of a Futurama fan (and if not, are you lost or something?), you probably know the story by now: the show aired for 4 seasons on Fox before being cancelled, and has now been revived as a series of 4 direct-to-DVD movies. The most recent entry, Bender’s Game, is the third in the series and the most standalone, which may appeal to those less enamored of dangling plot threads.

Bender’s Big Score reintroduced us to the gang after a long absence and focused on longstanding series continuity, and its cliffhanger led directly into The Beast with a Billion Backs. Likewise, Into the Wild Green Yonder will reportedly clear up at least one ongoing mystery and, if necessary, serve as a final send-off to the series. That leaves us with Bender’s Game, definitely the easiest for a casual fan to pick up and watch, and romance-phobes can take heart: no Fry/Leela, no Amy/Kif, no Bender/hookerbots. This one’s all about the comedy, kids.

The adventure du jour centers around skyrocketing fuel prices thanks to longtime nemesis Mom, the universe’s only supplier of dark matter. Fed up, Professor Farnsworth reveals he was the one who discovered dark matter’s use as a fuel source decades ago, as well as something else: two attuned crystals that, if brought together, will destroy all dark matter in the universe. One is under constant surveillance in Mom’s arctic stronghold, and the other is… being used as a makeshift gaming die by Farnsworth’s son Cubert, his nerdy friends, and Bender Titanius Inglesmith, fancy man of Cornwood. Before you can say copyright infringement, an attempt to bring the crystals together leads to our heroes being thrown into a fantasy world of dungeons, dragons and dorks, with their only hope being to hurl the Die of Power into the geysers of Gygax before evil Momon can recover it. But with Frydo succumbing to the temptation of the ring die and Legola’s efforts to renounce her violent ways, is the fellowship boned before it’s even begun?

Here’s the good news: it’s funny. I mentioned earlier that Bender’s Game doesn’t bog itself down in continuing series subplots – Nibbler’s people get some additional backstory, but you don’t need to know anything else about them to enjoy the movie. With their characters in a new venue, the writers are free to just concentrate on the jokes, and the result is a film that feels more lighthearted and enjoyable than their last offering. It reminds me of one of my favorite episodes of the original series, “The Farnsworth Parabox,” where half the entertainment came from seeing the various alternate versions of themselves the Planet Express crew encountered. In this case, the writers get some good mileage out of Tolkien-izing their cast… Gynecaladriel, queen of the water nymphos is a personal favorite, and predictable gag or not, I defy anyone not to laugh at mighty Hermaphrodite. There’s also some amusing meta-commentary with Fry finding the antics of Mom’s 3 Stooges-esque sons hilarious while Leela and Amy think they’re boring and insipid. (And ladies, you are wrong. So, so wrong.)

If I have any criticism, it’s that Bender’s Game isn’t quite sure what it wants to be. Instead of one cohesive movie, it feels more like two extended episodes jammed together with only the barest of threads connecting them. The fuel shortage storyline and the D&D spoof are funny individually, but they never exactly seem to gel – the chain reaction that tosses everyone into the fantasy world is barely an afterthought, not even given the pseudo-scientific nonsense explanation that comes standard in sci-fi shows and comic books. Say the positrons collided in just the right way, explain that the crystals gained sentience and brought Bender’s fantasy to life, tell me the flux capacitor overloaded, whatever… just give me something. Yes, I know it’s Futurama, not Doctor bloody Who, but if I’ve watched the movie three times and still couldn’t tell you in the slightest how the characters got to or from the fantasy world, that’s a sign that it wasn’t explained clearly. Or that I’m special ed, but as I’m sure we all just got a hearty laugh out of that one, let’s move on.

Bender’s Game is one of those films where it doesn’t really matter what recommendation I give: if you’re a Futurama fan you’re going to see it anyway, and if you’re not you aren’t even reading this, so your mother. Still, I’m happy to report that while it isn’t my favorite of the DVD movies, it is a solid entry in the series and an excellent way to cleanse the palate, as it were, before the (possibly) final Futurama adventure. What else needs to be said? Have at it.

NEEEEERDS!

Didja Notice?

A sign in the Planet Express locker room reads “No pointing and laughing.”
Bender is incarcerated in the “HAL Institute For Criminally Insane Robots,” a reference to 2001: A Space Odyssey. In addition, Nurse Ratchet is a tip of the hat to One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest.
One of the robots in Bender’s group therapy session is Rosie from The Jetsons.
Nibbler was last seen at the end of Bender’s Big Score yelling “Everyone out of the universe!” and imploding. His reappearance in Bender’s Game isn’t explained, but Fry and Leela mention not being surprised he can talk because he forgot to mindwipe them after the last time.
Titanius Inglesmith’s family motto (shown on his sleeping bag) is machina ex deo, Latin for “the machine from God.” His coat of arms is a nut and bolt, an alkaline battery, and a chalice of ale.
After the credits they show a clip from a past Futurama episode of Gary Gygax (creator of D&D) saying “Anyone wanna play Dungeons & Dragons for the next quadrillion years?”

'They wants to steal it, my precioussss'

Intermission

Into the Wild Green Yonder

Groovy Quotes

Bender: You’re right. I’m great in every way except I have no imagination. All I ever wanted is to play this magical game, and I can’t.
Dwight: Yes you can. You just have to lose yourself in the fantasy. You have to believe the impossible is merely preposterous.

Professor: The collar will be triggered anytime your thoughts turn to violence-
Leela: OUCH!
Professor: -profanity-
Leela: Son of a- OW!
Professor: -or perversions of a sexual nature.
Leela: …………OW!

Rod Serling: In the end, it was not guns or bombs that defeated the aliens, but that humblest of all God’s creatures, the Tyrannosaurus rex.

Fry: Bender, no! When will young people learn that Dungeons & Dragons won’t make you cool?

Professor: Good God! Just knowing we’re in the same genus makes me embarrassed to call myself homo.

Fry: There are so many killbots behind us, I can’t count them all! Three, I think!

Legola: I can’t believe I’m saying this, but that was really exciting. I’ve never felt so alive! What else can we slay? Is that a hobbit over there?
Titanius Inglesmith: Naw, that’s a hobo and a rabbit. But they’re making a hobbit.

Grayfarn: Of course! Wipe Castle! And while we’re there, we can get some of those greasy little dwarf burgers.

Gynecaladriel: Ooh, I love those! You can eat like eight of them without gaining any weight, ’cause of all the diarrhea!

Frydo: I… I’m too exhausted, I can’t go on.
Zoidberg: I’m here for you, my friend. I’ll drag you onward, even to my last ounce of strength. Grab onto my testicles!
Frydo: …you know, I think maybe I can walk after all.

Frydo: So it’s all come down to this: a dungeon, and dragons.
Zoidberg: I didn’t see it coming.

Classic always triumphs updated. Always.

DVD Review

Feast your eyes on commentary with the directors and voice actors, storyboard animatics, a “D&D&F” (Dungeons & Dragons & Futurama) featurette, a lesson on how to draw Futurama in 83 easy steps, some deleted scenes and bloopers, and a sneak peek at the next Futurama movie. Of special note are the anti-piracy warning where Bender of all people advises you not to steal in his own special way, and a bizarre “genetics lab” where you can mix n’ match pieces of your favorite Futurama characters to create hybrid abominations in the eyes of God and man. If that’s what does it for you.

If You Liked This Movie, Try These:

Futurama: Bender’s Big Score
Futurama: The Beast with a Billion Backs
The Simpsons Movie

Drew’s Mutant Viewing of A Christmas Carol (1938)

Justin — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 12:29:44 +0000

It’s a simple concept. A beloved Christmas story written in 1843. A film version created in 1938, available for free on On Demand. Friday night, beer, wine and a sausage pizza. A joint collaboration by Drew, Lady Luck, and Baby Luck (whose creative contributions were minimal but whose inspiration proved invaluable).

Let’s get our Christmas on, kids.

[0:03] Drew: Sweet, the old-school MGM lion. The one that looked like it would rip your face off if you didn’t sit through the entire movie.

[0:05] Tiny Tim: Oh, no thank you, guv’nor. I’m not very good at running. See, my father took an extra lump of coal last Christmas and Mr. Scrooge broke my leg in three places. He… he was right to do it, sir.

[0:06] Lady Luck: Is Scrooge’s nephew supposed to be so flamboyantly gay?
Drew: Well, or a 1930s actor playing an Englishman. Same difference.
Lady Luck: Either way, he needs to lay off the eye shadow.

[0:07] Drew: Doesn’t it kind of defeat the purpose to have a fat guy playing Bob Cratchit? I guess that second chin explains why Tiny Tim has nothing to eat.

[0:09] Drew: It is pretty hilarious to see Bob actually reaching into the fire to pull lumps of coal back out. Whh-pssh!

[0:11] Drew: I want to be a Hollywood screenwriter in the 1930s. Take a popular book, copy the dialogue literally word-for-word, submit that sucker, and wait for your Oscar. Works for me.

[0:13] Lady Luck: Uh, Scrooge’s pants are WAY too tight.
Drew: Wow, he is sporting a little moose knuckle, huh?
Lady Luck: No, that’s the worst part, he isn’t… somehow he’s got camel toe.
Drew: Ew.

[0:24] Drew: These are some pretty decent special effects for 1938. Oh, but hold up- I didn’t realize the English police force of the 18th century was comprised entirely of oversized leprechauns. “Now Mister Scrooge, don’t you be callin’ us for any more false alarms, or I’ll be breakin’ me shillelagh on yer ‘ead. Run along now.”

[0:29] Scrooge: Couldn’t I take all three at once and have it over?
Drew: Ah, how many an adult film star has uttered those words before?

[0:31] Drew: Whoa, the Ghost of Christmas Past is hot!
Lady Luck: Maybe Scrooge thinks Cratchit is trying to get his job back by hiring a stripper for him.
Drew: He does look like he wants to do the nasty with the Pasty.

[0:35] Drew: “Whatever, I didn’t want to go home for Christmas anyway. I’d rather stay here and study so I can graduate with honors.”
Lady Luck: Hey!
Drew: Don’t worry, you didn’t skip Hanukkah to get your honors. You’ll never be visited by three spirits trying to teach you how to make oil last for 8 days.

[0:39] Drew: Wait, they skipped the entire subplot with Scrooge’s fiancee leaving him because he’d grown obsessed with money. This movie has ten expletive deleted minutes of Bob Cratchit throwing snowballs and they cut that scene? Weak.

[0:41] Scrooge: Have you had many brothers, spirit?
Ghost of Christmas Present: A huge number, some… eighteen hundred.
Lady Luck: Perhaps mommy and daddy need to learn about a little something called contraceptives, hmm?

Scrooge: Did you say walk, or fly?
Ghost of Christmas Past: Touch my p- robe. My robe. *ahem* Touch it now.

[0:42] Scrooge: What do you sprinkle from that horn that made them stop quarreling?
Drew: Uh, Scrooge, it‘s vodka. 180 proof.
Lady Luck: No, I think he’s actually getting them stoned. His “Christmas spirit” is the ganja.

[0:45] Lady Luck: Ouch. Tiny Tim, there’s a reason you’re not in the Boys Choir.
Drew: And it’s not because you can’t run after them.

[0:47] Lady Luck: My, that’s awfully enlightened of Fred to say a priest has no soul.

[0:48] Drew: Mrs. Cratchit, you need a way more supportive bra than that.
Lady Luck: She does have quite the large knockers, doesn’t she?
Drew: Yeah, but not the good kind.

[0:51] Bob: There never was such a goose. And reasonable, too.
Tiny Tim: I- I’d like to stroke it!
Lady Luck: Whoa! Inappropriate at the table, Tim. Save it for your bedroom.

[0:54] Tiny Tim: I’m sure I’m going to burst!
Bob: Not in here, my lad, if you want to burst you go outside.
Lady Luck: Dammit, Tim, what did I just say?

[0:55] Fred: QED, he punishes himself.
Lady Luck: “QED”?
Drew: Yeah, it basically means “ergo.”
Lady Luck [glaring]: …sorry, I didn’t quite hear what my unpretentious, not foolish husband just said.
Drew: Uh, I said I don’t know what it means.
Lady Luck: Good, neither do I.

[1:01] Drew: So I guess Bob Cratchit finally ate Tiny Tim? That’s a shame.

[1:05] Drew: I get that Scrooge is all freaked out at seeing his grave, but I don’t understand why he thinks mending his ways is going to change that. Did he just learn the extra special secret that, psst, good people never die?

[1:07] Lady Luck: They really have a thing for showing geese with their feet still attached and their necks swinging to and fro, don’t they? Gross.

[1:09] Scrooge: Merry Christmas, Bob! Here, give this to your wife.
Bob: Well, let’s see- you’re not my boss anymore, you just barged into my home uninvited, then shoved a giant dead bird in my face and ordered my wife to disembowel it. Sure, why not?

[1:10] Drew: How mean do you have to have been for a warm greeting on your part to make a wife hide in the pantry while ordering her husband to make sure you’re not murdering the children? Ouch.

[1:11] Lady Luck: Well said, Tiny Tim. Now, maybe after your polio is taken care of Scrooge can get you to an orthodontist, because… damn.

So that’s that. We hope you enjoyed this brief look into our dull, everyday home life, and we wish you all the best in the coming year. Happy holidays!