Film Review :' 'the Batman"

 Matt Reeves has a pretty clear vision of the Batman he wanted to bring to life. This allowed him to cast Robert Pattinson, as the Dark Knight, and focus on the early noir of the detective days. After all DC stand for Detective Comics. Comparisons to movies like "Seven" could be applied. The gimp version of the Riddler even worked. The less you saw of him the better. This is Batman year two so I f not to get too hung up over the first fight scene that saw just common gang members able to take more than one punch from Batman. Early buzz about the movie made claims that this was the best Batman movie ever on one side of the fence and that it was too woke on the other. In 2022 we have allowed a narrative to flourish that a rich white man would be the enemy, so that would be Bruce Wayne how did they handle this?  

The Riddler was a social justice warrior who wanted to bring this into the light. The politics of this film were much like the riddles the villain set up if you look into the layers the joke might be on you. We find that Thomas Wayne, whose relationship with Falcone leans onto the "Long Halloween" storyline. Wayne whose politics must be left leaning considering how much he gives to those in need, something that is even brought up by a political candidate who asks Bruce to follow in his father's footsteps, askes the gangster to have someone taken care of, which would align him more with the Clintons.  So who is the movie covertly mocking? Or is this an even handed message that all power corrupts no matter than hat they are wearing. 

It was when the Riddler's mask comes off that the movie falls apart, It almost recreates the scene with Heather Ledger and Bale in the second Nolan film. In fact this is where the movie loses the focus it started with and tries to hard to be a Nolan film. The climatic final battle, was too formulaic, We find Batman most in peril because he is hanging by one arm. This is a guy who swings around Gotham , climbing on buildings, he has been doing it for two years, do you mean to tell me he can not do a one arm pull up? Not buying it. Leading up to this i dozed off a few times, as the movie was that captivating, but the parts a slept through needed to be edited any way as it did not miss a beat with the storyline, much of the bloat could have been trimmed and this film given more focus. Lots of wasted potential .Pattinson was better than expected but as a physical prescience, even Keaton was better.  I wished the move kept the tone of the first 30 minutes. 

Marvel's Hawkeye

 

The Disney Plus shows have been a mixed bag. There have been strong moments with Wandavision possibly being the best, though I do like those character more than the others that have graced the small screen. The Netflix material had its moments the first season of Jessican Jones, the Punisher and Daredevil being the strongest and the rest boring to unwatchable. Hawkeye is better than Falcon and Winter Solider. It flows more seamlessly out of the movies and does what only Spider-Man No Way Home has done which is attempted to reconcile those Netflix shows with the movies, by bringing Kingpin in. Matt Murdock was in No Way Home only for 30 seconds at most, and Kingpin's character in Hawkeye is closer to the comics. Renner shows how comfortable he is in the role. Hailee Steinfield works really well as Kate Bishop and is a likeable character, so it happens in a very organic way than Marvel shoving a female superhero down our throats.  

Not to say the shove does not occur and predictably fail with the introduction of Echo. The character has no personality. Which was never really developed much in the comic books, there was talk hyping her up for her own series which is hopefully something Marvel rethinks as that would be watching paint dry as she can work well supporting say Daredevil, but the show does not flesh her out, nor should it since we already have other characters like the Swordsman, who is more charming and interesting. We also get Yelena, the other Balck Widow, who was introduced in the Black Widow solo movie. She has also grown into her role. The show was a bland of action and story that felt very natural along with the staple humor the movies have been known for.

I am far more interested in Moon Knight and She-Hulk as characters, so it makes me hopeful to see those if Marvel can make me root for a character, I am lukewarm on, though I have been reading comics for over forty years so even then forty years with any character and you gain more affinity for than not. It is wise to streamline these down to 6 episodes as it takes out a great deal of filler so it never drags. They did alot right here so hopefully they learned from this going forward.    

The Truth About the Punisher

It is time to clear up some misconceptions about the Punisher. The children of today who are prone to cry about everything raised their tiny fists in the air to take offense at police and supporters of police using the Punisher’s logo as their own coat of arms. While generation outrage is correct in pointing out that the Punisher is not a fan of police, the joke is still on them. If they do not like Police then they really are not going to like Frank Castle and need to wake up to why he doesn’t like them. Frank Castle is not against police brutality. He thinks police are not brutal enough. That is why he kills criminals because he thinks the system is just going to spit them back out on the streets. He sees criminals as a problem that needs to be ended. 

 When Frank Castle first graced the pages of Spider-man in 1974 he was the villain. Over the years that followed he continued to come up against actual superheroes like Daredevil, Iron-Man, Wolverine and Ghost Rider. He was not created with the intention of being a hero, but Marvel has a long tradition of turning villains you acquire enough popularity into “anti-heroes” because why not cash in. It paid off as the Punisher has had longer stretches of carrying his own book than both Captain Marvel and Black Panther combined. He has appeared in three movies and carried multiple tv shows. It is unlikely he is going anywhere since he has made Marvel a ton of money.

 Marvel’s only Punisher problem is finding the balls to point out. this is who the character is and not all products are for all people. A person who does not want to watch a Punisher show or read a Punisher comic has other options to choose from. Just like it is not realistic to like everyone in the world, the Marvel Universe should be no different. You are not going to like every character, but that does not mean they need to change. You are opposed to police brutality, well then, the Punisher is going to be harder to handle as he wants to skip all due process and be judge, jury executioner. Funny enough, in the current cancel culture due process is not really a thing, but I guess that is just a matter of convenience. Most superheroes are vigilantes. They do not go to the lengths Frank Castle does, perhaps even having to hold back because they have superpowers making them more capable of killing than Frank who is just a normal man. I think his dedication and intensity is what makes Frank an interesting character and one of the few sonic book character who does not have powers that I like, typically because the stories are so dark. He has worked as a character for almost 50 years and there are many more stories worth telling with him, if you do not like him or what he stands for then just do not read or watch them,

Film Review : Spider-man No Way Home

 This phase of the Spider-man trilogy comes to an end in a big way. I have a couple of friends who have not cared for Tom Holand in the role and this movie dismisses such notions in a very vivid manner. It picks up where the previous film left off with Parker's identity being revealed. If you have seen the trailer and have half a brain the plot is not surprise. Nor are there any surprises that are not numbered among the fan theories. Though there are a few theories that do not come to life, this movie does not include Captain Marvel who was rumored to appear and try to hunt Spider Man down. Nor does Miles Morales appear. Kraven the Hunter is also not one of the film's villains.  Dr. Strange is one of the main characters but really only bookends the film, yet this movie is a clear cut set up for his sequel. 

If you did not like the previous Holland movies, I do not think you are going to like this one. Since magic figures in as a key plot point, if you need hyper realism then stick to Bat-man movies.  It feels more like a comic book. Which is the tone these movies should have. They try to fix a few problems the movies have had. It is well paced and two of the major fan's theories do occur and pay off well. It almost made me think if the internet buzz is the new focus group and wonder if Marvel did reshoots for these. I think there is a balance of meeting expectations. The focal point is not his legal disputes though the thought of Spider-man being painted as a more of an anti-hero is present. His relationship with Dr. Strange is pretty comics accurate.  I think the only flaw in the movie this version of MJ.  She worked better in the previous film, but the chemistry is not believable and trying to paint them as a couple in real life is one of the oldest Hollywood tricks in the book, if you need an example of this watch the movie "Hail Caeser" . I give that picture they are trying to paint with them a month or two before that clause in their contract expires. 

Yes, this movie is a huge marketing vehicle. The Marvel brand is out the center. To the point that this is the first time one of the post credit scenes has been a trailer. This is done in a way that works and is not heavy handed until that moment. The movie is a lot of fun, one of the strengths is how it redeem William Dafoe, who has the movies best performance, no that is not a spoiler, he is in the trailer so if you get your feelings hurt by thinking it is, then go fuck yourself.  This movie sets up the next phase of Marvel movies better than anything we have seen so far and is the best of the four Marvel movies released this year.   

Marvel Comics -2021 a Year in Review

 When I started this blog, I reviewed the comics that came out every week. Perhaps I need to go back to that, are maybe once a month would be a better goal, as their need to be some voice of quality control out there which does not just pay lip service to the current comics trends since that is what got us here in the first place. Marvel is a mess this can be summed up in the most recent Kazar comic. How hard is Kazar to mess up? Instead, they turn it into an acid trip, giving him new powers, when it is ok that he is their version of Tarzan, there is no reason to turn him into Animal Man. They want to celebrate but the artist felt the need to slut shame Shanna because her costume has worked for years. Is he a character that could use more depth? Yes, but this story does not do that and the art is awful

It is not all bad news, when the Fantastic Four is not cluttered up by becoming a home for wayward cosmic kids, they capture the feel of the first family and the art works. But the bulk of their books clutter up the stories by diluting the book with supporting casts that take away from what makes the hero special. Hulk was the first I noticed falling victim to this when we saw too much focus place on a multitude of other colored hulks.  do we need a Red and Green She-hulk? The off-shoot books from this work, but not as a main book. The Immortal Hulk book got mired into this as we had Sasquatch merged with Doc Sampson tagging along, which did not play to the strength of Leonard Sampson and melding the two characters did nothing.  They tried making She-Hulk more like Banner and took away what makes Jennifer Walters work.  The whole Hulk spaceship story they are on now is going to tank hard, I think Immortal might not have been as great as people made it out to be, but was better than what we are getting now.  

The Avengers would work better with Vision and Scarlets Witch re-joining the team and getting rid of Blade and Ghost Rider, who did not fit and are not about the same kinds of missions. Blade was best made an example of in Hulk when he just threw him across the city. If it is not a vampire, then it is not his problem. Both Spider-man and the X-men suffer from similar problems, though perhaps Spider-man to a lesser extent. The Hulk issue we touched on earlier too many Spider-people. The X-men are clustered up on a island, which is not unlike the Mansion in that regard, but rather than focus on certain characters in certain books, we get a bunch of books that have no focus. 4 X books is what works best Uncanny, the main team big mutant threats. X-Force- black ops team. X-- Factor- the CSI teem and New Mutants, the training camp.

With Spider-man, it felt like we were circling the same drain. the Black Cat off shoot book at times working better. Amazing is really all we need, Spider-woman works thought Jessica Drew does not need to get mired down into other spiders, nor does Mile Morales need his own clone sage, it is like they never learn. Thor was another hit or miss book, that jumped around to Thor's past and future and forgot what makes him great. This unworthy thing, well I have talked about how if Jesus was a comic character, they would never treat him that way. Why kill off Dr. Strange? he is the least likely character to stay dead as he knows how to traverse the astral plane. Why replace Daredevil with Elektra?   

Over in DC the Bat books are overcrowded with other Bat characters so learn the lesson here. The days of big events are done, they were all anti-climactic anyway. Hopefully 2022 sees Sentry coming back and more Elsa Bloodstone. Given to how they follow the movies expect big emphasis to the point of over kill for Moon Knight, Ms. Marvel, She Hulk, and the movie stars pending Thor, Dr. Strange and Capt. Marvel. Which I am fine with as two of those are two of my favorite characters. Comic books are already on life support sales wise do stick with what works and build off it rather than deconstruction and build it back into something that does not work. 

Film Review : the Eternals

 

There is a great deal that needs clearing up in regards to "the Eternals" . Both the "gay" superhero hype and the film's underwhelming Rotten Tomato score, which has marked it as the MCU's worst film. It shows you how fair weather critics can be, and how hyping a movie based on a marketing agenda with a false sense of inclusion is running out of gas, if this box office does to show the tank is already on empty. We had the "first" black superhero movie from Marvel studios, since we are not supposed to count "Blade" and if you did not think "Black Panther " was a great movie you were a racist. Though the tides have turned , since not liking  "Eternals "  does not make you a homophobe. Despite the gay back lash over this hype, this movie is far from "Brokeback Mountain". The fact the character is gay is a minor detail, really only accented by the most awkward kiss we have seen in a Marvel movie .In truth Kingo's character seemed more gay. Kingo's character also show how Marvel makes a mess when trying to force diversity, as this Indian heroes being a part of the Bollywood world plays into stereotypes in a more racist way. I am surprised it is not getting banned in India as well, it is worse that what they did with Shang Chi, But they needed an angle since know one knew who the Eternals were unless they were a hard core Marvel comics reader. 

The Eternals tend to only cross over in the more cosmic titles , with perhaps Hulk being the one exception, but he traverses so many places he runs into everyone at some point. They do not come in contact with the street level heroes at all really . Thor , Dr. Strange and Fantastic Four, sure even Captain America not so much ,really due to the fact they they are so far out of his league in terms of their powers. The movie conveys this pretty well. It does a good job of making the more unknow among the like Druig and Gilgamesh more fully formed characters. Where Ikarus is more card board due to his stoic nature. There is some gender flipping as Ajax is a make character and is portrayed n the film by Selma Hayek. What the movie does get wrong is the lineage of when these beings were created and in what order as well as leaving out some character in the comics that might have made for more interesting story telling.  

This movie could have uses some serious editing, but it was more fun than tedious. I think some of the elements that could have taken it from being just ok to great would have been to go ahead and use Black Knight, Star Fox and Pip. There was speculation of Hercules being in this . Instead we get characters used in ways that might not have played up to their strengths.. The Deviants would have been better served in a more humanoid form like they are in the comics , rather than just video game monsters. There is more fighting and action than the trailers lead you to believe I would say on par with Justice League. This movie is more like the Thor films than other Marvel movies. It is better than both Shang Chi and Black Widow, as well as Black Panther and Captain Marvel. It could have been better and maybe Marvel is going to learn their lesson when it comes to straying from source material, I think it will also serve as a wake up call regarding the direction they have been heading if it is not too late to course correct.      

       

Film Review : "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings"

 The monumental accomplishment of this movie by Marvel Studios was the make the studios first Asian super hero movie did this by making a sampler platter of all the other Asian super heroes that just do not fall under the Marvel banner. We have have some breaded "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" cheese sticks. We have a side of Sesame "Dragon Ball z" balls, along with bacon glazed Jackie Chan strips. When some white guys from New York decided they wanted their own comic book version of Bruce Lee back in the 70s, they  created Shang Chi, the Master of Kung fu- David Csrradine also had a show with a similar premise at the time. Over the years the character managed to stay on life support cropping up here and their , but was a 3rd stringer who mainly sat on the bench. So when the actor playing him seems to grasp at straws in a effort to make him something other than a Bruce Lee homage, well that is because he never really had much of a fleshed personality. 

While I think a good rule of thumb for super hero movies would be a a minimum requirement of being able to carry at least a hundred issues under the belt, to have them and their world flesh out . Marvel just wants to pump out product and will do whatever to market it. The first hour of the movie is fun, but it is there when the formula begins to reveal itself. We are going to have a big fight, then tell you a fable about the days past when all this back story is supposed to matter.  While I like how the untangled the mess they created with Iron-Man's version of the Mandarin, Every one is pretty disposable, aside from his comic relief side kick all the other supposedly kick ass women who make up his familiar are all inter changeable. Depending on where you are in the story his mother , aunt and sister could all be the same person. While praise is being heaped on the Mandarin, is he really any different from another evil emperor we have seen be it from "Mulan"  or insert martial arts movie here. 

The trap this movie falls into is the third act gets lost in non-sensical anime like fantasy. Does it have to have dragons in it ? Wait isn't that stereo typing? Shang Chi at any time could have been replaced by Iron Fist and it would have almost been the same movie. When he does get more powered up there is not explanation , and these are certainly not what his powers are in the comic books. Instead we get a bunch of non sense that feels like a child dumping all their action figures on the bed and trying to come up with a fight for them to have. This fantasy wonder land of eye candy is an exaggeration, yeah we get cgi creatures walking around but otherwise t he land scape looks no different than any other martial arts movie which is what this is, just another martial arts movie with a heavy dose of fantasy. More manga than Marvel.