The Hype Machine...Comes Through?

I've enjoyed a good deal of Mark Millar's work, but his incessant hyping of it makes me less and less likely to try his new projects. The slowness with which they eek out is a deterrent, too, but it's really his endlessly hyping up his own abilities, successes and spinning of his shortcomings as wins that push me away.

But damn if it doesn't work for him.

I don't know how it happened, but somehow I've found up on e-mail alerts from The Hollywood Reporter throughout the day about any entertainment developments. Two of them today have included news about Hollywood Mark Millar:

Universal in Negotiations to Pick Up 'War Heroes' Comic Book Project (Exclusive)

&

'X-Men' Director Matthew Vaughn Developing Mark Millar Comics 'The Secret Service,' 'Superior'

Though, it is interesting to note, that the second THR article asserts that Vaughn co-created The Secret Service property, which makes this appear more like Millar is a hired hand in the process with Vaughn than the full-fledged creative force that he more often sells himself as. The appearance of this point, coupled with the article mentioning that Vaughn wants to get back more control from start-to-finish of his projects, seems to suggest that he may have played a large role in formulating the key points that the project launches from and then handed it off to Millar to flesh it out.

Regardless, success for comic book projects in other media still brings at least a modicum of attention back to the medium that was its source...and if War Heroes is a success, I'll be thrilled for the payday it might bring to Tony F___ing Harris, stand-up guy and outspoken workers' rights fella on Twitter.

Uh-Durrrrrrrr

(or why I hope the CGI is still being tweaked in a movie I'm otherwise fairly excited to see)

Green Lantern Trailer Hits Web

So...That's Green Lantern?

If you haven't seen the image of Ryan Reynolds as Green Lantern before, there it is on the right.

I don't love it. I don't even like it, really. But I don't hate it, either.

From what can be seen in the image, it seems to be solid green (other than the symbol) with texturing that is supposed to constantly reinforce to the viewer that it is an energy construct threaded together from hard light.

One of the most basic points of honest-to-goodness iconic super-hero costume design, IMO, is keeping it to 2-3 colors. The best (read: easiest to get right) combinations are generally some balanced mixture of black, white and another color. Most of the costumes that are busier than that or select colors that aren't as natural together succeeded because they were introduced in different/simpler times and have been ingrained into pop culture.

So, this outfit that seems to be just green, aside from the white in the symbol? Not so iconic or dynamic. A bit of a dud. Here's hoping they decide to tweak it a bit, since it is all CGI anyway.

Great Scott, The Economy Is Fucked, Isn't It?

So, I'm watching cable news and the Lending Tree commercial with the Adam West voiceover comes on. The idea is that Lending Tree somehow makes the average person a financial super-hero.

So, after shaking my head, once again, at how cornball it is, I start thinking about how over-the-top this country's current love affair with comic book properties is. I mean...using it to advertise something as stiff-collared as financial products?

Then it dawned on me that the last time super-heroes and comic book properties were this popular came about during the Great Depression in the states.


More than being simply something new, they were popular because the population really needed to completely escape from the reality surrounding them. They needed to daydream of being super-human or otherworldly enough that such trivial things as room & board didn't even register on their list of things to be concerned by.

Technology has caught up to the ideas contained in super-hero fiction, so this renewed interest isn't translating into sales of comic books, just licensing of their product for other media.

In 1940, the price of a comic was 10 cents and a movie ticket 24 cents. Today, comic books cost $3-5 a pop. Movie tickets? Well, much like they did in the Great Depression, some chains are finding that they have to reduce prices on tickets to lure in customers and hope they buy items at the concession stand.

Locally, the stadium seating Cinemark has dropped their full price tickets to $6.50 and the outdated one has been locked in at $6 for years (with a matching drop quite possible in the future). Both Cinemark locations have $4 tickets for their matinée showings (start times before 6pm). The AMC theaters in the area (and, I believe, many non-metropolitan areas) have all of their Monday-Thursday tickets (except for Wednesday debuts and 11:59pm Thursday first showings) priced at $5, regardless of showtime.

Now, I'm not trying to renew that ages old "movies/videogames/etc offer more bang for the buck than comic books" argument. I'm just saying that other media can and do offer the same types of stories, making it possible that the public can quench their thirst for escapism without having to change their entertainment consumption habits.

But hey kids: depressions (or really drastic recessions) make the rest of the country appreciate some of the same characters you've loved for years.

Iron Man 2: Mickey Rourke As Whiplash

Found on USA Today.

Summer Movies Thus Far

Lately, I haven't been able to get to preview screenings due to my schedule being filled at night these days. That doesn't mean I have failed to see the newest movies...just that I haven't felt the urge to blog about them right away since they'd only go up after they debut now. I have some time, so I thought I'd give my opinion on what I've seen.

X-Men: Origins: Wolverine

Stepping away from it as a comic fan, it wasn't a half-bad summer-popcorn-action flick. There are several things that have been changed from comic continuity, but you have to go in expecting that these days. Not because it NEEDS to be changed, but because Hollywood ALWAYS feels compelled to make changes. The movie has moments of comic relief and quite a bit of action. I was personally happy that they included Wolverine's being nearly immortal (as in he's been stuck in his 30s since at least WWI or WWII, from the looks of it). What we saw of Deadpool towards the end of the movie was a bastardization of the existing character, but 1) it's a summer-popcorn-action flick, not the latest issue of a Marvel comic and b) there are questions as to whether that's actually Deadpool. It's by no means a perfect movie, but it isn't the steaming pile that so many myopic comic readers have accused it of being.

Star Trek

Hands down, the best summer action movie at this point in the release schedule. The characters pull you right into the story and the action keeps you from breaking your attention away. I understand that there are a number of old school Trek fans that are livid about the reboot, despite the fact that it is treated as an alternate history. If you follow science regarding the possibilities of time travel, the most dominant theory is that any change in the past creates a fork in the river of time. The two branches go forward: one being history as we knew it and the other being the left turn we forced it to take. So the new can co-exist with the old.

Yikes, for wanting to really just address the quality of the movies, I sure am dealing with fanboy complaints too much.

UP

What a beautiful movie. I don't get the people that say this succeeds where WALL-E failed, because a) I saw no failure in that flick and 2) there's no reason to tear one down to praise the other. If you watch this movie and don't feel your eyes well up a time or two, you have no heart. It's a love story and not just of the romantic kind. See the movie and you'll get what I mean.

Land of the Lost

I wasn't some great fan of the TV show. I caught a few episodes as a kid and didn't find myself moved to change the channel away from it. So I went into this flick with far fewer expectations and demands than someone who spent many Saturdays glued to the set watching it. For what it's worth, I enjoyed the flick on a purely "Will Ferrell and Danny McBride riffing" level. It worked on East Bound & Down and it entertains here. While not being worthy of box office blockbuster numbers, it isn't a waste of the price of admission, either.

The Hangover

Hilarious. Deserving of the R rating and it's very successful weekend. Bradley "That Guy From Wedding Crashers" Cooper leads the cast, but Ed Helms and Zach Galifianakis (I spelled that without looking it up) match him at every step. The cringe humor involving Zach's character really helped bring the funny. A few of the bigger laughs are actually in a credit sequence that the cast frames at the end of the flick. I'm going to give some thought to catching this a second time.

Angels & Demons

I wasn't a huge fan of DaVinci Code, but decided to give this a shot anyway. Less Audrey Tautou makes a film less good. In many ways, the plot was better and you felt more tension in their race to decode all of the clues, but it wound up being predictable at the same time. Ron Howard is a much better director than Dan Brown is a writer, it would appear...because it is clear his touches are what made either of the films enjoyable.

Terminator Salvation

While I felt the flick disappointed, dragging on in parts and found lacking in the tried & true chase formula of previous installments, I didn't feel any regret for spending my money on a ticket. It was enjoyable, despite not living up to expectations. I became a little more frustrated with it when I found that Christian Bale diva'd his way into screwing up the flick, though. But still...it's a good, not great, film that continues the Terminator mythos. It succeeds when the Terminator hybrid is on screen and flounders when he is not.

Night at the Museum II

I felt this suffered from being more of the same we encountered in the first flick. Whereas the original had the benefit of being a fresh idea, this one didn't really seem to get past being a retread. There's only so many big man jokes Owen Wilson can make about Ben Stiller before you hope he dies gasping for air under a mountain of sand. This is where it clearly embraces being a family film: kids can watch the same schtick over and over and over without necessarily getting bored.

Still hoping to get out to see Drag Me To Hell soon. I'll probably see the latest Potter, but there's nothing left this summer that I can really say I'm looking forward to.

How about you?

Fantastic Four Movie Reboot?

From Rottentomatoes.com:

#1 FANTASTIC FOUR ALREADY GETTING A REMAKE

IESB.net broke the exclusive news this week that 20th Century Fox, which is developing reboots of Marvel's Daredevil and their Planet of the Apes franchise, now also has plans to reboot Fantastic Four completely from scratch. This means none of the same cast will return, and most importantly (I think) neither will director Tim Story, who arguably exaggerated the lighter aspects of the classic Marvel Comics title, so much that it became just plain goofy and basically a kids movie. Both recent movies were hits ($290 million and $330 million), but they were also critically reviled (26% and 35% on the Tomatometer), and are generally unpopular with comics fans. IESB.net says that Fox wants the new version to be "less bubble gum" and more like Iron Man.

Yeah...every studio wants their superhero movies to be like Iron Man or Dark Knight now. It's ridiculous that they tend to think that making the movies exactly like previous blockbusters will lead to them raking in the cash. Never mind that, if it were that easy, there'd be a billion dollar movie out every weekend.

By the way, Hollywood is running out of ideas when it makes a Donkey Punch movie. I'd expect a movie with that title to be made in the valley, not by the studios.

BEST. MOVIE. TIE-IN. EVER.

Courtesy of Topless Robot

Well, Now The Mainstream Moviegoer Has Spoken

There's been much complaining about The Spirit since the first images and trailers started coming out. But it had come largely from the comic book community and revolved around how much it seemed to become THE SIN CITY SPIRIT, rather than resembling anything Will Eisner ever did.

That sort of thing doesn't bother the mainstream moviegoer, though. So, what did they think of the film? Box Office Mojo has how they expressed their opinion with their dollars:

Also opening, The Spirit drew a piddling estimated $6.5 million over the weekend on around 2,600 screens at 2,509 theaters for $10.4 million in four days. Brandishing the style of Sin City and 300 in its ads and little else, the comic book movie was less-attended than The Shadow and The Phantom.

Damn shame, Frank. You done fucked up real good when you do worse than The Shadow and The Phantom.

Who Clusterfucks The Watchmen?

Judge Gary Feess, that's who.

After saying that the issues surrounding rights to a Watchmen movie between 20th Century Fox & Warner Bros could only be resolved by trial, the judge changes his mind and delivers a decision on Christmas Eve of all times. The judge decided that Fox definitely has a copyright interest in the film.

While both sides were encouraged to begin negotiations to resolve this, it is still possible that Warner Bros will seek an appeal.

Here comes all the fanboy outrage, again, directed at 20th Century Fox for no particularly good reason. ;)

New Watchmen Character Posters Online

The Internet Movie Posters Awards site has them all up.

(hat tip to Kevin Melrose)