I'm Not a Critic, I just Blog A Lot

Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die Starring Sam Rockwell. Directed by Gore Verbinski

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 18:45:00 +0000

Before I watched CRIME 101 last week, I went to the movies to check out Gore Verbinski's sci-fi new sci-fi mind-bender, GOOD LUCK, HAVE FUN, DON'T DIE.

The Sales Pitch:

A man claiming to be from the future takes the patrons of an iconic Los Angeles diner hostage in search of unlikely recruits in a quest to save the world. February 13 - Only in Theaters Directed by: Gore Verbinski Starring: Sam Rockwell, Haley Lu Richardson, Michael Peña, Zazie Beetz, Asim Chaudhry, and Juno Temple

This movie is wildly fun and imaginative.

Verbinski's pointed satire critiques humanity's slow surrender to technology in general, personified in the buzzwords of our time: Artificial Intelligence. Social Media. Algorithm.

The story puts its finger on and explains modern feelings of disconnection and alienation, a tried and true tactic that made movies like Terminator, Everything Everywhere All At Once, Inception, and The Matrix work. While not quite as well written or executed as any of those movies, GOOD LUCK, HAVE FUN, DON'T DIE is still incredibly fun.

GOOD LUCK, HAVE FUN, DON'T DIE gleefully plays with the our expectations as a n audience. Most of the movie it's unclear whether Sam Rockwell’s unnamed protagonist is just insane, a grifty conman, a bonafide time-travelling badass, or some mixture thereof. As we get a chance to see him in action, understand the objectives of his mission, and get a grasp of how all these seemingly random characters' backstories overlap to build a team that can save the world.

I'll write another piece going into my theories about what all is going on in this movie later.

For now, I really recommend you to check it out!

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-Samax

CRIME 101 starring Chris Hemsworth, Halle Berry, and Mark Ruffalo

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Thu, 19 Feb 2026 23:38:44 +0000

This week I'm reviewing a couple of new releases that I saw in the theater. First let's talk about CRIME 101, starring Chris Hemsworth, Halle Berry, and Mark Ruffalo.

The Sales Pitch:

He’s about to break every rule he’s ever lived by. Crime101 now, starring Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Barry Keoghan, and Halle Berry. See the movie only in theaters February 13. Set against the sun-bleached grit of Los Angeles, Crime 101 weaves the tale of an elusive jewel thief (Chris Hemsworth) whose string of heists along the 101 freeway have mystified police. When he eyes the score of a lifetime, his path crosses that of a disillusioned insurance broker (Halle Berry) who is facing her own crossroads. Convinced he has found a pattern, a relentless detective (Mark Ruffalo) is closing in, raising the stakes even higher. As the heist approaches, the line between hunter and hunted begins to blur, and all three are faced with life-defining choices–and the realization that there can be no turning back. Adapted from Don Winslow’s acclaimed novella of the same name, the film is written and directed by Bart Layton (American Animals, The Imposter). Barry Keoghan, Monica Barbaro, Corey Hawkins, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Nick Nolte round out the cast.

First thing I wanna say is this movie was beautifully shot.

CRIME 101 takes place in Los Angeles, a setting we have obviously seen a thousand times, and yet at times when shots of the skyline, aerial shots and city scenes are on the screen, I was just mesmerized.

Director Bart Layton and his team somehow capture very unique shots of what should be a familiar place.

The car chases in CRIME 101 are pretty good too. Chris Hemsworth's character is a great driver who plans for everything, but when the unexpected happens, he kind of loses his shit. And the car chases at these times feel like a man driving like his heart is gonna burst out of his chest, even when no one is chasing him.

Great cast of stars and supporting characters: Halle Berry is phenomenal. Hemsworth is surprisingly good. Nick Nolte's RFKesque gravel-mouthed voice delivers as Hemsworth's shady handler, and Barry Keoghan (Druig from Eternals) goes hard as a batshit crazy rival of Hemsworth’s thoughtful thief with a heart of gold. Even the black detective partner to Ruffalo’s character and Hemsworth's love interest were great.

CRIME 101 works because instead of making the robbery and investigations super complex, they devoted the narrative energy to developing the humanity of every character and making sure all the scenes look amazing. All the main characters are likeable, so when they are put through the wringer, you're rooting for them.

In the end, this movie delivers on emotion with life and death stakes where you want all the characters to win, but you know that isn't possible.

RECOMMENDED.

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-Samax

A Few Words About THE BOOK OF CLARENCE

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Mon, 22 Jan 2024 08:20:00 +0000

I watched THE BOOK OF CLARENCE over the weekend and I loved it.

LaKeith Stanfield (Get Out, Sorry to Bother You, Uncut Gems, Knives Out, and Judas and the Black Messiah) stars as the twin brother of the disciple Thomas. While Thomas leaves the family to follow Jesus, the atheist Clarence stays home with their mom.

Clarence gets into trouble chasing money in the street, falls in love with the sister of a local gangster, and is in debt to said gangster when the movie starts. Desperate to avoid getting killed, Clarence tries to join Jesus's disciples.

Blocked from even speaking to Jesus by Thomas and Judas, Clarence decides to study Jesus's ministry so he can imitate him. Clarence gathers his own disciples and declares himself the messiah.

Hijinks ensue.

BOOK OF CLARENCE is a mostly effective satirical comedy set during the time of Jesus's ministry. In the movie we meet biblical characters like John the Baptist, Mary Magdalene, Barrabas, Pontius Pilate, Mary the Mother of Jesus, and of course Jesus himself.

The movie's portrayal of Jesus is spot on. His appearances are brief and he's often hooded or hidden behind other characters, which increases anticipation to catch a glimpse of him.

BOOK OF CLARENCE is a little bit lighter in the middle than I would like. The montage of sermons doesn't quite tell us how Clarence was able to fool people into thinking he's the messiah, he just does it easily.

In my opinion, BOOK OF CLARENCE's flaws do not derail the story. Clarence's character arc is satisfying, and all the characters' casting and acting are very strong. The direction by Jeymes Samuel (The Harder They Fall) is well composed.

THE BOOK OF CLARENCE left me wanting to follow these characters after the story ends, which is always a good sign.

Recommended.

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-Samax

Samax Amen is a teaching artist who creates art on computers, canvas, faces, stages, and pages. He also helps create many great comics you never heard of, and creates his own comics sometimes. Samax started GhettoManga in 2003 to galvanize his audience and promote the people, places, and things he loves.
His latest project Samax Amen's Pocket Sketchbook Volume One is on sale now!

Sic Transit Gloria - A few words about RUSHMORE

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sun, 06 Nov 2022 17:54:00 +0000

Rushmore is the story of Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman), a brilliant teenage underachiever who has coasted on the wave of privilege, perks, and patience that being labeled a gifted student at an early age has afforded him.

Chief among these benefits is his continued attendance at the prestigious Rushmore Academy, situated among the children of the wealthy elites despite being the son of a humble barber.

When Max and his new friend Herman (Bill Murray) become infatuated with the same pretty young first grade teacher (Olivia Williams), hijinks ensue.

I really can't believe it has taken me over twenty years to officially write something about this movie, which would probably be in my top 5-10 movies of all time if I was the type to keep those kinda lists.

Directed by celebrated auteur Wes Anderson (co-written by Owen Wilson), Rushmore will probably always be my favorite Anderson film.

I was in my mid-twenties when Rushmore came out, with just enough experience with being a lovesick gifted underachiever that the Hero's Journey of Max Fischer hit me like a megaton bomb.

Max exemplifies what it means to be loud and wrong and selfish and in love. I found him very relatable, even (maybe especially) at the times when he was clearly screwing up.

Watching Rushmore now, Max is even creepier and his behavior feels even more out of line than it did when I first saw it. But he was definitely walking on ground that was unacceptable, even then.

Though talented, Max is ashamed of who he is. He tells everyone his father is a brain surgeon, instead of a lowly barber. He claims to be having a sexual relationship with his best friend's mom to impress dimwitted bullies.

Max is so comfortable with lying about his background to everyone, that he manages to fool himself about what's possible for him.

While she is intrigued by him, there is no chance that the lovely widow Mrs. Cross will ever return Max's clumsy romantic advances. But Max persists anyways, manipulating his friend Herman Blume to help him win her heart, until Blume inevitably falls for Mrs. Cross himself.

Max's refusal to accept reality in the face of his desires gets him kicked out of Rushmore, ruins all of his friendships, and earns him a well-deserved ass kicking. Of course, I still felt for him the whole time. I never pushed the envelope as hard as Max does, but I have been called delusional by the people whose love and approval I wanted the most. Slow social suicide at the hands of others is a common form of torture among the gifted kids.

Like the lucky ones of us, Max Fischer makes a truce with reality and finds a path-of-least-resistance to redemption and happiness in the third act. Banishment to the hellscape of public school, poor classmates, and girls his own age actually works out for Max once he learns how to accept himself and pick his battles better.

Like I said earlier, Rushmore is one of my all-time favorite films. Max is a character that is not designed to be likeable, but I fell in love with anyway. He presented me my own flaws and strengths at the same time. All the actors in the film are amazing, and the story allows for growth of each character, giving even smaller players a time to shine.

Jason Schwartzman is so good as Max Fischer that I haven't been able to ignore him any time he's come across my screen since. Bill Murray's comedic genius and deadpan façade are weaponized by Wilson and Anderson in this movie in ways I had not seen before. If you're not a fan of Anderson's other movies, you probably won't like Rushmore, but it's by far my favorite film of his.

But if you're open to it, give it a chance and let me know what you think. For me, the glory of this one has not faded with time.

-Samax

THE PEOPLE'S CHAMPION - A Few Words About BLACK ADAM

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Mon, 24 Oct 2022 18:57:00 +0000

I went out to see BLACK ADAM on opening day. Which was good, because people were already filling my timeline with magnanimous opinions about how good or bad DC's latest cinematic offering was before it had even come out.

Whether it's rooted in DC vs Marvel brand loyalty, railing against (or in favor of) wokeness/cancel culture/SJWs, everyone has an agenda these days. Everything is either complete trash or AH-MAZING, with little or no room in between.

And that's okay, I guess. But I wanted to watch The Rock (his momma named him Dwayne Johnson) in his official superhero movie debut* without having my expectations tampered with too much. So on opening day, I jumped in the back seat of my sister's Charger (mom was riding shotgun) and went to see BLACK ADAM.

*In my opinion, The Fast And The Furious is also a superhero franchise, because not all heroes wear capes or whatever. But that is probably what the kids call a "hot take."

BLACK ADAM is the story of Teth Adam - an ancient slave turned super-powered revolutionary demigod revered for overthrowing the evil despot of the fictional Middle Eastern kingdom of Khandaq - awakened from millennia of mystical imprisonment by Khandaqi revolutionary and single mom Adriana Tomaz, played by veteran tv actress Sarah Shahi (The L Word, Life, Alias, City On A Hill, The Rookie).

If you're craving mindless superhero action, lite global political notes, and DCEU cameos, go ahead and watch Black Adam. You'll love it. Like most DCEU films, BLACK ADAM is kind of a narrative mess, but boy is it an entertaining mess!

The Rock is perfectly cast as the titular demigod who is really neither hero nor villain. Despite what critics will undoubtedly say, he does a solid job playing the part, hitting the emotional notes when they're needed without trying to do too much.

Teth Adam is not really bad, he's just lawless. Which is reasonable, since the law of his time made him a slave, doomed to die in service to an evil power-hungry monarch who killed his family and loved ones. Granted a version of the pantheon-in-a-box powers that we have seen bestowed on Billy Batson in SHAZAM, Adam's only desire is to unleash his rage on the king with extreme prejudice. Which he does.

Then the wizards who granted his power, apparently unable to take the power back, feel the need to entomb him for all time.

Awakened from his eternal sleep by Tomaz, a tomb-raiding do-gooder trying to keep an ancient occult weapon out of the hands of the techno-criminal mercenary group Intergang, Adam intuitively saves the native Khandaqi woman from the battalion of heavily-armed colonizers in a display of slow-motion ultraviolence worthy of Zack Snyder in all his glory.

This coming out party is immediately noticed by Amanda Waller (played once more by Oscar Winner Viola Davis), Director of Task Force X.

But instead of the Suicide Squad, this time Waller dispatches The Justice Society, a hodge-podge team of super heroes led by BFF's Hawkman and Doctor Fate (Aldis Hodge and Pierce Brosnan). Atom Smasher (Noah Centineo) and Cyclone (Quintessa Swindell) round out the team.

The way the Justice Society - the actual "heroes" - are written in this movie is BLACK ADAM's most glaring weak spot.

While it's reasonable that a ruthless international power broker like Amanda Waller might have a "strike first and ask questions later (if at all)" attitude about taking down a loose cannon like Teth Adam before he can get his bearings, it was clear to everyone involved that even combined they would be no match for him once he got his blood up.

So what did they do? Break him off some disrespect immediately and consistently. While they recognized en route to Khandaq that their only hope was to convince Adam to relinquish his power and submit to being returned to deep sleep, they never once make a sincere appeal to him despite his total lack of malicious intent.

While Hawkman and Doctor Fate are presented as archetypal field captain and elder statesman of the team respectively, neither character is written with a lick of leadership skills at all. In fact, Hawkman leads his own team by alternating between shaming and threatening his younger teammates when they make mistakes that are the direct result of his lack of proper planning and guidance.

Even after the Justice Society and Black Adam team up to take on the real bad guys in the movie, Hawkman remains more interested in antagonizing, threatening, and locking up Adam than in saving innocent people.

My mom was ready to put hands on Hawkman almost immediately, and never warmed up to him during the course of the movie.

Although they seemed to be sincere in their belief that they were working to preserve "international stability" (i.e. the status quo), the Justice Society's complete disregard for the safety and property of the Khandaqi people in pursuit of a "threat" who had so far only killed international criminals (in self-defense at that) seemed to suggest that their heroism was somewhere between ethnocentric pretentiousness and complete bullshit.

For entertainment purposes, the Justice Society's portrayal works as a limp critique of superheroes as an extension of fascistic "might makes right" ideology, and the Western world's inability to perceive their own blind spots. These flaws don't completely undermine their claims of heroism, but they effectively disqualify their moral authority to tell Adam to submit to extrajudicial imprisonment.

So maybe that was the intent? I dunno.

Either way, I really enjoyed the story as it unfolded. This movie isn't called The Justice Society of America. It's Adam's world now, and these heroes are just living in it. Besides the heavy hand they painted the heroes with, I didn't see any problems with BLACK ADAM that would prevent me from watching it again in the theater, and over and over once it hits streaming platforms.

Even with its shaky portrayal of the "regular" heroes, I felt BLACK ADAM was written much better than SHAZAM, finding Teth Adam much more likeable and heroic than Billy Batson. Director Jaume Collet-Serra (Jungle Cruise, The Commuter, Run All Night, House of Wax) did an admirable job with the script and actors at his disposal and showed a good command of superhero action and effects.

The big bad at the end (not gonna spoil it here) was pretty basic, but served his narrative purpose. There's also a mid credit scene that's worth sitting a few minutes extra for.

So I wouldn't say BLACK ADAM is a masterpiece or anything, but it's one of the better DCEU offerings, in my opinion. It also seems like they're set up well to do better in a sequel, if there is one.

That's my two cents.

____________ A M E N

7 Things (Some Good, Some bad) About James Gunn's THE SUICIDE SQUAD

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Thu, 12 Aug 2021 04:21:00 +0000

So I finally coaxed myself out of the house to see James Gunn's action-comedy sequel THE SUICIDE SQUAD.

I liked James Gunn's vision of Amanda Waller's super-villain-fueled Task Force X, but I definitely had some issues with it.

Here's 7 points that drive my opinion of the movie, SPOILERS AND ALL, after the jump.

LIKES:
SEQUEL(ish)- There's a lot to be said for this approach to a sequel: The story is constructed so that watching the original is not required.  I didn't get the sense that this movie is a reboot, like Ayers' Suicide Squad never happened, but this film didn't really NEED it to have happened.  Likewise, this could just as easily be in the Snyderverse or in its own world.  Moreover, The Suicide Squad is peppered with people, places, and things from DC Comics lore.
IDRIS BE IDRISSING.  In a more-or-less brilliantly cast movie, Idris Elba's masked killing machine Bloodsport was the anchor of the film.  He's based on a character I have only seen in comics once: 

Bloodsport shot Superman with a Kryptonite needle gun in the fourth issue of John Byrne's late 80's reboot of Superman.  Like Will Smith's Deadshot before him, Bloodsport's daughter is the leverage Amanda Waller uses to get the otherwise retired inmate to take point on her eponymous black ops team.  Where this character is dishonest and insane in the comic, Idris's Bloodsport is the angry, belligerent, yet resolute rock that forms the foundation of Waller's team.
SO BAD, THEY'RE GOOD- King Shark and Ratcatcher were fun.  Gunn really has a soft spot for these characters, the most fearsome and disgusting characters on the Squad.   Like Groot and Rocket on his Guardians of the Galaxy films, these characters are both ugly and adorable.  Spared the family-friendly limits of the MCU, Gunn pushes even harder into the edges.  Shark is unambiguously monstrous, but he's so dumb it's cute.  We are openly invited to be protective of the homeless girl next door Ratcatcher, whatever larcenies she may have committed.  Also, don't think about how either of these characters must smell.
HARLEY QUINN RETURNS- I thought Gunn did a better job with Harley than her previous movie appearances.  She came off as a seriously formidable, truly psychotic, yet strangely lovable.  Which is to say, I thought Margot Robbie was good in the first film and Birds Of Prey, but this script gave her more to work with.  Harley comes out of the Joker's shadow. leaving no question as to her worthiness as a one woman wrecking crew.

Strange as it seems to say this, I think Harley Quinn has the best character arc in the DC movies so far. The next logical step is a true solo movie for DC's emergent anti-heroine.  Or maybe a Harley/Poison Ivy team up?

DISLIKES:
AMANDA WALLER- Let me start by saying Viola Davis is amazing in this role, even though I have already let it be known that I would have preferred that a fat lady portray Amanda Waller.  Davis did everything that could be done with the material that was given to her.  The first two acts of the script were fine, but I found Gunn's handling of Amanda Waller in the last act to be pretty weak.  She went out like a sucker, which is 100% not on brand for the character.
FATAL DISTRACTION- Overall, I like the idea that you're watching to see which characters will get killed.  As the name implies, Suicide Squad missions are high-risk, and none of these characters (other than Harley) are important enough as an intellectual property to be promised tomorrow.  That was a feature of the team from the comics.  Unfortunately, Some characters die before they even get a chance to do anything.  While this may be a reminder that most supervillains lose every time they leave the house, I would like to have seen some of them live to fight another day.
Conqueror FAIL- As much as I wanted to have my mind blown by Starro the Conqueror's emergence and rampage in the third act, I will go on record as being underwhelmed by him when it comes down to it. Starro is an amazing choice for a big bad, because it shows that the filmmakers fully embrace that they are recreating comic books for the big screen.  Starro is also appropriately disgusting, like a dayglo Lovecraftian elder god.  In comics, Starro fights elite teams like the Justice League to a standstill.  In The Suicide Squad, Starro is defeated by a team of enemies with only modest superpowers.  After he explodes out of captivity, enthralls the bloodthirsty dictator of Corto Maltese, and turns hundreds (maybe thousands) of citizens into cyclopean zombies, the mighty Starro fails to capture even one member of the Suicide Squad into his hive mind. It would have been great for Bloodsport and Harley to have to fight and even kill Starro-enslaved members of their own team, or to have it revealed that other superheroes or villains had fallen to Starro before they got there. Far from being a JL level threat, Starro was killed by a spear and a bunch of rats. As it is, I don't think you can bring Starro back again as a villain.*  Gunn brought out a great villain, and set him up well, but didn't make very good use of him in the end.
Sounds bad, but again, I thoroughly enjoyed The Suicide Squad.  The special effects and color palette were great.  The casting was great. 

I'm a comicbook nerd first and foremost, so I always think my ideas are better than the people who make these movies.  But for the most part, it was fun and fast-moving.

*(NOW THAT I THINK ABOUT IT, I have an idea how Starro could return that would be REALLY dope.  So forget I said that)

Anyways, that's my two cents for now.

What are the things you liked or didn't like about The Suicide Squad?

LOKI is good, but let's talk about Hunter B-15 ♥

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sat, 26 Jun 2021 16:44:00 +0000

I think I'm in love with a T.V.A. Agent. . .

Since I haven't really spoken too much about it publicly, I should start out by saying that I'm really enjoying LOKI, the marvelous Marvel streaming show starring Tom Hiddleston as the eponymous Asgardian god of mischief.

After dying at the hands of Thanos just as he was getting used to being a relatively good guy, an earlier version of Loki escapes this grisly fate thanks to the time-raveling shenanigans of the Avengers.

Loki's freedom is short-lived, as his escape immediately attracts the attention of the almighty cosmic bureaucrats of the Time Variance Authority. He is unceremoniously captured, tried, and found guilty of crimes against the Sacred Timeline (presumably, the MCU narrative as we have observed it through Avengers: Endgame). As we saw in Infinity War, Loki was fated to die, which inspired Thor to level up enough to save the Avengers from Thanos and his army (sort of).

By escaping during Endgame, Loki was not playing his predetermined role as the bad guy who motivates and facilitates the growth of Midgard's mightiest heroes. In the kind of metanarrative that comics nerds like me can't get enough of, the first episode of LOKI unwinds the burden of glorious purpose of its star, forcing him to face the possibility that his life had been but a plot device in the journey Thor and the Avengers. The god who would (and should) be king was just a supporting character in a story bigger and more important than his own.

BUT ENOUGH ABOUT HIM...

It all started to come apart mere moments after escaping from imprisonment for his part in The Battle of New York in Avengers.

Loki can't even complete his condescending conquering speech before he is interrupted by my favorite character from the show.

I said all that up front, so I could take the rest of our time today (guilt-free) to rain praise and affection on the supporting character Hunter B-15.

Not trying to be inappropriate, but does Hunter B-15 have a boyfriend?

I'm a sucker for a full-figured No-Nonsense Black Lady with a Good Ass Job. pic.twitter.com/wreuBMHdKM
— GhettoManga Magazine (@ghettoManga) June 20, 2021

Hunter B-15 is brought to life by Wunmi Mosaku, whom I have already fallen in love with in the Spectrum On Demand streaming show TEMPLE, where her character Mercy King uses her feminine wiles to wrangle her thirsty ex into helping her hunt down the bumbling getaway driver whose ineptitude landed her son in jail.

Mosaku shifts from brutal to maternal to seductive from one moment to the next in TEMPLE, and she has cranked her badass black lady vibe up a notch in LOKI as the unflinching steel-toe-booted jawbreaker Hunter B-15.

Hunter B-15 wears her power- both physical and bureaucratic- on her sleeve, and fearlessly speaks her truth even in the face of other authority figures. Consistently at odds with Loki and Mobius (his TVA handler - played brilliantly by Owen Wilson - who enlists the doomed Asgardian to help catch a more murderous variant), Hunter B-15 is probably being set up as the typical company loyalist with an axe to grind with the (anti-)hero of the story.

If that's all they do with her, it will be a shame, because this character has potential.

[Note: Hunter B-15 does not appear in LOKI Episode Three, so I have nothing to say about it]

So that's all I have to say about LOKI for now. Like I said before, it's pretty good so far.

Before you go, here's a HUNTER B-15 fan art I made!

I uploaded this to my Teepublic store so you can buy it now on these items:

MY FAVORITE HUNTER ADULT APPAREL

Tee shirt

Tank Top

Crewneck Sweatshirt

Long Sleeve T-Shirt

Baseball T-Shirt

MY FAVORITE HUNTER CASES & STICKERS

Sticker

Phone Case

Laptop Case

Magnet

MY FAVORITE HUNTER KIDS APPAREL

Kids Hoodie

Kids Long Sleeve T-Shirt

Onesie

MY FAVORITE HUNTER HOME GOODS

Notebook

Pillow

Tote

Tapestry

Stay tuned, I expect to draw some more LOKI fan art (maybe another Hunter B-15 ♥).

- Samax

Samax Amen is a professional Content Developer, Illustrator and Hip Hop Cartoonist. He is the artist of many great comics you never heard of like Herman Heed, Champion of Children, The Brother and The World As You Know It. He even writes and draws his own comics, like Dare: The Adventures of Darius Davidson, Spontaneous, and Manchild when he gets around to it. Because making comics is hard and stuff, he started GhettoManga as a blog in 2006 and as a print magazine in 2008.

Marvel's Falcon + Winter Soldier Hits and Misses... But We'll Take It.

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sun, 11 Apr 2021 05:37:00 +0000

As of this writing*, we are three episodes into The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (which, from now on, I will refer to as Falcon and Bucky, because damn). Now that any excitement or annoyance (and I have felt both) has had time to wear off, and we are half way into this 6 episode series, I feel safe saying that I can give this show a passing grade so far, but not high marks.

Originally slated to be the first streaming Marvel Cinematic Universe show that is 100% under the Kevin Feige umbrella, Falcon and Bucky got pushed back to the second slot by COVID, after the mind-bending conversation-starter WandaVision.

The first episode started by reminding us that Captain America was gone, and neither Falcon or Bucky were fit to take his place.

As much as WandaVision portrayed the lengths one Avenger was willing to go to in her attempts to escape the consequences of the Infinity Gauntlet saga, Falcon and Bucky is the more grounded portrayal of the two men's inability to escape the fallout of the Captain America trilogy that preceded it.

It's a decent plan. After all, we are living in the Golden Age of consequences. We want justice, and we want it now. We want equality. We want representation. We want evil done in the darkness to be drug out into the light... and maybe shot.

We want our heroes to stare down economic injustice, systemic racism, sexist double standards and all other such things.

Falcon and Bucky sets out to do it immediately by portraying Falcon's alter-ego Sam Wilson having difficulty getting credit for his family business in the same episode that he risks his life to save American troops on the battlefield. I got so frustrated watching Sam and his sister pleading with the loan officer, I didn't think I was gonna be able to sit through the whole scene.

Meanwhile, Bucky Barnes' mental health treatment after spending decades being tortured and manipulated by a foreign terror group seems more like the parole board grilling of a willfully violent felon. My mom, a retired VA nurse who worked with veterans in a high security psych ward for twenty years, was visibly disturbed by the passive-aggressive attitude of Bucky's therapist.

Then they gave me someone to focus my hate on.

Unlike a lot of people watching the show who are beside themselves about the thinly veiled douchebag vibe of John Walker (the great white hype that the government gave the shield to when Falcon decided not to take on the mantle of replacement Captain America), I know enough about who this dude is gonna become that I feel perfectly fine hating his ass.

In the comics, John Walker started out as a character called the Super Patriot, who embodied everything bad about patriotism, while Steve Rogers embodied everything good about it. When Steve quit being Captain America after falling out with the government powers-that-be, John stepped in to replace him.

In the comics, John was actually very popular as Captain America, spending about a year and a half of issues in the role. I, for one, did not like the guy as Cap. But lots of people did. The writers of the show are trying to play with his character so that he is likable enough, while also staying true to the a-hole qualities I hated about the guy.

They're doing a great job.

They've also pulled in Isaiah Bradley, the black Captain America from TRUTH: Red, White, and Black.

The comic reveals Isaiah as a contemporary of Cap and Bucky who was unknown to most heroes, but that all black superheroes and celebrities revere to the point of hero worship.

I love that they included Isaiah in the show, but it irritates me that they took away his notoriety, so that Sam did not know his story, while Bucky (who had took an ass whooping from Isaiah, when Buck was still Winter Soldiering) did.

Again, the change was made to be a more seamless integration into MCU storytelling, but something important to me was lost.

Before I start complaining too much, I will mention something I am excited about:

In the third episode, we finally get to meet the real Baron Zemo.

When the trail runs cold chasing the real villain in the series, Bucky has the bright idea of breaking Zemo, the crafty mastermind from Captain America: Winter Soldier and Civil War, out of prison.

Even though he was pivotal to both Captain America sequels, I was always a little disappointed with the flimsy fresh-faced nerd steez of Zemo. But he evolved quickly in the third episode of Falcon and Bucky, where he is quickly confirms that he is indeed a Baron in the MCU, complete with private jet, multiple safehouses, and a multilingual manservant.

And he dons his purple ski mask and gets his hands dirty, as befits the dude who would throw hands with Captain America when the moment called for it in the comics. I suspect that Zemo still has hooks in Bucky, which would explain why Bucky would be so insistent that they rescue the dude who brainwashed and tortured him into killing the King of Wakanda.

We'll see.

Then there's Sharon Carter.

After helping Cap and Falcon steal their iconic gear to chase Bucky around the globe in Civil War, everybody forgot about good ole Agent 13.

Since then, she has gone full rogue.

It seems there really are consequences to what people do in the MCU, and Sharon is still considered an enemy of the state. She seems to be doing alright as a highly-positioned fence making it rain Picassos in the lawless city-state of Madripoor. Some of my friends are put off by how comfy this patriot seems to be as an expat, but I ain't mad at her. Cap forgot her number. Nick Fury was dusted, then left the planet. And a girl's gotta do what she gotta.

Falcon and Bucky is working off the presumption that justice is not applied equally, and Sharon's arc suggests that white privilege only extends so far for a woman without friends in high places.

So, yeah. Falcon and Bucky is hit or miss. But I'll take it.

The use of the Power Broker and the Flag Smasher are fun tie ins that I remember from the Captain America comics I grew up reading. Even though they have changed and compressed a lot about the Power Broker's role in the Marvel Universe, I'm eagerly waiting to see what the the Broker's impact will be on this cast of characters...

And the greater MCU.

*This article originally appeared in the King Shark Week issue of GhettoManga Weekly Digest which was published on April 7th, 2021.

Samax Amen is a professional Content Developer, Illustrator and Cartoonist. He is the artist of many great comics you never heard of like FREELANCER LIFE, Herman Heed, Champion of Children, and The World As You Know It. He even writes and draws his own comics, like Dare: The Adventures of Darius Davidson, Spontaneous, and Manchild when he gets around to it. Because making comics is hard and stuff, he started GhettoManga as a blog in 2006 and as a print magazine in 2008.

SNYDE or DIE!

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sun, 28 Mar 2021 17:42:00 +0000

A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE LONG-AWAITED AND HIGHLY DIVISIVE DIRECTORS CUT OF ZACK SNYDER'S JUSTICE LEAGUE

Unless you've been living under a rock since 2017, you probably know that Zack Snyder left filming of Justice League before it was finished due to the death of his daughter. He was replaced by Avengers helmsman Joss Whedon, who was charged not only with finishing the movie, but changing the tone and story to meet Hollywood marketability concerns.

That is just about universally considered to have been a bad move.

Whedon's Justice League was a mess of a film that benefitted from Snyder's style, but also abandoned a lot of what Snyder is known for in favor of a safer narrative. So for the past few years, fanbros have clamored for the Snyder Cut. This week, they finally got it on HBO Max.

The Snyder Cut of Justice League is head-and-shoulders better than the theatrical version.

I wasn't as bothered by the theatrical version's attempts to lighten the tone as the most vocal critics of the film were, but it's clear watching Snyder's cut of the movie that it does help to have a more consistent tone. Every character is darker and more brutal in Snyder's hands, with the possible exception of the Flash, who still feels like a cheerful geek of a rookie superhero. Additional scenes with Flash do not improve the overall narrative, but did make the case for a Flash movie.

But the character who benefitted most from the Snyder Cut is Cyborg.

Without really reading any of the articles, I see why Ray Fisher [the actor who payed Cyborg] has been complaining about Whedon so much over the years since Justice League's theatrical release. All the WB/DC execs owe him an apology (and a bag of money). Snyder's vision made Cyborg a lynchpin of the team with a more important role in solidifying their victory. It also digs deep into just how powerful Cyborg is, physically and in cyberspace. Almost all of which Whedon significantly reduced.

And then there's the story's villain Steppenwolf.

Ciarán Hinds as Steppenwolf in the theatrically-released version of Justice League (top) and in Zack Snyder's Justice League (bottom)

The conquering war god Steppenwolf is more alien... more brutal and animalistic in nature in Zack Snyder's Justice League.

His battle scenes are longer and more violent. The destruction and carnage when he appears on screen is much more than in the theatrical version. But at the same time, his role is reduced, because we see more of his master Darkseid, and some other new gods of Apokolips.

Ultimately, Steppenwolf works better as an ultra-violent world-breaking monster than a wayward general, and the addition of more characters helps him stick to what he's good at.

I'm not inclined to slobber all over the Snyder Cut, though.
Most of my problems with the theatrical version of Justice League are still there, and Snyder's cut added some new ones:

I ain't missing you at all- Building the whole story on bringing Superman back is stupid. They did a much better job setting it all up in Snyder's cut, but it's still dumb. This is an overall problem I have with the DCEU in particular and superhero films in general (except for MCU-era Marvel): These people don't know how to pace a franchise and get the most out of the source material. Superman wasn't dead long enough to give his return the narrative punch it deserves. It also means no Reign of Supermen. No Steel. No Hank Henshaw. No Superboy. Lame. I tried not to blame this movie for that. But still.
4 HOURS? REALLY? There are a lot of empty panning and slow motion junk shots that could/should be cut out to make it into a much better experience. 4 hours is a disrespectfully long run time for a superhero movie. Zack Snyder's Justice League is divided into 6 chapters, probably because the plan was to release it as a streaming show. It definitely feels more like binge-watching a tv show than watching a movie. I literally had to drink a [energy drink brand name redacted] to get through it in one sitting.
The Batfleck/Leto scene is much ado about nothing- I was actually excited to hear Jared Leto was getting some shine as the Joker in this movie. I keep hearing people talk about how awesome it was, and I can't figure out why they think so. If I ever watch this movie again, I will be paying closer attention to that part.
Bomb Threat- There are multiple instances of superheroes dropping F Bombs. I think most superhero movies have more cursing than necessary, and Snyder went the whole way with it. Since he added enough bloody violence to get the R rating, Snyder didn't need to count curse words. There are a few corny moments fueled by characters cursing awkwardly like middle school nerds.

I think there should be more Snyderverse follow up films. But I would prefer new Batfleck, Cyborg, and Flash movies (and maaaaybe an Aquaman sequel) before bringing the Justice League back for a sequel..

That said, I don't think Snyder has the right temperament to be the standard-bearer for the DC Universe as a whole.

As I said in my review of BVS:DOJ, Snyder doesn't believe in Superman.

He compensates by accentuating that Superman is the most powerful hero (at the expense of the other heroes), but he doesn't understand what really makes him great.

It's Superman's integrity, not just his power, that inspires other heroes. Snyder just doesn't get it.

Still, I would love Snyder to make more Batman movies, though. Make him the czar of the Batman Family franchise or something. His dark, cynical sensibility works well for Batman. Ultimately, rebooting the DC movie universe probably won't work any better, because I don't think Hollywood has learned two biggest lessons that the MCU peeps have figured out:

Faith in the source material works.
While they are happy to tweak the details for cultural relevance, Marvel has stayed true to the spirit of their greatest stories with the MCU movies, and they're generally eating the Distinguished Competition's lunch as a result.

Patience pays.
Marvel invests time into the growth of the characters' stories as individuals, and as a group. But DC is in such a rush, they have already hit so many of the high points of Superman's decades-long history. With those opportunities wasted, the reboots are the rule that applies to this situation, not the exception.

All-in-all, I enjoyed myself watching Zack Snyder's Justice League. Like his other DC movies, it was kind of a mess, but entertaining.

-Samax

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This article originally appeared in GhettoManga Weekly: All Dark Everything which came out on March 22nd, 2021.

Samax Amen is a professional Content Creator and Developer, which is another way of saying he creates something from little to nothing for fun and profit. Click Here to hire him to make stuff for you. He also curates, celebrates, and critiques popular culture via GhettoManga Magazine, so you should buy it or something.

Veteran Actress Cloris Leachman Dies at 94

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Thu, 28 Jan 2021 15:45:00 +0000

"I love everybody. That's what's killing me."

-Evelyn Wright (Cloris Leachman, Spanglish)

I just found out that Cloris Leachman died yesterday.Cloris Leachman is one of those actors that can convince you to watch a movie you are on the fence about, just by being in the trailer. She won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role in the 1971 drama The Last Picture Show, and has more Emmy nominations than any other television actress, and is tied for the most wins.

To be fair, she cheated by being in the game for more than 70 years.

She played Phyllis Lindstrom on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and won a Golden Globe playing the character on a short-lived spinoff Phyllis.

Leachman played in tons of movies and tv shows from Young Frankenstein to The Facts of Life to American Gods, and as far as I can tell, she was always amazing.

I will always remember her for her turn in Spanglish as the lovable alcoholic jazz singer Evelyn Wright.

Evelyn was the live-in mother-in-law to a brilliant and neurotic restauranteur John Clasky (Adam Sandler), and dysfunctional mother of her wayward daughter Deborah (Téa Leoni).

Leachman has a small role in this multi-genre dramedy with lots of moving parts, but as usual, she kills it. Evelyn Wright is alternately sad, funny, tragic, wise, and nostalgic. Leachman was a master of her craft, able to pull from her years of experience to deliver whatever a role called for.

“[The work] finds me and it is the most amazing thing,” she told her hometown newspaper, the Des Moines Register in August 2019.

“So many times I have been like, ‘Oh God, what were they thinking? How did they connect me to this part?’ If you asked me, I wouldn’t have thought of myself for this role or this production, but they do and it comes to me and that means more to me than anything.”

Cloris Leachman died on Wednesday January 27, 2021 of natural causes.
She was 94.

Movies That Should Be Comics #22- THEY LIVE

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Thu, 23 Jul 2020 04:21:00 +0000

As a lifelong comic book fan, there are movies everyone always expects I have seen already. One of them is the 1988 John Carpenter classic They Live, which stars pro wrestling star "Rowdy Roddy" Piper. I never bothered to watch it. Didn't feel like I needed to, because people had told me so much about it.

I found out today that his sidekick Frank was played by a young, scrappy Keith David. That was enough to push me over the edge to watch it.

There are lots of things to like about They Live.

The high concept, if you haven't seen it, is that an alien race has taken over the world at some point before the film starts. The aliens have taken full control of the economies of every country, and filled the media with subliminal messages.

Roddy's character George Nada gets his hands on glasses that allow him to see through the alien's deception. After a pointless street fight, Nada convinces his co-worker (played by Keith David) to hook up with a local rebellion, and it's all downhill from there.

There's lots of plot holes in this movie, but I found it pretty engaging emotionally. Like any good secret invasion story, it latches onto the feeling that something is really wrong with life, but the main character just can't put his finger on it.

They Live was written for the screen by the director under the pseudonym Frank Armitage (that's also the name of Keith David's character, by the way). It was heavily inspired by Ray Nelson's short story 8 O' Clock in the Morning, which was published in comicbook form by Eclipse Comics as part of an anthology in 1986 under the title NADA.

In 2008, I did art on a graphic novel called The World As You Know It: Plate Tectonics for e-learning company Study Island's reading intervention program, which was probably inspired by They Live, making the proverbial cipher complete.

When I was working on this, people were always asking me if I had seen They Live, and now that I have seen it, I know why.

Plate Tectonics was the second book in a series of comics about kids who discover that they live in a world populated by at least two hidden alien races.

Now that I've seen They Live, I would love to draw a comic taking place in the version of the world we see in the movie. A prequel or sequel would be fine. I like sci-fi best when it's tied into the contemporary world, not in outer space, or a gazillion years in the future.

If I didn't get to draw it, I would still love to read it! What creative team would you like to see bring Ray Nelson's Fascinators back to comics?

If you got Amazon Prime, you can CLICK HERE to watch They Live right now. If you use the links in this post, any purchase you make might end up sending me a few pennies that will be used to support my many self-publishing schemes. So if you hate affiliate links, just Google They Live movie or something like that with my blessings!
-Samax
Samax Amen is a professional Content Developer, Illustrator and Cartoonist. He is the artist of many great comics you never heard of like FREELANCER LIFE, Herman Heed, Champion of Children, and The World As You Know It. He even writes and draws his own comics, like Dare: The Adventures of Darius Davidson, Spontaneous, and Manchild when he gets around to it. Because making comics is hard and stuff, he started GhettoManga as a blog in 2006 and as a print magazine in 2008.

A few words about "The Foreigner"

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sun, 15 Oct 2017 11:24:00 +0000

So I got around to watching the dead-serious Jackie Chan action revenge flick The Foreigner, the story of humble restaurant owner Quan Ngoc Minh's single-minded campaign to avenge the death of his daughter at the hands of Irish terrorist bombers.

They ain't know who they're messin' with. So this is one of those instances where the trailer lets you know for sure what to expect. If you enjoy the trailer, you will enjoy the film. In The Foreigner, director Martin Campbell does for Jackie Chan what he did for James Bond in Casino Royale. Jackie has long desired to transcend his action comedy roots, and The Foreigner manages to be a great action flick to watch while being devoid of the physical comedy upon which Jackie has built his career. There is nothing sweet or amusing about the hurt locker Mr. Quan puts these dudes in. The Foreigner is not Rush Hour, Shanghai Noon or Drunken Master. In places where we expect Jackie to make funny faces or wink at the viewer, we are shown Quan's frustration and heartbreak. Chan is good in this serious role, so I think we are getting closer to his dream of making movies where he needs not throw any punches.

Here is a great interview to get more insight.

I should mention that Pierce Brosnan is pretty good in this movie as well as the IRA fighter turned politician Liam Hennessy. The Foreigner is characterized by solid performances, and Brosnan holds the screen well in his scenes. The script gives room for actors to portray their characters and has a few surprises, but is not particularly complicated. While Hennessy is consistently out-maneuvered by Quan, he still shows his grit and intelligence in a losing struggle against the elderly badass with nothing more to lose. Like Chan, Brosnan has toggled his considerable charm to the off setting, as he is ran over the coals by the women in his life, and knee deep in gangster shit.

Anyways, I liked this movie. I can imagine people wanting more from the political thriller angles in the movie, but I felt the script included enough IRA vs England background drama to keep the story moving along. As I said, if you like the trailer, The Foreigner will be worth your money.

-Samax

Finding Dory delivers an entertaining story and a topical message.

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Fri, 17 Jun 2016 06:26:00 +0000

I never got around to watching the Pixar fish story Finding Nemo, so I was not necessarily the ideal audience for the sequel Finding Dory. At least I didn't think I was when my homegirl asked me to attend a press screening and review the movie for Jedi Goddess Presents. Still, we all know I love me some Pixar, so I welcomed the chance to watch their latest joint.

If you missed Finding Nemo like I did, you will be likewise unfamiliar with Dory, a perpetually enraptured and memory-challenged blue tang played by Ellen DeGeneres, who helped a fish named Marlin locate his missing son in that one. But that's okay. Finding Dory will set you straight on all that in the opening scenes.

While Dory's short-term memory loss served as a simple gag in Nemo, this time around it is the foundation of the story, which sensitively illustrates the realities of living with a disability. Dory remembers that she long ago lost her parents, and with Nemo and Marlin in tow, dashes off on an epic journey across the sea in search of her true family and home.

All the characters in Dory are well-designed and animated, especially the color-changing, scene-stealing septopus Hank, voiced by veteran character actor Ed O'Neil (Married With Children). While the character designs in Dory lack the contemporary anthro cool-factor of recent animated smash Zootopia, they more than make up for it in other ways. The combination of sensitive human facial expressions and naturalistic animal movement infuses each character with soul.

Character performances energize the narrative of Finding Dory. DeGeneres gives a performance that is variously proud, exuberant, befuddled, and vulnerable, but never weak or entitled. Finding Dory is not afraid to illustrate the ways in which our communities and families interact with our differently-abled members, whether good or bad. As our society continues to fight the stigma associated with disability and mental health issues, Finding Dory will arm a generation with lots of teachable moments.

While not as strong as recent classics Up or Inside Out, Finding Dory is much better than what I would expect of a kid's movie or a sequel. Kicking tail at both, it more than meets Pixar's standard of excellence for animation and storytelling. I was among those concerned that Disney would upset the apple cart at Pixar, but with the string of winners leading up to and including a sequel like Finding Dory, it appears that those concerns are best left forgotten.

Putting the MESS in Messianic: A few Words about BATMAN VS SUPERMAN

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Mon, 11 Apr 2016 18:29:00 +0000

So I finally caught Batman Vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice last week. It follows lots of Hollywood trends that irk me, like overly-long names (as if Batman Vs. Superman doesn't cover it), bloated running times, and superhero costumes that are dark for no reason. But don't get me wrong! I really enjoyed most of the movie.
But I guess my expectations were not that high.

Despite his incredible gift for capturing super hero visuals, Snyder may not be the right choice to direct a movie about Superman. Fortunately, this movie isn't really about Superman. But maybe I'm getting ahead of myself...

More than any other superhero, Superman is meant to inspire wonder and faith in the goodness of humanity. He isn't perfect, but he must inspire others to aspire to perfection. All-Star Superman author Grant Morrison is among the writers that get what the original superhero is meant to be.
"We created superheroes to inspire us. To give us an idea of our better selves, and then we could imitate our better selves"
-Grant Morrison

Morrison pushes back against the deconstructionist view of superheroes that informs Snyder's faithless vision of Superman, a view that originated with Alan Moore's Watchmen (which Snyder stylishly adapted to film in 2009) and Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns. I obviously believe there is room for superheroes with feet of clay, but it is a role ill-suited to Superman, the ultimate good guy. In Morrison's JLA, even the other heroes look up to Superman, not just because he is far above them in power, but because he does the right thing. Superman should have answers for his critics, not prove them right, as he does in Snyder's films.

I get that kids (like Snyder) who grew up in the shadow of Watchmen, DKR, and decades of "grim and gritty" super-bastard comics and movies are convinced that anti-heroes are more "realistic" than old-fashioned men of virtue and excellence. Even though I think that idea is pretty silly (I know lots of old-fashioned men of virtue and excellence), it doesn't matter, because Superman isn't meant to be realistic. He's meant to be inspirational.

"You are the salt of the earth.
But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor? Can you make it salty again? It will be thrown out and trampled underfoot as worthless."
-Jesus of Nazereth
(Matthew 5:13)

Yeah, I went there. This is, in my opinion, where "grim and gritty" Superman gets it wrong. If Superman is no longer the shining light of greatness for regular people (and superheroes) to aspire to, if times of moral crisis break him, if he is a slowly detaching Doctor Manhattan-like man-shaped alien weapon of mass destruction, then Lex Luthor is right. A weak Superman IS likely to evolve into an ominous fascist might-makes-right Ubermensch, only useful as something to fear, and those who continue to believe in him are the gullible masses, who do so at their own peril.
This diminished and diminishing view of Superman as an ideal is an outgrowth of the diminished and diminishing view of the "Truth, Justice, and the American Way" that Superman stands for. The institutions our forefathers stood for are crumbling, and Superman, in many ways the image of those institutions, has been struggling with that ever since. It's bigger than Superman, of course. Watchmen and DKR brought this battle to the forefront of American comics in the eighties, and the battle has been waging ever since. Supes' Marvel Universe reflection Captain America managed to free himself from that by decoupling the ideals of America from the actions of the American government in stories like Mark Waid and Ron Garney's Man Without a Country. Superman scribes have found it harder, because Superman's power situates him as bigger than a government. He is a god. And, as Lex says "If God is all-powerful, he can't be all good."

Superman has been effectively parodied and deconstructed in other characters like Supreme, Hyperion, the Sentry, Apollo from The Authority and countless others. These riffs on the original superhero make Superman-as-beacon-of-light more necessary, not less. Although a few writers have gotten it right (Example: Read Joe Kelly's What's So Funny About Truth, Justice, and the American Way), Snyder has so far chosen not to listen to them, instead opting for a powerful, but emotionally weak Kal-El. This emo Superman is a lot like unsalty salt. Worthless.

So here's the part where I advocate for the possibility that Snyder and the DC brass might be smarter than their critics give them credit for. Here's a few things I think they got incredibly right:

Superman doesn't love you, and that's okay- I am not a huge Superman fan, but it's not my fault. After all, most Superman comics suck. But the ones that don't suck have taught me a lot about Kal-El of Krypton. As a spiritual dude, I have had to ponder the questions that often lead people to the dark places populated by Lex and Bruce Wayne, and come to different conclusions, which are too lengthy a matrix to fully cover here, but it is summed up best in the sentence I started this paragraph with. Like Lex, I am convinced that Superman, while raised by humans, is not a human in any meaningful way. I think the Clark Kent persona is an elaborate construction, that is nevertheless not able to contain all that Kal-El is. Like Tarzan eventually and inevitably outgrows being a relatively hairless ape, Kal must eventually outgrow being a human. Like Tarzan, he loves these lesser creatures that raised him, especially certain ones he knows intimately, like the Kents, Jimmy Olsen and Perry White. Even Bruce Wayne, whose trust he struggles to gain and maintain. Of course Superman loves Lois Lane.

Because he loves these particular humans intensely, he loves the human race as a whole. But as much as Superman loves the human race, as much as he finds comfort in humankind's traditions, as much as he admires humanity's budding potential, he doesn't love you. I mean you, as an individual, are really kinda beneath his notice. Superman doesn't fight crime (sorry Gotham), or do good deeds based on the idea that the sanctity of every life matters. After all, death means something totally different to him. He chats with both his dead fathers on a regular basis, after all. Superman does not love you, and that's okay because he keeps the world safe for Jimmy, Lois, and his other friends. He preserves the status quo. He keeps giant meteors, doomsday devices, and alien invaders from wiping you out. He saves your little human race just enough so you can save yourselves. He doesn't make good things happen, but he makes them possible. You're welcome.
Wonder Woman go hard- As the subtitle suggests, the other superheroes in Dawn of Justice are really what make it worth (re)watching. The big-screen debut of Wonder Woman is probably what most fans I follow on social media were crowing about the most, and with good reason. Wonder Woman is best portrayed in the comics as more of a warrior than a spandex hero, and Warrior Princess Diana of Themyscira dominated every scene she was in. Diana showed herself worthy of standing shoulder to shoulder with Superman in battle, and matched wits with the Dark Knight detective. One of my biggest gripes with Dawn of Justice was that Superman's death was very forced, maybe even more than Kal-El's quasi-justifiable murder of Zod in Man of Steel. I get that the narrative required Supes to give his life to defeat ~~Bizarro~~ Doomsday, but he should'a passed the rock to Diana, who would'a deaded Lex's science experiment in short order and took Bruce Wayne to the res for some Netflix and Chill. Anticlimactic endings not withstanding, Wonder Woman was the whole shit, and easily the second best thing in the movie.
The Goddamn Batman-Superman fans should realize that this movie was not a sequel to Man of Steel, it was the second in series of movies officially (re)establishing the DC Universe on the silver screen. Superman's name came second in the title for a reason, because the real purpose of Dawn of Justice was introducing moviegoers to Detective Comics' greatest hero: The Goddamn Batman. As much as Alan Moore's Watchmen broke Superman for post-modern writers and fans, causing us to question his relevance in a pluralistic world where might doesn't always make right, Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns made Batman into the caped and cowled champion of a generation. He wasn't just a silly, jet-setting playboy with a bunch of wonderful toys, he was an outlaw warrior willing to rob his own riches to rescue the poor from the predators among them and the corrupt and crumbling establishment above them. By squaring Batman and Superman off in tooth-rattling combat, Frank Miller finally (and probably permanently) shifted our hero-worship from the Alien God in man's clothing to the wounded over-achieving plutocrat from Gotham. Where Superman defended the status quo, Batman told the status quo to go fuck itself, and we love him for it. For the record, Snyder is a perfect director for Batman. Snyder and Affleck's Batman is a brutal, black and grey hurricane of fists and batarangs. The way his cape moves when he fights feels better than any other live-action iteration of the character. As much as I enjoyed Nolan's portrayal of Batman and Bruce Wayne, Batman Vs Superman is the purest depiction of the character on screen to date.
Lex Luthor: Man of Steel- Nobody seems to like Jesse Eisenberg's Alexander "My dad was the Lex in Lexcorp" Luthor, but he was one of my favorite things about the movie. The thing I love most about him is that he is smarter than Batman. Lex and Batman have a lot in common, but while most fans would assume Bruce Wayne is the sharpest mind on Earth, Snyder and company agree with me. Young Alexander Luthor had Wayne and Kent figured out from day zero. He would need to be the smartest man Earth could produce to be a worthy foe of the Last Son of Krypton, and he doesn't disappoint. He didn't disappoint me, at least. Lex takes humanism to villainous ends, offended as he is by Kal-El's arrival on the scene. In Brian Azzarello and Lee Bermejo's Lex Luthor: Man of Steel, Lex suggests that Superman is an interruption of mankind's growth as a species, that by casting our faith on a man in the sky we are turning from faith in ourselves, to our own peril. This particular germ of heroism in Lex is what makes him a perfect foil for Superman, and I like that they included it. It pleases me that Snyder and friends allowed the nietzschean superman Bruce Wayne to be vulnerable to the even more nietzschean superman Lex's machinations. Again, a Lex who is smarter than Batman, who can manipulate Batman and Superman at every turn (who actually beat them in this movie), is a necessary evil, and I can only hope he stays awesome when more supervillains start to appear. And yes, I fully expect them to blow my high by making him a lapdog to Darkseid in future movies. But that's a whole 'nother review.

So, how does unsalty salt regain its saltiness?
Through the ultimate miracle: Resurrection.

Although they have chosen a post-Watchmen/DKR style reality to establish the DC Universe on the big screen, I'm hoping betting they will choose to reaffirm Superman's idealistic purpose as a beacon of light and optimism after his inevitable resurrection in future films, as other heroes contemplate Superman in his absence, and feel his presence in his resurrection. Like almost every superhero movie franchise before Marvel started getting it (mostly) right, Dawn of Justice suffers from trying to do too much, too soon. But it also does a great job creating villains so large that it will take real heroes to defeat and keep them at bay. Already we see that even in defeat, the acts of Zod, Lex Luthor, and (offscreen) the Joker have lasting repercussions that will take many movies to resolve. And we know Darkseid is coming (if only to one-up his Marvel based knockoff, Thanos). But hopefully, not too soon. If events like Superman's resurrection and the arrival of DC's god of Anti-Life are to have any impact, we need to have time to anticipate them. The ability to hold back master strokes for greatest impact, to emulate comics' ability to leave you wanting more while still being satisfying in the moment, and to give each character his or her own tone and color palette, are bonuses Marvel has introduced to audiences. These are features I am not convinced DC has learned to integrate into its movie-making machine yet.

We'll see...

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A few words about the late, great Roger Ebert...

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sat, 06 Apr 2013 16:41:00 +0000

Like most people, I came to know Roger Ebert as "the fat one" half of the most famous televised movie critic duo of all time, via Siskel & Ebert At the Movies. Sometimes I agreed with Ebert's criticism. Often I didn't. I always enjoyed reading or listening to his opinion though, even when I didn't agree with it.

Ebert started early as a journalist, writing movie reviews professionally as a teenager. He became the film critic for the Chicago Sun-Times in 1967, a position he held until he died of complications of his long fight with cancer on Thursday April 4th 2013.

Ebert was a rare example of a cat that could write high quality discourse that was still legible to common people, which enabled his long and stellar career in journalism and criticism. It won him a Pulitzer before he became a household name on television. He became famous because of the accessibility of his intellectualism, his nerd-next-door persona, and -obviously- his love of the movies.

In recent years, more than the vast majority of the professional press, Ebert embraced and excelled in the world of social media, which turned every person who wanted to be (like me) into a published amateur critic. Rather than childishly railing against the social internet the way many journalists and critics did, Ebert navigated it like a boss. His Facebook and Twitter presence was huge but strangely intimate, and exposed his flair for writing and sharing about any and every topic. He wrote about his illness, his fears (or lack thereof) and just about everything else.

I didn't follow Ebert everyday the way many did, but word of his passing still hit me hard. His wife Chaz said he passed with "no struggle, no pain, just a quiet, dignified transition." I'm thankful for that at least.

Peace,
-Samax

My favorite "Teen Titans Go" episode

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Wed, 04 Jul 2012 18:56:00 +0000

The 2 parter Homecoming is probably my favorite story from the dearly departed cartoon show Teen Titans Go. Launching the show's fifth and final season, Homecoming introduces Beast Boy's former team the Doom Patrol, and their evil archenemies the Brotherhood of Evil.

The story starts with a flashback to Beast Boy's time as a member of the Doom Patrol that gives us a glimpse at how this team differs from the Teen Titans. When the present day Beast Boy is called upon to return to the aid of his fallen former teammates he brings the Titans along for the ride. While the Doom Patrol are more powerful and experienced, the Titans, in many ways, are more mature. As the first episode ends and the stakes are raised, Beast Boy must choose which team he will side with.

The Doom Patrol's leader Mento has a militaristic attitude and seems to be hellbent on sacrificing his team to defeat the Brotherhood. Unlike the Titans, who seem like five friends who also happen to be superheroes, the Doom Patrol are more dedicated to defeating their enemy than they are to one another. That distinction reinforces the awesomeness of the Titans while still building on the appeal and mystique of the Doom Patrol.
A great episode.

I finally saw Avengers...

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 00:52:00 +0000

"So, is Avengers the greatest superhero movie ever?"

"I don't know. I haven't seen it yet."

"...
You need to see it..."

This exchange took place on Facebook back when The Avengers debuted in theaters in May. My friend Anthony could not believe I had not seen the movie, given my place (whatever that is) in the world of semi-professional online nerdery. What he didn't know is that I had been over the so-called "comic book movie" for some time. I had not bothered to see a superhero flick since the sensory overload of Iron Man 2, and even then, it was more of a social outing than a "must see" for me. So, already having missed Captain America and Thor, I had not made plans to see The Avengers, even though the trailers looked great...

As I'm sure you are aware, The Avengers came with unprecedented fan-fueled fanfare. This only solidified my desire to miss it. What was it? My family-man concerns? My career worries? My slow-but-steady drift away from mainstream comics (and it doesn't get any more mainstream than The Avengers)? Was I outgrowing superheroes?

No. In fact, I have spent the better part of the last few years trying to master the rendition of superheroes. Even if I didn't always read mainstream books like what everyone else was reading, I still got excited about plenty of Marvel stuff. I even write about them from time to time. If anything, I may love the characters too much. I didn't want to turn into one of those dudes who tries to light the internet on fire with complaints about how the movie "got it wrong"... Whining about how superhero films were jumping the shark by diverging from continuity or crying about the superiority of Kirby designs over the contemporary costumes. That brings up another thing. Jack Kirby had a hand in creating every character in this movie (the cosmic godling who appears after the end titles was not created by Kirby, but was a direct knock-off of one of Kirby's greatest characters for that other mainstream publisher), but he essentially died broke, and his family will not see a dime from all the cash brought in by this blockbuster of blockbusters.

Don't get me started...

I could go on, but the point is that up until yesterday, I was totally cool with missing this movie. But yesterday, my wife and daughter both had other plans, and I could not get motivated to draw. Say what you want about the genre, but unless they are totally wack, superhero films make me want to draw, so I saddled up and headed to the local multiplex to catch The Avengers.
...

It's probably the best superhero movie ever.

At first, I was put off by the scope of the story. Cosmic threats so powerful, they have the Norse god Loki on a leash? Isn't that a bit much for the first movie? But then I remembered that The Avengers is actually a sequel. The next logical step in the progression of Marvel's shared universe of movies. Two Iron Man films, The Incredible Hulk, Captain America and Thor set this movie up. We know who these characters are. We know what they are capable of on their own. "And then came a day unlike any other..."

Brilliant.
Beyond the lightning-in-a-bottle scenario they were able to pull off getting to this point, whoever selected Joss Whedon to write and direct The Avengers deserves a lion's share of the credit. The movie encapsulates everything that makes superhero comics (particularly Marvel comics) work. The characters are flawed. Apart, they're each so powerful and capable that they command complete respect. But put them together, and they are as likely to destroy each other as to defeat the enemy.

Here, Whedon shines. He knows that a gathering of tough guys of this magnitude will erupt into violence and why. And he's perfect at writing it. When Captain America interrupts a scuffle between Thor and Iron Man by asking Thor to put down the hammer, my hand involuntarily went up as Thor replies "You want me to put my hammer down?" because I knew exactly what would happen next. Not aware that Whedon wrote the screenplay, I muttered to myself "whoever they got to write this is the bomb..."

And that's just one example. The Avengers is as loaded with subplots and surprise twists as any trade paperback I can recommend. Each character gets their moments to be exalted, humbled, and then raised to greatness again. Black Widow and Hawkeye (both former reformed Iron Man villains in the comics) bring a slick, dark edge to the film.

Hulk is perfectly utilized. The jade giant's alter ego Bruce Banner is the only character whose star from his previous film (Ed Norton) was not present in The Avengers, but Mark Ruffalo was so good as the tortured physicist that Norton wasn't missed. The relationship between Banner and Tony Stark was complex, well conceived and and excellently executed.

Again, one of the themes in this film about the Earth's Mightiest Heroes is humility. Whedon takes the characters apart, so that they will be willing to put aside their differences and personal fears in order to work together. Their doubts about one another are replaced with trust that is earned the hard way.
So if I haven't been clear enough, The Avengers was dope. I reserve the right to change my mind about that "greatest ever" tag, but I was not disappointed by it, despite the outrageous expectations I had going in. Marvel has successfully created a shared universe and continuing-yet-accessible narrative on the big screen. That's something I would not have thought possible.

Excelsior!

MI4: Ghost Protocol is pretty sweet!

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 23:30:00 +0000

After watching Young Adult at the sneakeasy* last week, I couldn't resist the urge to sneak into Mission Impossible 4: Ghost Protocol. Besides having a long name that is nevertheless fun to say, Ghost Protocol is directed by one of the best storytellers in animation: Brad Bird (The Incredibles, The Iron Giant, Ratatouille), and it was just starting as I was leaving Young Adult. It's like they WANTED me to sneak in and see it!

And I'm glad I followed the sparkly dust of synchronicity, because MI4:GP was awesome! It starts out with Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, Run Fatboy Run) and fine ass Paula Patton (Deja Vu, Jumping the Broom, Idlewild) breaking Ethan Hunt out of a Russian prison. The movie hits the proverbial ground running and moves ahead at full speed from there without stopping.

Before long, Hunt and his team are on the track of a faceless Russian terrorist named Kobalt, who manages to frame Hunt and the entire IMF for a bombing of the Kremlin. Hunt doesn't bat an eye when he learns the President has enacted Ghost Protocol, disavowing the entire IMF in one shot. Sure, it cuts him off from hundreds of other agents and billions of dollars in technical support and safe houses... yeah, he knows Kobalt is planning to plunge the world into nuclear Armageddon and no one else can stop him. No problem... He got this...

No matter what tabloids are saying at any given time, it's all hate: Tom Cruise is the mother effing MAN! He's only getting better as the definitive American answer to James Bond.They let Pegg's character Benji off the leash as a field agent this go-round, but he's still short on badassery and long on jokes. The plot holes were of tolerable size and placement for the genre, and there were tons of cool locations, cars and violence to make up for them!

Brad Bird does a commendable job keeping all the balls in the air. The movie sags in the middle, but only slightly. And it's a beautiful-looking piece of work. If you're on the fence about watching it, I say check it out.

Movies That Should Be Comics #21- Young Adult

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 21:55:00 +0000

A Beautiful Mess

After 3 straight days cooped up with me and my three year old , my wife ~~snapped~~ suggested I go (by myself) to the movies. For whatever reason, the movie I most wanted to see amid all the holiday blockbuster hooplah was Young Adult, the story of a ghost writer of a once-popular teen novel series. Besides the fact that it stars the lovely and talented Charlize Theron, Young Adult was written by Diablo Cody (Juno, United States of Tara) and directed by Jason Reitman (Juno, Up in the Air, Thank You for Smoking). Obviously disturbed by a recent divorce, Theron's character Mavis Gary randomly fixates on an old boyfriend, her highschool sweetheart Buddy (Nite-Owl from Watchmen), who just so happens to be married with a new baby. The combination of subject matter and creative team was too much for me to resist, so I decided to check it out!

Category FAIL

"OMG... Nite-Owl is so effin' HAWT!"

First of all, I have seen this movie branded as a romantic comedy which is really misleading. Sure, I found it very funny, and Mavis is determined to "get her man against all odds" in typical romcom fashion, but Young Adult is way more drama than comedy. When I arrived (very early) at the theater, I saw a couple of twentysomething suburbanistas coming from watching the previous showing, and one turns to the other and sneers "I thought it would be funny, but it was kind of depressing..."

Because "funny" and "depressing" can't happen in the same story, right? They totally can of course, and in Young Adult, they totally do. The storytelling is superbly done, and all the actors deliver. The ever-elastic Theron is scary good as the movie's alcoholic basketcase of a star, whom lazy critics will label "unlikeable" due to her laundry list of personality flaws. Mavis is messed up, but she's funny, good-looking, and talented. That is enough to make a person attractive to most people, and she's also good at hiding her shortcomings when she wants to. The director protects us from her charms by quickly and repeatedly revealing her hotness and charisma to be a masterfully constructed, but ultimately thin facade. As we get to know her, her problematic traits start to reveal the train wreck that awaits.
Spoiler Alert! Not really...

This movie is excellent, but not necessarily for everyone. Let me give you a spoiler that will help you decide if it's for you: If you are planning on watching to see if Mavis and Nite Owl will rekindle their fated high school romance, forget it. Mavis' home-wrecking mission is doomed to fail in awkward and spectacular fashion. The only thing approaching a romcom plotline is the intimate-yet-dysfunctional relationship Mavis forms with her handicapped toy-friend Matt (comedian Patton Oswalt [United States of Tara, Ratatouille, The Informant!]), but it mocks romcom fans' desires more than it satisfies them. No matter how you slice it, this movie is not a romantic comedy, and it will punish you for wanting it to be one, hence the depressed chick who was leaving as I was coming in...
Mavis is...

Mavis is the mean girl who never grew out of it. She is a self-defeating, alcoholic drama queen. While not technically insane, she has serious issues that she refuses to face, and while they repeatedly destroy her relationships, she is capable enough to stay ahead of the wave. Because she is pretty and talented, there is always someone willing to rescue her that she will throw away once she thinks she can stand on her own. As much as critics want to brand Mavis unlikeable, society produces lots of people like her that we like just fine until we get to know them. We sweat them, woo them and beg for their approval. We rejoice at their every passing wink or pinch of attention. When they need us to enable their bad behavior, we are just happy to be needed. And even though we miss them when they are gone, we eventually realize we are better off without them. Is that depressing? Not to me. But then, I'm not Mavis, nor am I in love with anyone like her. If you are, you should follow Matt's advice: "Keep that to yourself... and see a therapist".
the Anti-Crumb?

I think it would be really cool if this was made into a comic, especially by a female writer-artist. Imagine if there was an ex-cheerleader/prom queen like Mavis who also happened to write and draw semi-autobio comics! Lets call her the Anti-Crumb... It would sell like Taylor Swift mp3s, buddy! Let's face it: everyone in the comics industry CLAIMS they want girls to read comics, but most comics are made by dudes like Matt. Eeew! In the movie, Mavis is all messed up and self-absorbed... but she's a helluva writer who knows what girls want to read! If she could draw comics like R. Crumb or Harvey Pekar, not only would girls flock to her signings in Twilight-like droves, but she would have art nerds and Eisner awards piling up at her door! Whether she was drafted by a traditional comics publisher or her books dropped as outsider comix, the Anti-Crumb would smash the comics industry as we know it, generating adoring fans, angry critiques and eager copycats in record numbers! So put down your old yearbooks and sharpen your pencils, ladies. Your audience is waiting...

5 reasons why I cuts for "Colombiana" even though you told me not to watch it...

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 20:51:00 +0000

When I announced my intention to go watch Colombiana, the new shoot-em-up popcorn flick starring rising star Zoe Saldana, I received many texts, tweets, and other assorted comments suggesting that my hard-earned money would be better spent elsewhere. They're welcome to their opinions, but I had several good reasons to put my chips on the deck to watch this one, whether I really expected it to blow my mind or not. I wasn't expecting an Oscar-worthy tour de force (and it wasn't one), but I was hoping for a good time, which it delivered. Here's five reasons I watched it, and you should too...

5) Gun control means using both hands- It's been a while since I saw an action movie where the protagonist pulls out guns the size of the one Saldana's hit-girl for hire Cataleya Restrepo packs in Colombiana, which definitely did not disappoint in the steel-packing category, scoring high on my Wa-da-da-dang-o-meter.

4) Girl Power- Americans have a problem imagining women as violent or powerful, especially if they are still hot and feminine. As the only son of a single mom with two older sisters, I know this reductive view of female ability is a fictional construct, not reflective of the true potential of women. The script for Colombiana is by French writer/director Luc Besson, known for supplying chick badassery in films like Le Femme Nakita and The Fifth Element. While Colombiana is not the equal of those films, there are several great action scenes that place Cataleya's athletic and combat prowess front and center. I got the impression that many critics have a fundamental problem with depicting a female (and in this case a woman of color) with mad skills and a stone-faced attitude toward violence. If you liked XXX and/or Salt, but you can't accept Saldana as a badass gun-clapping, neck-snapping instrument of vengeance, then I think you pro'lly need to check yourself.

3) Inspiration- One of the best compliments I can give a film or television show is that it makes me want to write and draw comics. Although much of the execution in this movie falls short of outstanding, it definitely met my "makes me wanna make comics" criteria. I would not be surprised if lots of creative people had a similar experience. If anybody hears that the rights-holders are thinking about making comics based on Cataleya (and Brian Stelfreeze and Jason Pearson aren't interested), have them give me a shout...

2) Can you say "Franchise?"- Sequels aren't often better than the original films, just more expensive. Even though I enjoyed Colombiana, I think there is a lot of room to improve upon this movie's execution and build on the characters (the ones that survived anyways).There is enough substance here to turn this into a series of movies like James Bond (or at least The Transporter). When I was watching it, I could feel it as a 1st person shooter video game. Wouldn't you love to snipe CIA agents and drown Colombian drug lords and emerge from swimming pools of blood as the lovely and deadly femme fatale?

1) Fear of a Tyler Perry planet- I like Zoe Saldana. I have been a fan ever since she played the Star Trek-loving bureaucrat Dolores Torres in The Terminal. My hope is that her agents will keep her on the fanboytoy track evidenced by that role, as well as her ventures into badassery in The Losers and Colombiana. As a black(ish... I know she mostly identifies herself as latina. Whatevs) actress, the mysterious magnetic powers of racial typecasting will try to exile her the dark and seedy world of Tyler Perry films, never to return, and frankly I'd rather not see that happen. While I would never take Tyler Perry away from those who love his movies, I personally can't stand them. So I feel very strongly about supporting genre films that Saldana appears in... besides which, it would be awesome if Hollywood money-men believed in black women. I swear they are capable of more than romantic comedies and The Help.

Movies That Should be Comics #19- Meet Dave

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sun, 11 Sep 2011 20:50:00 +0000

For reasons i'm still at a loss to explain, I watched the sci-fi comedy Meet Dave starring Eddie Murphy (48 Hours, Trading Places, Beverly Hills Cop, Coming To America, Boomerang, Dreamgirls) on television the other day. I'm a big fan of Eddie's old movies and stand-up, and while I did enjoy the first Daddy Day Care (there was a kid who spent the ENTIRE FILM dressed as the Flash... I'm sorry, that's funny!), I am extremely perplexed by Eddie's family comedies. Eddie is still a phenomenal talent. He's funny, good looking, and has super star charm. he's just waiting to work with a great director, in a great film...

Meet Dave is not that film. Eddie Murphy plays the captain of a space ship staffed by tiny aliens who arrive on Earth to retrieve a device that can save their world from destruction, but will unfortunately kill the human race in the process. Because they are so small, their ship is disguised as a human who looks just like Murphy (of course..?). As Dave (the starship's alias) interacts with a pretty human chick played by Elizabeth Banks (Zack and Miri Make A Porno, Role Models, 40 Year Old Virgin, W ), Murphy discovers that he might not want to kill the whole human race after all. Meanwhile (for some reason) being on earth has adverse emotional effects on Murphy's crew, and y'know, hyjinx ensue.

i found the film to be a lot more tolerable (even entertaining) than i thought it would be. there are some good concepts and comedic moments, but it was just not well-done overall. The actors (even actors who were great in other films) were mostly flat. the special effects, as Butthead would say "were not that special" and the child actors were a hot mess. The chemistry was great between Dave and the love interests played by Banks and Gabrielle Union (Deliver Us From Eva, Bad Boys 2, Bring It On, Something the Lord Made), but there was little room to make the interactions ring true. At the end when Dave's 2nd in command takes over the ship and uses its weapons to go on a super-powered rampage, I saw the movie this could have been. Director Brian Robbins (Norbit, The Shaggy Dog) was totally out of his breadth, but anyone who saw the trailer for Meet Dave and still paid to see it deserved what they got.

I'm only writing about Meet Dave for one reason: I came up with a similar idea many years ago, but it wasn't a comedy, it was dead serious. I honestly think that in many ways, the concept was conceived better in this film. Adding a little comedy helps the absurd ideas work. That said, I think Meet Dave would work MUCH better as a comic! there are so many scenes in this movie (especially the part where the white-suited Murphy goes berzerk on the cops with hand-mounted laser cannons) that even a decent comicbook artist would have a BLAST with! I know I'd love to draw a comic based on this premise... the movie, bad as it was, revealed a lot of potential for gags and visuals that were just beyond this director's capabilities.

[EDIT: In a moment of pure procrastination, I drew the image seen here, to play with the idea of what this movie could be in comics form. If you know the person who owns the rights, tell them I'd happily adapt it for comics for a reasonable fee...]
holla!
-samax

Rise of a Supervillain, or Clown Prince of Street Art Strikes Again?

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 17:00:00 +0000

So I finally got around to watching the heavily talked-about, Oscar-nominated street art doc Exit Through the Gift Shop this weekend. The film is directed by the anonymous street artist and culture critic Banksy, constructed primarily of footage shot by the film's presumably unwitting star, the would-be filmmaker-turned street art sensation Thierry Guetta (above), aka Mr. Brainwash.

As someone coming very late to the film (which has since been accused of being at least partially fabricated), I chose to try and accept it on face value- to watch it as another in a long line of slanted documentaries with an agenda beyond documentation of reality- and to deal with the question of it's veracity separately. There are tons of details about the movie that are very easily confirmed as true, while others will always be open for speculation and alternating theories.

Even with all I had heard about the film prior to watching it, I found myself drawn into the weird life of Thierry Guetta, which reads like the origin story of a super-villain. If the documentary's account of Guetta's life can be believed, sad and fairly tragic events in his childhood (including the death of his mother) saddled him with a compulsion to take pictures and video of everything and everyone in his life, to the point that his friends and family just got used to the constant filming. When a cousin (himself a prolific street artist) allows Thierry to film his art-making, he unwittingly provides Thierry with an entry point into filming more and more prominent street artists, culminating with the golden goose of street artists, the elusive and anonymous Banksy.

He mostly made these inroads because he convinced the artists that he too was an artist: They believed he intended to eventually combine all that footage to create a documentary about street artists exploits, adventures and culture. Instead, when Banksy decides that Guetta is incapable of creating a documentary of any merit, he prods him down the road of becoming a street artist himself, while secretly using Guetta's footage to create his own film about Guetta's transformation into the street art franchise called Mr. Brainwash, who hires a squad of artists and takes the Los Angeles art scene by storm.

Whether Banksy's account of all this is sincere, it brings to mind many of the usual notions about where the boundaries are (or should be) around art. What can fairly be called art, who can fairly be called an artist, and what the real value of art is, if there is any. Guetta is subtly painted as a shifty and unbalanced con man, who had already made a good living exploiting the mildly stupid (buying discarded clothes and reselling them as "vintage" to well-heeled hipsters) who then brought the same mindset to the art world. He contracted a gang of artists to take him from art zero to art hero in short order, selling almost a million bucks worth of his cheesy art to the gullible Tinseltown art dorks.

Of course, it's not surprising that people might call Banksy's sincerity into question. His art is at its core social satire. He frequently thumbs his nose at the art community and he is to date completely anonymous. Since so much of his art is done using stencils and reproductions, there's no way to confirm his own identity, and some suspect he may actually be franchising his name (or "brand" if you prefer) out to other artists. Obviously, someone is out there cashing the checks, but the art world at large (including art nerds like me, and probably you too) has no real way to know if the hooded figure in the film is the "real" Banksy or a spokesman. And while we can't be sure what percentage of his origin story for Mr. Brainwash is accurate, he's at least real enough to be the latest street artist to lose a high-profile copyright case that may wreck the Fair Use defense for pop artists... but I digress...

I said all that to say: this movie is dope either way. After years of reading comics, I would love to think this is a straight-up documentary chronicling the rise of an unintentional art villain who exploits the cracks in the framework of the so-called "fine art" world for financial gain and ego inflation. But I can just as easily enjoy it as a likely inside joke from one of the most well-known (yet anonymous) court jesters in the global village.
If you haven't seen this movie, you probably should if you are an art nerd. It's available for Instant Viewing on Amazon (FREE for Amazon Prime members). The questions it raises about art are not new ones, but it will give you a chance to talk about them from another angle (and what art nerd doesn't want THAT?). If you have seen it, I'd LOVE to hear your thoughts!
holla!
-samax

I need to peep this anime...

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 20:02:00 +0000

This movie Summer Wars looks hard...

Here's the sales pitch:
From the visionary directory of The Girl Who Leapt Through Time (2007 Japanese Academy Award winner, Best Animated Feature) comes the story of an ordinary family going to extraordinary lengths to avert the impending cyber apocalypse!

I need to check this out! I have read some good reviews of it, but haven't caught it yet myself...
It seems to press some of the same buttons as the Satoshi Kon mindbender Paprika (which I really liked), but with a lighter touch. I'm sure some of you have seen Summer Wars already, so feel free to speak up. Just try not to give away too much!

Okay... this is dope...

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 17:00:00 +0000

I clowned Green Lantern pretty bad when the first trailer came out, so it's only fair that I admit how much I'm feeling this one...

I still think I would like Reynolds better as Kyle Rayner, but that's moot... these snippets (it's not really a trailer per se) do a much better job of selling the movie, I think. Feel free to kick in with your own comments I know you probably commented on a million blogs and websites, but hey, what's one more!?!

Another bubble Busted

noreply@blogger.com (Samax) — Tue, 29 Mar 2011 00:00:00 +0000

I recently watched August, a movie about a struggling internet company skating on the skin of the dot-com bubble the month before the infamous terror attacks of 2001. August stars Josh Hartnett (40 Days and 40 Nights,30 Days of Night,Lucky Number Slevin) as Tom Sterling, the hotshot co-founder of Landshark, a company that does something having to do with aggregating (google it). I had no interest in August when it popped up on cable, until I realized that (like many other good stories) this movie was all about getting the girl...

okay, so it wasn't TOTALLY about getting the girl, but it SHOULD have been... There is a small segment of the movie that IS about getting the girl. Namely his sexy European bar-tending ex-girlfriend, played by the lovely Naomi Harris. THAT part was awesome, except... well, I'll get to that a little later... But basically, this movie reminds us that creating a remarkable product and selling a remarkable product take two totally different sets of skills. Hartnett's character is a beast at selling... not just selling what Landshark DOES, but what Landshark IS: the Future.

Like a lot of people selling the future, Sterling isn't able to deliver it fast enough for anyone (his girl, investors, his dad, or his brother... the tech-savvy better half of Landshark, played by Adam Scott). Unfortunately, this movie isn't able to deliver either...

I mean, the performances are all awesome. The direction isn't bad either. The storytellers do a good job of creating tension, with the impending doom that we know about but the characters don't (the terror attacks coming the following month, and the long-term downward thrust they deliver to the economy) as well as the company's financial problems that they do know. They use television and movie clips to situate the viewer so that I felt I was back in 2001. But the story really isn't going anywhere... or rather, not anywhere I wanted to go.

Like I said before, what really hooked me was when he runs into his ex and it looks like he is going to rekindle their romance. I mean, I was pretty sure by then that this dude was just a high-powered sales dog whose business was probably going down, whether it was from getting snaked by competitors or by an Al-Qaeda- inspired economic downturn, but at least he would have a hot girlfriend who loved him even before he had loot.
That would have made a good movie, I think... but that wasn't the plan. This movie is a good-ole fashioned tragedy, with all that entails.

Like all of us, Tom is flawed. He's a mildly likable, highly ambitious douchebag, whose futuristic thinking is the real secret of his success, and ultimately his failure. I think I could have stood the movie, even loved it, if the romance was allowed to flourish, like the proverbial rose growing from concrete...

but I guess that wasn't the point, was it? Like a lot of people who are focused on the future, Tom doesn't spend nearly enough time on what's right in front of him. Tom leverages all his relationships on the future and pays the price for his arrogance, and If you're rooting for him, you will too.
*sigh* SO sad...
:(
-Samax