What Makes a Comic Book Movie "Bad"?

If you were to go down the list of all the comic book films released dating all the way back to 1939’s “Mandrake the Magician” you will find the fan base for these various properties split almost entirely down the middle.  Professional film critics tend to be harder on comic book films than they are on pretty much any other genre because of a litany of factors.  Doug Walker, the Nostalgia Critic once pointed out those professional film critics then to have a harsher opinion because they are saturated in films.  When you consider how many movies you see in the theaters each year, it’s probably only a handful because you have other things to do.  Professional critics have to see them all the time so an action sequence or a joke that seems unique and cool to you, they’ve seen a dozen times because multiple movies have done the same sequence or joke, each with varying degrees of competency.

For more on Doug’s thoughts on the trials of being a critic vs being just a movie viewer, check out his video here

http://channelawesome.com/when-are-critics-wrong/

But what does that have to do with how we, the average fan views a superhero film.  Well, let’s take a look at 2011’s “Green Lantern” starring Ryan Reynolds.  Personally I’ve blasted this movie in the past but in looking back, even I have to admit I was harder on it than I should have been.  We, the fans, see so many superhero movies over the course of our lives that frankly they start to blur together.  A lot of people were hard on “Green Lantern” but it had a competent movie star in the lead role, great actors all around, an amazing effects budget, some very unique ideas on style, and some pretty solid dialog.  So, why was it blasted?  Because we felt we’d seen it all done before.  “Green Lantern” was very much a “by the numbers” production and it followed the same basic plot of almost every superhero movie out there.  For some reason when it came out we expected more out of it because of the unique material it had to work with.  It literally had whole galaxies to explore, but it confined itself to three locations, Oa, space, and Earth.  We’d become so jaded at that point that a lot of fans were willing to write it off as just another bad comic book movie.  Even “The Big Bang Theory” took a shot at the film.

(The Big Bang Theory: The Countdown Reflection 2012)

So, if a bad comic book movie isn’t technically “bad”, what is a bad comic book movie?  Chances are when I say “bad comic book movie” the same handful of titles keep coming to your mind: Batman Forever, Batman and Robin, Steel, Superman 3 and 4, X-Men: The Last Stand, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Superman Returns, Man of Steel, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Iron Man 2, Spider-Man 3, and probably a few others.  Chances are you saw one title in that list that made you cringe.  Now let’s break that list down and see if we can find common threads that makes think of these films as “bad”

“Batman Forever” featured competent actors, a decent budget, and some amazing practical effects.  There were, however choices made by the director, Joel Schumacher, that fans question greatly.  Namely the fact that Tommy Lee Jones’ Harvey (Two-Face) Dent and Jim Carey’s the Riddler feel like Joker knock-offs.  That’s the primary complaint I hear from fans, the Joker knock-offs.

Speaking strictly in tone of the film, they feel it is vastly different from the Michael Keaton/Tim Burton era (which some fans are divided on whether or not those two films were any good either).  The colors are brighter, there are more jokes, more slap stick humor and the Dark Knight is anything but dark.  What Schumacher was attempting to do with his interpretation of the character is recapture the camp and spark of the Adam West television series.  He wasn’t attempting to make a “sequel” to the Tim Burton films; he was making his own version of the character.  It just happened to fall into the franchise established by the first film.  If this was your first time watching a Batman film since 1966’s Batman series and theatrical release, you would have thought this was just an extension of that series.  The same goes with “Batman and Robin”.  It’s a bad sequel, but as a standalone film, it’s stupid and funny and you can take young kids to see a Batman movie.  If anything Schumacher seems to understand that his films were only one part in a much bigger franchise, one that included video games, comic books, and action figures.  The plot feels thin because he’s making a commercial for merchandise, and kids need to be able to see that commercial.

Perhaps Michael Bay could learn that lesson, that he’s essentially making 90 minute toy commercials.

Does creating a film to be a really long commercial make it any better or any less mercenary? Not really, but it informs why a filmmaker makes certain choices.

Let’s flip over to the Marvel Camp really quick.  “Iron Man 2” gets a lot of flak for being a “cash in” sequel, but it actually slips into the plot threads set down by the first film really well, as well as establishing characters and interactions that are expanded upon by the greater Marvel Cinematic Universe.  Nick Fury and Agent Coulson are expanded on, both of whom have major roles later down the line, and we are introduced to Scarlet Johansson’s Black Widow and reintroduced to Major James Rhodes, now played with a lot more personality by Don Cheadle, and who has again a major role in “Captain America: Civil War”.  A lot of fans feel that a better plot line for the second film to follow would have been “Demon in a Bottle”; a story that delves into Tony Stark’s alcoholism in the comics, but that wouldn’t have fit with the movie characterization.  Yes, there was a huge plot convenience in the film that, under any amount of scrutiny doesn’t make any sense, but that’s very common for really any action based film, not just comic books.

“Spider-Man 3” catches a lot of heat for shoving in a lot of villains in a short amount of time, and accusations that Sony insisting Venom be in the picture actually created a lot of the problems with the film, making director Sam Raimi re-write the story around the added villain.  The final product again was good for kids and something they could watch again and again.

A lot of how we respond to a film is dictated by our perspective.  When I was a kid, for instance, I loved “Superman 3”, I was okay with “Superman 4”, and “Batman” with Michael Keaton was the definitive Batman movie.  Now, as an adult, I see the flaws in all of them.  The jokes that made me as a kid laugh don’t make me as an adult laugh.  The plot choices I thought were cool at the time do not hold up now.  Even the sacred “Batman” film leaves me with the grown up question of “Wait, where are the poison gas balloons going now?”

Rather than blasting a movie as being automatically bad because we the fans are grown up and have “more sophisticated tastes” we should consider how the general audience is going to look at these movies.  “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” has some plot holes and choices that, to an adult don’t make any sense, but to most of the kids in the audience, it makes perfect sense, because it was geared to appeal to them so they would go out and get us, the parents, to buy the toys.

We as fans need to understand that “Avengers” and “Spider-Man” are not “The Godfather”, they are geared towards wider audiences.  You won’t find Scarface action figures in the toy aisle at Wal-Mart.  You won’t see the “Great Gatsby” on a kid’s lunchbox.  That doesn’t mean that, as a fan, you shouldn’t enjoy the movie, it’s made for you too.  But don’t take it so seriously either.  There isn’t a definitive movie about a character; there will always be other interpretations later down the road.  Heck, take a look back at some of the movies you “hate”, and you may find something you really enjoy there too.

Thanks for reading.

https://www.amazon.com/Better-Off-Dead-Lakehaven-Chronicles-ebook/dp/B00JLPG8HE

Batman v Superman Dawn of Justice Film Review

Okay, so it’s come down to this.  I feel that we are so far removed from the initial theatrical release of the film that I can actually talk about it without fear of spoiling it for anyone.  If you still haven’t seen it, buy or rent “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” and watch it before you keep reading.  You’ve been warned.

Also, we’re going to cover the theatrical version of the film here today, because that is what is going to be determined by many as cannon for the film franchise.

But like our titular heroes I’m not tackling this alone.  I’m pulling assistance from William Dilbeck, who, despite my insistence has staunchly refused to start his own blog, likely because he has better things to do with his time.  At least so he says.

So let’s talk about Ben Affleck as Batman, which kicking off had to be the most (later second most) controversial thing in the movie.  Will?

“He’s a decent Batman.  Better than bale in some respects.  He’s more believable as Bruce, but his story line was better, and that’s not Bale’s fault.”

This is true.  Ben Affleck had a lot more creative influence when it came to his interpretation of Bruce Wayne/Batman than Bale likely ever did.  Through his working relationship with Zack Snyder he was allowed to give Bruce more depth and a wider range of emotions.  I think it’s also important to note this was meant to be Bruce 20 years into being Batman, while the total time in the suit that Bale’s Batman had was about 11, maybe 12, nearly twice as much time.  Further, this Batman never gave up the role so he comes across as more driven than the previous incarnation.

Next up is the MOST controversial role in the film, Jessie Eisenberg’s unapologetic portrayal of Lex Luthor.  Serious he has not apologized for this performance, and I for one won’t ask him to.  Eisenberg was compared by a lot of people to the Joker, in that his mannerisms seemed overly silly and his motivation didn’t make any sense.  At least if you don’t put certain elements into context.  Again, this is strictly from the theatrical cut.  Admittedly the performance was hard to swallow.  Will said “I didn’t like 40% of him.” This is fair, considering we’ve got over a dozen other actors who’ve portrayed the same character over the years to compare him to.  Yet one cannot escape that there has never been a portrayal like this.  While Gene Hackman’s Lex may bleed over into Kevin Spacy’s incarnation and there into Michael Rosenbaum’s, nobody played Lex like Jessie.  Also, if you consider Jessie’s body of work, could you imagine him trying to play that character, the cold, calculating business man?  He played Lex the mad scientist, which is something they’ve pulled away from over the last few decades up to the point that the character trait is more incidental than defining.  He brought it back in full force, and you can see his manipulation throughout the entire film.  He actually is the smartest person in the room when you think about it.

Mad Max, starring Batman?

 

Then there his motivation, which many have described to be completely non-existent, but it’s actually right there in the movie, if you are paying attention.  Remember that dream sequence Bruce Wayne had about Superman in the desert?  The one with the “Omega” symbol burned into the ground and parademons flying around?  The symbol and the parademons have nothing to do with Superman, and by proxy there should be no reason Bruce would have them in his mind.  If the nightmare is Bruce’s own psychosis playing on his own fears of Superman, then shouldn’t the burned mark in the ground been the Superman symbol?  Shouldn’t those have been modified human soldiers or Kryptonians flying around?  Yet there we have everything that reaches back to Darkseid and his crew.  The dream, if you think about it, wasn’t from Bruce’s mind, but rather it was sent to Bruce’s mind.  And Lex had a similar dream.

If you consider the dream to be ramping up Batman’s fear and hatred of Superman, then if Lex had a similar dream, then you can draw the reasonable conclusion that he’s being ramped up to by an outside force.  In his final scene, Lex even alludes to being manipulated by forces “beyond the stars”.  They couldn’t quite bend Bruce, but they broke Lex.

Again, that’s all in the theatrical cut, but it was ignored due to Eisenberg’s performance.

They understood that I was bat-crap crazy, but never why...

 

Superman was a different ball game all together and, probably the shortest changed.  It’s been long said that Superman is difficult to write and that shows here because he becomes an incidental character in his own sequel.  Set less than 2 years after Man of Steel, even though the film was released 3 years later, they talk about “Superman’s impact” on the world, but they don’t show it until AFTER they talk about it.  If they played it logically they would have had the sequence where Superman is going around saving the day across the globe, and then follow it with news footage of the fallout from it, then talk about whether or not he’s doing any good here.  I know that in the extended version they have Lex manipulating events to make Superman look bad, but they really don’t need to.  I thought the way it played out made sense in the context of the film.  Superman’s presence, even if it was just to save Lois (here I go again) Lane could be seen as an act of U.S. military aggression.  He’s an American superhero and during his debut worked extensively with the U.S. military to halt the Kryptonian invasion.  But since they never talk about that part in the film, it’s hard to draw that conclusion.  Which this is part of the problem with the portrayal of Superman in the film, you don’t feel his real impact on the world.  You don’t get this sense of how he’s this major hero to a lot of people.  They talk about it, but they don’t really show it, at least not for Metropolis where his memorial is supposed to take place.  Instead they kill of Superman using the “Death of Superman” concept but it doesn’t feel like they earned it.  They didn’t earn the right to kill Superman in his second movie.  Had there been a film in between which showcased his selflessness in fighting for earth, maybe we could push the death a little easier, but when you give the second named character in the title minimal screen time, you haven’t earned that right.

Going back to motivation really quick, Batman’s chief argument is that Superman doesn’t consider the collateral damage to his actions.  Which is a hypocritical argument coming from a guy who killed a truck driver, blew up hundreds of thousands of dollars of property, and mercilessly obliterated a dozen henchmen, all to steal an element that would help him eventually kill Superman?  Of course Superman stopped him and tore up the batmobile, he was on a rampage through the city.  Who knows who else would have died because he wanted to “defend the world” from Superman.

On the flip side of that, Superman doesn’t seem to care that much about collateral damage.  Take that sequence where he saves Lois in Africa.  He flies over two dozen dead bodies, and doesn’t wonder what happened.  Not to mention the guy holding the gun to Lois’ head.  Sorry you can go through two walls why being propelled by a battering ram and survive.  Maybe if he’d spared that one guy he could have gotten to the bottom of why all these guys are dead.  The scene at the hearing where the bomb in Lex’s wheelchair blows up, he later complains that he didn’t know if he just didn’t see it, or if he didn’t look for it.  That’s a fair question Clark because you know you are hated and bombings in government buildings happen a lot.  So…you didn’t look for it because for just a moment you didn’t give a rat’s ass.

Your argument is invalid

 

Let’s talk about something awesome…Wonder Woman.  I laugh at the haters when they found out Gail Gadot was playing Diana Prince in this film because it was all “she’s too skinny, she’s too little, she has no acting experience” then she shows up in the film, plays Bruce for a sap, does some actual detective work, and then jumps into the big monster fight at the end, and just dominates that battle field.  She made Batman look completely ineffective and Superman look like a punching bag.  She was the only one able to make a critical strike on Doomsday and restrain him.  With Wonder Woman, she didn’t talk much which made you pay attention when she did, and Gail’s facial expressions were just on point.  Plus they gave her some incredibly awesome music.  This is a Wonder Woman we’ve waited 75 years to see.

You've forgotten what your argument was

 

This might be the part where I address how Lois was either annoying, useless, or caused more problems than she helped fix…but that’s Lois Lane in the films.  I wish I could give her more credit or say that Amy Adam’s performance was amazing, but it was very “second verse, same as the first.”  Amy is a great actor, but she wasn’t given that good of a role here.

Maybe next time, Amy.

 

The cameos of Flash and Aquaman were pretty cool, though I was disappointed with the cameo of Cyborg.  I don’t know, when you had the other two actually doing something on screen, it seems kind of a letdown not to have Cyborg equally awesome.

Sonic...he can really move!

 

He's got an attitude...

So in conclusion, would I recommend this movie?  Only if you are willing to give it a shot, an honest to God chance, and you allow yourself to think about what’s going on.  If you want something to just munch popcorn to, you probably won’t have that much fun, because it’s going to ask you to think.

Do you need the Ultimate Edition?  Eh, probably not.  It doesn’t add that much to the story itself.

Part of this review was brought to you by William Dilbeck, author of the Lake Haven Chronicles, which you can find here:

https://www.amazon.com/Better-Off-Dead-Lakehaven-Chronicles-ebook/dp/B00JLPG8HE#nav-subnav

Please check it out.

Until next time…Thanks for reading.

The Sword of Superman: A Retrospective from someone who was THERE!

Oh the Pre-Crisis era.  For those of you who don’t know, the Pre-Crisis era refers to any event that happened before “Crisis on Infinite Earths”, the first and arguably best revamping of the DC comic book universe.  It was an unprecedented event whose sole purpose was to cut the wheat from the chaff, as it were, and clean up the history of the shared universe that had characters doing all matter of crazy things, sometimes in two places at once.  Basically, continuity was Swiss cheese at the time and nearly impossible to follow.

During the pre-crisis era, Superman had a wealth of wonky powers, some of which made absolutely no sense whatsoever.  One element however sticks out in my mind from way back in the ancient days of 1984.

Growing up in Portland, Texas, a sleepy little town on the Gulf Coast, just north of Corpus Christi, comics were not in great supply.  I was five, and if I wanted comics, I had to hitch a ride with my parents whenever they happened to go to Feudos, a neat little market in one of the quiet shopping centers in town.  Feudos had them all…at least to a five year old’s perspective.  Spider-Man and Superman are the ones that stick out in my head.  One specific comic stands out in my memory of this time, and if you haven’t heard of it, don’t feel bad.  It became part of the chaff that was Crisis on Infinite Earths.  It is, of course, the Sword of Superman, ala “Superman Annual 10”.

Now during the pre-crisis era, you would get several explanations for one single event, and the most famously confused event ever was “Why the ‘S’ shield logo?”

Well NOW we all know that it was the family crest for the House of El on Krypton, but back then it apparently had a more significant meaning.

According to the issue, during the Big Bang some primordial matter and energy came together and formed itself into something like an English broadsword.  Because reasons. 

 

This sword, bearing the “S” shield just existed in history since the dawn of time and when Ma Kent was making Superboy’s first costume, the sword reached out to him telepathically to place the “S” emblem on his suit, apparently because the sword knew he would be important one day.

Later Superman would come into contact with the sword and it would turn him, basically into a god.  I mean more so than he already was.  He became an all knowing, all seeing protector of good, truth, and righteousness.  Think the Infinity Gauntlet, but for good guys.

But there was a price that came with all this power.  The populace he was sworn to protect feared him.  Granted he’s wielding a sword, something that’s generally identified with cutting and stabbing, not something you want to associate with the defender of life.  That’d be like giving Superman a gun…

Yep, that happened too, but that's for a different blog.

So Superman rejected the sword in a sequence of panels that was so weird it may have permanently scarred my young psyche.  Not enough to make me stop reading the comic. I read it till it fell apart, not unlike what happens to the sword!

                       

 

Spoiler alert, don’t let a pre-teen handle comics without educating him on how to properly care for them in the even they are worth money one day.

So Superman rejected the sword’s power, and it seemed pretty cool with it.  It wasn’t mad at all as it left back into the cosmos and, a year later, was seemingly wiped from history.

But why?  With all the stuff that has trickled through the veil of time over the years, why has Superman’s Sword remained off limits?  Well, at the time it was written out of existence we had Superman and Supergirl, and a slew of super-pets.  That limited who could wield the sword to exactly two people.  Its not like the Infinity Gauntlet or the Cosmic Cube, who could potentially be wielded by anyone.  Its tied directly to two characters and pretty much halts the story all together.  If writers thought it was hard to write around Superman’s powers before, giving him the potential to have infinite power makes it very difficult.

Then there was the growing cast of Team Superman, involving Steel, Superboy, Supergirl, the return of Krypto, and so forth.  Now you could bring in the Sword and let it have some options on which to present that power to, but then how do you get rid of it to let the characters have normal stories again?  It’s been around literally since the dawn of time.  It’s not getting destroyed.  You could put it in the Fortress under lock and key, but then, how can you have cataclysmic events when you could just pull out the sword and fix everything?  How do you justify the Death of Superman if the Sword could have taken care of Doomsday in short order?

I think, personally, from both a nostalgic point of view and from a story telling point of view, you could justify bringing the sword back into continuity.  Tweak it’s origin just a bit, where it became the symbol of Hope on Krypton and later was adopted as the crest for the House of El, and leave it “out there” waiting for Superman to prove himself again.

Just a thought.

Thanks for reading

 

 

Justice Leage: We are....Family?

Today I want to take a second or two to talk about a theory I recently saw on Nerdist on YouTube.  Specifically that Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and the Flash from the DC cinematic universe may actually be Kryptonians, or perhaps descendants of ancient Kryptonians.

The principle of the theory is that it would be easier to explain their amazing abilities by chalking them up to Kryptonian heritage, adding that they would be less affected or completely immune to Kryptonite because they had that weakness bred out over time.  The idea stems from two places.  The first is from Man of Steel where Jor-El, explaining the history of Krypton, talks about ancient Kryptonian colonies, citing why there was a Kryptonian scout ship located on Earth, buried under ice for thousands of years.  Okay, that’s our jumping off point which actually leads into the second place, Wonder Woman’s sword.

Nerdist pointed out in their video that there is some writing on the blade that is decidedly not ancient Greek and theorized that the writing isn’t simply decorative, since the production company spends a lot of time with attention to details.  Here’s what I could find as far as the blade was concerned.

 

They’re right, that’s not simply ancient Greek.  It actually looks like a conglomeration of several writing styles from the ancient world.  So here is it: It’s possible that the ancient Kryptonians who came to Earth in the scout ship over 5000 years ago encountered ancient humans and were considered gods due to their amazing powers.  Wonder Woman is, by accounts in the film, a daughter of Zeus, who could be the leader of the ancient Kryptonians, and probably figures as the chief god of any polytheistic religion.  Her amazing abilities stem from this heritage.  Atlantis, founded by an offshoot of these Kryptonians and Aquaman, again possibly the son of Poseidon, also half Kryptonian.  Barry Allen could be of the blood line of Kryptonians and only had his powers activated by a bolt of lightning due to them lying dormant for generations.

Sounds pretty straight forward, but there are a few hiccups in the theory.  Namely the writing style established for Kryptonians by Man of Steel

 

None of these symbols looks like anything on the sword for Wonder Woman.  Something should cross over but none of these symbols even come close to matching up.  If Kryptonians founded the writing style for Ancient Greece, you’d think at least a few of their symbols would have surfaced, but they are completely different.

The second major problem comes from a story telling aspect.  This theory, while straight forward is also incredibly lazy.  Part of what makes the Justice League such a great story telling platform is that you have a group of characters from a very diverse background.  Everyone brings something very different to the table and if you tie in three of your major characters, characters who historically have very unique back stories and make them all cousins, you start turning the JLA into the superhero equivalent of the mafia.  It just feels out of place and I hope they don’t do it.  I would hate for them to explain the extraordinary away in one hand wave as “They’re all basically Kryptonians.”

Supergirl + Flash...Dawn of Cuteness?

Alright, so it happened.  I hope to God you guys watched it.  If you haven’t, check out CBS Access or CBS online and see if you can grab it real quick (an hour of your life you won’t regret) and come back because we are going into some serious spoiler territory here.

I don’t often do reviews of stand-alone episodes, but this is different.  This is one of my absolute favorite shows, the Flash, teaming up with the gang from Supergirl.  This episode worked on a lot of different levels.  First of all, if you are like me and only have a tenuous relationship with Supergirl (ie. I’ve watched one, count em one episode so far) this episode served as a great jumping off point as during its events it re-established Supergirl’s premise.  In many ways I came into this show like Barry did.  I’m unfamiliar with the scope of the Supergirl Universe so I really get to know these characters roughly the same time Barry does and he serves as a great entrance point for new watchers.  Like Barry, it doesn’t take the audience long to get up to speed as to who everyone is, at least their fundamental roles on the team.

Secondly, this episode came out less than a week after Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice broke a few box office records, and before Marvel’s Civil War epic due out later this summer.  That said it actually serves as a big refreshing gulp of wholesome in a sea of hero vs hero media.  Barry and Kara have personalities that naturally click with each other.  Grant and Melissa’s personal and professional history helps in this as well, but ultimately the actors have just this fantastic chemistry with each other and that shines through the whole episode, so much so that I rather wish this had been an hour and a half long episode rather than the standard 48-50 minute running time.  That certainly would have ironed out a few problems.

So what’s the story?  Well roughly around the same time Silver Banshee is coming into her power set and attacking people at CatCo (still sounds like a pet store-terrible name) Kara is knocked unconscious by a sonic blast and hurled out of a window when she is saved by none other than The Flash.  Realizing they both have powers, Barry and Kara get to talking, discovering that Barry has traveled here from Central City, and an entirely different universe.  Barry is looking for what his people call “Earth 2” to have a final face off with a villain named Zoom, but for more of that go see The Flash.  Seriously watch it.

Barry hooks up with Team Supergirl in an effort to find a way back to his universe, but while they are doing that, Silver Banshee springs Livewire from jail.  Both have a hate for Supergirl, and Livewire isn’t too fond of Cat Grant either, so they team up to bring down the cheerleader of steel.  Thinking she only has to contend with Livewire, Supergirl enlists the aid of the Flash (who is more than willing to lend a superfast hand) and they go to face the villain with absolutely no battle plan, despite Barry’s suggestions that they have one ready.  Supergirl is confident that with their combined powers they’ll make short work of the villain and is understandably surprised when Silver Banshee shows up to tip the scales.  Receiving a beat down, Barry suggests a strategic withdraw, and the two regroup to assess the situation.  During this time Kara shares some of her recent personal struggles with Barry who can actually relate to those very specific situations.

Real quick, its important to understand that Supergirl is still in season 1, so the titular character is going through her rookie year while Flash is already well into season 2, so he’s been there and done that, and a testament to Barry’s personality, rather than be jaded by his personal experience, he’s willing to serve as a pseudo mentor to Kara.  He understands exactly what she’s going through, more than anyone else in her world can.  He explains to her that some of the problems she is going to deal with can’t be handled by powers, only time, trial, error, and experience.  He relates to the fact that they are both used to dealing with conflict by falling back on their powers, but that can’t always be the answer.  This exchange, I think was probably the strongest moment in the episode and for both characters.  Barry is finally serving as the mentor figure, when he’s had so many mentors in his time, and he’s learning that when you teach, you learn and when you learn, you also teach.

Kara is receptive to his advice and they soon discover that Livewire and Banshee have kidnapped Kat and taken her to an open park.  There they plan to publically execute her if Supergirl and Flash don’t make an appearance.  During this very brief battle Supergirl puts herself in harm’s way to save a helicopter, while Flash is knocked out on top of a roof (so glad you were here to help buddy).  This turns public opinion, which had waned from Supergirl, back into her favor as the citizens come to her aid and actually defeat the villains for her.

Flash and Supergirl say their goodbyes as they do an impromptu race to get Barry home.  Kara later meets up with James Olsen and finally kisses him, only for him to turn into a brainwashed zombie and wander off with apparently everyone in the city as they are being controlled by Kryptonians.

Let me back up just a bit: James Olsen.  Oh I love what they did with James because he was always the coolest kid in school, and he knew he had Kara’s heart, and never had to work for it, but seemed to keep her at a distance.  When Barry enters the picture and the two instantly click you quickly see James starting to get jealous.  Again, Barry and Kara’s personalities naturally mesh, and they can relate to each other on a lot of levels.  Plus Barry has an impressive skill set to go along with his amazing powers.  He’s super smart and very likable.  Which starts to piss James off, and Mehcad Brooks pulls this off perfectly.

Now let’s look at a few negatives of the episode.  The fights feel very short and anticlimactic, which is why I think this would have been better served as an hour and a half episode.  I say hour and a half, because I think if you pushed this to a two hour episode you would have drawn it out longer than the content would allow.  Giving it an extra thirty minutes however could allow for extended fight scenes and a chance for Supergirl to really earn the city’s trust again.  A lot of that felt very rushed, but it could also indicate that the city wasn’t that mad at her after all.

I’ve heard complaints that it didn’t seem like the Flash had a lot to do here, and he didn’t, but Barry Allen did.  Barry Allen worked with the team to track Livewire, and Barry Allen mentored Kara.  This was really more about characters than it was about spectacle.  Even Winn trying to talk Silver Banshee down, that was more about character development than the actual fight inside CatCo.  Character development is really where Supergirl shines, but it could take a few lessons from the Flash in beefing up its fight scenes a bit.

One of the challenges with any Super(noun) property is that you have to balance the powers with the character and that’s not easy to do on a weekly television budget.  Flash allows a little more room to cheat because you can always have his powers do something without actually needing to show it.  A gust of wind and a sound effect and you’ve planted in your audience that the Flash did something.  Supergirl can actually use this trick too, but I think it doesn’t because that’s a very “Flash” thing.

Kat Grant is still annoying.  I don’t like her, but that’s the character.

So overall, everyone did an amazing job in their roles.  I would love to see Kara show up in Central City, I think that would really shake up some dynamics there.  The fights felt a little neutered, but that’s kind of in keeping with the show.  Hopefully we’ll see more of this kind of cross-company team ups.

Thanks for reading.

Jim Gordon is Bad at his Job…

 

It’s right there in the title, and I mean it.  Jim Gordon is not a good policeman.  Let’s jump off with the series that chronicles his eventual rise to police commissioner, “Gotham”.  This is a detective that isn’t very effective.  Sure he starts with that white-knight thing going, the one incorruptible cop in all of Gotham, and he has a really good start, but then cracks start appearing in his veneer.  As the cases escalate in craziness, he starts going more and more to the local criminal element for help.  On more than one occasion he sought out aide from Fish Mooney and Cobblepot.  His relationship with Cobblepot has been, without a doubt, the worst for his credibility, but to make matters worse, he double-crosses Penguin.

Regardless of what I’ve said in the past about Batman’s tactics, there is one indelible truth to the man.  He doesn’t double cross.  Even when he’s had to team with his own villains, he never does it at a compromise to his own integrity, and he never lies to them about the terms of their “cease-fire”. 

And it’s not just in the series “Gotham” where this is evident.  Throughout the various incarnations (with the exception of the 1960’s where it’s apparently acceptable to have a masked vigilante do your crime fighting) the very fact that he associates with Batman and allows him to operate within the city compromises his integrity.  Batman as a vigilante cannot affect an arrest regardless of the circumstances.  Any time he stops a purse snatcher or a jay walker, never mind anything higher, that case cannot be admissible in a court of law.  In order for these cases to stick, some serious blurring of facts has to happen.  Gordon didn’t eliminate the corruption of the police force, he just tweaked it.

In the Nolan Trilogy, Gordon is aware of the ethical challenges in associating with a caped lunatic, however this is taken a step further in “The Dark Knight” when he covers up the facts surrounding the death of Harvey Dent and allows Batman to take the heat for Two-Face’s crimes.  This was at least addressed in “The Dark Knight Rises”, but the failure in that instance is that Gordon is still unethical.  He may have been unethical for the right reasons, but if he’s supposed to be the last ethical man in Gotham, he’s failed in that effort.

In the Tim Burton films he ends the first film allying himself with Batman, and the second film basically endorsing violent crime every time the Bat-Signal is lit.  I won’t address the Joel Schumacher films because, as I said in a previous blog, they are just 1966 Batman with a modern spin.

In the famous animated series, he again has to compromise himself in order to work with Batman and condone Batman’s methods.  Other police officers are seen as heels or bad because they look down on this relationship, but as law ENFORCEMENT personnel, they should look down on it.  It’s a violation of public trust to say that these crimes are bad but this crime is okay.  His hand-shaking with Batman make Bruce Way the most successful violent criminal in Gotham’s history.

Well, that’s all I’ve got.

Have a great day.

 

1997's Batman and Robin: A Second Look...

Hello I’m back!  After a devastatingly long hiatus, I’ve returned to give my totally unsolicited opinion about something nobody is really talking about any more.  As ya do on the internet.

But given that we are but a stone’s throw from Batman returning to the big screen via “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice”, I thought I’d take a minute to talk about one of the less than reputable moments from the Caped Crusader’s movie career.  That’s right, a film so polarizing you either love it or…well you probably hate it.  1997’s “Batman and Robin”.

Taking place in what we are to assume is the same cinematic universe as Tim Burton’s films, this particular film stars none other than George Clooney and Chris O’Donnel as the respective dynamic duo.  Giving them an assist is Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl and filling in the roles of villains are Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy, Arnold (get-to-da-choppah) Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze, and Robert Swensen as Bane.

There is a lot wrong with this movie, and you don’t even have to be a fan of the comics to find it.  The acting was phoned in at its best, a crime since all of these actors are actually really talented, and the characters were dumbed down from literally every other incarnation.

Well, hang on…ANY other incarnation?

Part of what irked fans of the franchise, myself included, was that we remembered quite fondly the Michael Keaton films, and even gave a pass to “Batman Forever”.  Watching the Val Kilmer/Jim Carrey film again, one can see the signs of where the franchise was going, but hind sight is 20/20 after all.  Yet somehow we were expected to swallow this neon/black light circus as being part of the same “reality” that had a man electrocuted down to a charred skeleton and an umbrella twirling nightmare trying to kill children.

But that’s if you are trying to link all four films together, which you probably shouldn’t.  How it makes sense in my head is that “Batman” and “Batman Returns” is an adaptation of the comics of the 1980’s whereas the Joel Schumacher films are in fact re-imagining of the Batman series of the 1960’s.

If you take these two specific films away from the context of the franchise as a whole, and put them alongside the 1960’s television series, they match up remarkably well.  Suddenly you see that George Clooney isn’t playing Bruce Wayne/Batman, he’s playing Adam West playing Bruce Wayne/Batman.  Uma Thurman’s Poison Ivy would have worked perfectly with Julie Newmar or Burgess Meredith, but not the Catwoman and Penguin of the film franchise.

I think if you give the latter two of the films another shot in that light, you might find that…they honestly won’t be any better, but they will make a lot more sense.

Even if you can’t find it in your heart to accept them as they are or in this new light, look on this bright side:  It came out along with “Steel” and “Spawn”, forming the unholy trinity that effectively killed comic book films and forced Hollywood to actually put some thought and effort into these properties.  This wouldn’t be rectified until 1998 when “Blade” came to theaters and reminded audiences that films based on comics could be awesome.

What is Love to the Joker?

I recently stumbled on a question on the DC page, and I was going to comment on it, then found myself doing what I usually do, writing way too much for a casual comment.  So rather than do that, I thought I’d address this here.

Question: Do you think the Joker is gay?

At first this is a very “left field” question because just about everyone, even the most causal DC fan knows who Harley Quinn is.  The Joker has to be straight because she’s the Joker’s girlfriend.

Or is she?  In the cartoon it’s all but explicitly stated that the Joker uses Harley as a means to an end, and even when she’s trying to make overt sexual advances on him he pretty much keeps her at a distance.  His relationship towards her goes from playful banter, to neglect, to outright physical abuse at one point nearly killing her.  There’s no indication that they have any kind of relationship beyond that.  He spends at least one episode discussing the “relationship” he and Batman have, but never once addresses his “relationship” with Harley.

Now the problem with trying to pigeon hole the Joker’s concept of sexuality is he doesn’t necessary play by the same psychological rules as you and I do.  Most conventions dictate that for a human to be psychologically sound they need to have a secured source of food, a safe place to take shelter, and a means to let off sexual frustration.  This last part is because there is a huge mess of chemicals that swim through the brain when someone climaxes sexually.  Even the worse of living arrangements are deemed acceptable due to this flood of momentary ecstasy.  But the Joker doesn’t play by those rules necessarily.

The Joker takes shelter in seemingly random locations, usually abandoned factories or carnival locations.  These are not secure or safe.  We don’t really know about his source of food, but he doesn’t strike me as the kind of character to frequent grocery stores or restaurants, especially with a fluctuating income, so he probably doesn’t care about having a secured source of food.  Given that the first two of the trifecta aren’t being met the same way we meet them, chances are he’s given the same kind of attention to the third.

It’s possible that the way the Joker’s brain is wired; these conventions are awkward and uncomfortable to him.  People with Asperger’s or high functioning autism don’t function the same way socially that other people do.

*For the record I am in no way saying the Joker has Asperger’s or autism, it’s just an example.

Physical intimacy for some people is just uncomfortable.  The Joker just appears to have a ramped up version of this where all social conventions are uncomfortable.

We do know one thing that the Joker is always going to return to though, Batman.  He wants Batman’s full attention.  He competes with other criminals and even the Robins to keep Batman’s focus.  So what is a fundamental part of any sexual relationship?  Attention.

We want attention from our partners.  We want to be their entire focus.  Many new fathers go through a period of intense resentment towards newborns because their wives spend so much time focusing their attention towards the baby that the dad goes unattended.  Is this resentment deliberate?  No, it’s entirely subconscious, but it also states what we want on a very basic level.  We want to be our partner’s focus.  That’s what the Joker wants.

So does that mean the Joker is gay?  Not necessarily.  He wants Batman’s attention and it’s likely during the beat-downs, the violence that occurs during apprehension, that the same chemicals that go off in our brains during orgasm go off in the Joker’s brain.  Notice that he always ramps up his crimes, getting bigger and bigger, with a higher and higher destructive toll or body count.  That way the violence will be equal or greater to what he received the last time.  In a sense, the Joker’s crimes are his version of foreplay.  However the real question is, would this be the same if Batman was “Batwoman?”

I theorize yes.  If Bruce had been born Beatrice Wayne and she grew up to be the first Batwoman and delivered the same level of violence towards the Joker, he would have the same response. 

To ask if the Joker is gay is the same as asking if his brain works the same way ours do.  Clearly it doesn’t.  The entire base for his psychology is way off.  Also it’s not like any superhero could replace Batman for him.  It starts with Batman, which is why if Batman were Batwoman, she’d have to be the first hero he faced off against in order to establish that same connection.

Does that mean, since Joker received sexual pleasure from violence, that’s how he sees Harley and when he abuses her that’s his way of having sex with her?  No.  Joker has a clear understanding that violence is violence.  He knows that if he throws Harley or any of his henchmen into oncoming traffic, he’s not having sex with them; he’s trying to kill them.  He doesn’t have sex with violence; he has sex with violence from Batman.  Further in books like “Arkahm Asylum: A Serious House on a Serious Earth” and “The Killing Joke”, he has a clear understand of sexuality, and its corrupted forms such as rape.  He uses jokes and attacks to get a rise of out Batman in these stories, again to illicit the violence he craves.

Well, this certainly has been a dark one.

Thanks for reading.

The Boxing Glove Arrow: The Most Absurd Killing Machine Ever Devised

 

 

There’s a generally accepted rule in superhero books where in the titular hero does his or her level best not to kill their chief antagonists or the armies of thugs sent against them.  It’s a very loose rule, more of a suggestion most of the time, however it exists.  It’s from this rule that the Green Arrow developed a quiver full of trick arrows, most famously-the BOXING GLOVE ARROW (BGA).

Not since the batarang has there been a more captivating projectile spawned from the pages of DC Comics with countless attempts to develop it in real life, with myself being one of those budding entrepreneurs.  Seriously I have plans, and if I can ever find a viable market for functioning trick arrows, I may just be a millionaire.  Or not.

 

Anyway, the question today isn’t “can a boxing glove arrow be developed”, but rather “would it be functional.”  When CW’s “The Arrow” series aired, it seemed pretty cut and dry, but then in Season 3, the episode “Guilty” featured the boxing glove arrow in probably the most practical way possible.  Take a look:

                                         

Let’s break this scene down and take a look at the factors.

 

1)      The Distance: Oliver stands maybe ten to fifteen feet away from Ted when he fires at him.  Most bows commercially available have a range that can be measured in double digit yards.  For instance, the bow I use has a range of about forty yards before physics turns against me.  Oliver uses the close distance to his advantage.

 

2)      The Bow: Take a close look at the bow.  Oliver draws the string back to its maximum, and for that kind of bow, that would make it an effective killing machine past my own 40 yard limitation.  A more skilled and experienced archer than I would make that weapon effective probably up to 80-100 yards.

 

3)      The Target: Ted Grant is an experienced fighter and has conditioned his body, either directly or indirectly, to take a severe beating.  He’s struck in the forehead area and knocked on his back, but why? 

 

4)      The Projectile: This is where the first three factors come together to make it work.  An arrow is a very balanced instrument.  As the bow arms snap forward, it imparts energy through the string, into the arrow causing it to launch forward.  The arrow needs to be balanced and aerodynamic in order to fly in a straight direction and inflict the maximum amount of damage possible on the intended target.  But look at how the BGA dips in flight, striking Ted with the knuckles of the glove rather than straight on with the “fingers”.  Well, this is good because the padding in that glove is insufficient to stop a hunting tipped arrow if the flight pattern goes uninterrupted.  Energy is lost as the arrow begins to tumble; where in the weight of the front causes it to flip in air.  The arrow has a boxing glove attached to it, it’s going to tumble, that’s inevitable, but Oliver uses the close proximity to his advantage.  He’s far enough away that the arrow will start to tumble thus preventing the arrowhead from tearing through the glove and into Ted’s face.  He’s close enough that the tumbling effect is reduced and more energy is put behind the glove causing the effect he desires…to punch someone from far away.

A similar effect can be achieved by putting a tennis ball on the end of a commercially purchased arrow.  The arrow will tumble, but if you are close enough you will still hit your target.  But is it safe?

Hell no.  Let me elaborate.  You have a significant amount of energy put into a relatively small space, namely the arrowhead.  If you drop a target practice arrow, which is typically blunt, on your foot point down, it won’t penetrate.  It doesn’t have enough force.  However, knock that arrow out of a bow, and it’s going to punch through your foot.  The force imparted on the arrow creates heavier pounds per square inch.

Let’s put that into perspective: Look at how a hammer affects a nail.  If you take a hammer and slam it down onto a board, you’re going to dent the board in an impact area similar to the head of said hammer.  However, if you set up a nail and strike the head of the nail with the hammer, the force is imparted from the hammer to the nail, driving it through the board because that nail has a much narrower surface area.  The same principle applies to the BGA, but in reverse.

The force of Oliver’s arrow is distributed through a greater surface area, the glove.  However if that bow has enough strength to launch an arrow 80-100 yards with lethal velocity, distributing it across the surface of the glove won’t be sufficient to negate the deadly effect.  At speed, that glove is traveling at roughly 2.5 times the fastest boxing punch recorded at 44 miles per hour (delivered by Keith Liddell circa 2014) and boxing punches as slower speeds than even that have killed people.

Now obviously in the shot above, we’re talking special effects and professional stuntmen to ensure no one is actually harmed, because they all understand that punching someone in the face with a fist moving at 110 miles per hour is a bad idea.

So what does that mean for the future of non-lethal bow fired ordinances?  Well for starters there really is no such thing as “non-lethal”.  Despite how sturdy humans are, if it inflicts damage in anyway, it carries the ability to kill you.  Pepper spray, tasers, stun guns, bean bag shot, air powered projectiles (BB’s), even propelled water has the ability, under the right circumstances, to end a life.  Further, with all the afore mentioned methods, there’s not much of a market outside of novelty and entertainment for trick arrows as it is.  I’ve worked in law enforcement for about 15 years now and not once have I ever heard an officer say “Man, I just wish I had a compound bow instead of this semi-automatic.”

But in the long run, that’s okay.  The BGA is an awesome tool that always gets a cheer when it’s deployed by everyone’s favorite emerald archer because it’s just so absurd and now you know why it’s always effective.

Thanks for reading.