Brightburn (2019)

Brandon Breyer isn't like twelve year olds his age. He has never been bruised or bled and his parents found him crashed in an alien spacecraft when he was a baby. Now, puberty hits him the same time as his powers start to develop in earnest and the spacecraft draws him closer with a message. Brandon has to decide how he will use his powers and if he goes with his human family who raised him or the people who sent him there.

Brightburn takes the familiar story of Superman, where in an alien boy is dropped on Earth with special powers, and makes it a story of horror and violence instead of heroism. Because the story is so familiar, the crash and discovery of the child are shown and then it fast forwards to his teenage years. My biggest problem with the film is that we don't get to see Brandon acting "normally." We see him being quiet and knowledgeable in class (and being teased as a result). The discovery of his powers coincides with puberty, but where boys are becoming interested in girls and growing hair, Brandon is curious about the insides of humans, experimenting with his indestructible skin, and discovering his superhuman strength. His mother goes on and on about how nice and sweet he was before the transformation, but we never see it. Maybe it was never there as plenty of people are delusional about the merits of their children.

The story is fairly straight forward without many twists and turns. Brandon discovers his superiority to humans and decides what to do about it. Unlike Superman, he chooses to be much more self serving and starts killing people who get in his way. Imagine an entitled white boy having the power to do what they want. He creeps on the girl he likes and hurts her when she rightfully rejects him, removes people who have authority over him, and shows no remorse for any of it. Of course, he insists on signing each scene with his symbol and leads a mounting police investigation in his direction. The atmosphere and death scenes are the best part of the film. The violence comes in unexpected ways as Brandon toys with his prey. Superhero films usually downplay brutal violence and do everything they can to detach the viewer from most deaths, but this film doesn't look away. For a fairly mainstream film, the gore much more than I expected and seen in extreme closeup in some cases. It's cringe inducing and one of the highlights of the film for me.

The other thing the film does well is in the human characters, particularly in Brandon's mom Tori. Tori is a mom trying to do her very best. Her parents gave up on her when she was a teenager and she vows to never do that to her son. Even when he does the most horrific things, she clings to some kind of hope that she can help turn him around and that he's good deep down inside. It's frustrating to watch from the outside, but it entirely makes sense to her character. Caitlyn, the girl Brandon harasses, is nice to him at first, but becomes creeped out when he sneaks into her room uninvited at night and then completely terrified when he breaks her hand for rejecting him in a game. Her mother is understandably angry at Brandon, that his counselor is going to be his own aunt, and the school's general lack of response to her daughter being assaulted. These two characters, though seen as villains to Brandon, are entirely understandable and I felt for them especially in this society that doesn't see men and boys like Brandon as the problem they are. Each death that happens is a bit of a gut punch because we know these characters and their motivation.

Brightburn is the superhero horror film that I wanted. It included social issues in a subtle way and portrayed human characters in a varied, relatable way. It has its problems like the predictable ending, the lack of development in Brandon, and the father seeming to be super willing to kill his kid without solid evidence. I would love to see a sequel or follow up because I think the story has more to give. I would recommend this film if you don't mind gore and are looking for a film kind of like Superman mixed with The Omen.

My rating: 4/5 fishmuffins

Ex-Heroes by Peter Clines

Superheroes of all kinds are cropping up with a wide variety of abilities from superhuman strength to flight, fire breathing to magic. These people have chosen to save those in need and keep their true identities secret. When people start turning into zombies, the heroes mobilize, but the zombies are too widespread and numerous to defeat. They set up a living situation in a movie studio in Hollywood they call The Mount. Everyone contributes and the heroes enforce their laws in addition to scavenging for resources and protecting the people from zombie and human foes alike. A gang called the Seventeens have their own living space and have been largely left alone until they launch an assault on the heroes during a scavenging mission. A new enemy has taken over and is hellbent on making the heroes pay.

Ex-Heroes melds two disparate genres, superhero and zombie apocalypse, and makes them work together in an oddly harmonious way. The superheroes are created by a variety of things like toxic spills or magic with abilities like super strength, breathing fire, speedy healing, and/or flight. These characters follow the same archetypes of famous heroes. For instance, St. George is clearly the overpowered boyscout Superman with slightly different abilities (breathing fire instead of laser eyes). Stealth is similar to Batman with her abilities and more cynical worldview. Chapters are labeled Then from before the apocalypse and Now. St. George is the main character, but each hero gets their own chapter Then chapter and, if still alive, a Now chapter. Then, each hero is fighting crime on a fairly small scale and Now, they are maintaining The Mount and merely surviving.

The zombies (or exes) are pretty standard fare. They are the animated unded. The disease is a bit different. It's a virus that mimics white blood cells thus replicating quickly in the body. It's highly infectious through bodily fluids and survives a long time outside of its host, making dead exes and even smears of blood just as dangerous. This disease isn't fatal and only takes hold after death. The reason why people usually die after a bite is that other diseases piggyback on the zombie disease, making it a toxic mix of every other disease every other person in the line of infection had. I'm not honestly sure how sound the science is, but the concept is intriguing. Further, zombified heroes retain their abilities and create havoc when an uber-zombie with the ability to control other exes has a grudge against the heroes.

Ex-Heroes has a fast pace and interesting stories in the past and present to get to know each hero a little bit along the way. The beginning just throws you into the world and you start to tread water a couple chapters in. My only criticism is in some of the heroes' narratives. Stealth is a beautiful woman in a revealing outfit and she's disgustingly objectified by quite a few of the male heroes. Once is showing a perspective and doing it multiple times just seems immature of the author and the characters. Stealth herself seems more like a robot than a person as if she had to be so different than her appearance to be seen as a legitimate hero. Other than that, I enjoyed the twists and turns. I'm planning to continue the series and I hope the problems I have resolve as the characters get more developed.

My rating: 4/5 fishmuffins

Ms. Marvel: No Normal

Kamala Khan is a teenage girl, living in New Jersey with her family and struggling with her identity. At school, she's teased for bringing food that "smells weird" and condescended to about her own faith. The mocking nature of this concern troll goes over Kamala's head because she wants to be More than anything, she wants to belong and be comfortable, not an outsider who doesn't belong. One night, she sneaks out to go to a party which she was expressly forbidden and feels rejected once again. The partgoers assume that since she disobeyed her family, she rejects everything they stand for including her Pakistani heritage and Muslim faith. This friction between her culture and the schools dominant culture wears on her.

Each of Kamala's family members put their own expectations on how she should be behave and what she should become as well. Her father Yusuf wants her to focus on her studies and become a doctor. Her mother Muneeba is more worried about her becoming pregnant and keeps her away from boys. Kamala fulfilling her familial duties out in public is also very important to her. Kamala's older brother Aamir is incredibly devout and strict in his religious beliefs, much more than their parents, and wants her to live as he does. With all these people pulling Kamala in different directions, she has to decide what she wants for herself.

On the way home from the party, a fog engulfs her and she emerges with shapeshifting powers, looking exactly like Carol Danvers' Ms. Marvel. With this transformation, Kamala gets everything she thought she wanted. She becomes the norm she sees around her with blonde hair, pale skin, and a skin tight revealing outfit. However, her emotions don't match her expectation. She feels uncomfortable and exposed instead of confident and comfortable. Over the course of the book, Kamala becomes more comfortable with herself. She creates a unique costume, gets more used to her new polymorph powers, and decides that she wants to save people. Her first super hero act is saving the girl who was so mean to her because that's the right thing to do.

Kamala is just learning to be a superhero so she makes quite a few mistakes. She gets shot and accidentally discovers that shifting back to herself makes her heal instantly and simultaneously exposes her identity to a friend. Second, she fails trying to save her friend from Robot Spiders. Her perseverence is eventually rewarded in victory, but it took a few tries. Then, her commitments to her family suffer as she tries to save Jersey City from various threats. Through it all, Kamala doesn't lose herself and finds inspiration from her faith. She's a relatable character struggling to see who she wants to be and I can't wait to read more of her story.

My rating: 4.5/5 fishmuffins

Thor: Goddess of Thunder

Thor is no longer worthy to wield Mjolnir, his hammer, and it's stuck on the moon with no one being able to lift it. He desperately tries over and over, but can't due to some comment Nick Fury whispered into his ear. A woman comes to the moon and takes the hammer when Frost Giants invade Earth. The leaders of Asgard act as if it's been stolen and react accordingly, making pacts with dangerous beings. This mysterious woman may be Earth's only hope of survival.

Thor: Goddess of Thunder is quite a controversial comic. Many fanboys didn't even bother to read it and automatically rejected the new character out of principle, citing that Thor can only be male and writers can't just slap the name on another character. Many of them also said that it's somehow disrespectful to the history of the comic and the myth alike. If they had actually read the book, many of these points are addressed except the "disrespect" issue. Only misogynists thinks it's disrespectful to have a female character in a traditionally male role and I don't see them condemning other stories that change ancient mythological characters around. The Mjolnir wielder didn't want the name Thor, but Thor gave it to her. Of course not before blaming her for his own incompetence and fighting her for the hammer. After his initial rage cooled and he saw reason, he stated he was no longer worthy of the name. I especially enjoy how all of these complaints are addressed clearly within the plot.

The new Thor is an admirable character and her identity remains a mystery throughout this book. She has to adapt to the powers quickly in order to address the emergent situation with the Frost Giants. Mistakes are made at critical times, like having the hammer trapped in a vibranium room which will eventually sap her supernatural power on top of revealing her identity. Her wonder and delight at the newfound powers are refreshing to see and her strength and power are formidable. However, she's automatically dismissed and underestimated due to her gender by the Frost Giants who see her as an easy meal and a mockery of the previous Thor. She beats them handily and, as many women do, she simply shows It's nice to see Freya in a place of power as well. Before this story started, Freya became the All-Mother in Odin's absence. When he returned, she refused to cede power to him and came to Midgard's aid when Odin refused to, much too distracted by his son's failure and teaming up with old enemies to care.

Thor: Goddess of Thunder lays out the tone and reasoning of the haters and has Thor smash through them, showing her to be maybe even better than the previous Thor (as he admits himself).So many comic book characters give the mantle to someone else and it makes sense to reflect the current time and culture. Gatekeeping fanboys can whine all they like, but the male Thor still exists as a character as do Peter Parker and Carol Danvers even though Miles Morales and Kamala Khan have their own comics. This is honestly the first time since I was a child that I read a non-Deadpool non-zombified superhero comic and this new trend of much more relevant characters makes me want to read them all.

My rating: 4.5/5 fishmuffins

Batman: Nightwalker

Bruce Wayne is a young man with his whole future ahead of him. He has everything he could ever want at his fingertips except the parents killed by a thief when he was a child. While testing out a prototype car, a police chase passes him by involving the notorious Nightwalkers responsible for terrorizing Gotham City. Despite the police telling him repeatedly to stay away, Bruce decides to chase down the Nightwalker car and disable it so the police can catch it. The police give him community service that entails cleaning Arkham Asylum, home to hundreds of the most notorious criminals the city has seen. He's immediately drawn to a young girl named Madeleine imprisoned for murder and working for the Nightwalker gang. She only speaks to him and the police agree to allow him to try to get information from her, but she is more than she seems.

Batman: Nightwalker isn't like any other Batman incarnation because he isn't Batman yet. Bruce is the most innocent and naive you will ever see him. His intentions are pure and he still acutely feels the pain of his parents' absence. Unfortunately, he also is heavily influenced by his own arrogance and the assumption that he knows everything. Even when warned of Madeleine's methods of manipulation and reading people, Bruce assumes that he's just too competent to fool. (Spoiler alert: he wasn't.) He succeeds in feeding her information and making himself look like a fool. His whole attitude around Madeleine frankly disgusted me. He invented an entire senario in his head where she is truly innocent because she's female, young, and attractive. I was doubly disgusted when his sexist theory was correct to a point. The entire narrative only proved to reinforce his arrogant and sexist ideas.

Many plot points in this novel are hard to believe or unnatural feeling. The police having a teen work at Arkham Asylum is like having one work at a maximum security prison. No one would do that because that teen would be at risk. They also wouldn't ask him to do exactly what he was being punished for: interfering in police matters even when he thinks he's helping. It kind of ruins the whole point of his community service. The drones Lucius Fox made seemed more like something out of Robocop than something made today. The whole situation with them was completely predictable. The most egregious part of the novel for me was Madeleine's turnaround from bloodthirsty killer to reluctant criminal in love with Bruce Wayne. The entire time they spoke, she was manipulating him (too much like Sherlock Holmes if you ask me), but somehow she grew to like him? I didn't see it at all and it came out of nowhere.

Batman: Nightwalker did not meet my expectations. The most natural feeling parts of the book are between Bruce and his friends. These parts are unfortunately few and far between. Very little of the book is believable and I found myself exasperated and annoyed most of the short book. Bruce didn't really learn anything by the end of the novel and his arrogance is reinforced. I would not like to see this Batman in the future.

My rating: 2/5 fishmuffins

SDCC 2017 Panels Part 1: Composers and Jim Lee

* Anatomy of a Superhero Panel

I went to this panel by accident, thinking it was the Anything Goes with John Barrowman one. This one had a variety of superhero movie or TV composers talking about their craft, challenges, and projects. Mark Isham, famous for the TV soundtrack Once Upon a Time, composed the soundtrack to the upcoming Marvel show Cloak and Dagger. Ludwig Goransson composed the soundtrack to the upcoming Marvel film Black Panther. Brian Tyler composed the most superhero soundtracks with Iron Man 3, Thor: The Dark World, and Avengers: Age of Ultron. Mark Beltrami unfortunately couldn't make it to the panel. David Russo composed the soundtrack to the DC show Gotham. Lorne Balfe, who composed The Lego Batman movie, moderated the session.



A video montage of each composer with snippets of their work and the TV and movie played on the screen. Each talked a little about their projects and played a clip. Brian Tyler's was my favorite because he talked about using music to portray the aftermath of Frigga's death, a beautiful funeral rite with no dialogue. Goransson talked about recording the music for Black Panther in Senegal and Africa. Russo talked about the swift schedule for Gotham where he had a lot of freedom to explore themes with the trust of producers. The consensus of the panel was that film is a medium to luxuriate in themes and explore more while TV is more about speed and making fast changes when needed. They all have different opinions about conducting their work in the studio. Brian Tyler prefers to conduct as a self admitted control freak, which makes sense since a different conductor can make a work sound vastly different. Mark Isham, on the other hand, prefers to be in the listening booth to address producer problems quickly sometimes only based on their facial expressions. He also admits to not being a great conductor and wants to take lessons to improve his skill.

Audience questions were decent. One asked if failed or rejected themes ever came back in different works. Only Brian Tyler had done so and realized it after the fact. Another asked about the lack of diversity in their industry, which stunned the panel a little bit. Balfe tried to clumsily dismiss the woman's criticism, but others like Isham talked about steps they were personally taking to help with the issue. Russo was the first to admit that the industry is mostly comprised of white men, which is an uncomfortable thing to address on a panel of white men. Another question was if they miss performing. Goransson performs regularly with Childish Gambino as a DJ. Russo was in a band for years before composing and misses it. Overall, the panel was an unexpected delight. I was especially excited to see Brian Tyler as he was the only one I recognized from my movie soundtrack collection.

* Jim Lee

Jim Lee is always a delight to see in any panel situation. He draws art filmed on a projector while answering various questions or generally talking about his life and career. He drew a portrait of Wonder Woman during most of the panel and did a hurried portrait of Batman at the end. He talked a lot about his life. He moved to the US as a child from Korea and didn't know how to read or write English. Comic books helped him learn English first from following the action with just the art and transitioning over time to reading the words. His parents wanted him to be a doctor, but he chose to follow his passion for comics. However, they still hold high expectations for him. Lee started out as a huge fan in a time when the audience for comics was much smaller. One of his big motivators for the job was not having to interact with a lot of other people, but the industry has vastly expanded and meeting fans at convention became a regular part of his job. When he first started his job, he expected the writers to have years of plot planned out and was very surprised when a writer asked him to choose his favorite Marvel characters to write a story about.



Lee talked about how his style of art changed as he has gotten older. As a young artist, he packed each frame full of stuff to impress and become a sought after artist. As his career solidified and he didn't have to try to impress anymore, he was more contemplative about conveying the story and what is needed in each frame to do that. He answered quite a few audience questions and it would have been nice if less of those audience members treated it as a signing session when it wasn't. My favorite audience member didn't ask a question, but gave Jim Lee his own drawing of Wonder Woman. The best moment of all was when Jim Lee gave Scott Williams a Batman Rolex watch as a surprise gift for their 30 years of work together and gave a heartfelt speech about their relationship (video above). Williams in turn gave an emotional speech about their collaboration in the X-Men issue 258 cover and how it was a huge turning point for him. If you ever get the opportunity to see Jim Lee in person, go! He's always hilarious, very kind, and incredibly talented.

Keep an eye out for more SDCC!

Guardians of the Galaxy

Peter Quill AKA Star Lord steals an orb for a job like he always does as a ravager. This orb is earth-shatteringly powerful and attracts the attention a diverse group of people including genocidal Ronan the Accusor and his considerable army, cybernetically enhanced daughters of Thanos Gamora and Nebula, Yondu Udonta and his ravager gang, the Collector Tanaleer Tivan, and Iran Rael and the rest of the Nova Corps. He teams up with other misfits by chance to fight agains Ronan and (eventually) save the universe, including Gamora, Drax the Destroyer, an enhanced racoon Rocket, and his best friend Groot.

Guardians of the Galaxy is one of my favorite superhero movies. I had my doubts going into it because a sentient tree and a talking raccoon don't exactly scream superhero. At this point, I've seen the film countless times and it never gets old. The narrative does so many things in a concise way. All of the characters and worlds are brand new to Marvel Cinematic Universe and they are all introduced without lengthy flashbacks or exposition. The five main characters in particular are simply thrown together and we get to know them as they get to know each other. These heroes are more anit-hero or even villain in some cases. Peter, Rocket, and Groot are thieves who just want to make as much money as possible without a thought for others. Gamora has committed atrocities under the guidance of her evil adoptive father. Drax makes foolish decisions that hurt the whole group for his own selfish ends. They aren't morally as squeaky clean as superheroes usually are and prove to be much more inventive and erratic as a result.

When the Guardians meet, they all have conflicts of interest and get in each others way. At first, they begrudgingly help each other for their own benefit. They share pieces of themselves as they spend time together and eventually become friends despite their differences. For example, a drunken game starts a fistfight between Rocket and Drax that ends with a surprisingly emotional monologue from Rocket describing what his life as an experiment was like and how hurtful people treat him. Peter shares his music, his dancing, and odd bits of Earth pop culture with the others. Drax shares the traumatic story of Ronan's murder of his wife and daughter. Groot has a genuine personality even though he only ever says "I am Groot." Vin Diesel's performance gives the perfect tone and emotion for each scene. Gamora tries to make amends for her past wrongs, even putting herself at great risk. These heroes become friends when previously they were directionless and largely alone.

One thing the MCU does wonderfully is have fairly sanitized battle scenes while still having high stakes and tragic deaths. Marvel sits firmly in PG-13 territory which means no blood or closeup violence. Their high stakes are in the fate of the panicked people on the ground, the Ravagers, and the Nova Corps soldiers. Ronan's Putty-like army starts suicide bombing the citizens and Rocket and the Ravagers have to adjust their battle style to save people. Not all of them get out alive. Donarian Garthan Saal has the most horrific death as Rocket frantically tries to talk to him as he is crushed by Ronan's ship. He refused to break ranks and sacrificed his life to fight Ronan along with the rest of the Nova Corps soldiers that formed a force field around Ronan's ship. We even see some familiar characters in the panicked crowd such as the Broker and Rhomann Day's wife and child so they aren't just faceless people. This makes the audience care about all sides of the battle and all experience loss.

The film has a lot of unique qualities. It is visually beautiful with a variety of bright colors. The MCU tends to be more colorful than DC, but this one brings in neon colors that gives it a look that stands out. Much like the Guardians, all the colors should clash but they work together to make a striking look. The CGI looks gorgeous and fits in with the film incredibly well. The fact that two main characters are CGI never takes away from their characters at all. The soundtrack, both the symphonic background music and the pop songs used, is wonderful. This is my favorite Tyler Bates soundtrack and the Guardians theme never fails to make my heart beat a little faster. The 60's and 70's pop songs aren't the most popular of the era, but definitely familiar. They are never too on the nose and illustrate the mood and feeling of the scenes perfectly. My favorites are Hooked on a Feeling and Come and Get Your Love. Many of these songs are forever changed for me because of this film.

The Guardians of the Galaxy is a fun film but also an emotional one. For a film about mercenary type people, there were many heartwarming and wrenching moments plus tons of humor. Rocket's drunken speech and Groot's "We are Groot" always make my eyes fill with tears. In a way, the Guardians are a lot like the Elements of Harmony in My Little Pony. They discover friendship, step in pitfalls, and make sacrifices for each other and the greater good. This is a superhero movie with the most humor, the most heart, and the most irreverence. My only tiny problems with the film is that Nebula screams every line (but she doesn't get a lot of chance to do much else) and Thanos doesn't look too realistic. Other than that, this is one of the best superhero movies period.

My rating: 5/5 fishmuffins

Daredevil (2015)

Daredevil's concept is essentially a blind lawyer with superhuman senses that fights crime in Hell's Kitchen. It's extremely scaled down from the usual Marvel Cinematic Universe fare that deals with alien invasions and the fate of the galaxy. Daredevil or Matt Murdock is trying to jumpstart his grass roots law firm with his best friend Foggy by day and protecting the city from criminals (and getting his ass handed to him) by night. In all facets of his life, he has a lot to learn. He has no clout or experience as a lawyer and he's just going out in a mask and black clothes to do what he can't in the courtroom. It's refreshing to have a hero that is just a person. He's not inhumanly strong or fast, but he pushes himself to his limits for what he thinks is right. He learns from his mistakes and strives to fix any harm he caused on his journey. I find him much more relatable because he has the limitations of a real person. His background is interspersed within the forward moving plot, detailing how he became blind, how he was trained to fight, how he lost his father. I found his backstory heartbreaking because his father wanted so much to be someone his son could look up to.

My first reaction is how brutal the violence is. Daredevil beats a human trafficker to a bloody pulp, stabs criminals in the eyes, drops them off buildings, and summarily breaks bones and maims the corrupt. Karen is savagely strangled with a bed sheet and she practically scratches the attacker's eye out. The action is less stylized and far from neatly choreographed. The effects of the violence aren't glossed over or sanitized. Daredevil often goes home injured and bleeding. Some episodes have him very narrowly escaping death. Bones are broken and blood is spilled on both sides. People are tortured. One particularly good scene in the second episode has Daredevil battling criminals in an apartment hallway in one continuous take. Not only is it an awesome scene, but it's a nod to the brutal Korean film Oldboy. Both fights are one continuous take and show violence for what it is: messy, tiring, clumsy, painful, and fueled by willpower. Take notes DC; this is what gritty and dark looks like.


Daredevil's Hallway Fight Scene by kimchisuckerdude

The cast of characters that help Daredevil are varied and generally virtuous at heart. Foggy Nelson, Matt's lawyer partner, is Daredevil's foil. He's kind of goofy, kindhearted, and sweet, but he isn't just there for comic relief. He has his own harsh journey to follow on the other side of the law than Daredevil. Karen Paige was saved by Matt and Foggy from being framed for murder and she now acts as their secretary. Her goal is to bring Wilson Fisk's company down for killing her co-worker, framing her, and trying to kill her. Despite her fear and lack of physical strength, Karen uses all of her resources to accomplish her revenge. Claire is the nurse who helps Daredevil occasionally. She puts her job and life on the line to do so and definitely pays for it. She still perseveres and does what's right. I like that Matt doesn't really have a love interest. Claire is more of the voice of reason who tells him things he needs to realize.

Wilson Fisk or Kingpin is the big villain of the season, expertly portrayed by Vincent D'Onofrio. Our first introduction to him has a particularly brutal criminal killing himself rather than facing Fisk. This version of Fisk is a bit different than the usual fare. He's often soft spoken and clumsy with his words, but when his temper rises, he unleashes his rage and his considerable strength. His abusive father shaped him, but he strives to be different. His life is spotless and ordered in contrast to his actions and orders. All of his orchestrated violence and destruction is for what he believes to be the greater good. His goal is to make the improve the city and isn't cruel without reason. It's a small but significant distinction to be cruel for the sake of cruelty as opposed to being cruel for a purpose. Fisk has a softer side as he awkwardly but sweetly romances an art dealer named Vanessa. Usually, superheroes feel the pain of their loves being targeted to get to them, but this show turns it around to the villain. He experiences the pain her inflicts on others. His character is so dynamic that I still feel sorry for him when he's in pain despite his monstrous actions, corrupting judges, cops, and other supposedly lawful entities.

Daredevil is a formidable step forward for the Marvel Cinematic Universe. At this point, the tone and style are set for the big screens films. This one sets the scene for the small screen ones as realistic and brutal while still keeping moments of levity, compelling characters, and a complex plot. The only real problem I had with it is with the source material. The different ethnic gangs are stereotypical in their dealings, which doesn't really fit in to the style. It's the only aspect that lacks and I hope next season (which is on Netflix now) can move beyond it. I am thrilled for what the next season has to offer.

My rating: 5/5 fishmuffins

Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice

* spoilers *

Bruce Wayne vows vengeance upon Superman for the havoc he wreaked in the battle against Zod, Superman just wants to save people whenever it's convenient for him. Lex Luthor wants to throw everything into chaos and reap the profits by pitting Batman against Superman. The government is trying to contain Superman and restrict him to their rules. You would think the film would be straight forward with such simple story lines, but you would be very wrong.

Full disclosure: I did not enjoy Man of Steel and I went into this film knowing I would also not enjoy it. I did like some things about it, but there are fundamental problems that make it a bloated confusing mess. The best thing about the whole film is Wonder Woman. At first, she's an enigmatic character kind of like Catwoman whose motivations are murky. Her fight scenes bring to mind Snyder's 300 that was his strength: a fighting movie with very little plot and a lot of cool visual effects. I look forward to seeing more from her character, especially since she used to fight with the humans and gave it up due to perhaps disillusionment. Alfred is my other favorite character. He's a sassy, tech-savvy drunk who is tired of Bruce's shit, not the obedient formal butler of the past. I also enjoyed Ben Affleck's Batman for what it was, but I had more of a problem with the writing than his portrayal. It was nice that he actually used his detecting skills and thought critically about the situation.

Now for the bad stuff which way outweighs the good stuff. I didn't like the pacing, the tone, the "heroes," and the convenient coincidences. The pacing is horrible. First, the film is way too long at two and half hours and it feels like an eternity. Second, if all the terrible and unnecessary dream sequences were cut out, it would be at least a half hour shorter. All of these Bruce Wayne dreams were over-long and had something laughable in them. One had young Bruce lifted into the air by bats. Another had a Mad Max style future with Superman logoed Gestapo. It way slowed down the film and took time creating ridiculous situations that didn't even mean anything. The set-up for later films also takes up time and stalls the plot. The two second cameos of Aquaman, the Flash, and Cyborg were mildly interesting, but needed to be cut. The title fight didn't happen until well into the film and it wasn't even the main fight. 

The tone problem is consistent through most DC films. They focus on being dour, humorless, and angsty. Even the colors are incredibly muted. I like films with some humor to cut into the drama and some actual color. I prefer Marvel movies because they have levity along with the superhero drama, color, and actually value human life (which I will get to later). Suicide Squad seems to be a step in the right direction, but it still looks dour and monochromatic. DC is obsessed with appearing gritty and realistic, but they are never rated R to keep the wide audience and end up being more unrealistic and cartoonish than their Marvel counterparts. If you're going to be gritty and realistic, then do it, but they are half-assing it and want the best of both worlds with disappointing results.

The "heroes" of this film aren't real heroes at all. Batman is up front with this admission and says he's not a hero. He does save people from the Zod fight, but then sets his sights on taking down Superman exclusively. When stealing the Kryptonite chunk, he doesn't hesitate to open heavy artillery fire on people and of course vows to kill Superman. His critique makes sense, but he ceases to really help innocents in his quest for vengeance. Superman, on the other hand, only seems to care about humans directly related to him or sleeping with him. Everyone else is expendable. It was painfully apparent in Man of Steel that he didn't care about anyone in the buildings he was smashing to oblivion. He saves a girl once in the film to further shove the messianic imagery surrounding him down our throats. The character is a wet blanket of a person and seems to have no critical thinking skills at all. Even the villains are underwhelming. Doomsday looks like a Lord of the Rings cave troll with a skin problem and Lex Luthor was a sloppy, crazed child, a huge departure from his usual character.

These two characters' conflict is solved by the shared name of their mothers in a bizarre mood change for Bruce and suddenly they are best pals. Because of the criticism of Man of Steel, it is explicitly stated multiple times that the buildings being crushed by our heroes are completely deserted. Even ones that are business buildings in a tightly packed city...Just no. There will always be people around a metropolis at all hours of the night. Then Batman has the great idea to have the main actual villain follow him back to the city to endanger even more lives. There are so many lapses in judgment and weird decision making. I'm not sure what exactly the writers were doing, but they need to hire new ones for the next films. 

Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice is a bloated mess of bad writing, dour tone, horrible heroes, and weird reasonings and coincidences. The ending is especially stupid because the audience is supposed to believe that Superman is dead despite the fact that we know the Justice League franchise is just starting. It's insulting and no one is fooled. The false emotion is wasted and again just wastes even more time trying to get the audience to feel bullshit feelings. I went in expecting horrible and that's about what it gave. I have hope for future movies, but not much. I have more hope for X-Men , Disney's Marvel Cinematic Universe, and Deadpool. DC is too busy trying to be gritty without losing profits and mimicking Transformer fights to make quality films. 

My rating: 2/5 fishmuffins

The Avengers

Asgardian Loki breaks in to SHIELD headquarters uses the Tesseract, a cube of pure energy that can destroy the world, and plans to conquer the world using it to open a portal to let an alien race called the Chitauri. No one on Earth has the power to fight these extraterrestrials, so Nick Fury in desperation, calls in Bruce Banner (the Hulk), Tony Stark (Ironman), Thor, and Steve Rogers (Captain America) to band together and stop Loki. However, they are a volatile, unruly group that simply don't get along and don't trust SHIELD's motives. Can they put aside their petty differences and distrust of SHIELD long enough to save the world?

I was very excited to see The Avengers because I enjoyed all of the films leading up to it and their characters, but especially because Joss Whedon was directing. I think this is one of the best comic book movies I've ever seen and I believe it is thanks to Whedon. He brought a lot of humor throughout the film, even during the most heartbreaking moments. I don't remember ever laughing so hard in any superhero movie. There were even moments when dialogue was unintelligible because the whole audience was roaring with laughter.

He also fleshed out the minor characters wonderfully. In the previous movies, I couldn't care less about Hawkeye and Black Widow. Hawkeye had a super small part in Thor and did practically nothing. Black Widow in Iron Man 2 was super flat and only really there for eye candy and cool fight scenes. In The Avengers, Hawkeye is instrumental to the story and he updates the bow from a practically obsolete relic (compared to guns and other firearms) to something useful and dangerous. His sense of loyalty and justice really made him a cool character, as well as his relationship with Black Widow. Black Widow is also very important to the plot. She gets to show off how she is actually a good spy by playing the victim and getting those who would think themselves above her to reveal their plans. She is much more than just a pretty face and we get to see how is she is underneath her strong exterior. I liked that these two characters aren't marginalized because they are weaker than the other super heroes. They prove to be important in their own right and are allowed to actually develop as dynamic characters.

One of the things I was afraid of was one superhero or another dominating the movie. This film masterfully balances each hero. Each make mistakes and look silly at one point and they also all have great, shining moments of heroism. They all bring something that the others don't have and make this disparate, hodge podge group into a real team. Captain America is a great tactician who sees each person's strength and how best to utilize that strength on the battlefield. Iron Man thinks outside the box and has incredible intelligence beyond that huge ego of his. Bruce Banner is also extremely smart, but also turns into a huge, strong rage monster when he transforms. Thor is practically immortal with a powerful hammer, the ability to fly, and power over thunder and lightning. These larger than life characters are lot to stuff into one movie, but they end up being a well balanced, powerful team.

The last act of the film is the giant splodey extraterrestrial battle for New York. The comparisons to the Transformers are cringeworthy, but not complete unfounded. There are a few key differences, one being that The Avengers is actually a good, coherent movie that doesn't entirely rely on special effects. Another is that while the Transformers movies have cool shots of buildings exploding and falling down and CGI fight scenes, but the human element is lost. In The Avengers, the people running and screaming from the attack are a focus in the middle of this battle. We even follow a particular waitress as she runs from location to location and is finally saved by Captain America. This makes the audience care about the civilians and actually worry when buildings collapse and debris is falling everywhere.

The Avengers is a spectacular superhero film that takes the characters we know and gives them portrays them in a much deeper way and keeps that human element in a huge, epic fight. I also really liked the banter between the characters, the humor throughout, and especially the deviously manipulative, sinister Loki. I have seen it 3 times so far and wouldn't mind seeing it again. If you want a truly enjoyable film with action, adventure, aliens, and superheroes, The Avengers is definitely for you.

My rating: 10/10 fishmuffins