Tag: Comic Book

2016, Movies

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016, Zach Snyder)

God these DC movies are just so…dour. I am no fan of the MCU, as you know, but every time I watch one of these DC movies from the teens I think the MCU has really stumbled onto something. They may be dumb, but they’re usually at least moderately entertaining. But these films are just …

2022, Movies

The Batman (2022, Matt Reeves)

A little while ago, Jenn and I decided to watch every Batman movie in order. We watched the Adam West movie and then we watched the Burton/Schumacher films. But then, we got this one sooner and ended up watching it before all the other 21st century Batman films. (I’ve most Batman films already, save one …

2021, Movies

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021, Jon Watts)

The MCU Spider-Man movies are probably the best overall series within the whole massive thing, though there may be better individual movies. But this is the weakest – and longest (and most self-important) – of the three and, in many ways, reverts back to the usual Marvel crap. There is a difference here, of course, …

2021, Movies

Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021, Andy Serkis)

So I liked this substantially more than the first movie and I think it’s for one main reason: Venom is present from the beginning. I don’t remember if there were this many wisecracks in the first film but, if there were, I was already pretty bored when they started. Here it’s clearly a comedy (in …

2008, Movies

The Incredible Hulk (2008, Louis Leterrier)

So I’ve finally found my way to one of the few MCU movies I’ve missed, the weird one where they replaced the star before things really took off. At this point this feels like a movie from another era, as it has more in common with the first Iron Man, as you’d imagine, than it …

2020, Movies

Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn (2020, Cathy Yan)

I remember hearing about the good reviews. And I briefly thought that maybe here was a recent DC movie I wanted to watch. And then I promptly forgot about it until I got on a plane. Now, it’s possible that this film didn’t work for in part because it was the second film I watched …

2021, Movies

Black Widow (2021, Cate Shortland)

Much like Captain Marvel, this is a necessary and needed corrective. And much more than Captain Marvel, we can legitimately wonder what took so damn long. Most of the other Avengers got their movies a long time ago. (The Hulk got his own movie, remember.) But being a necessary corrective to a patriarchal movie franchise …

2018, Movies

Venom (2018, Ruben Fleischer)

The world is a strange place. Because of rights issues, Venom is not currently part of the MCU even though Spider-Man and the recent Spider-Man movies are. So Venom isn’t part of the MCU and there is no Spider-Man in it. So that’s, um, weird. It might not be the worst thing, given all the …

2013, Movies

Man of Steel (2013, Zack Snyder)

I feel like I remember reading that this movie had too much origin story and they weren’t kidding. This film tries to both tell the origin story of Superman and of General Zod, and then pit them against each other. And there is just an absolute ton of stuff about Krypton. Honestly, if feels like …

2019, Movies

Captain Marvel (2019, Anna Boden, Ryan Fleck)

As I have noted with Marvel movies, I only ever read X Men and related comics, so I have no skin in the game of whether or not Captain Marvel should be a man. But a quick Wikipedia search reveals that it’s not so controversial as some made it seem. But make no mistake, this …

2017, Movies

Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017, Jon Watts)

I hate reboots. There are perhaps few things I hate more than reboots than reboots of reboots. And yet, I must admit, this one works. And it works way better than expected. This film is, for me, one of the top 3 MCU movies. It might be the best, actually. Very minor spoilers if you …

2019, Movies

Avengers: Endgame (2019, Anthony Russo, Joe Russo)

Note: Due to the nature of this film – concluding this “phase” of the Marvel Cinematic Universe – and also its plot, it’s impossible to talk about it without heavy spoilers for the entire set of 20 odd movies, particularly Infinity War, as this is a direct sequel to that movie. You’ve been warned. (Of …

2018, Movies

Black Panther (2018, Ryan Coogler)

So, before I get to the actual film, I think there is the film’s importance to discuss, and it’s hard to ignore. This is the only blockbuster film to have a majority black cast. It is an absolute landmark and it’s hard to believe it took so long. (It’s a testament to both systemic racism …

2016, Movies

Suicide Squad (2016, David Ayer)

It’s kind of hard to express how incomprehensibly incompetent this film is for a major Hollywood blockbuster.  I am not a fan of the Avengers films but, watching this I feel like those films are masterpieces in comparison. In fact, watching this film, I long for the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s basic film-making competence – yeah, they’re …

2017, Movies

Wonder Woman (2017, Patty Jenkins)

Wonder Woman is yet another super hero origin story. It is obviously different from most feature comic book super hero origin stories we’ve seen before for a very obvious reason – the character is a woman – but, otherwise, I found the movie reminiscent of a number of previous super hero films, one in particular. …

2017, Movies

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017, James Gunn)

I don’t know what kind of ill-humour causes me to not love these movies as much as the next guy, but I was pretty damn underwhelmed by the (possibly over-hyped) first Guardians of the Galaxy and really had no plans to watch this one, unless I was bored one day looking through Netflix (which is how …

2016, Movies

X-Men: Apocalypse (2016, Bryan Singer)

The stakes got upped a bit in the previous entry and so I must say I was worried about the endless stake-upping occurring in this series, like it does with the Avengers movies. And, to an extent, the stakes are indeed upped passed the point of sanity. The bad guy is a different kind of …

2016, Movies

Captain America: Civil War (2016, Anthony Russo, Joe Russo)

What is this? Is it a 2 and a half hour prelude to another movie? Because it sure feels like that to me. It’s the nadir of this recent trend in blockbusters to split a movie into two halves. Because, though this is ostensibly a Captain America film, what it really feels like is just …