Archive for May, 2007
19 items.
I don’t care how many times I pull the joke out of storage, I will never grow tired of seeing Tom wearing the Spider-Man mask along with his street clothes. He can afford the mask, just not the body suit. It’s very innocent and charming to me. Plus, a lot of fun to draw.
Are you guys getting as hyped up as I am about Spider-Man 3? Man, I hope it lives up to the hype. This was actually something Gordon, Joe and I talked about on this week’s Triple Feature talkcast. If perhaps we’ve been waiting and thinking and salivating over Spider-Man 3 for so long, it’s lost some of it’s verve?
I haven’t seen a lot of television commercials for Spider-Man 3, which I suppose is good. Either that, or I’m just not watching the networks that run the bulk of the advertising. Oh, no! Am I culturally irrelevant?
For me, however, a lot of air was let out of my tires as soon as the marketing blitz took shape for the movie. I remember being in the toy aisle at Target a few weeks ago (looking for playthings for Henry, I swear!) when I came across the full line of Spider-Man 3 action figures.
The first thing I noticed is that they looked like ass. The SECOND thing I noticed was the Venom action figure. Production had been keeping things under wraps for so long and they were doing such a good job about it, seeing Venom on screen was probably 50% of my motivation to see the movie (even if he only gets 10% of screen time).
But then there I was, standing face to contorted plastic face with the tiny avatar of fictionalized evil and I thought to myself, “Hmph. Okay, so that’s what he looks like. Mystery solved.” I walked away almost defeated by my own apathy.
I’m turning 30 this year and I won’t pretend for a minute that it’s more than likely the window is closing in regards to my interest in such things. But I can’t help but imagine what delivering a movie like this would have been like in the days before the internet. The first Spider-Man kind of took people by surprise. X-Men was the first of the “nu comic book” movies to land in theaters and people were somewhat impressed. But I don’t remember people expecting great things from the first Spider-Man movie. When it arrived post 9/11 during a period where we REALLY needed heroes, people were over the moon about it. Since then, it seems like we’re all on the same page in terms of our Spider-Man love.
But is third time NOT the charm? You get the vague sense that with three villains in the mix and all the rumors about Raimi and the principle cast not coming back for a fourth movie that they’re really going for broke and adding everything imaginable. That worries me. Because I can’t think of a single blockbuster that was best served by a “What the hell – throw that in, too” mentality. Look at the latter Batman flicks or even the most recent King Kong. Sometimes, to have a great popcorn flick, you gotta show a little restraint.
Of course I’ll see Spider-Man 3 this weekend and of course I will love it. All the nit picking at this stage is just a nervous fanboy tic. But if the rumors are true and Raimi and the cast really decide to hang it up after this, I think I’ll be okay with that.
As mentioned above, Gordon, Joe and I completed another successful broadcast of The Triple Feature talkcast on Monday. I strongly encourage you to download it along with all of our other episodes. They’re a lot of fun and hopefully it will motivate you to participate in them as they occur live.
Since most of the free world will be seeing Spider-Man 3 this weekend and since that’s what we plan to talk about for the full hour this coming Monday, it’ll be a great opportunity for you to check out the show and call in live. We want to get your thoughts and reactions in real time. So set aside some time on your calendar, Monday, May 7 at 9:00 PM CST.
Another thing we had hoped would draw in more listeners are our contests and I announced two giveaways on Monday – Dreamgirls and Diggers (which both came out on DVD yesterday and – incidentally, was giving a glowing review on Ebert & Ropert this weekend). You need to download and listen to Monday’s show for the first half of the clue for these giveaways. I’m hear now to give the second half.
For Dreamgirls, the second half of the clue is “HIVE”
For Diggers, the second half of the clue is “BAKE”
If you’ve participated in a few of these, you know the drill. Send in the complete clue along with your name, age and mailing address to theaterhopper@hotmail.com. And for the sake of organization, please send in your entries in two separate e-mails. If you submit both clues in one e-mail, I have to throw it out because I won’t be able to keep them straight.
Sound good? Good! Fire away!
Oh, and by the way, I received in the mail my giveaway copies of Copying Beethoven, Deja Vu and The Queen and the winners have been chosen and mailed out. Don’t worry, I’m not going to post your name if you won. I just wanted to let everyone know that those contests are now off the table.
Come back a little later in the day. I have some news regarding that freelance movie review job I was shooting for with The Des Moines Register that I talked about about a month ago.
[ No Comments ]
Okay, I know I said to come back later in the day for this story, but I couldn’t wait to tell it. At least this way, it’s kept away from the main site-related stuff and is organized.
Remember about a month ago when I told you I was applying to be part of The Des Moines Register’s newly formed team of community reviewers? Well, I got word back yesterday that I was NOT one of the 30 finalists selected from the field of 150 who participated. Incidentally, from that group of 30, 10 will be chosen by a reader vote to be a part of the team.
I’m kind of bummed because I’ve been informally reviewing movies for five years and I thought that would be great experience for them to tap into. I mean, who better than me, right?
I went through this weird analytical cycle. At first I thought they turned me down because they were aware of Theater Hopper and the freelancing I do for their sister publication Juice. The must have figured my legion of fans would skew the voting round.
Then I got kind of suspicious. The editor who made the decision as to what contestants made it to the voting round is the same editor I worked for a couple of years ago when I did freelance concert reviews for The Register. Interestingly enough, he contacted me out of the blue a few days before I got the notice about the movie reviewer thing when he asked me if I would be interested in reviewing a Stone Sour contest this Friday and an all day metal festival called LazerFest going on May 13. I accepted the Stone Sour gig. I’m not available for LazerFest. Was this meant to soften the blow?
Then I entered into acceptance. Well, obviously they can’t pay me freelancing fees for BOTH my contributions to Juice and for my concert reviews. It’s just not fair! Spread the love.
And then I felt superior because I had “let it go.”
At one point early on I thought I would contest my rejection and give a laundry list of reasons as to why I would rock the community movie review team the hardest. But I stopped when I realized that I didn’t know if the community movie review team paid well (if at all) and that I might be shooting myself in the foot if I said “I don’t want to do paid concert reviews! Put me into the voting round for the community movie review team where I may or may not be voted in as a finalist!” Seemed kind of like a dumb gamble.
All the same, I would have rocked it hard. I just know I would have….
[ No Comments ]
I think I may have made him a little beefy in the shoulders, but I’m really happy with how my sketch of Venom turned. I tried to incorporate elements of the movie version and the comic book version in his facial features. What do you guys think?
So today is the big day, right? Spider-Man 3 is in theaters. I had a few friends going to midnight showings, but for obvious reasons I wasn’t able to join them. I haven’t been to a midnight showing since Star Wars: Episode III – Revenge of the Sith and I paid for it dearly. I don’t think I have it in me to do that kind of stuff anymore.
Cami and I are planning on seeing Spider-Man 3 on Sunday while my parents watch Henry. Cami’s not too hyped about it. I think it’s because she doesn’t want to encourage my fascination with comic book characters. She always sites precedence back when we watched the first Spider-Man. She fell asleep during the middle of the movie. Honestly, I about fell asleep, too.
But before you grab the pitchforks, know that it wasn’t because I was bored! I think we had done a lot of yard work that day and we were both wiped out. Put us in a dark room with comfortable seats and it’s lights out. Anyway, she always reminds me of that like if I take her to a comic book movie, she’ll be bored to tears. Nice try, honey.
I am somewhat intimidated by the movie’s near 3-hour running time. That’s a long time to be in a theater no matter which way you slice it.
I know earlier in the week that I expressed some apprehension about whether or not the movie would be able to support itself under the weight of it’s own hype. Critics are kind of beating up on it a little bit but I’ve read a lot of fan reactions and it seems to be quite the opposite. Almost bordering on hyperbole. That’s okay. I’m a fan myself. I’ll be right there with ’em. Even though I was apprehensive, I’m starting to get excited again. It’s kind of like when you’re a teenager and you’re excited for Christmas, but then because you’re moody and your Dad made you fight the crowds to get something nice for your Mom, you get dismissive and talk about how you’re “so over Christmas.” Then it’s, like, two days before Christmas and you start flipping out again because you know you’re going to get presents. Same thing.
Did anyone sit through a midnight showing? What did you think? Stay away from spoilers, please. Keep it in the general category. I’m just wondering if some of the critics complaints are valid (over stuffing things with too many villains, over-choreographed fight sequences, etc.) Leave your thoughts below!
[ No Comments ]
Since we’re on a super-hero movie kick (sorry, high-minded movie fans) I was wondering if you guys caught the first image of the armor from the forthcoming 2008 Iron Man movie over at EW.com?
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a HARD CORE Iron Man fan. As I type this, no less than 13 different Iron Man figures are staring at me from atop a nearby shelf. I would even go so far to say that I’m a bigger fan of Iron Man than Spider-Man. I mean, Spider-Man will always be my first love. But I have a thing for the second-tier characters. Of course, that’s less and less the case with Iron Man these days.
There is something I’ve always found very visually appealing about Iron Man and I think it’s because the technology he utilizes allows artists to create variations on a theme for his signature look. That’s a lot of fun. Even the crap armor designs I love because they’re trying something new and it fits within the motivations of the character.
I mean, you can slap Spider-Man into a dark suit to make him more “moody” and it looks cool. But we all know that’s not who Peter Parker is. Iron Man, on the other hand, is constantly upgrading and improving his armor and the look progresses because of it. The only thing non-progressive about the character is his origin story. In the comics, he was wounded by a piece of shrapnel selling arms and munitions during the Vietnam War. He was held captive and forced to design a chest plate to keep his heart beating. He built the armor around it and escaped. Timely when the character was introduced, sure. But a little stale 40-plus years later.
In recent years they’ve tried to update the conflict placing him in Afghanistan. But in another 40 years, it’ll be the same problem.
At any rate, the topic I really wanted to address was the armor design for the movie. Stan Winston is doing visual effects. He’s the guy who created the Alien, Robocop, the Predator, the dinosaurs from Jurassic Park and the Terminator. So you know you’re in good hands. I just want to breathe a huge sigh of relief that they’re staying faithful to the armor design from the comics. The smartest thing director Jon Favreau did was hire artist Adi Granov as a technical adviser. Granov was the last artist to update Iron Man’s look and it’s probably one of my favorite interpretations yet. To me it says they’re taking it seriously.
Anyway, I could geek out for hours. But I didn’t want to let this slip by without saying something about it.
Is anyone else excited for Iron Man in 2008?
[ No Comments ]
This has nothing to do with anything, but since it’s the weekend, I thought you guys might enjoy a little linkage to kick things off.
Cracked.com runs down comparisons between some of the most obviously similar movies released in the same year. Dante’s Peak and Volcano, for example. Or A Bug’s Life and Antz. It’s pretty amazing to see how long stuff like this has been going on and how often it happens.
Incidentally, this was something we touched on by total happenstance during this Monday’s Triple Feature talkcast. So I was pretty psyched when I ran across it later in the week. What’s your favorite pair of suspiciously similar movies?
Speaking of The Triple Feautre talkcast, don’t forget that’s where you need to go to get the first clue in our Dreamgirls and Diggers free DVD giveaway. You can get the second half of the clue here. Send in the complete clue for each giveaway to theaterhopper@hotmail.com with your name, age and mailing address to have your entry submitted into a random drawing. My free copies of Dreamgirls were delivered earlier in the week, so I’m picking winners on Monday. I haven’t gotten a lot of entries, so your odds are good if you throw your hat into the ring now!
Good luck and have a great weekend!
[ No Comments ]
May07
When you think about it, there was really nowhere to go but down.
After the success of Spider-Man 2 – one of the most note-perfect superhero movies ever – where else could director Sam Raimi go when he has the Sony breathing down his neck to deliver another installment of a franchise that has earned them nearly $2 billion worldwide? Make the best movie you can, throw all your marketing muscle behind it to put Spider-Man’s face on everything from a box of Mac ‘N Cheese to a pair of gym shorts and hope it rakes in another big pile of money.
Well, the money part is over and done with. Spider-Man 3 had the largest opening day ever – almost $60 million – and the largest three-day weekend ever- almost $150 million.
Unfortunately, Raimi might have lost his credibility in the process.
Reviewing a film like Spider-Man 3 is a difficult one for me. I have to wear two hats. One hat says “Objective Movie Critic” and the other hat says “Obsessive Fan Boy.” If the movie gets the details of the comics wrong, you can slap on the critic hat and dissect it that way. If the movie itself is poorly made, you can put on the fanboy hat and look at it that way.
Spider-Man 3 was so thoroughly wrong on both fronts, I wanted to take off both hats, burn them and bury them.
The largest contributor to Spider-Man 3’s failure is the meandering script by Raimi, his older brother Ivan Raimi and their screenwriting partner Alvin Sargent. The trio try to build on the foundation of the first two movies by raising the stakes in the conflict between Harry Osborn (James Franco) and Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) and it’s a good place to start. Unfortunately, after that, things get muddled.
Harry has undergone treatments similar to those of his father to avenge his murder. Retrofitting his father’s equipment into a “totally extreme!” air glider, he’s out for blood as the second Green Goblin and Spider-Man is his target.
Their battle is the movie’s first action set-piece. Too bad it looks entirely cartoonish. Like, “I can see the black outlines around the characters” cartoonish. The aftermath leaves Harry a partial amnesiac who remembers his father died, but not by Spider-Man’s hand. Convenient!
After that, we’re forced to endure Mary Jane’s (Kirsten Dunst) career letdowns as she’s dropped from a Broadway play after one performance. Spider-Man saves Gwen Stacy (Bryce Dallas Howard)– a classmate and photocopier model (?!) in the film’s second (and best) action set-piece and he’s given the key to the city while MJ scowls in the background. Peter then tries to propose at a French restaurant where Bruce Campbell delivers his requisite cameo but botches it and – oh, yeah – there’s some background story about a new villain called the Sandman (Thomas Hayden Church) that can molecularly reassemble his body into an errant special effect from the Mummy movies to steal money for his sick daughter. Oh! Oh! And don’t forget Topher Grace as Peter’s new photographer rival at The Daily Bugle Eddie Brock! Most importantly, don’t forget that black tar alien slinky that crash landed in a meteorite and latched on to Peter’s scooter at the beginning of the movie.
Get all that? Oh, wait. There’s more.
The black goop from the meteorite is revealed to be a symbiote that amplifies aggression, bonds with Peter and gives him a new black costume. Good timing, too. Because now he can use his amped up powers to take on the Sandman, who he’s learned was the REAL triggerman in his Uncle Ben’s death. Again… Convenient!
There’s more, but it’s really not worth getting into. Basically, the movie is just a series of action pieces strung together loosely by non-organic plot elements that move the characters around like chess pieces to get them there.
Actually, chess is too generous an analogy. How about Candyland?
A big failure in particular is the use – or rather, lack thereof – of the black suit. Peter is probably in the suit a total of 10 minutes. We’re let to believe that it’s corrupting him. After his confrontation with the Sandman, we’re told his intent was to kill him but it looks more like an accident. Later, as we witness how the suit is affecting Peter Parker, Raimi treats it like a campy joke by having Peter strutting down the street like John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. When he seeks to get back at MJ while she works as a singer/waitress in a jazz bar, he chooses to do so by… stealing the spotlight from her playing piano and dancing around the room?
How are we supposed to take this transformation seriously when they don’t take it seriously themselves?
Eventually, Peter realizes that he doesn’t like what the symbiote is doing to him, so he sheds the alien creature in a church where Eddie Brock has found refuge after he was exposed doctoring a photo of Spider-Man to paint him in a bad light.
In record time, the symbiote bonds with Brock and they become Venom – ANOTHER villain for Spider-Man to contend with.
Venom’s addition feels totally tacked on and if I were Topher Grace, I’d be asking myself “I left That 70’s show for this?” Venom ends up enlisting Sandman’s help to kill Spider-Man using MJ as bait to draw him out. Spider-Man enlists the “on good terms again” Harry Osborne and a big bru-ha-ha ensues. A couple of people die and I leave the theater not caring about any of it.
Typing this review was like pulling teeth for me because deep down, I WANTED to like it. But a bad film is a bad film and I can’t help but wonder if Raimi has lost his touch.
The movie suffers from Batman Forever syndrome. Throwing more villains at Spider-Man doesn’t make him more interesting. It’s always been Peter Parker’s real-life problems that made him interesting. The filmmakers could have easily gone with the conflict between him and Harry as the centerpiece of the film and left it at that. It would have been a lot less interesting to look at – especially considering Harry’s choice of a paintball mask for his “costume,” but at least it would have been authentic.
Or, instead, focus on the symbiote and the Venom character. Illustrate more clearly how Eddie Brock is the polar opposite of Peter Parker. What a real snake-in-the-grass would do with that level of power instead of someone who is at their core decent like Parker.
Anything involving Sandman could have been thrown out the window. His story adds nothing to the movie except for commentary about revenge and forgiveness. But, like the original Batman movie before it (where the Joker is revealed as the man who killed Batman’s parents and is then killed), a great disservice is done to the character of Spider-Man by allowing him to confront the man who killed his Uncle and forgiving him. It strips Peter of his guilt for not saving his Uncle when he had the chance. THIS IS HIS ENTIRE MOTIVATION FOR BEING A SUPER HERO!
Ultimately, it appeared as if the filmmakers totally lost touch with the characters. For a franchise that presented both sides of a super hero so well, it’s probably the deepest cut that they apparently stopped caring. I could go on with this review, but I’ve stopped caring myself.
Spider-Man 3 is the worst of the franchise and certainly did not live up to the hype.
[ No Comments ]
Hey, guys. I hope you liked the first formal, main page review for the site for Spider-Man 3. I still kind of have my training wheels on, so hopefully it’s not too out of place.
If you guys are at all interested in reading more reviews, be sure to check out my recent concert review of Stone Sour that I did for The Des Moines Register. They posted it on their web site yesterday and readers have already left a few comments.
It was a good show. I was really surprised by how much I enjoyed their music. I guess it’s just not cool for a hipster like myself to admit I like Stone Sour now. But what can I say? I appreciate their lack of irony. It’s just straight to the gut rock. Nothin’ wrong with that.
Be sure to tune in to The Triple Feature talkcast tonight at 9:00 PM CST over at Talkshoe. Gordon, Joe and I will be discussing Spider-Man 3 for the full hour and taking your calls. If you’re a hard-core comic book nerd like me, I’m sure you have opinions. So don’t be afraid to call in and voice ’em!
Oh, and one more thing: I’m staying home from work this week to spend time with Cami and Henry before Cami’s maternity leave is up. If I have some free time, I have an idea for an extra strip related to Spider-Man 3 that I’d like to put together this week while it’s still timely. You’ll still get the Wednesday strip. I’m just giving you the head’s up there might be a little bonus comic action coming soon! Check the site again on Tuesday!
[ No Comments ]
I was coming across my notes for my review this morning and I remembered a bitchy little comment I wanted to make that I didn’t add to the final review.
“Spider-Man is without his mask so often in this movie, the should have called it ‘Peter Parker 3’ instead of Spider-Man 3.”
Look, I realize that the first movie was raked over the coals for the totally Power Rangers-esque dialogue delivery between Green Goblin and Spider-Man during that scene on the rooftop. Lots of overexaggerated head bobs to indicate words were being spoken. I also realize that Tobey Maguire is a big star now and probably pushed for more face time. For an actor, it makes sense. But it just bugged the hell of out of me. Put on your damn mask! Staple it to your neck if you need to!
Also, can anyone explain to me what Captain Stacy and Gwen Stacy were doing at a certain someone’s funeral at the end of the movie? Were these characters ever introduced to each other? Sorry, stuck out like a sore thumb to me.
Also, total waste of James Cromwell as Captain Stacy and J.K. Simmons as J. Jonah Jameson. They were hardly in it at all. Another example of how this movie was stuffed to the gills, in my opinion – and in a bad way.
[ No Comments ]
After seeing Spider-Man 3 this weekend, posting my review on Monday and weathering the 90+ comments and controversy it generated, I figured it was about time we got back to business and had a little fun with the comics again.
Real quick synopsis of the whole review thing – I feel it was a success. I mean, it was my first “official” review for the site and by “official” I mean “first review instead of a comic” and it really got people talking. Some people were totally on board with me – thanking me, even, for giving voice to the same frustrations they had with the film. Some people politely disagreed with me and pointed out holes in my logic. I was totally cool with that. Like I said, it was the first review and (admittedly) not the most well written. So I appreciate the opportunity for constructive feedback.
Then there was… the third category of responses. Wherein people reacted so violently against my review, they made sure to tell me the review sucked, that I personally sucked, that I knew nothing about comics, that Theater Hopper was never funny, the jokes have always been terrible, that I’m a poseur and I’m off their bookmarks list forever.
Ho-kay.
I don’t want to dwell on it too much, but that kind of criticism really caught me off guard. I mean, I know it’s the internet and there are always going to be people mouthing off. But I never understood the logic of someone who lashes out with every personal insult they can come up with because they disagree with you about a movie, or an album or whatever. I mean, unless you’re Sam Raimi, what’s effective about telling me how much I suck and that you’re never visiting the site again like I owe you something? That’s just being mean for no good reason. All the best to you, I guess. If you blow up like that over matters of opinion, I just hope you don’t end up kicking the cat or murdering someone when it’s about something that’s actually important!
That said, many thanks to those who left messages of support. Like I said, I was caught off guard by some of the comments, but I like the idea of doing more reviews because it really got people participating in the comments thread and, well… that’s kind of the point! So, don’t worry – a couple of sourpusses haven’t run me off from doing reviews! If anything, I’m going to take the experience and make sure the next review is that much better!
At any rate, to take a step away from that controversy, I wanted to do a comic that was pulled from real life. Orignally, this comic was supposed to go up on Tuesday with another new comic going up on Wednesday. But since I’m at home on vacation this week, I decided to space things out a little and stay true to the Monday, Wednesday, Friday schedule. So the comic that was originally meant for today will run Friday. Be sure to check it out!
Today’s comic was taken almost word for word from a conversation Cami and I had before going to see Spider-Man 3. Yes, I do own a t-shirt with the black costume logo on it and yes, I did wear it to the movie. Cami totally rolled her eyes and named checked PCU and my reply was as it is in the comic. Slimming lines were my best comeback.
Don’t believe me that I own the black costume logo shirt? Check it, true-believers!
That one is for all the haters that said I don’t know anything about comics!
I was psyched to see this movie and don’t let me dour review convince you otherwise. I mean, why else would a 30 year-old man dress up like this in public, let alone in public advertising “Yes, I am wearing a Spider-Man shirt to a Spider-Man movie? What of it?”
I was actually so excited to see Spider-Man 3 that I was totally suckered into buying the combo meal at the concession stand that came with a “collectible cup!” Any keepsake I could get my grubby little mitts on, y’know?
During the movie, I was totally amazed at how many parents brought their little kids with them. Cami and I caught an early matinee at 12:30 on a Sunday, so I’m sure that had something to do with it. But looking around, Cami commented on all of the kids and asked me “If Henry were a few years older, would you bring him to this movie.” I told her in all honesty, no, I wouldn’t. I mean, I know it’s technically a kids movie. Well, okay a kids AND geek movie. But it’s PG-13 for a reason, right? Plus, it’s got Venom in it and Venom used to freak me out when he was a flat drawing in a comic book. I could only imagine how much scarier he would be leaping toward you with the fangs and the spittle and whatnot. No way would I bring Henry to this movie if he was 5 or 6 years old.
But anyway, there we are, sitting in the movie surrounded by kids.
Some of it was cute. When Spider-Man was web-slining through the city, a little girl sitting next to Cami would lean over to her Mom and say “That’s dangerous!” Some of it was annoying. Like the other little girl over my right shoulder with her family of eight who would not. shut. up! At one point, one of the characters in the movie had a line of dialogue where they used the word “stupid.” This little girl went on and on asking her father if movies could use the word “stupid” – like it was a swear word or something.
Later on, immediately after the scene where Topher Grace is consumed by the Venom symbiote, the little girl is murmuring over and over “I want to go home. I want to go home.” I’m thinking to myself, “Great. Venom freaked her out and now she’s going to be scared out of her wits for the rest of the movie. Take her home already!”
No sooner do I finish that thought when I hear what sounds like a burp from the row behind me. Then another burp. Then a wet slap on the linoleum floor. Then the sickly smell of SweetTarts in the air.
The little girl threw up. Whoops! Should have listened to her, Dad!
What I found priceless was the reaction of the woman who was sitting a few seats over from me, roughly directly in front of the blast zone. She hunched her shoulders up and kind of brushed her shoulders gingerly, reluctantly feeling for trace elements of vomit on her sleeve. She kept looking over her shoulder like the second wave was coming.
It wasn’t long before the little girl and her family left the theater and I thought to myself “Yeah! Alright! No more talking during the movie!” Then I felt really bad about myself because I’m sure the family was embarrassed and the little girl probably felt terrible, too.
After the movie, Cami and I were walking out and she said “Can you believe that little girl threw up like that?” I looked back at her and said, “You know it’s going to happen to us one day.”
And it probably will.
At any rate, after the movie, we picked up Henry who was being watched by my parents and went home. We put Henry to sleep and I was left to quietly contemplate the movie as I outlined the review in my head. I looked to my “special edition collectors cup” I had purchased from the concession stand for inspiration, but drew nothing from it.
The rest is history.
Have a great Wednesday!
[ No Comments ]
I don’t know exactly how to explain today’s comic except there is this weird lull in theaters this weekend between Spider-Man 3 coming out last week and Shrek the Third coming out next week. The only new high-profile release is 28 Weeks Later. Since I’m all about drawing Tom in the Spider-Man mask as much as possible, I decided on this weird little mash-up.
At least I know for some of you it will be weird. The comic book faithful knows there is already a precedence for a zombie Spider-Man and that would be in Marvel Comics popular maxi-series Marvel Zombies from early last year. Robert Kirkman – who is one of my favorite comic book writers – did a really excellent job with it and it has a really black sense of humor. As you can see, I’ve posted the cover to the second printing of the first issue so you could see where I picked up the visual reference.
Right now there is a very interesting Army of Darkness vs. Marvel Zombies crossover going on right now. So if you’re a fan of the Evil Dead movies (somewhat timely considering Sam Raimi’s involvement in that franchise as well as the Spider-Man franchise), you might want to stop by your local comic book store and pick it up.
As far as the comic goes. I’m happy with it. It gave me an opportunity to do some dramatic up-lighting, which I always enjoy. Plus, you got two full comics this week instead of one while I was on vacation. Can’t complain about that! Well, that is unless you’re one of the people who took my Spider-Man 3 review personally and vowed never to visit my site again. Because – let’s face it – you’re just looking for stuff to complain about!
Some of you with less serious opinions about comic book movies will be glad to know that I’m through covering Spider-Man 3. After today’s comic, we’re moving forward. I wish I had more to say about 28 Weeks Later, but I’m not sure where I stand on it.
The first movie was amazing. To take zombies and make them faster and more aggressive than a linebacker was such a simple move that worked out so well. It finally made zombies really, REALLY scary to me. And before anyone writes in and tries to correct me that “they weren’t zombies! It was a virus!” I know that. But let’s not kid ourselves. It was a zombie movie, okay. At any rate – excellent execution (no pun).
I never really understood the appeal of zombie movies before that. Shuffling around, and whatnot. Why are they a threat? I guess it was the thrill of taking one’s head off with a shotgun that people liked to see. Of course, the social commentary between zombies and mall culture in Dawn of the Dead was cool. But beyond that, what was cool or menacing about zombies? Their numbers? Their relentlessness? I’ve never been a big horror fan, so if anyone wants to take a stab (again, no pun) at explaining the appeal in the comments, I’m all ears.
As much as I liked the original 28 Days Later, I wonder if the sequel can live up to it’s predecessor. The rumor is that the producers threw a bunch of money at Cillian Murphy to reprise his role and (I think) have him come back as a zombie. Is that right? No dice, though because he turned them down.
I don’t really think that Murphy’s involvement is a requirement to make 28 Weeks Later a success. After all, there were no real big name actors in the first movie, so this one will probably do just fine. It just makes me wonder if that would have been an insurance policy of sorts for the producers or if it’s a sign that they don’t have faith in what they have script-wise.
For me it’ll be wait-and-see. I saw the first 28 Days Later on DVD. It’ll probably be the same for 28 Weeks Later. I’m too much of a wuss. I need to pause the movie and get a soda sometimes. I can’t do that in the theater. Oh, well.
Anyone out there planning on seeing it? What’s the agenda for the weekend? Leave your comments below and I’ll see you on Monday!
[ No Comments ]
