Captain America: The First Avenger - America with Both Stars and Stripes

If there were ever a Captain America that the world truly accepted, it was Chris Evans playing Steve Rogers in 2011's Captain America: The First Avengers. While it is not the greatest movie in the roster, our introduction to the American hero was a real success. It made some money, sure, but what it did was introduce a man who wanted to truly help the war effort. During World War 2, he rose up to whatever lengths and whatever risks to get into the battlefield. Bringing him into a storyline that assembles the Avengers was a master stroke. 

Our introduction to Steve Rogers showed us a very ailing individual. He wants to enlist in the army, but he is barely able to breathe and his body mass is sorely lacking for the task. Seeing his desperation to help, a scientist who is developing a secret serum enlists him under special circumstances. After proving his valor in training, they hook him up to a machine and inject him with the super serum, making him much taller and much more muscular in mass. 

After taking down an assassin who kills the doctor, Captain America explodes in popularity. The scenes where he is advertising the war effort are some of the best nods to the old comics, as punching Hitler in a public relations act several dozen times is rather humorous. He is not satisfied with this, though. He is helping the war effort quite a bit, but he is now stronger than any peak physical human being, heals faster and is able to push forward on sheer willpower alone.

Watching Captain America storm a Nazi base and save a team of Ally soldiers is one of the most inspiring and patriotic pieces to be put on film. He had a very powerful shield that could bounce away bullets and infinitely more traits than that, which became one of the most recognizable symbols, even outside of the US. 

Throughout the film, though, we are gifted with one of the greatest iterations of the Red Skull in any form of media. Hugo Weaving is one of the greatest actors on the market and has made his name in nerd culture around the world. His makeup for Red Skull was menacing, relentless, and spent the entire movie using a strange cube that had powers beyond mortal belief. This cube would link this film to the main storyline of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and is the first appearance of an Infinity Stone. The Tesseract became a staple and a symbol of the series, all the way up until Infinity War. 

The rivalry between Red Skull and Captain America has been a part of Marvel since some of its earliest years and this movie treated it with true reverence. The two of them kept butting heads throughout the film and both of them saw losses in battle that would scar them very deeply. Bucky, Captain America's friend since childhood, who enlisted shortly before Steve, was added to his strikeforce who were tasked with the destruction of Hydra. After killing so many of the third reich, they tried to take down a train that was crucial to Hydra's plans and it ended with Bucky falling to his assumed death. 

The story goes back and forth in the power's paradigm until American forces stormed Hydra's giant aircraft. Tommy Lee Jones brings in the troops that blow down the proverbial walls surrounding the Red Skull's secret plot to use the Tesseract in a horrific act of power to win the war. The final fight between the two of them is really something to behold. It's not film action genius, but it is a suitable battle between two arch nemeses that ends in both of their banishment from reality. Red Skull holds his hand onto the cube and it suddenly decides it doesn't like him and casted him out into the universe for his hubris. Captain America, as is well known in his origin, crashed into ice water and was frozen solid until he was excavated in the late 2000's by SHIELD. 

With a clear sequel bate ending involving Nick Fury, Captain America ends with a strong retroactive stance in the MCU. It is the first proper apperance of a beloved Marvel character and brought him about where he was a good man, but he was also flawed and prone to weakness. His love for Agent Carter proves to be one of his biggest weaknesses, as it haunts him after this film for the rest of its run until Avengers Endgame. Looking back on it, it is a pillar of MCU's lore, holding up several aspects of it, and creating a history that inspired more heroes to be who they are. After Cap gets out of the ice, he is respected and grown men and women geek out over him for good reason. It is one of the earliest MCU movies and it is also one that showed that they didn't need Iron Man to remain popular. The Incredible Hulk was made by a different studio, so Captain America is the first one where Marvel veered away from Tony Stark, and only added a man to the roster that would iconize it. It perfectly set up what came next for the MCU, which would shoot it into the tier of legend. Even against killer aliens and giant space worms, Steve Rogers became Captain America in a big way, and as we've seen, that title is not an easy one to hold. Virtua Mustache Punch!!  

Thor (2011) - Another One!

There were a variety of superheroes that I have loved over the course of my life and Thor happens to not really be one of them. He was cool and all, but for some reason, my eye caught to Thunderstrike. He was literally a Thor replacement, but he came with his own roster of baddies like Blood Axe, and he had cool interactions with cameo guest appearances like Spider-man. Thor was just never really on my radar, though I respected the character and his Norse origins. The movie is a decent amount of good but just not great. The humor in it bats from left to right, but the love interest is actually quite strong... here in this film. 

I love Natalie Portman, especially in Leon the Professional and Black Swan. She is an amazing actress, but only when she really puts her mind to something. Here, we can see there is plenty of her beaming talent. Sadly, though, her enthusiasm for the role would eventually dry up, leading to her turning down several appearances throughout the series. Her chemistry with Chris Hemsworth is actually quite great, as she seems interested in him, but also very perplexed by his mannerisms. 

Thor is a man of battle and glory, but he is also a pampered prince who does not know how the world works. He is to be crowned king of Asgard, but that ceremony was interrupted. We are introduced to Loki, where Tom Hiddleston would be so popular that he'd spawn his own lackluster Disney+ series. Here, though, he is manipulative, and in such a subtle way that you may actually need to view it again to see how he talks to his brother and his father. Throughout the whole film, he is gaining control little by little, by having his brother banished for his hubris, losing his powers and getting rid of an obstacle in his way. 

Somehow, they got the great Anthony Hopkins for the role of Odin and it couldn't have been more perfect. He is fair, but he is also very harsh in his punishment. He strips Thor of everything and lands him on Earth to make him learn humility. It is very much an ancient tale, but they tell it so well here in this movie. While not every character and actor is as great as Odin, we still get Stellan Skarsgard and he is magnificent as the scientist. While he would be relegated to a joke in Thor 2, he's still awesome here. The scene where he challenges Thor to a drinking match just shows how he has some pride along with his brilliance and he is very personable with Thor, even knowing who he is. 

Jane Foster is a highly underrated character. She has doubts, but she also seems to have guts and chooses to believe that Thor is who he says he is. Even though he gets zapped with electricity and goes down in a fidgeting mess. He still has a very strange speech pattern, and she recognizes that he isn't like a normal human being, no matter how long she stays with him through out the movie. When things get tough, she stays with him and even helps him when he needs her. 

The standout, however, is a then unknown Idris Elba who would take up the screen and take our hearts right out of our chests. He is absolutely brilliant, once again, this time as Heimdall. He doesn't do a great deal in terms of action in this movie, but his presence is very well known and he puts on a magnificent performance. This, thankfully, jumpstarted Elba to a household name. 

Now, this movie isn't without its faults. Loki does get a little dramatic and those scenes aren't really all that convincing that they would put him in the Odin sleep. Yes, he played it up like he was very angry that he found out he was adopted, but really, he seemed like a wiser ruler than that. Still, it gets them where they need to go. They also do spend a lot of time on Earth and those scenes can drag on at times. 

Thor does stick to its mythical elements rather well, but that kind of comes crashing down when the rest of his team from Asgard come to Earth. Seriously, when their costumes are out in a normal everyday setting, it clashes so hard that they kind of look silly. These characters are hardly ever seen again, even changing actors at random points before just flat out going away in the third movie. We'll get to that one. The mini villain in this movie is one of the most random in the entire Marvel universe. Who in their right minds thought that the Destroyer was a good idea for a random cameo fight? Sure, it links them to SHIELD because it's big and noticeable so that's all well and good, but I really feel like they could have done better.

In the end, it's a good movie. It is fun to watch in theaters and lighthearted enough to leave you feeling pretty good. The ending is a slight bummer and the conclusion to it is rather awful, but this movie stands by itself. It introduced a very relateable character with flaws that he needs to overcome. He brings himself back in style and the ending fight between him and Loki is pretty damn good, even ending in a bit of sacrifice. It solidified Thor's place in the MCU, even if the movie was considered middling by comparison.After this movie, we're just one movie away from a blatant Virtua Fangasm! 

Iron Man 2 - A Rough Metal Start

The MCU was a landmark of cinema because of the way it serialized entire movies and brought them all to a breath-taking conclusion. This was a journey that was marred with certain complications. Enter Iron Man 2, where they seemed to not know where they wanted to take Tony Stark's story. While Iron Man 3 would prove to be just as unhelpful, it seemed that after the initial Iron Man movie, Tony Stark shined a lot brighter in the Avengers movies or other movies that were not his. 

For starters, the villain in this movie was rather forgettable. Mickey Rourke gives a good performance as Whiplash, and Sam Rockwell is always good for an entertaining villain, but they just didn't mix well. There seemed to be too much conflict without enough actual story between them to make Hammer and Whiplash's interactions really click. They could be funny in the same scene, and they even pulled off a few good gags here and there. Overall, though, they both ended up just fizzling out of the series all together, both in person and memory.

One thing I did not hit on in the first review was the part of Thomas Howard. I have always loved him in pretty much any movie he is in and Iron Man is no different. This is why I was a little heartbroken that he was not returning as War Machine for the sequel. Apparently, he got top billing for the first movie and he wanted that again. When the studio refused, he walked and we got Don Cheadle instead. Cheadle has sat in that position comfortably ever since and we are all good for it. He brought some of his own personality and charm to the character and it worked like a perfectly fitted puzzle piece. A bit of a shame, but hey, who doesn't love Captain Planet, am I right?

The story, however, is not wrapped up with a very tight bow. In fact, there are some plot holes you could drive a semi through. For some reason, they decided that the fuel source for his power generator that was surgically implanted in his chest is now killing him. So, thinking he has no more time to live, he decides to go on a bender. This brings up conflict with Rhodes and the two of them go on and off while Whiplash is in the background, trying to kill Tony for his father ruining his father. This whole plot was a mess from the start. 

The biggest plothole lies within the sickness that is killing Tony. Bringing it into the story from the start painted them into a corner that they needed to get out of. So, what do they do? Make it to where his father made a new power source, made needless clues and difficulty to get to it and told Tony through a secret recording. His father somehow knew he would need this new power source and put the code for it in a secret message in a miniature Stark Industries display. It even miraculously cures Tony's illness immediately! To say this was nonsensical would be a grievous understatement. 

They handled some scenes with grace, obviously. They had a ball with Tony and Hammer going head to head in the courtroom at the very beginning. Some interactions with Tony and Nick Fury are quite comedic, but Fury basically is just a downer through the majority of the film. They also did very well with War Machine and Iron Man teaming up at the end to defeat all of the Whiplash drones, as well as the man himself. The battle was done well enough, but it's not going to be in any history books. While their teamwork was fun to watch, they're still just robot drones along with Mickey Rourke in a knockoff Iron Man suit. 

One of the biggest points in this movie's favor, though, is the introduction of Black Widow. Scarlett Johansson makes her debut as Natasha Romanova and does such a spectacular job, that the fanbase welcomed her to the Avengers with open arms. Her scenes of kicking ass did make it to the Marvel history books, especially mixed with some comedy from John Favreau. It's kind of sad that people actually liked her more than they liked this movie, thinking she deserved a better first appearance.

It's a mix and match of good and bad, but it's also not especially favorable around campfires. With how well the Avengers series did, this is seen as sort of a black sheep among the herd. It has its definite pros, but the cons kind of weigh it down to mediocrity. Iron Man would go on to become one of the most beloved characters in the MCU, but it most certainly wasn't due to his solo series in the franchise. As well as Robert Downey Jr plays him, it's still going to boil down to the script and what it provides to the series. This may have been an early entry, but it still did very little for the MCU as a whole. Black Widow and shiny new suits will only get you so far when you know what menace is over the horizon. That storyline is about to begin and it will shake this series to its very foundations. Virtua Snap.  

Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths - The Resemblance is Justice!

 These are where DC truly shined. Even above the Marvel Animated Universe, the DC Animated Movies were a grand success and it is clear why. Not all of them were part of the same universe, such as this one, but there is an actual reason for this. Crisis on Two Earths is one of the movies, such as Doomed, that was originally going to be part of the DCAU, but was scrapped. It would bridge the gap between Justice League and Justice League Unlimited. So, instead, we are given a masterful iteration of the Justice League.The voice acting, the action and the dialogue, all of it rings true with a real story behind it. 

While the idea of an evil Justice League dates way back to the early days of comics, this movie brings it to a real conflict of ideas having to do with existance itself. James Wood voices Owlman, Earth 2's version of Batman, and he deserves an award for this performance. He is serious, he is calculating, and he is a strategist bent on destroying existance itself. He is part of the Crime Syndicate, an evil version of the Justice League. Ultra Man, the evil Superman, leads them like a gang and has several different lieutenant on the field who also have super powers. The heroes of this universe are all but dead, wiped out by the Crime Syndicate, all down to their last man, Lex Luthor. 

Luthor of Earth 2 is the only one who is in this movie, while Earth 1's Luthor is seen to be in prison, reading a book. He goes to Earth 1 to enlist the help of the Justice League, saying that his team is dead and Ultra Man is planning something that will make his ownership of the world all but a certainty. The only thing standing in their way is the American president threat of nuclear retaliation. To gain the advantage, the Crime Syndicate needs a device that will allow them to destroy the entire planet. Owlman, however, decides he wants to destroy Earth Prime, the first planet and the only one that truly matters in the grand scheme of things. If Earth Prime is destroyed, reality is destroyed. 

The real fun of this movie starts when the Justice League come to Earth 2 and meet the Crime Syndicate's smaller gang members with lesser super powers. The fight between them is very charming and very large nods toward actual super villains and heroes of DC. There is even a lesser Wonder Woman besides Super Woman later in the film and Wonder Woman's conviction to defeat her is very telling of her character and shows that they understood her to a deeper level. 

It is not just a slug fest of two super powered opposites, while there is a good bit of that. It is always fun to see Superman take on Ultra Man and the two of them show which one is stronger and how they get the upper hand. Lex Luthor shows that he is also quite resourceful for the fight, though, and he is seen as the ultimate good in Earth 2 with his genius being able to match the powers of his opponents. It is good to see that they understood that he needed to be the seen as the one who claimed victory, as it would call heroes to his aid and ensure its continued prosperity. 

There are so many elements of DC represented in this movie, it's really hard to not just go straight into the entire plot beat by beat. The scenes with the Flash being hynotized, Martian Manhunter's rescue of the President's daughter, and Green Lantern's game of paper, rock, scissors, it all just added charm and little touches to this movie's entertainment value. However, there is one element that stands out above all else, and I only touched on the surface of it. 

Owlman is the hidden ultimate evil in this film. While Ultra Man is the leader of the evil gang, Owlman is the one who is even undermining him with his efforts. Destroying the Earth was already an evil enough plan, destroying Earth Prime would erase literally everything, but that is what Owlman believes is the only thing that would matter. He is an empty shell of Batman, as he gave into the abyss and believed that nothing truly mattered. The big problem is, when Batman fights him, Owlman is superior in both technology and hand-to-hand combat. It's one of this movie's little faults that Batman didn't put up a better fight, but in the end, he proved to be the winning strategist. 

When the Crime Syndicate invade the Justice League's base in order to gain the device for the bomb, this is when they decide to expand their roster. They call upon prospective members of the league and they fight the Crime Syndicate's strongest lieutenants and Super Woman. Batman is able to subdue her and bring her back to Earth 2, which is also another one of this film's greatest scenes.  

Crisis on Two Earths is my favorite movie in the DC Universe, and that's up against Batman vs Robin and Justice League The New Frontier. This animated series of DC movies would prove to be far more popular and profitable for WB and it was clear that they let them write their own movies. It's just such a shame that the DCEU couldn't be a similar success. Which movies I review will be up in the air, because I plan to touch on both. There is a lot to say about the entire run, and even if I haven't watched all of them, they're not hard to find. There shall be plenty of animated DC, though, these movies are just too good to pass on. Get ready for some exploring of the quality spectrum, from Son of Batman to Joss Whedon's Justice League... Virtua Help Us...

Spider-man: Brand New Day - Webheaded Disappointment

Spider-man is still the most marketable superhero there is. His toys, video games, comic books, and various other merch sells far better than the second, Batman. This may be part of why I started the series of Batman or Spider-man? The big problem with his marketability is that once the well really starts to run dry in the finances, they tend to lean on properties that show more returns. As a result, it feels like they rushed this movie out the door. They needed this success quickly, so story took a backseat to spectacle and fanservice. Whether a lot of it made any sense is apparently just not an issue. SPIDER SPOILERS!

How this needs to happen is going by the plotlines. Each of these plotlines go along the movie for as long as they need to be there. Once they have outlived their usefulness, they are discarded and never mentioned again. These can be storylines with severe repercussions on the characters and it can come and go as if it were nothing. This even goes into the territory of MCU's current state of affairs. Whether Tom Holland's Spider-man is a part of the Avengers at this point is very sketchy, but that's not really the movie's fault. The MCU itself is rather sketchy on such details in general.

The core of the problem with this movie lies with Jean Grey. A great deal of the faults in the story's morality and shifting focus boils down to the fact that Grey's overall plan was absolutely terrible. What she is after is her sister, as she was kidnapped by Damage Control and taken to a facility. The guy who is covering this up is not subtle, nor is his villainous intent. How Jean constantly attempts to break into Damage Control makes her out to be even worse than him. The first one that we see, which was her fourth attempt, is her taking control of some old lady's mind in order to drive a tank into the building to... break out... Scorpion. 

Look, I understand that you need to keep a villain's true motive secret in order to make the plot unveil nearer the end, but this subversion adds nothing and wastes time. Scorpion becomes the most important character for the first few scenes of the movie only for him to be dropped from the plot like a sack of bricks. Peter has a spider DNA problem taking him over and makes him turn angry with less control over his power. So, he hospitalizes Scorpion and starts to think that, maybe something is wrong.

It's all just anxiety ridden for the audience, and not in a good way. Even with all of this technology in his apartment, Jean invades his home. Even when the movie tries to make her sympathetic, she invade's MJ's mind only to taunt him. Her over-powered abilities don't even make sense for Jean Grey in the first place. She was only an average telepath, leaning more on her telekinetic powers. Yet, when unleashed fully, Jean can apparently hold entire crowds of people in mental stasis for several square miles in every direction. Even at his most powerful, Professor X has shown that a feat like this would tax him terribly, yet Grey is doing it here while also in the primary climax with Spider-man. They have a sit down about their feelings... Seriously, it's as lame as it sounds. Then, Peter gets shot!!! 

This is just the core problem with the movie. Not only are we supposed to show empathy for a girl who has shown no empathy for a single soul around her, taking over their minds like jumping through hoolah hoops, but now we need to see Peter obsess over his former life. MJ is caught up in all of this because Jean gleams his affections for her so now she's in terrible danger. Ned is a decent laugh every once in a while, but then we're reminded of his part in the script when he fangasms over "Black Widow" while she talks to Peter over video feed. I'm sorry, but no, I will never accept her as Black Widow and pulling me out of the experience of watching a movie to pass that over the audience really just shows what they're trying to concentrate on. 

So, these concentrated powers seem to come from his ineptitude to cope with the fact that MJ no longer has him in her life. Alright, well, this is probably not helped when MJ remembers Peter and still rebukes him. All of his fawning over her is not paid off, and we're left with the consolation prize of him reuniting with Ned instead. The powers? Oh, they just work themselves out. All of the biologically created webbing, new strength and stronger senses, he just learns to deal with it while fighting ninjas. The Hand's inclusion in this was... Yeah, it was dumb. The powers worked themselves out, giving hard questions as to whether it really needed so much screen time at all. 

Oh, yeah! The Punisher! The Hulk! Who else can we cram into this movie? While the Frank's scenes were good because his chemistry with Spider-man is fun to watch, the Hulk was a severely mixed bag. Jean puts far more people in terrible danger as she takes over the Hulk's mind. His mind is supposed to be excruciatingly difficult to control, both for Banner's brilliance and the Hulk's raw, terrible anger making anyone attempting control recoil in terror. Here, though, total control. He even comes very close killing both Frank Castle and Peter in a rage. Then he gets back to normal and is carted away, once again, out of the movie for good.

This story is exhausting and terribly written. There is no pacing and it feels like there is no story in the first place. It takes forever for us to get into Jean's story and once we're in it, we want out! Her morals are so twisted and the fact that she got away scott free just makes this movie feel unfinished. The climax is marred with overdramatized near-death scenes. Tom Holland is good as Spidey, as usual, but it's just another film that loves to stomp on his face throughout the runtime. It really feels like this life didn't get a whole lot better by the end of it. Watching him fail upward gets old after a while, and it'd be nice if he got a few actual wins every so often. Bring in Mary Jane or Black Cat, give him someone to be happy with that isn't dragged from his past life. Sure, the movie was successful in the box office, but it's pretty obvious that this was a film that was meant to be forgotten. It's in that stale area where it's not quite as bad as Far From Home, but still wagging on the tale-end of the tier list. It'll rest with the mediocre likes of Across the Spider-verse and Amazing Spider-man. Virtua Web Dud.

Batman or Spider-man?: Heroes at their Worst (Pt. 4)

 Well, since we judged our favorite superhero movies at their best, it's only fair that we go for their worst. While these movies had some fandom and others would argue that others are worse than these, this is going by a stark popular opinion and these are the two that gave me the worst time in the theaters. Though, there are some close competitors for the worst movies of our duo, we'll just go with these for now and call it good. By all means, if you have a better comparison, leave it in the comments. Also Activate Spider Bat Spoiler Warnings! BATSPIDER SPOILERS!

The Amazing Spider-man 2

It was an enormous task to decide which of these to put in this spot. Between this and Spider-man 3, it really came to petty devices to choose. Needless to say, this one wasted the most time for the audience. Not only does half of the movie's plots go nowhere, but it also gave us one of the worst performances by Jamie Foxx, a very talented actor. There is just so much to go over for this movie, so let's get this over with.

The problems just start immediately as you are watching. The pointless plotline of his father and mother's fate and what they were doing went absolutely nowhere. We see him look into his father's research, his notes, his briefcase with the technology and then it all goes off a cliff. There was so much precious screentime devoted to this horrible waste of human breath and it was interesting to see where it could have gone. Then it was just a conversation between ghost dad and Peter at the end that was cut from the movie. You know what?? Nevermind!

Then you have that age old problem with the villains, which is a TRAVESTY in this film. Both villains are boring and both villains only serve to piss off the audience by wasting more time. We may as well start with Foxx, since we've already mentioned him. He's the lesser of the two evils, but he is still quite evil. Electro comes to life, then hates Spider-man because he takes away his audience for 2 seconds. He loves him, then immediately hates him because the cameras go on him. Great writing, guys, way to put in that second grader logic. The rest of his story is no better, and the effects they used for his face were positively abysmal! The final fight scene was so poorly done that it's really hard to remember anything other than when he beat him in the tone of "Itsy Bitsy Spider". His obsessive Spider-man delusions at the beginning were hard enough to sit through, and they just hand us nothing better throughout the film's runtime.

The Green Goblin was even more horribly handled, as hard as that seems to believe if you haven't seen for yourself. The guy they got to play Harry Osborn was absolutely horrific in his role throughout the entire film. He cannot act to save his life, though that also may just be the directing. Either way, his performance was boring, monotone and absolute cringeworthy material by the time he got on the speeder thingy. His costume as the Green Goblin would have probably made it to more memes if he didn't look so utterly special. The way he came to the realization of Spider-man being Peter just made hands meet foreheads across the globe with how terribly it was executed. 

Then, of course, there's Gwen Stacy. Obviously, they handled their relationship fairly well. The breakup was unneeded drama, especially when it doesn't end up mattering in the end. Her obvious exit from the franchise was forecasted to an extent, but given their choice of Green Goblin, it just didn't work. Would we have liked her not to die? Yes, but if she had to, they could have at least gotten someone better for the villain role to do it. His reaction to her death was understandable, giving up the mask for a time. They handled his depression well and Garfield put on a great performance with her death scene. 

Beyond that, the Rhino with Paul Giamatti was a stupid way to handle his role. If they were going to waste all of their time with him as a human, they should have swapped and just given all of the time with him as the Rhino. There are just so many plotlines that go nowhere, like Spider-man's blood maybe having the cure for Osborne's disease or the Sinister Six garbage they set up but alas, there was no sequel. It really just all amounted to the audience getting nothing they wanted. 

It's also quite strange to note that they were planning to set up the Sinister Six, and yet they killed Electro in the end. He has been a key member in several iterations of the team and yet they kill him off before this series even gets a Sandman. The lizard was a good start, and Green Goblin plus Electro could have possibly gotten a good squad together, but they seemed to readily poke holes in their own plans. Just think of how they set up the Rhino. It's hard to believe anyone would get excited for such a team up, even with Giamatti returning to the role, which would be doubtful even if the series continued.

There were some good scenes in the movie. Some of the smaller scenes of Spider-man doing his thing were quite entertaining or when he was inventing new webshooters. The scenes between Peter and Gwen were very well handled when they were an actual couple. The fight and Gwen leaving to go overseas for college were just all filler upon filler to add more and more storylines that bog this movie down. Given what actually happens to Gwen, they spend entirely too much time with them fighting and worrying about each other and not enough time doing what was their strong suit: Being a couple. The two actors were dating at the time, so they knew how to bounce off of one another very readily. They even improvised lines very effectively. 

The fact that some snearing, ugly jerk comes and kills her is probably one of the worst things about this film. The problem was that their version of the Green Goblin was gangreneous and every moment he was on screen was absolute torture. How he took one single look at Gwen and figured out that Spider-man was Peter will go under file as one of the worst most contrived plotpoints since Spider-man 3's Harry Osborne had the butler revelation of who actually killed his father. Such lazy storytelling takes the audience out of the experience and this is no different. 

There came a time when the story just didn't know when it needed to ease off the throttle. When Green Goblin is starting to execute his plan, Electro is fighting Spider-man and Gwen is struggling to get the controls of a power plant, they decide to sprinkle a small plan crash plot like a garnish that ruins the food's texture. Why was this in the film? No, seriously, they had everything else going on, why did they need to add to the duration of an already over-stuffed movie? There is a rule: Every scene should do one, if not multiple things in a natural flow. This entire thing with the plane being unable to land does literally nothing.

Even the good things are bad in this movie. It is a slog to get through with all of the weight it is carrying with wasted time and plot devices. The performances are laughable and unable to carry this film, it just had too much footage cut from it when they thought they should keep in all of the content and maybe finish it later? Their decision didn't make any sense and we never got a third movie because Sony would have liked Andrew Garfield to attend big parties or something like that, it's all just a mess. Given how the first Amazing Spider-man started out, it would have been nice to see it go in a better direction. Is it worse than... another superhero dud, though?

Batman and Robin

There comes a time when studios and directors need to ask themselves how serious they are going to take a project. Sadly, Joel Schumacher has passed on since the making of this film and Planet Virtua bears him no ill will. We understand he was actually quite a lovely human being and he did direct Phone Booth, which was a very good movie. Batman and Robin, however, was not taken seriously in the slightest. Even with the dark versions of Batman being popular and the more serious elements of even the third movie, Schumacher was told to make it safe for kids. He took that to mean it should be a cartoon. He has since apologized through an audio commentary.

If you don't take this movie seriously, it can be fun to watch. Putting it next to Batman and Batman Returns, however, is another story. Hell, putting this up against Batman the Animated Series, which WAS a cartoon, still paints this in such a silly and clownish light. How they changed Bane from an actually intelligent criminal with venom powers just killed his character. Now he's just a Frankenstein's monster knockoff who has caveman talk. Everything is dumbed down like that. Even Uma Thurman didn't take this seriously and just had a lot of fun pumped into her performance. 

George Clooney, however, seemed to be rather miserable throughout the entire shoot. It seemed like he was wanting a more serious version of Batman, not this one where he ice skates and plays hockey with a bunch of thugs like Adam West Batman days. That's how the entire duration continues to play. Even when this movie is trying to be serious, it just gets serious enough to get to the next joke of a movie scene. Both Clooney and Arnold would go on to say that the movie did not help their careers in the slightest and many criticized them for making Batman into a parody. They have apologized, but they have also garnered a bit of an ironic cult following at the same time.

That leads us to Arnold as Mr. Freeze. If there was ever a more memed villain, it's hard to think of one. His ice puns are infamous from this role, and he just clowned it up for the fun of it. He had no problem putting on the polar bear house slippers and having a good dance to the Snow Miser song. His costume did look very impressive and apparently cost millions of dollars to both operate and keep Arnold in. Every single second he was on screen, they were burning through cash for this film, as it turned out to be one of the most expensive movies of the time. 

Nothing in this movie really makes a whole lot of sense at all. We don't see how Mr. Freeze's wife can breathe in her fish tank, we don't know how diamonds can power and charge machines meant to freeze things with ice lasers, and the forces that they are playing with in this movie could possibly destroy the Earth's atmosphere with ice lasers and sun heat beams from space. They just tossed logic out the window and said nonsense mumbo jumbo to make it sound good. They even made up a fictional sickness for both Mr. Freeze's wife and Alfred Pennyworth to be sick with just to tie their two plots together. 

Every side plot in this movie basically all boils down to "Team Work" and goes about it with a scattered sensibility. Robin keeps getting snubbed during missions because Batman does not trust that he is able to handle the danger. Thankfully, he doesn't milk the fact that he is an orphan and sad about his parents, in fact, he simply mentions that while he was with the Flying Graysons, it only worked because they were a team. While the theme is readily available without thought, the line does show character depth. Then there is them accepting that maybe Alfred's niece is skilled enough to take down criminals in a bat costume. This was a great idea with very poor execution. Making them into the Bat Family was a great idea, but it needed time to breathe, rather than be shoehorned in at the third act. Not to mention, let me accentuate my point when I say that Alicia Silverstone cannot seem to get out of her school girl persona until she gets into her Batgirl outfit and suddenly she is a blank plank of wood. Alicia is trying to be a badass when she's in the costume, but it makes her sound like she's about to fall asleep. They take the theme of "Team Work" entirely too seriously and run with it a few bridges too far. It's also prudent to note that Poison Ivy betrays Mr. Freeze because she is jealous of his wife. Bad guys have no "Team Work" and yadda yadda. 

There's another character that got very poor treatment, Batgirl. Oh yes, and Alicia Silverstone is absolutely horrible in the role. She has the look but she does not have the acting skills. She and Robin have a very terribly written dialogue of some sort of chemistry. It wasn't the good kind of chemistry but something was at least there. If the script were any better, it may have been passed off as a wacky comedy Batman, but as it stands, it will never be extended upon.

The relationship between Robin and Batgirl could have gone somewhere, but all it really did was pad out the runtime and give the late, great Coolio a brief cameo. Neither Silverstone nor Chris O'Donnell had the chemistry nor the script to pull this off effectively, so their flirting near the end was stilted and cringeworthy. In fact, even the scientists' acting was extremely amateur. When these elements are put together with a stupid giant laser plot, it really just falls off the rails. Yes, it was always a good plot for an Adam West Batman movie. With exploding sharks and other wondrous gimmicks like running around with a giant cartoon bomb, you can see where Schumacher got his inspiration.

The movie made money, but the reviews for it were so bad that Warner Brothers decided to pull the plug on the entire series. Many will argue that the Burton universe and the Schumacher universe were two separate things and you'll get no argument here. What it brought were the Nolan films and those were far better received, even though the third movie was... well that's a review for another time.

Which of these movies is worse? That's an excellent question. Should I give a point to the winner of the worst movie or the one that's not as bad? That's another very good question. So, we'll keep this rolling by going for a tie, giving them both a point, because no one truly wins in a conest of absolute horrific quality. Both of them have terrible movies, not to mention TV shows, but that's, once again, another article for another day. Rest in Peace, Joel Schumacher, Virtua Rest.

The Incredible Hulk - An Underrated SMASHING Gem

If there were ever a time that opinions clashed, it would be my personal review of The Incredible Hulk against seemingly everyone else. This movie had an all-star cast, the late great William Hurt, Liv Tyler, Edward Norton and Tim Roth from one of the greatest movies, Pulp Fiction. The Incredible Hulk was coming off the tail-end of the horrific realm of Hulk, an Ang Lee film starring Eric Bana and Nick Nolte. The film was a slog to get through, and it was wonderful to see that this film was not going to waste its time with an origin story that most of the public already knows. So, we get a Reader's Digest version in the opening credits and then find our hero hiding in Brazil. This was easy to match as a spiritual sequel to the Ang Lee film, and seeing the handling of the story, it was easy to see that this was going to be a much better experience. 

We get to see Bruce live among other people who do not understand very good English, so he has to learn Portuguese in one of the most dangerous parts of the world. The story gives us enough to see his new life and how he's adapting, also how he is going out of his way to hide his whereabouts. This goes awry, obviously, as General Ross locks onto his location and sends an entire special ops team to extract him. 

Within the first thirty minutes of the movie, we get a very nice tease of the Hulk as he succumbs to bullying from co-workers. This scene is chilling, and shows his power in stark detail as he throws giant machinery around. The Hulk scenes in this movie are awesome, I do not care what any detractor says. Seeing Bruce's eyes turn green is a rush, especially when he starts ripping apart military vehicles as they unload high caliber weapons at him. Then, of course, there was the final battle of The Hulk vs Abomination. 

Tim Roth plays a special ops soldier who survived his first encounter with the Hulk himself. Obviously, not all of them did. He becomes obsessed with finding the power that Bruce Banner possesses and Ross decides to give it to him. He starts becoming amazing as a fighter, but you also see his whithering form because of the toxic chemicals they put into him. He finds the other man who has the formula for becoming the Hulk, Dr. Samuel Sterns. Throughout the movie, we see him communicate with Banner in order to find a cure for turning into the Hulk. It goes about as well as any other time they try to find a way out of transforming into a giant beast. 

The actor they got for Sterns, Tim Blake Nelson, was an amazing choice for him. He was charmingly ignorant, optimistic and aspired to greater futures. This was a precursor to what would become The Leader, as Sterns gets some of the irradiated blood in a wound on his head. We immediately see his head expand, foreshadowing to his transformation down the line. Spoiler Alert: It didn't end up well, I'm sad to report.

Liv Tyler plays Betty Ross, General Thadeus Ross's daughter, and she does a very good job. She is a real character who tries so hard to help Banner throughout the entire movie. Their relationship is well handled, even if it's never followed up on after this movie in any meaningful way. Edward Norton and Liv Tyler have very good chemistry together in this film. They play off of one another very well and their scenes are very good to watch, even if they're passing exposition. 

The final fight is awesome, even better than the one in Iron Man. Hulk and Abomination bash the lights out of one another and it escalates into real strength-inducing rage! Whoever handled the CGI for the Hulk design and Abomination design had some serious talent behind them. Every time we see Norton turn into the Hulk, they blend the actor into the big green man very well without being overbearing. 

This film gets a bad reputation for various reasons, but it does what it set out to do. It brought the Hulk to cinemas with a good, coherent story. They even add the bit with Tony Stark and Ross at the end to give us a silently brilliant scene, hooking the Hulk in for the Avengers. That was all we had linking this to the MCU. They did not over crowd this movie with a bunch of Marvel tie-ins, they let it be its own movie with its own stakes. There's a lot to love about this film and it's actually a shame we didn't keep Edward Norton as Bruce Banner. Mark Ruffalo was alright at first but his awkward Banner acting became a little old and stale. The Professor Hulk persona didn't help but that's another review for another time. There's a lot to go through so let's wait and Virtua SMASH!!!!

Iron Man (2008) - Where Chaos Took Form

Iron Man is where everything rested, as far as Marvel was concerned. This was their final shot in creating their own film studio and it was set in motion because comic books were dying. Marvel has had some great highs along with some historic lows, and Iron Man was what pulled it out of the pits of near bankrupcy. It did that, and it revitalized Robert Downey Jr's career after a long battle with addiction and unreliability in the eyes of Hollywood. This is the first movie that officially brought about what was coined the Marvel Cinematic Universe and pulled victory from the jaws of defeat. It not only brought Marvel back into full mainstream attention, but it also brought the comic books from the brink of destruction. 

This is rather strange, because Iron Man is not what one would call a masterpiece, but it does what it set out to do. Even Stan Lee agrees that Downey Jr is definitively Tony Stark and he has remained as such throughout the MCU's run. Another great thing that helps this movie is the legendary Jeff Bridges, who plays the main antagonist Obediah Stane. While he doesn't make a very good giant robot boss, he does make a very devious, slick talking snake. No matter what the deal, he always has a way out and takes whatever advantage he can when the time comes. 

The greatest victory this movie performs is Tony's backstory of being captured by Middle Eastern Radicalists who try to use him to create a massively devastating weapon system. Instead of building the missile attack device, he is assisted by his scientific friend in creating Iron Man's prototyical suit. Tony's escape is easily one of the best scenes of this entire film and is both heartfelt and action packed. It's even got a little dark humor when one of the terrorists tries to sneak up on him and shoot him in the helmet. 

While Gwyneth Paltrow is a bit of a controversial subject all her own, she does well in this movie as Tony's love interest. Both her and John Favreau play their roles very well, as well as Favreau directing the film itself. The performances are stellar, and that elevated this movie to its highly favorable position. The only problem was the ending when Iron Man faces off against War Monger, Stane's iron suit. The banter is humorous and the fight is unique when the thought is put behind the icing problem at high elevations. Beyond that, though, they made Iron Man have a handicap because he's using an outdated energy core for the device in his chest, keeping him alive. 

The movie is just flat out entertaining and gives you some great characters through amazing acting talent. The story has a great pace and the fact that they focused on making it a great movie rather than the start of a cinematic universe, only shows their dedication to success rather than weighing it down with hints of Hulk, Thor and Black Widow. They allowed movies to be movies and that really let people ease into the idea of a feature connected to another feature to make a series. This was normally done with one character in mind, not an entire barrage of main characters who were destined to form a team. There were so many factors that made this movie and series a success and it all began with this fantastic film that had minor issues but major impact. Virtua-Venger  

Batman Forever - Because Why Not?

So, since we've got the first two movies in the bag, let's keep this rolling into the Schumacher era. Batman Returns turned out to be so dark that the toy deal they had with McDonalds was cancelled and taken out of Happy Meals. Apparently a grim penguin man biting someone's nose into drawing blood and planning to kill children didn't go over well with parents. Tim Burton was immediately off the next movie and the studio decided that Joel Schumacher was a much safer bet. He set out to create a new Batman with the essence of Adam West in mind. Gotham was now colorful, brightly lit and more like a city of neon and jazz. 

Right from the start, we get a bank heist with Tommy Lee Jones acting as Two Face like he's both the Joker and a Dick Tracy villain. The dialogue took a massive hit. The civilians in this movie act so over the top and the action is so sporadically huge. Everything that was subtle and dark in the first movie are now brightly lit and Val Kilmer puts on a much more light-hearted Batman. Given better circumstances, Kilmer could have been a great lead. He even did well as Bruce Wayne. The problem was the script. He has an overly provocative therapist horning after him like she thought she was hired for an adult film and, at the same time, has two variations of the Joker as villains. 

Jim Carrey was a homerun when it came to casting. He took The Riddler to heart and he went big with it. The riddles are still lame, though, and everything doesn't seem to want to make sense throughout the runtime. Half of the stuff that happens, like how he edited a video to make it look like his boss committed suicide, or how there was already a Riddler type character with a game machine and a bobblehead, none of it made any sense. Logic went very much more aligned with the Silver Age of comic books. 

There came another addition to the cast that actually made it to the fourth film, and that is Robin. Chris O'Donnell's induction into the film was a bit sketchy. He was supposed to be Dick Grayson, who was far younger when he became Batman's sidekick. It is understandable that he would want to go after Two Face for killing his family, but the way he just shoved himself into the lore was jarring. Stealing the Batmobile, saving Batman from dying while wearing his acrobat outfit, and then the full suit he was given seemingly out of nowhere, Robin just didn't feel like a natural part of the story for several reasons, and it really doesn't get any better in the next movie.

One great thing that followed the films in all four of them was Pat Hingle and Michael Gogh and they were an anchor when we needed them. Commissioner Gordan and Alfred Pennyworth are two characters that they took by storm and God rest them both. Even when things got nonsensical, these two stayed themselves and rocked their roles like they always did. Beyond these two characters, the movie series is literally unrecognizable from this point on.

How they gave Two Face two of so many things was meant to be comical. It makes no sense for real life, but sure, go ahead and have Drew Barrymore as one of two of his wives and make everything dual colors. The Riddler's lair is not any better as the question marks are everywhere to an impractical degree. The movie is entertaining in its strange decore, and it could have been good as a stand-alone universe movie, but it branded itself as the third entry in a series that it bears no resemblance to. 

When you turn your brain off and activate your Batman fandom, you can enjoy this film as a silly Batman flick. Schumacher took what all of them said to heart and made it as safe and marketable as they possibly could. It worked. The toy sales were through the roof, the ticket sales were nice and plentiful, but the problem was that they changed everything. Parents came with the children they were with and they asked, along with the critics, what happened? This would be a massive precursor for what would come next, though. Schumacher seemingly won this round, but that inevitably led to him getting another film where he was given the keys to the kingdom. He took that control to the next level and I suppose that's the inescapable next review. I would like to escape, though. Robin, get the bat grapple! 

Batman or Spider-man? - Saturday Morning Beatings! (Pt. 3)

Very few characters have ever had so many iterations of animated TV shows. Both of them had their own live action and animated series back from Batman's start in the 1930 serials to super hip 60's and 70's shows for both of them with horrific special effects. To Batman's credit, his flew on for entire seasons while Spider-man's poorly received series not even going past 13 episodes. Adam West's TV series went on to be respected as the shark-spraying piece of cheese that it is, but it was hardly the peak of the Caped Crusader's most popular outing. Both of these superheroes have an entire plethora of TV history, but their true renaissance wouldn't come until their Saturday morning animated series in the 90's. 

Batman The Animated Series

Bruce Timm and Paul Dini are the two men credited with making this show the great entity that it was. After Tim Burton's 1989 movie took the fanbase by storm, they wanted to follow it up with a shadowy, more young adult oriented animated series that was also safe(ish) for kids. Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill brought about a Batman and Joker that would live on for generations as two of the greatest versions of each character. Each episode was so amazingly crafted with developing stories for both the Batman rogue's gallery and the batfamily, even going so far as to create its own ever-spanning characters like Harley Quinn. Joker's jester-like partner and underling came about with this series in the episode "Joker's Favor". 

Even Mr. Freeze, a character that was never taken seriously before this cartoon, was expanded in his lore and treated as one of Batman's most dangerous opponents. With a wife in a coma with which he is finding a cure, he needs to resort to crime in order to gain the funding. This version of Freeze would become the real version that everyone turned to for reference. Killer Croc, The Mad Hatter, Clay Face, Catwoman, all of them were so done with astonishing quality in both writing and character progression throughout. 

The scripts were written with intelligence and even the worst episode, "I've got Batman in my Basement!", is still good enough to hold its own against scrutiny. Villains were given understanding motivations and some of them are genuinely heartfelt in their dispositions. Sometimes, they don't want to be this way and just succumb to mental illnesses. Most of them are just greedy, though, and with Batman's no-kill rule, it's not as if he's over punishing them. H.A.R.D.A.C. Batman was just confused as to who was the real Batman and actually thought he was the Dark Knight himself. He was a robot clone that was just trying to be Batman. These stories really can go to some dark places and make you think.

The animation and artwork became iconic for Bruce Timm's style and all the way to the Superman crossover and art change, they were very aesthetically pleasing. Once the art change happened, though, Joker, Scarecrow, Bane, Mad Hatter and some others took a bit of a nosedive in character design. It wasn't a dealbreaker and it didn't outright destroy the show, but it didn't do it any favors. The last season is seen as a bit of a weak point but the show was still great. Even when it added the Robins and Batwoman, this series never faltered in its quality. The series in its entirety is still seen as a milestone for the character and comic series of Batman.

Spider-man The Animate Series

Once Spider-man threw his hat into the ring, it took a lot of fans by surprise. You would think it would just copy off of Batman's homework, but it took the series in a whole other direction. The idea for a series was, in fact, directly connected to Batman's, but beyond that, it exists in its own style of art and storytelling. It is far more into progressive storytelling, where the Dark Knight was more episodic. This was a good and bad thing for both series for two different reasons. Sometimes, Spider-man just carried on its stories for a little too long. Sometimes, though, Spider-man pulled off a real banger of a season. 

The early episodes are far superior to the later, though. By season 3, the stories began running on for far too long and this came to a head in season 4 where it ends on a cliffhanger that would never be resolved. It went from episodic and 2 to 3 parters to just going on and on and on with the same story that just ends up getting old. To try and spice it up, they even bring in the X-men 92 characters, but it didn't have exactly the hyped effect that they were hoping for. 

When Spider-man started with fighting Vulture, Scorpion, Rhino and Doc Ock, many agree that the series was at its peak. When Venom and Kingpin had plots, they tended to last longer but kept up the quality writing. There were some fantastic stories being told with pacing that was willing to take its time and build up to the bigger battles. This was when the series was hitting them out of the park! Peter Parker struggled with his home life and his hero life while trying to get with Mary Jane and this had its ups and downs while only really getting annoying by the last season. Then there was the more complicated relationship Spidey had with Black Cat. With villains like the Green Goblin or Lizard being people he looked up to professionally, it held real weight because these were characters we've been introduced to before they went to the baddies. 

There were limitations, though. This was a time when bullet guns were seen as bad, so they switched to lasers. They also wanted to keep a hard Y7 rating for the younger audiences and Fox was on a no violence kick, so there could be no on-screen punches. So, you get more jump cuts away from hits and a whole lot of web shooting to debilitate villains. Spider-man had to use his brain and out smart a lot of his opponents and a lot of kids never even noticed the nonviolence. It didn't really suffer as a result. It was more the graphical aspect and the framerates that hurt the series. Sometimes the slow-motion would just make the screen bug out and the animation would get jumpy and it was weird, even for the younger audience. 

The voice work and the overall execution of the series had its very high points, but also had a few flops. A lot of people will point to the Black Spider-man calling after Shocker, and yeah that's when it was most noticeable. While Kingpin's voice became iconic for the character, there's more stock villain voices for a lot of the rogues. After a while, they started making up villains and pulling some of the more not great versions of well known characters. Blade was done pretty well, but Morbius wasn't. Instead of being a blood-sucking vampire, he absorbed plasma through weird growths on his palms. If they weren't going to go full on with him, then they shouldn't have brought him up in the first place. The did the same with Punisher. Obviously, he wasn't going to go on his normal blood baths like in the more adult themed comics, but the laser blasters just took something away from the more tough-guy persona. 

So, obviously, Batman wins this one by a longshot. Spider-man was not a bad series, it just didn't age as well and took a much deeper dive in the later seasons. It had its place in the vast amount of superhero cartoons, but Batman was seen as the prime example to follow. Many could make the case that Spectacular Spider-man was a better choice to face this challenge, but it was made in a different era, whether it was better than the 1994 series or not. The two of them did well in their own right, but this is definitely 5 points to the Caped Crusader himself! Give them a try and next time we'll examine some of the lesser animated series tries. So, be warned that we may be viewing Beware the Batman. That's right, a warning. You're Bat Warned.