Green Lantern: Best or Worst Superhero Movie? (Answer: Worst)

Holy shit, even the poster is 100% CGI.

In a time when superhero movies are all the rage, and they gets lavished with great casts, shitloads of money, and decent writing, you would think that Hollywood would have this down to a formula. But, nope, they don’t. That much is evident with Green Lantern. This movie is a colossal piece of shit starring Ryan Reynolds as Hal Jordan, a dopey guy who gets omnipotent green mist powers…or something. Green Lantern falters every step of the way.

Reynolds’ character is paper-thin. Reynolds pretty much plays himself, as he does in every role, a handsome, wise-cracking, irresponsible, self-centered jerk with a heart of gold. His act has grown tiresome, and watching him cavort around on screen yet again is exhausting. His girlfriend, Blake Lively, is nothing more than a generically pretty, but vapid, and incredibly unbelievable higher-up in a multi-national aircraft corporation. While Reynolds at least has his typical manic energy, Lively sleepwalks through the movie. Every time she showed up, I felt myself drifting off.

Gatchaman Crowds is Horrible

If only the series was as cool as this artwork.

“Gatcha, Gatcha-Gatcha, Gatcha,” sang main character Hajime.

“Strangle, Strangle-Strangle, Strangle,” sang BrikHaus as he strangled the life out of Hajime.

Seriously, Hajime is one of the most annoying anime characters in recent memory. She is a super-positive, Mary-Sue type who has earned the dual ire and love of anime fans who have watched this series. She is one of those characters who shouts all their lines, says incredible positive things all the time, and is unrealistically naieve. It’s impossible to think that anyone could be as dense as her in real life. So, when this is a show’s main character, things aren’t off to a great start.

Things don’t get much better with the rest of the characters. Three characters shout/scream all of their lines. Two characters are incredibly pseudo-gay, they are insulting stereotypes. Of course, there is the token quiet/shy loli character. None of the characters have any depth at all. They are all completely one-note. They have virtually no backstories, no personalities, and nothing to make them interesting at all.

The Expendables 2, Get Carter (1971)

The Expendables 2

We wait decades to see these guys in a movie together, and this is the best they could do?

Sylvester Stallone’s original Expendables film was a complete misfire. Meant to be an homage to 80s action films, it was a pathetic attempt at recapturing the glory days of a bygone era. I couldn’t believe it when I heard there was going to be a sequel. Wasn’t one film enough? Apparently not, because Hollywood doesn’t have any original ideas anyway, so why not make a sequel to a one-off homage film?

The second movie adds a bunch of new characters, none of whom do anything important. The only new actor worth mentioning is Chuck Norris. He shows up, mid-film, like an indestructible god of war who obliterates everything in his path. He even has time to throw in one of those Chuch Norris Internet meme jokes. The most bizarre part wasn’t Norris himself, but the fact they used the theme song from The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly as his character’s musical theme. Umm, last time I checked Norris was never in that film. They probably wrote the part for Clint Eastwood, but Eastwood wouldn’t agree to be in such a shitty film. Since they had already paid licensing fees to get the theme song, they said “Fuck it” and used it with Norris instead.

Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger get upgraded from cameos and partake in the action this time around. Even Jean-Claude Van Damme comes out of his cave to deliver a totally one-note villain. There isn’t anything else worth mentioning about this movie. The whole thing is about stunt casting. Stallone wants to get as many old movie “stars” as he can into these films at the expense of a decent story. It’s really quite a shame.

Verdict: Shitty

Get Carter (1971)

An average day in England.

Get Carter is a weird movie. Really weird. I guess since it took place in the early 1970s, everyone involved was as high as fuck while making this movie. The movie begins with a bunch of dudes hanging out, watching a porn slide show. Next, Michael Caine, who plays the titular Carter, learns his brother has died and goes back home for the funeral. He finds his dead brother stuffed into the smallest coffin imaginable, in a bedroom of his house. Um, lolwut? Is that what they do in England, keep dead bodies in the house until the funeral?

Later, Caine spends some time with the corpse, shaving and chatting on the phone. Caine doesn’t believe his brother died in a drunk-driving accident, he suspects foul play, so he begins to investigate. His investigation leads him to chase down bad guys in the cleanest, most-brightly lit nightclub on Earth where he interrogates a dude hiding on a toilet. Caine eventually sleeps with a nasty old bed-and-breakfast owner to prevent her from calling the cops on him for his violent ways. Caine gets into some more trouble, drives around town in a sports car, sleeps with some more women, and ruthlessly murders some other people. Caine plays a complete sociopath, displaying virtually no emotion whatsoever as he leaves mayhem in his wake. The only hint of emotion he shows is satisfaction after clubbing someone to death with the stock of a shotgun.

To say this movie is weird is an understatement. The characters exist in a bizarre waking-dream world that looks like England, but doesn’t actually take place anywhere on planet Earth. It’s also incredibly slow with all the interesting bits comprising about 15 minutes of the 2 hour runtime. It isn’t as boring as The Italian Job but only because it’s so goddamn strange, you somehow can’t stop watching it. Weirder still is the total lack of music except in the beginning and ending of the film. Whatever these guys were smoking when they made this film, it must have been some powerful shit.

Verdict: Bad

Pacific Rimjob

Let’s put on our serious faces.

Pacific Rimjob is a 2013 movie directed by Guillermo “I’ve only ever directed one good movie”* del Toro. And guess what? That one good movie is not this one. This is absolutely one of the worst summer tentpole movies I have ever seen. It’s kind of like an old man who has lost control of his anal sphincter. He tries to hold it in as long as possible, but no longer how long he holds out, he’s going to end up covered in shit.

It’s the near future, and giant monsters from another dimension (dubbed Kaiju) are attacking Earth. Humanity quickly develops giant robots that are used to fight the Kaiju, thus ensuring the safety of our planet. This is essentially the setup to every giant robot anime ever created. But unlike those anime, Pacific Rimjob stopped trying right after it came up with a premise.

Del Toro and writer Travis Beacham were so pumped that they were getting to make a live-action giant robot anime, they forgot to write an actual story for their movie. Virtually nothing happens beyond a skeleton of a plot that lumbers along from one CGI action sequence to the next. The CGI is quite good, in fact, I found myself thinking it looked pretty good, but good CGI is no substitute for plot. Without a compelling story or interesting characters (this film has neither), all the CGI in the world can’t help.