Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice

Just when it seems like superhero movies can’t get any worse, the studios manage to shit out a fouler turd than ever before. Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice (you can’t believe how much I hate typing that long-winded, dumbass title) is definitely in the top 3 worst big-budget superhero movies I’ve ever seen. Fantastic Four and Green Lantern are the only ones that somehow managed to be worse, but only by a slim margin, because BVS is really fucking terrible.

The movie begins with yet another recap of Batman’s origins. Seriously, every goddamn person on the planet knows Batman’s origins, we don’t need to see it rehashed again, especially since we had an entire movie, Batman Begins, dedicated to his origins, and it isn’t even that old. Except this time, it’s overwrought, and inter-spliced with Bruce Wayne’s flashbacks/nightmares. For some reason, Bruce Wayne has zombie/desert nightmares which make no sense and add nothing of value to the movie. This comes along with Lois Lane’s incomprehensible-to-the-plot voyage into the Middle East to do a journalistic expose on . . . something. What the fuck was the point of these scenes?

Fuck your cinematic universe

This is a movie I never want to see.

OK, we need to have a talk. A serious talk. Why don’t you sit down over there?

*takes deep breath*

I heard you were doing something you shouldn’t be.

*holds out hand to stop a response*

I know, I know, you were probably just experimenting. And that’s OK. When I was your age, I experimented with stuff, too. You’re young, and you want to explore the world. Maybe you want to experiment with the same sex, or drugs, or a different religion. You know what? That’s OK. That’s how you discover yourself and become the person you are going to be as an adult.

*crosses arms over chest*

But there is one thing you should never experiment with. Something that, if you get involved with, can lead you down a very dark path. You might never come back from it.

*narrows eyes*

I heard from a friend of yours, that you…

*sighs*

…were thinking of starting your own cinematic universe.

Man of Steel Left Skidmarks All Over the Planet

Why does the Man of Steel wear so much Spandex, anyway?

BrikHaus

Man of Steel is the 2013 GRRR DARK AND GRITTY GRRR reboot of the Superman franchise. And like its predecessors, it manages to soar to unseen heights of mediocrity. There are so many problems with this movie, when I think about them, my head spins. Instead of writing a coherent review with thematic flow, I’m just going to take a shit all over this post, kind of like the movie did to the audience.

First, we get a half-hour long battle with Russell Crowe fighting CGI bad guys while riding flying dragons from Avatar. I can’t recall Jor-El being featured so heavily in any other Superman film. But, fuck it, they managed to get the Gladiator himself, so they better just fucking use him, yeah? After what seems like an eternity of space battles, the movie finally gets to the goddamn point. Jor-El eats it, Superman gets sent into space, and Krypton blows up. Couldn’t they have done all that in, like, 10 minutes? Did it have to be a 30 minute extravaganza? I honestly thought I was watching the climax of the movie. And it’s all downhill from there.

“My name is Maximus Decimus Meridius, commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions and loyal servant to the true emperor, Marcus Aurelius. Father to a murdered son, husband to a murdered wife. And I will have my vengeance, in this life or the next.”

Later, we get an interchange of present day and flashbacks. Henry Cavill plays Clark Kent/Superman. He is lost in the world, travelling from place to place, helping people, staying off the ra– HOLY SHIT CHECK OUT THAT DUDE’S ABS! HE IS TOTALLY FUCKING RIPPED! I’M NOT EVEN GAY AND I HAVE A MAJOR BONER FOR THIS GUY RIGHT NOW! I THINK ALL THE WOMEN IN THE THEATER JUST SQUIRTED IN THEIR PANTIES! Eventually, Clark gets a job in Canada or someplace, and finds an ancient Kryptonian spaceship.

Superman I & II

Superman: The Movie

“Here I come to save the daaayyyy!”

Superman: I’m here to fight for truth, justice, and the American way.

I realize it’s nerd blasphemy to speak ill of the original Superman movies, but I don’t really care. The fact is, despite how much we all love Superman as a character, his movies have always blown cock. The biggest problem is these come from an era before superhero films treated their source material with respect. As far as I can tell, the first superhero movies to take their characters seriously were Blade in 1998 and X-Men in 2000. Prior to that, the main goals of superhero movies were to ramp up the cheese factor and sell as many toys as possible. The problem with Superman I is it’s campy as hell, and appears to be loving every minute of it. That might work in a non-superhero B-movie, but in a movie starring one of the world’s most famous superheroes, it becomes a detriment.

So, yeah, the movie is incredibly cheesy. The dialog is horrendous, and the acting is atrocious. People deliver their lines like they are reading for a high school play. There are numerous stupid visual gags. Perhaps worst of all is that Lex Luthor, the villain, is treated more like a comic relief than a menacing threat. When your movie doesn’t even have a worthy villain, there isn’t a lot for your superhero to fight against.

Screw You, Marvel

This is exactly what Marvel is doing to their properties.

All of Marvel’s upcoming movies are going to be trash.

A decade ago, movie adaptations of comic books were a joke. With the exception of the 1989 Batman and 1978 Superman films, they were laughable at best, and huge steaming piles of shit at worst. The problem was that nobody took it seriously, not even the creators. They made them campy and hokey, and self-referentially stupid. They were the lowest common denominator of movies. They became a self-fulfilling prophecy of crappy movie-making. After all, if the filmmakers themselves treated the properties like shit, then the movies would inevitably turn out to be shit. The industry chugged along, and churned out turd after turd with the occasional, anomalous decent movie like Blade in 1998.

Fast forward to 2002, and the release of Spider-Man. Suddenly, we had a GOOD live action version of a comic book movie. How did it turn out good, you ask? Well, let me answer that for you. The simple reason was that the director, Sam Raimi, had been a longtime fan of the comic book series. He wanted to stay as true to the character as possible while adapting him for the more difficult live action film environment. Naturally, certain things needed to be changed, but they were done with as much care as possible. The characters and situations were taken seriously, and given the right amount of gravity with occasional moments of levity thrown in to keep things fun. The script was solid, the actors were well cast and talented, and everything flowed together seamlessly. It just worked. Worldwide, that movie grossed over $800 million. People were screaming about how awesome the movie was, and all of a sudden it wasn’t nerdy to like comics any more.