All Superheroes Must Die

  Four superheroes have been kidnapped, stripped of their powers, and deposited into a deserted town rigged with explosives. Can the heroes save themselves and stop the mastermind behind this plot?
  A microbudget film from writer/director Jason Trost (who also plays the lead hero Charge) All Superheroes Must Die is a superhero movie mixed with Saw.
  Like I said before, this is a very low budget film (according to Wikipedia it had a budget of twenty thousand dollars) so don't expect much when it comes to things like costumes, sets, or special effects. The costumes look a little Halloweeny at times, but much like the film itself, get the job done in a bare bones sort of way.
  I enjoyed Trost's performance as Charge, James Remar's hammy performance as Rickshaw, and Sean Whalen as the henchman Manpower but acting wise these are the only notable performances, as the rest are mediocre (Lucas Till as Cutthroat) to bad (Sophie Merkley as Shadow.)
  Now to the special effects, there are none. The plot conveniently strips the heroes of their powers, so we never get to see anything other then some basic action movie stuff i.e. guns, exposions and, at one point, a flame thrower.
  The working title for this film was Vs, which I would take any day over the cheesey title All Superheroes Must Die, but I guess whoever released this thought All Superheroes Must Die would be more memorable.
  While I did enjoy this movie, I can say I'll always wonder what the film would look like if the production had had more money to work with. I think the idea of putting superheroes up against Jigsaw (or in this case, Rickshaw) is an interesting idea, one that deserves a better movie then this turned out to be.
  This is one of those movies I was following well before its release, I favorited the trailer on YouTube and watched it a bunch of times. In many ways, I enjoyed the trailer more then the final film, though I still think you'll enjoy your time with this if you're an open minded superhero fan who doesn't mind a tiny budget. Recommended. Barely.

Sparks

  Disgraced superhero Ian Sparks must reclaim his reputation after blacking out during a confrontation with a serial killer. Hitting rock bottom, and losing the love of his life, Sparks must confront a plot involving his origins and the villain who humiliated him.
  The superhero movie as a genre is a train that keeps on chugging along, with people in increasing number flocking to see the latest Marvel Studios film or whatever halfhearted effort DC and Warner Brothers have dumped into theaters. For a genre that was considered a joke 20 years ago, the tables sure have turned for costumed heroes, and I, for one, couldn't be happier about it.
  Sparks is not your standard superhero movie, it tells a story of redemption and love through a noir lens. This movie is also not afraid to look a little silly at times, something the big Hollywood movies tend to stay away from as much as possible. The costumes worn by Sparks and his love Lady Heavenly are unmistakably the kind seen in comic books, which is something I found refreshing.
  While the cast isn't quite all star, it does include a number of notable names, including veteran character actors like Clancy Brown and Clint Howard. William Katt, who also produced the film, shows up to play a part.
  This film is far from perfect, at times it looks a little cheap, including a somewhat unconvincing cgi scene of a car crashing into a train. There are moments where some of the acting feels a tiny bit rough, and some of the dialogue feels slightly hammy, but this is a superhero noir film, so I guess that is something that is unavoidable. With all of that said, I enjoyed my time with Sparks, the movie has heart, and it tells a different kind of story then the ones you'll see at your local multiplex. I enjoyed it enough that it made me want to read the graphic novel that the film is based upon, and in terms of recommendation, isn't that praise enough?  

Good Dick

  A woman who is living as a shut-in enters into an unlikely romance with a video store clerk who tries to draw her out of her shell.
  Marianna Palka, who wrote, directed and stars in the movie, sells her character's dysfunction well, the viewer gets to feel that this is a woman with deep seated issues, which makes the film all the more compelling as we begin to root for the clerk who is trying his best to win her heart. Jason Ritter plays the part of the clerk, an affable every-man who begins on something of a creepy note, as we see him stalking the reclusive woman. It's not a huge issue for the movie, but I wondered if there wasn't a better way for the clerk to insert himself into the woman's life, as some of the opening scenes are slightly off-putting.
  While the movie doesn't give us much backstory about its characters at first, we do learn more as the movie progresses. The clerk is homeless, and used to be a drug addict, and then there of course comes the revelation about the woman towards the end of the movie, which I will not spoil here.
  The two leads aren't the only characters in the movie, but all the secondary characters don't get much backstory. We get to spend a little time with the other clerks at the video store, but the focus of the movie is really on the two main characters and their bizarre romance. The woman has a penchant for soft-core porn, which the two eventually watch together, but not as a prelude to sex.
  There are a lot of comedic moments, including a scene where the woman comes up behind the clerk and beings to simulate some rough doggy style, which I found surprisingly funny and surprising as it comes out of nowhere.
  As a fan of indie movies, and films generally about troubled and unusual characters I have to say I enjoyed my time with Good Dick. (Insert "That's what she said" line here.) It's a sweet story about an emotionally troubled woman who is eventually redeemed by the power of love, and it is funny at times and touching at others. Recommended.

War of the Worlds: Goliath

  Set after the events of the War of the Worlds novel, Goliath tells the story of Eric Wells, an orphan whose parents were killed in the original Martian invasion. After germs wiped out the invaders, humanity scavenged Martian technology to build their own tripods and heat rays. Now an adult, Eric has joined up with A.R.E.S., or Allied Resistance Earth Squadron, an international army created to fight the Martians if they ever invade again. Just as the first World War is about to break out, the Martians return, forcing Eric to overcome his own insecurities and prove himself a hero.
  Like most sci-fi and nerdy stuff, I am a fan of War of the Worlds. I read the novel when I was a teenager, and while it didn't knock my socks off, I enjoyed the darkness of it, specifically the idea that in a war against technologically advanced aliens, humanity was screwed.
  This movie was originally planned as an animated series, which probably explains why I enjoyed it. I'm a long time fan of animation, and it's not hard to think of Goliath as a kind of steam punk Exosquad, exactly the type of thing you'd find in a Saturday morning line up during the nineties. Visually I found Goliath to be a treat, the characters are very angular, with all of the male characters being square jawed he-men. The design of the A.R.E.S. tripods is neat, they look like bulky, walking tanks whereas the Martian tripods are much thinner and more sleek. The whole thing looks like a comic book come to life, which made me happy.  
  Goliath features the involvement of Kevin Eastman, who served as executive producer. Eastman is famous for co-creating the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I don't know the full extent of his involvement with the production of this movie, but it certainly lends some geek street cred to the final proceedings, which is probably why you can find his name mentioned on the cover of the DVD.
  The voice cast includes actors from notable geeky shows like Firefly (Adam Baldwin), Highlander (Adrian Paul) and Andromeda (Jim Byrnes). I enjoyed Adrian Paul in this, as his womanizing, loud mouthed Irishman brought some much needed levity to the film. Adam Baldwin's appearance is more of a cameo, as his lunatic character doesn't get much time to shine.
  War of the Worlds: Goliath, also features a fictionalized version of American President Theodore "Teddy" Roosevelt, who serves as a leader in A.R.E.S. who, considering his rank and status, is someone who does a surprising amount of fighting on the front lines. There's even a fun scene where Teddy incites a bar brawl. And really, folks, if you don't want to watch an hour and a half long cartoon where the 26th President of the United States shoots at aliens, then what's wrong with you? If you're a geek or fan of the source material then check this out.

Wizards

 A Ralph Bakshi production from the year 1977, Wizards is an animated film that mixes Lord of the Rings type fantasy with World War 2 ephemera into one strange, Reese's Peanut Butter Cup of cartoon weird-ness. I imagine a lot of the adult viewers of this film were eating peanut butter cups during the movie, as they probably were suffering from marijuana induced hunger pains.
  Wizards is set in a post apocalyptic Earth that, free of technology, has developed back into a fantasy land. Elves, fairies and magic have reappeared onto the scene, along with a race of mutants who were spawned by nuclear fallout. The titular wizards are Avatar and Blackwolf, brothers who are polar opposites on the good and evil spectrum. The evil brother, Blackwolf, is attempting to conquer the world armed with technology, like guns, tanks, and a projector that he uses to screen old Nazi propaganda films.  
  The other protagonists consist of a sexily drawn fairy queen, a fierce warrior elf, and a robot assassin initially named Nekron 99, and then later renamed Peace by the heroes, who he is forced to lead to Blackwolf's lair.
  The animation style is quite cartoonish and far from reality, and more resembles something you'd see in a comic strip, which is why the addition of the stock footage makes things all the more surreal. It really is a contrast of visual styles that is rarely seen, and makes Wizards an experience that you won't soon forget.
  As a movie I would have a hard time recommending this to anyone who isn't a big fan of unusual/mature animated movies i.e. Heavy Metal, Fantastic Planet, or Fire and Ice. While Wizards is more family friendly then those pictures, it's still a little stranger then your standard Disney movie. If you've yearned to watch psychedelic images of fantasy creatures mixed in with actual stock footage of Adolph Hitler then this is the movie you've been waiting for. I have a feeling that it is children who would best appreciate this, especially ones who like to draw or read comic books. While 32 year old me wasn't blown away by Wizards, I can easily say that 13 year old me would've had much more of an appreciation for a movie that contains scenes of elves getting mowed down with machine guns.

Halo: Nightfall

  Halo: Nightfall focuses on Locke, a naval intelligence agent who discovers that the hostile aliens known as the Covenant have weaponized an element that can wipe out human beings. After learning that the element is being harvested on a piece of a destroyed Halo installation, Locke and his team pair with Aiken, a former Spartan, to find the source of this element and destroy it.

  I adore Halo. While I didn’t own an original X-Box, I did play the first game on a friend’s PC, and I fell in love with it. I beat it several times, in fact I did a science paper on how quickly I could complete the game in relation to how much sleep I had gotten. While this experiment may have been a thinly veiled attempt to spend more time playing a video game, I did end up getting a B on my paper, and more importantly, I was able to spend extra hours inside of a world that I enjoy. My love of Halo has even propelled me to other forms of media, including books, where I basted myself in the expansive lore of the first four Halo novels. I’ve purchased Halo toys, soundtracks, comics and movies. The games don’t just deliver fun action, but an interesting universe that centers on an epic war between humanity and a technologically advanced, fanatical alliance of alien species hell bent on ending all life in the galaxy. The Master Chief may be something of a blank character, but his stoic nature and romance with his companion A.I. Cortana is far more compelling material then one gets in most first person shooters. The games also feature sweeping, melancholic musical scores and first class sci-fi designs. When one combines all of these things, what they get is a video game that has surpassed itself to become a cultural phenomenon that has spread to all forms of media, including movies, or in this case, a series packaged as a film. Unfortunately for us die hard Halo fans, the film we received this time is something of a let down, especially when compared to Forward Unto Dawn, the last Halo promotional series turned movie. 

  While Forward Unto Dawn was more Halo like in the sense that it delivered plenty of action, Nightfall ends up being more of a sci-fi tinged horror movie, which is an interesting decision except that it short changes the viewer of the Covenant, the main villains of the entire Halo franchise. Instead of fighting the Covenant, Locke and Aiken end up squaring off against killer worms. These aren’t giant killer worms like in Tremors, which is disappointing since Kevin Bacon does make a cameo in this movie, proving that Halo is less then seven degrees of this esteemed actor.  

  Worms might make fascinating antagonists in a different movie, but as the central baddies in a film based on Halo, they are underwhelming. The Covenant are great villains, and one of, if not the, main reasons for Halo’s popularity. Cutting the Covenant out of a Halo movie is quite a gamble, and in this case, one that does not pay off.

  While not great, this isn’t a bad movie, and for anyone who is a Halo fan it’ll be required viewing, if only as a curiosity, which is a shame because this could’ve been so much better if they’d of dropped the worms and given us Grunts, Jackals and Elites as cannon fodder.

  The performances in Nightfall are fine, but some of the writing (apart from the story decision to replace iconic villains with worms) is groan worthy, specifically the narration done by Aiken, who utters some of the cheesiest, faux philosophical nonsense I have ever heard.    

   

Serenity

  Spoiler alert! I discuss important plot details, if you haven’t seen this decade old movie based on a failed TV show and don’t want to know what happens then go watch it before you read my review. The movie is good, you’ll enjoy it.
  Outlaw Mal Reynolds and his crew of intergalactic bandits pick up a new passenger, a psychic named River Tam. River is being hunted by an operative of the Alliance, the chief government of the galaxy. Can Mal protect River and his crew while exposing the hidden crimes of the Alliance?
  While I’ve never seen the TV series that preceded it, for some reason I ended up watching Serenity in theaters during its release in 2005. I enjoyed the movie at the time, and years later I bought the DVD on a whim. Watching it recently, I was initially puzzled why I owned this movie, but by the time the film was over I was reminded why I liked it.
  Firefly is a cult TV show, and while I don’t fully understand all of the appeal, as a fan of weird things and sci-fi in general it’s hard not to like it at least a little. A sci-fi Western where all of the characters curse in Chinese? Sure, why not. I find it kind of strange that this movie even exists given that the show was cancelled during its first season due to poor ratings. I know Twin Peaks had a movie after it was cancelled, but that series was initially popular and had a lot of buzz around it, it also had a second season. I’m assuming Serenity was made due to the then growing power of creator Joss Whedon, who wrote and directed it. Whedon’s influence has only continued to gain momentum, as he has transformed from a TV writer to a director of huge blockbusters. If the man had just created Buffy the Vampire Slayer that would be enough to make him a geek legend, but giving nerds a live action Avengers movie ensures that his name will live on in internet chat rooms and comic conventions forever. He also wrote The Cabin in the Woods, which is a fucking awesome horror movie. Joss Whedon is the man.
  Like I said before, while I was watching the beginning of this movie I was wondering why I had purchased it given that I had never seen the TV show. The short answer is the story and the characters. The heroes in Serenity are a little more fleshed out then your average sci-fi characters, and Whedon is known for infusing his dialogue with wit and charm. Some of the protagonists are killed off, and the movie is good at making these deaths feel genuinely sad. A lot of movies slaughter cardboard characters left and right and nobody gives a damn, but seeing some of the people in Serenity get the axe was moving. I don’t think this is an easy thing to accomplish, but Whedon does it here and the movie is more compelling for that reason.
  The ideas in this are also something I found interesting. The movie explores the theme of control, and the pressures to conform to a society that manipulates individuals to no end. Anyone with adult responsibilities can probably relate to what the movie is talking about, I know I’m frequently stressed out by a system that often seems inhuman. Mal and the crew of Serenity oppose the overwhelming control of the Alliance, they are individualists trying to make their own way in a universe torn apart by power struggles. Later on in the film the good guys discover a planet where something killed the population in the midst of their daily routines, with the few that survived becoming the violently insane, space cannibals known as Reavers. It was the Alliance that caused all of this misery, they were trying to chemically control the population with a calming gas, with disastrous results. Control is not always a good thing, the movie is arguing, and too much control can be harmful.
  Characters and story aside, I thought Serenity had a good protagonist and villain. Nathan Fillion plays a square jawed anti-hero to good effect, he isn’t amazing but you like him enough and I found his back story intriguing as he is essentially a Confederate soldier living in the aftermath of a war his side lost. Chiwetel Ejiofor is frightening as the Operative because of the calm, collected way he murders innocent people. He is an idealist who thinks that the end justifies the means. At one point this villain admits to Mal that he knows he is a monster, and that he will not have a place in the world he is trying to create.
  One thing that is worth noting about Serenity is that while the movie does contain a climactic battle between the hero and villain, the hero does not kill the villain. After Mal beats up the Operative he forces him to watch video evidence proving that the Alliance wiped out that planet I mentioned earlier. After seeing this the Operative changes his position, and agrees with Mal. In 99% of these things the hero and villain can’t agree on anything, and one of them uses violence to take out the other. To see a movie where the bad guy actually learns the error of his ways was refreshing, and it felt natural to the story. Kudos to Joss for achieving this without it feeling forced in any way.
  If the Reavers are insane cannibals then how are they able to pilot and maintain space ships? And why don’t they wipe each other out? I understand this movie is a Western and the Reavers are the stand in for indians/Native Americans, but if you think about it they’re basically savage astronauts, which doesn’t really make any sense.  
  I don’t think you need to be a fan of the Firefly TV show to enjoy Serenity, the movie explains enough of the lore to give newcomers an idea of what’s going on. I’m sure fans of the show will get more out of this film, but I would recommend Serenity to anyone who likes good science fiction.