OK, we’re getting closer!

We’re now six films into DC Comics and Warner Bros.’ exciting new endeavor to launch high-quality direct-to-DVD animated films masterminded by Bruce Timm, one of the key creative forces behind the amazing Batman: The Animated Series from the 90’s.  In my review of the fourth film, Wonder Woman, I wrote that I enjoyed the effort but that I was disappointed that, to that point, the DVD series wasn’t turning out as I had hoped.  I wrote:

The original announcement had seemed to indicate that the series would focus more on adaptations of classic comic stories as opposed to this sort of one-off origin story that isn’t based on any specific source material.  This is the sort of thing that most of the live-action super-hero films do, creating a new story that is sort of a “melange” of various bits of story-lines and background from the many years of the character’s history.  It’s not what I was hoping for from these DVDs.  (To my dismay, the preview included on the Wonder Woman disc seems to indicate that the next DVD, a Green Lantern adventure, will be exactly this same type of not-based-on-anything-specific tale.)  Where is my epic animated adaptation of The Great Darkness Saga?  Or Batman: Year One?  Or Kingdom Come?  How cool would that be?

Other than my philosophical support of its premise, is Superman/Batman: Public Enemies actually any good?  Well, it definitely is, though like the rest of these new DVDs it does not match the heights of any of Bruce Timm’s animated DCU series (Batman: The Animated Series, Justice League, etc.).

The story is simple:  Lex Luthor has been elected President of the United States.  He uses the discovery of an enormous fragment of Kryptonite that is on-course to impact with Earth (to what would be sure to be devastating consequences for the planet) as an excuse to issue a warrant for Superman’s arrest.  Batman quickly gets involved, and the two heroes find themselves on the run from a whole host of super-villains eager for the bounty Luthor has offered.  They also find themselves hunted by a number of heroes who feel a moral imperative to obey the orders of America’s commander in chief.  Meanwhile, there’s still the little matter of finding a way to avert the impending impact of the Kryptonite meteor.

This DVD, as with the original comic books, is pretty much action-action-action.  The animation is, for the most part, really gorgeous (probably the best effort since the first one, Superman: Doomsday).  The animation teams on these DVDs seem to be more comfortable with the large action sequences than with intimate dialogue sequences (which is probably why I feel Superman: Doomsday and Public Enemies are the most successful ones, as they’re also the most action-packed).  These guys are AMAZING at choreographing enormous super-hero/villain action sequences.  There’s a lot of fun eye-candy here, and the pace of the story is pretty relentless.

I have really enjoyed how, for each of these DVDs, Timm and his team have created new designs for all of the characters, in an attempt to match the style of the artists of the source material.  Ed McGuinness has a very distinct style of drawing, and I was really surprised and impressed by the way the animation maintained a lot of the flavor of his original work.  Not everything is perfect — there are some instances where what worked in a still drawing doesn’t translate to a moving image, such as the early scene where Captain Atom and Major Force confront Superman.  As the two characters walk towards Superman, one can see that the animators had trouble making their enormously-muscled arms (a distinct McGuinness characteristic) move along with their bodies.  Also, while I found most of the character-designs to be really top-notch (especially the tweaked looks for Luthor and Batman), I was appalled at the hideous depiction of Amanda Waller.  She’s always been a heavy character, but here she was absurdly obese!  Yikes!  I also wasn’t wild about the over-simplified look of Power Girl’s face, with her enormous bird-like eyes.  But these are small quibbles — over-all, as I wrote, the animation is top-notch.

The best feature of this DVD is the return of the classic voices from the original DCU animated series: Clancy Brown (The Shawshank Redemption) as Lex Luthor, Tim Daly as Superman, and Kevin Conroy as Batman.  As far as I’m concerned, those three actors ARE those characters.  There have been many other great actors who have taken a swing at those roles (both in live-action and in the other DC animated DVDs), but no one can beat those three.  (PARTICULARLY Kevin Conroy’s Batman.)  So it was an ENORMOUS delight to have those three all return for this installment, and the film gives them a lot of opportunities to riff off of one another.  (I was further pleased to see several other voices from the original animated series return to reprise their roles, such as CCH Pounder as Amanda Waller.)

So what’s not so good?  Primarily, it’s that the story upon which all of the exciting action hangs is rather weak.  I understand that it’s popular, but Loeb and McGuinness’ original comic-book storyline is far being one of my favorites, and the DVD shares many of its weaknesses.  While the set-up is cool (how would Superman and Batman react if their worst enemy actually was elected, without fraud, to the highest office in the land?), the story quickly devolves into silliness.  By the time one gets to the end, in which Lex has donned his green and purple super-suit and an enormous Superman/Batman robot arrives out of nowhere to save the day, the adventure has veered into total lunacy.  Over-all, Timm and writer Stan Berkowitz have done a good job at trimming away many of the indulgences from the original story (such as the go-nowhere subplots involving the possibility that Superman villain Metallo was the one who shot Bruce Wayne’s parents, and the appearance of the Kingdom Come Superman from the future), but the disappointment of the third act’s story was exactly the same thing that bugged me about the final issues of the original comic.

I also would have enjoyed a lot more fleshing-out of how exactly Luthor got himself elected President.  There’s a great montage that opens the film that sets this premise up, hinting that tough economic times created desperation in the country’s voters, but after a clip of Luthor on a news show declaring his candidacy, we jump right to the announcement that he was elected President.  I would have liked to have seen a lot more info on how he sold himself to the country, how he convinced people to disregard his criminal past, etc. etc.  It’s key to the story that we buy into the notion that Luthor was legitimately elected, and I think more time needed to be spent on fleshing out that idea.

(True, none of that was present in the original comic, but that’s because this story came after several years of storytelling in DC’s various Superman books that DID explore the story of Luthor’s candidacy and eventual election.  Most readers who read those six issues of Superman/Batman in 2003/4 had read those other comics, so Loeb and McGuinness didn’t need to spend too much time on the set-up.  This DVD, on the other hand, needs to stand entirely on its own, and I think they would have been well-served to have taken a little more time to sell the premise.)

I also would have liked to have seen a little more time (even just a scene or two would have sufficed) to explain exactly why certain heroes agree to work for Luthor.  The dilemma of a super-hero having to decide whether his/her respect for the office of the President outweighs his/her personal feelings about the office-holder is an extraordinarily rich hook for the story.  But I felt those juicy issues were quickly swept aside (by the original comics, and even more-so by the DVD movie) in favor of moving on to more action.  This leaves me totally confused as to why heroes like Hawkman and Captain Marvel, for instance, choose to stand against their former colleagues Superman and Batman.  This DVD is the shortest of the six animated DVDs so far (it’s a brisk 67 minutes), so it’s not like they couldn’t have added in a few extra minutes fleshing out some of this character motivation and back-story.

(Speaking of Hawkman and Captain Marvel, by the way, brings me to yet another issue I have with both the DVD and the original comics: I think the drama of Superman and Batman having to fight against other super-heroes would have been much richer if they’d been facing off against other of the DCU’s big guns like Wonder Woman and Green Lantern, as opposed to B-listers like Captain Atom and Black Lightning.)

I’m getting into a lot of niggling complaints, now, and I really shouldn’t.  The DVD really is quite solid.  It’s just that I have extraordinarily high standards for animation, and particularly for the DCU animated projects.  (This is primarily because Timm & co. set the bar SO HIGH for themselves with all of their terrific work on the Batman, Superman, Batman: Beyond, and Justice League TV series!)   Superman/Batman: Public Enemies is a very entertaining and enjoyable entry in the new DVD series, and superior to the last three DVDs.

It’s great… but I am still waiting for the SPECTACULAR.

Last week I wrote about some of the great comics I’ve read lately.  That list was just scratching the surface!  Here’s some more fantastic stuff that I’ve been enjoying recently:

Hellboy: The Wild Hunt and BPRD: 1947 - The Hellboy saga continues in these two new wonderful mini-series.  In Hellboy: The Wild Hunt, things are coming to a head for the big red guy.  Cut off from his old friends and comrades in the BPRD, and hunted by the newly-resurrected Queen of Blood, things are looking grim for our hero!  Last month’s issue (#6) was jam-packed with astonishing revelations about Hellboy’s origin that I never saw coming, but that I thought worked absolutely PERFECTLY.  Meanwhile, BPRD: 1947 takes us through a rollicking tale of the second year of the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense as Professor Bruttenholm struggles against vampires and a lot of other weirdness.  The Hellboy universe has really richened and deepened over these last few years, and I am really excited to see where things go from here.

Ultimate Comics: Spider-Man — The relaunch of Brian Michael Bendis’ take on Spider-Man (three issues have been published as of this writing) continues just where the previous 133 issues (plus a handful of annuals and other specials) left off.  Young Peter Parker must juggle his, um, interesting love-life with a boring job at a fast-food joint (since he lost his job at the Daily Bugle following the devastation of NYC in the truly awful Ultimatum miniseries) with, oh yeah, his crime-fighting escapades as Spider-Man!  Mr. Bendis is well-known for his witty, true-to-teenaged-life dialogue, but I think his real strength is the depth of characterization he brings to Peter Parker and all the rest of the extraordinarily numerous cast of this comic.  Mary-Jane, Flash Thompson, Aunt May, “Kong,” Kitty Pryde from the X-Men, Johnny Storm from the Fantastic Four (and it is almost embarrassing how much more interesting Kitty and Johnny are here than in their “home” comics) and many more characters are all brought to amazingly real life in these pages.  I’ve been following Bendis’ run on “Ultimate” Spider-Man and I’ll be with the series until he leaves.  Spider-Man has never been done better (in my comic-reading life-time, at least!).  My only small complaint: I’m not quite taken with the overly stylized work of new series artist David Lafuente.  Let’s see if it grows on me any more after a few more issues…

Stephen King’s The Dark Tower — I fell way behind on this series of mini-series, adapting and expanding upon the back story of Stephen King’s seven-book The Dark Tower opus, but I was finally able to catch up last month.  Breathtakingly gorgeous art by Jae Lee combined with a wonderful epic fantasy yarn by Peter David & Robin Furth (working with Mr. King) make this a compelling comic book indeed.  Large amounts of extra credit for the terrific back-up features.  In addition to the main story, each issue is filled to overflowing with lengthy text-pieces that flesh out the extraordinary world that Stephen King created, interviews with the various creators involved with the book, and lots more.  (My only complaint is that Jae Lee was absent for the most recent mini-series, The Fall of Gilead, and the book was not the same without him.  I’d have preferred that they delayed the release of that mini-series so that Mr. Lee could have illustrated it, maintaining artistic continuity across the entire series.)

Batman and Robin — Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s latest partnership is this bizarre, violent, madcap new take on Batman and Robin.  But this isn’t the Batman and Robin that you might be familiar with.  Following the recent dramatic upheavals in the DC universe status quo, former Robin Dick Grayson has taken the mantle of the Dark Knight, with Bruce Wayne’s long-lost son Damian (who Bruce fathered to Ras Al Ghul’s daughter Talia in the long-forgotten but recently returned-to-continuity graphic novel Batman: Son of the Demon from 1987 by Mike W. Barr & Jerry Bingham).  The characterizations and plot-lines don’t quite jive with what’s happening in the other Batman titles these days, but who cares.  Mr. Quitely’s gorgeous, distinct illustrations have always served as the best conduits for Mr. Morrison’s out-there storytelling, and this book is no different.  My complaint, as with the Dark Tower series, is about the shift in artists: already we’re having fill-in artists after only three issues??  Sheesh!!

Batman: Streets of Gotham — Speaking of Batman, I’m also thoroughly enjoying this book written by the great Paul Dini (one of the key creative forces behind Batman: The Animated Series, which stands in my mind as my favorite version of Batman in ANY media) and illustrated by Dustin Nguyen.  I’ve been a fan of Mr. Nguyen since his great run on Wildcats 3.0 with Joe Casey, and his work here is absolutely stellar — from the wonderfully evocative water-color covers (issue #4’s cover featuring the horrifying Mr. Zsasz was a particular stand-out, though shame on whoever is responsible for the placement of the logo which makes it very difficult to see that Zsasz is standing under a silhouette of Batman) to his stylized work on the interiors.

Doom Patrol — Full disclosure: my friend Liz Gehrlein edits this book, and she’s the one who encouraged me to sample this new series (which I might not otherwise have picked off the racks myself).  I’m quite glad I gave it a try.  It’s got a sort-of retro feel filled to the brim with classic comic book super-hero escapades.  In contrast to the “decompressed” storytelling that has become very popular over the last several years, each issue so far has been jam-packed with exciting story.  Extra props for the magnificent Metal Men back-up feature that reunites two extraordinary talents: Keith Giffen and Kevin Maguire.

Superman: Secret Origin — I wasn’t sure that I would be interested in yet another take on Superman’s early years, but Gary Frank’s terrific cover prompted me to pick up issue #1, and I’m glad I did.  Mr. Frank’s art is, of course, spectacular.  He is able to combine really emotive faces with extraordinary detail in his rendering of people’s clothing, cars, and other background details.  I also found myself intrigued by the way writer Geoff Johns mixes and matches various ideas and iconography from various different versions of Superman.  There’s the crystalline Kryptonian technology from Richard Donner’s Superman movies; there’s the endearingly pre-Crisis look to the spaceship that brought Clark to Earth; there’s the heat-vision-as-metaphor-for-puberty idea from Smallville; there’s the depiction of Krypton as being divided up into various guilds that has been a big part of the New Krypton stories running through all of DC’s current Superman titles over the past year; and, of course, there’s the last page, which firmly establishes that young Clark took on the identity of Superboy while still living in Smallville.  (The only bit of cheese in this big melting pot that I wish had been left out?  The Gregory Peck-looking Jor-El from Adam Kubert’s run on Action Comics with Mr. Johns from 2007.  Mr. Kubert is a magnificent artist, but that version of Jor-El never did it for me.)  Still, a really enjoyable debut issue, and I eagerly anticipate the rest of the series.

So, wow!  After the recent Comic-Con the web has been flooded with all sorts of teases about upcoming movies, TV shows, and other geeky goodness.  Here’s some of the best stuff that I’ve found:

After so many years of speculation and false starts, the sequel to Tron is finally, actually happening!!  Check out the STUNNING trailer here.  It’s going to be in IMAX 3-D??  I’m THERE.

I cannot believe they’re actually making a Jonah Hex movie.  (And with Josh Brolin, no less!)  Check out the poster.

The ending of Lost revealed?  Um, not quite.  Check out this video from the Lost panel!  Quite a lot of additional footage from that panel can be found here.  For some reason, Michael Emmerson’s fake audition for the role of Hurley isn’t included, but you can find that here.  Funny stuff.

Here’s a pretty bad-ass trailer for Season 2 of The Clone Wars.  I actually found the first season to be fairly watchable, and this glimpse at the next season looks pretty promising.

You know what it takes to sell real estate?  The same thing it takes to re-make one of the most brilliant TV shows of all time.  Well, AMC’s version of The Prisoner, starring Ian McKellan and Jim Caviezel, is nearly upon us.  Check out this lengthy trailer.  I must say, that looks pretty damn intriguing!

Amongst all of this glorious fun is the extraordinarily troubling continuing story about the newly-resurrected Futurama’s uncertain future.  This report from the Futurama panel at the con is grim indeed.  Can’t everybody just make nice already?!!

That’s all for now — have a great weekend everybody!!

It is the distant future of the DC Universe.  Beings with super-human abilities have spread across the globe, and ever-more powerful violent heroes and villains wreak untold havoc with their escalating conflicts.  Meanwhile, the heroes of old are gone.  Green Lantern has abandoned Earth for the solitude of space.  Wonder Woman has returned to Themyscira.  Batman, his body broken after years of pushing himself beyond the limits of human endurance, maintains order over Gotham City through the use of menacing robotic sentries.  And Superman has lived alone in his Fortress of Solitude for the past ten years, ever since the Joker’s brutal attack on the Daily Planet resulted in the deaths of ninety-two men.  And one woman.

This is the world of Kingdom Come, a dazzling tale of the future of the DC Universe by Mark Waid and Alex Ross.  Originally published in four parts in 1996, one of the initial core ideas of the story was a comment on the increasingly violent anti-heroes that were very popular in comic books of the nineties.  The brutal Magog, with his scarred eye, his enormous shoulder-pads, and his vicious weaponry was a clear comment on Marvel Comics’ character of Cable.  The specificity of that reference has faded over the years, but the power of Kingdom Come has not.

I can think of few stories that have captured the grandeur of DC’s pantheon of heroes as well as Kingdom Come.  This may be a story of an alternate, possible future, but it remains oen of the most iconic tales of Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman that I have ever read.  The dynamic between the three of them is at the heart of the story.  Kingdom Come focuses our attention on the way their differing backgrounds have lead them to view the world from vastly different points of view.  Those differences drive deep wedges between the characters, and lead to much of the drama of the story.  Mark Waid’s script is filled with powerful moments and wonderful characterization.  Having read the tale countless times, I am still struck by the moments like Wonder Woman’s first visit to Superman in his isolation, when she throws his oft-repeated commitment to truth and justice in his face.  Then there is my very favorite moment in the series (and frankly, one of my favorite moments in any comic book ever), which comes in Chapter Three when a furious Superman flies out of the Batcave at super-sonic speed, basically disappearing from sight he’s moving so fast, leaving a solitary Batman to remark “so that’s what that feels like.”  Brilliant!

Which brings me to Alex Ross’ remarkable painted artwork.  I have been an enormous fan of this great talent ever since I read his epic work Marvels (with writer Kurt Busiek), and I have read almost everything he has ever illustrated in the years since.  But Kingdom Come remains, in my mind, his greatest work.  Ross is able to bring unparalleled realism to every image while never losing the ability to make the god-like heroes of the DC Universe look appropriately majestic.  He is able to cram a staggering amount of detail into every panel of every page, whether that image is of an elderly preacher walking down the street, or two armies of super-humans engaging in an armageddon-like conflict.  Each page, each panel, is a true work of art, and I get tremendous enjoyment from lingering on the images to try to absorb them all.

I can still remember the enormous anticipation my friends and I were gripped by as we waited for the fourth issue of Kingdom Come to come out, back in 1996.  I was working at summer camp at the time, and I remember like it was yesterday the afternoon when one of my friends strolled onto the camp grounds bearing issue four in his hands.  It was manna from heaven!  I sat down, with another one of my good buddies right beside me, and we read the issue together, page by page (not turning the page until we’d both finished reading).  If one of us finished before the other, there were a lot of non-verbal exhortations to “hurry up already!!” so we could move on to the next page.  This is a true story!  I have never in my life read a comic book in such a fashion.

Last month I wrote about some of my favorite super-hero graphic novels.  Kingdom Come is one of the very best.

Over the past two days I have listed several of my favorite graphic novels.  (Click here for part I and here for part II.)  You’ll notice that most of them had nothing to do with super-heroes.  This was purposeful — although super-hero stories dominate the American comic book scene, there are so many other types of stories that can be told using the comics medium.  That’s something I wanted to highlight.

But that’s not to say that I don’t also love a terrific super-hero story, because I certainly do!  Here are some of my favorites, that are available in graphic novel or collected-edition formats:

Batman: The Dark Knight Returns — Following the death of Robin, Bruce Wayne retired his Batman persona.  It’s been 10 years, and Gotham City has sunk into an urban decay of crime.  Bruce Wayne is a broken man, empty and lost.  But when something drives him to put on that mask one more time, everything changes.  (Although not necessarily for the better!)  Along with Watchmen (which was also released in 1986), Frank Miller’s magnus opus changed the comics industry forever, demonstrating without a doubt that it was possible to tell sophisticated, mature stories with super-hero characters.  (It also was a tremendous influence on the look and tone of Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman film.)  This story is intense and shockingly brutal.  It is also a gorgeous work of art, filled to the brim with overlapping narratives that tell the stories of an enormous cast of characters, all struggling to make their way in the brutal urban jungle that Gotham City has become, and all of them somehow affected by the shadow of the bat.  The Dark Knight Returns is also infamous for Miller’s depiction of an almost fascistic Superman, and his battle with the Batman in the series’ final chapter is a show-stopper.  (I should also mention that I am quite fond of Miller’s Batman: Year One, illustrated by David Mazzucchelli, from which a great deal of the story of Batman Begins was adapted.)

The New Frontier — Darwyn Cooke’s brilliant series re-tells the origins of many of DC Comics’ most familiar characters, albeit set in the years in which they were originally created.  Similar to the way in which The Right Stuff showed how American fighter pilots gradually became our astronauts, The New Frontier tells the story of how the pulp heroes that came out of the second world war gradually became the costumed super-heroes of a brave new age.  Cooke’s somewhat retro, simplified art style is stunningly gorgeous and absolutely perfect for the story being told.  The New Frontier captures the innocence and wonder, as well as the growing dangers, of the 1950’s and 60’s.  It is an epic saga, filled out by an enormous cast of characters, all of whom Cooke wonderfully brings to life.  I only discovered The New Frontier about two years ago, but it immediately became one of my absolute favorites.

Astonishing X-Men — Joss Whedon (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly) and John Cassaday crafted the greatest X-Men story of the past decade, which I wrote about at length here.  A scientist declares that she has discovered the cure for mutants (that storyline was incorporated into the lackluster third X-Men film), Professor X’s mutant-tracking system cerebro attains sentience and threatens the students, and an enormous extra-terrestrial threat is revealed.  But all of that takes a back seat to the characters’ story-lines.  Whedon has a quite a gift for creating vibrant characters, and his stories are intense and also filled with delightful humor.  Whedon & Cassaday’s entire story is available in four softcover editions or two hardcovers.  

Spider-Man: Kraven’s Last Hunt – I probably read this at too-young an age, but it certainly captured my imagination at the tim.  I am pleased to say that it also holds up today as one of the most compelling Spider-Man stories ever told.  In the ultimate tale of revenge, Spider-Man villain Kraven the Hunter shoots Spidey, buries him, and then, in order to prove his complete superiority over his foe, puts on his costume and takes his place.  And that’s just in the first chapter.  This jaw-droppingly grim and serious story takes the reader on a powerful journey through the haunted past and disturbed psyche of Kraven, while also giving us great insight into the mind of Peter Parker as he faces his mortality and struggles to overcome a seemingly impossible situation and an indomitable enemy.  J.M. DeMatteis’ wonderful prose (which follows the inter-weaving narratives of several major characters) and wonderful, over-lapping dialogue was way ahead of its time, and Mike Zeck and Bob McLeod’s art is dense, atmospheric, and truly gorgeous.  I can’t tell you how many times I have read this story, and it never ceases to amaze me.  

The Ultimates by Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch and Kingdom Come by Mark Waid and Alex Ross — I recently re-read both of these, and I have longer posts in the work about them both that will be coming in the next few weeks.  For now, let me just say that they are both true masterpieces, and must-reads for any comic fans.  

OK, whew!  This has been a fun look at various amazing comics over the past three days.  I like being reminded about just how terrific this medium can be.  Did I leave out one of your favorites?  Let me know!  And if you’ve never read a comic book and are just bewildered as to what the heck I’ve been going on about for these past few days, I do hope that you’ll give one of these great works that I have listed a try.

Have you seen this?  Jon Hamm (Mad Men) plays Lex Luthor in this short from Funnyordie.com, asking for bailout money for Luthorcorp.  Genius!

Out-there director Spike Jonze (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation) is making a film of Maurice Sendak’s beloved childrens’ book, Where The Wild Things Are?  What an insane, inspired notion.  Check out this wondrous trailer.  This is a movie I need to see.

Speaking of trailers I really want to see, I didn’t know anything whatsoever about Sam Mendes’ (American Beauty) new film, Away We Go, before I saw this new trailer (mentioned at the Motion Captured blog over on HitFix.com).  It stars John Krasinski (Jim from The Office) and Maya Rudolph (from SNL), and now that I’ve seen the trailer I am very excited for this film!  

I love this new poster for J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek movie.  I need this in my home.

Speaking of Trek, there’s been some interesting pieces posted on-line lately about the use of Bryan Tyler’s magnificent score for Children of Dune in the trailers for the new Star Trek film.  This article summarizes the confusion nicely.  I am fascinated by this stuff.  Tyler’s score was also used extensively in the first trailer for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.  I loved both of the Sci-Fi channel’s Dune mini-series, and it tickles me to hear snippets of the score being used all over the place these days!

Come back here tomorrow to read my thoughts on a terrific older film from director Guillermo del Toro, The Devil’s Backbone!

As I prepare for this weekend’s series finale of Battlestar Galactica (and contemplate life without that brilliant show, one of the greatest of the last two decades), I’ve been thinking about some of the great series finales of the recent past.  Here are some of my favorites, counting down from ten!

10.  Cheers — “One For the Road” – Diane Chambers (Shelly Long) returns in an attempt to re-kindle her romance with Sam (Ted Danson) in this extra-long finale.  To be honest, it’s been years since I’ve seen this one, but my recollection is of really enjoying it.  Bringing back Shelly Long, who was pretty much the star of the show (along with Danson) for the first half of its run, was a brilliant idea.  And the final scene is perfect — Sam waving away a customer while saying “sorry, we’re closed.”  Sniff!

9.  Star Trek: Deep Space Nine — “What You Leave Behind” — I am giving props here to the entire 10-hour, 9-episode “final chapter” of this, the greatest of the Star Trek series.  The show finally becomes what it has always flirted with — a true serial, as seven seasons worth of storylines come to fruition over the course of this magnificent final epic run of episodes.  The Dominion War escalates, a secret section of Starfleet’s complicity in attempted genocide is revealed, and Captain Benjamin Sisko must finally fulfill his destiny as Emissary of the Prophets (a story thread begun in the series’ pilot episode). The show was notable for its enormous cast of recurring characters, and everyone gets his/her due here (with quite a number of popular characters meeting their demise!).  The show gets bumped down a bit on my list because the actual final two hours isn’t quite as great as the episodes leading up to it (it looks like they used up their special effects budget, as one of the major battle sequences is composed almost entirely of recycled footage, something that eagle-eyed fans like me noticed).  Still, the melancholy tone (so unusual for a Trek series) and the sad, final shot of Jake Sisko looking out the window for his lost father as the camera pulls back and the station slowly fades away into the blackness of space is just perfection.

8.  Justice League Unlimited – “Destroyer” — Classic DC Comics villain Darkseid launches a full-scale invasion of Earth, and even the combined might of practically every character (hero & villain) who ever appeared on this amazing animated show are powerless to stop him.  In an epic battle atop the ruins of the Daily Planet building, Superman ultimately falls before the might of Darkseid.  (That sequence, by the way, is a showcase for the stupendous character designs and action animation that made this show so great.)  Ultimately, it is Lex Luthor himself who offers Darkseid a deal in order to spare the Earth.  Has Lex actually done something heroic, or has he doomed the entire universe to save himself?  In a surprising move that I just love, the show does not answer this question.  

7.  Mystery Science Theatre 3000 — “Danger: Diabolik” – As the Satellite of Love hurtles back to earth, the gang takes the time to heckle one last movie.  And what a movie.  This 1968 Italian film follows the elaborate exploits of a supremely skilled thief who likes to dress in skin-tight black leather and lives in a gaudy underground lair.  However silly you think this film is, rest assured it is even sillier, particularly the ludicrous ending.  All in all, this is a classic MST3K installment, and having Mike and the robots finally escape the satellite, only to get an apartment and spend their days watching old movies, is brilliant.

6.  The Office Special — This conclusion to the original British version of The Office jumps ahead three years after the last episode of series two.  Many of the folks from Wernham-Hogg have moved on (although Tim and Gareth are still there), but pretty much everyone is re-united for a Christmas party by the original documentary crew.  This 90 minute special captures everything that was great about The Office — no show captured cringe-worthy moments of painful humiliation quite as well — while also providing a lovely, emotional ending for Tim and Dawn.  

Click here for numbers 5 through 1!

Two rather high-profile new direct-to-DVD animation projects have been released recently — but are they worth your time and hard-earned dollars?  Well read on, true believers!

Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder — And so, once again, we bid farewell to Futurama.  Matt Groening’s lunatic sci-fi series was brutally cancelled by Fox back in 2003 after only four seasons.  Luckily, after several long years of waiting, the series was resurrected for a series of four direct-to-DVD feature-length animated films, of which this is the last.  While these new movies haven’t quite reached the high-points of the series’ best episodes (I’m thinking about episodes such as The Farnsworth Parabox, Roswell That Ends Well, Love and Rocket, War is the H-Word, Amazon Women in the Mood, The Bird-bot of Ice-Catraz, The Problem with Popplers, or The Day the Earth Stood Stupid), they have been very, very good.  The strongest, in my opinion, was The Beast with a  Billion Backs, in which David Cross (Arrested Development, Mr. Show) plays the alien Yivo who attempts to mate with every creature in the universe, while the weakest was Bender’s Game (as I found the extended fantasy sequence in the middle of the film to be a bit dull).

Into the Wild Green Yonder contains all the crazy zaniness, wild side-stories, and obscure sci-fi references that I have come to expect from the series.  The plot is almost beside the point, but I will attempt a summation.  The story begins on Mars, where the construction of a new Mars Vegas is disrupted by a band of eco-feminists.  Pretty soon Fry has been declared the savior of the universe by a bunch of telepaths wearing aluminum foil hats, Bender arouses the wrath of the mobster Don-Bot for making out with his wife, Leela goes under-cover with the feminists, and it all builds to a massive space-ship battle in the middle of an intergalactic mini-golf course.

The DVD is very solid — the animation is GORGEOUS, as always.  The story, despite some digressions, works well as a movie.  There are very few lulls between big laughs.  As for the ending — well, the original Futurama series was cancelled without any time to produce a final episode, so with this being the final DVD (for now, at least — hope always springs eternal that these will have proven profitable enough for more to be on the way!), fans wondered if we’d get some sort of “finale” to the over-all story.  Well, I think they got things just right.  The last scene is just terrific, with some nice closure that doesn’t close the door on further adventures.  And the very last shot?  Perfection.

If this is the end of Futurama then I will consider us lucky at being given the incredible gift of these four direct-to-DVD movies.  BUT… come-on… there’s a lot more mileage left in this series, right?  Let’s see four more DVDs!!

Wonder Woman — The enormous success of Bruce Timm’s Batman: The Animated Series lead to several other Bruce Timm-lead DC animated series: Superman, Batman Beyond, and Justice League. Marked by gorgeous animation and adult storytelling, it was intriguing the way all four of those animated series seemed to share a larger universe, with characters and story-lines carried over from one series to the next.  When the door closed on this DC Animated Universe with the end of Justice League in May, 2006, it seemed like the end of a remarkable decade of entertainment.  But soon-after, DC and Warner Brothers delighted fans by announcing that Bruce Timm would be spearheading a new line of direct-to-DVD animated films based on DC comics.  These would not be set in the shared universe of Timm’s TV shows — rather, they would each be stand-alone adventures, many of which would be adapted directly from seminal comic books, and they would be aimed squarely at adults.  Wow!  I’m sure I wasn’t alone at being overwhelmed with excitement at the thought that Timm would get to cut loose with some high-quality PG-13 animated films.

Unfortunately, the track record of this series has been pretty mixed so far.  The first project was an adaptation of the multi-issue Death of Superman storyline that made such waves back in the 90’s.  I don’t have great affection for that sprawling tale, but I was impressed with the way that Timm and co. condensed it into a pretty solid hour-and-a-half film.  Adam Baldwin (Jayne from Firefly) did terrific work as the new voice of Superman, and there was some pretty spectacular action.  The next film was adapted from a much higher-quality piece of source material, Darwyn Cooke’s retelling of the Golden Age origins of DC’s superheroes, The New Frontier.  Sadly, while there was clearly a lot of love on display in the animated adaptation, I found it to be pretty flat, missing a lot of the fun and dramatic energy of Cooke’s original work.  The third project was an anthology of Batman stories called Gotham Knight, with each short story created by a variety of different animators of wildly differing styles.  An interesting exercise, but not that compelling to me.

Which brings us to Wonder Woman.  I am pleased to report that this is a solid little adventure.  As always with these DC animated projects, the voice-cast is stellar.  Keri Russell is fabulous as Wonder Woman — tough but also able to bring a lot of humor to the role.  Speaking of humor, Nathan Fillion (Captain Mal from Firefly — I guess the casting director liked that show, huh?) is as reliably great as he always is as Steve Trevor, the pilot who crash-lands on Wonder Woman’s home of Paradise Island.  Fillion’s energy lifts every scene that he’s in, and he effectively walks the fine line between being a bit of a cad, but a lovable one.  Alfred Molina gives good menace as the villain, Ares, and Rosario Dawson, Oliver Platt, and Virginia Madsen also turn in fine work in supporting roles.

The design of the characters — the look and feel of the world — is very well done.  The design of Wonder Woman herself is particularly good.  She is strong and feminine without looking silly, and they gave her a slightly exotic look to her face that gives her a distinct, unique look, as opposed to appearing like a generic super-bimbo.  The animation is solid but not spectacular.  The film builds to a particularly carnage-filled battle in Washington, DC., which is cool, but the animation doesn’t quite sell the scale of things.  I think about an animated film like Akira, released back in 1988, that so gorgeously captured the enormous devastation that would result from the clash of super-powered beings.  In comparison to that, Wonder Woman’s final battle looks pretty small.  (Although, to be fair, so too does almost EVERY American animated film released in the intervening years!  And this certainly isn’t a big-budget theatrical release.)  I suppose the problem is that live-action super-hero films have gotten so good at bringing the world of super-heroes to extraordinarily vivid life that it’s hard for these modestly-budgeted animated efforts to compete.  For many years, these animated adventures could show us the type of spectacle that a live-action movie could never possibly capture.  But having just watched a film like Watchmen, it is now clear that the sky’s the limit in terms of what those films can accomplish with their visual effects — and these sorts of animated projects really need to raise the bar in order to compete.

I also found myself distracted by some pretty large plot holes in the film.  Who the heck were Steve Trevor and his fellow pilots fighting in that first aerial dog-fight?  After the other pilots are killed and Steve is rescued by Wonder Woman, he goes off on an adventure with her following Ares for the rest of the film.  But, um, doesn’t he have to check in with his superiors in the military, to let them know that he’s alive?  During the final big battle in DC, the President orders a nuclear strike on Paradise Island.  Cut to a missle shooting out from right over the Washington Monument.  Um, hasn’t it been established that Paradise Island is somewhere over by Greece?  Don’t we have some missiles closer to that part of the world that we could launch?  Do we really have a nuclear silo right by the Washington monument?  These sorts of lapses are distracting.

I sound like I’m being very critical of Wonder Woman, and I don’t mean to be.  It really is a nice rousing adventure story.  I really appreciated the more adult areas that the PG-13 rating allows this film to explore.  The combat sequences are pretty violent, and Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor’s banter is allowed to be a bit more risque than one otherwise might have expected.

Ultimately my disappointment is that this type of story isn’t where I wanted DC’s direct-to-DVD series to go.  The original announcement had seemed to indicate that the series would focus more on adaptations of classic comic stories as opposed to this sort of one-off origin story that isn’t based on any specific source material.  This is the sort of thing that most of the live-action super-hero films do, creating a new story that is sort of a “melange” of various bits of story-lines and background from the many years of the character’s history.  It’s not what I was hoping for from these DVDs.  (To my dismay, the preview included on the Wonder Woman disc seems to indicate that the next DVD, a Green Lantern adventure, will be exactly this same type of not-based-on-anything-specific tale.)  Where is my epic animated adaptation of The Great Darkness Saga?  Or Batman: Year One?  Or Kingdom Come?  How cool would that be?

Maybe someday…

Last week I wrote about the terrific new soundtrack collection of music from the early episodes of Batman: The Animated Series.  That got me reminiscing about that amazing cartoon series, and so of course I busted out my DVDs to enjoy a few episodes.

Several few years back, I was rather shocked to discover that one of my good friends who dug comics had never gotten into Batman: TAS.  So I put together a collection for her of several of my favorite episodes — everything I could squeeze onto one VHS tape.  A few days ago I happened to stumble across the list of the episodes I’d selected (yes, I save everything), and I thought I’d share it with you all.  

So what follows are some of the best half-hours of animated television you’re ever going to find, and also among the most perfect non-comic book depictions of Batman.  If you’ve got these episodes on DVD or on tape, then dust ‘em off and give ‘em a watching!  If you don’t, then go out and find a friend who does!!  

1.  The Demon’s Quest , Parts I & II — Batman traces a criminal conspiracy across the globe, in an effort to locate a kidnapped Robin.  Liam Neeson was fine in Batman Begins, but if you want to see the REAL Ra’s Al Ghul, check out this version, voiced by the incomparable David Warner (Time Bandits, Star Trek VI).

2.  I Am The Night — A depressed and disillusioned Batman goes into an emotional tailspin when Commissioner Gordon is shot during a botched stake-out.  

3.  It’s Never Too Late — There are no supervillains to be found in this episode — it’s just a small, personal story about an aging mobster’s fall from grace.  This is why this series is awesome.  

4.  Robin’s Reckoning, Parts I & II — Perhaps the series’ finest hour.  Batman and Robin’s relationship is strained to the breaking point when the man responsible for the murder of Robin’s parents returns to Gotham City.

5.  Legends of the Dark Knight — This episode pays homage to some of the most iconic comic book depictions of Batman over the years, from Dick Sprang’s Batman of the ’50s to Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns from the ’80s.  

6.  Mad Love — A disturbing examination of the twisted relationship between the Joker and his “hench-wench,” Harley Quinn.  Plus, Harley asks the Joker the question that comic fans have been wondering about for over 50 years.

7.  You Scratch My Back — I really enjoyed how, over the life of the series, we saw a noticeable passage of time.  This episode from late in the series’ run is a great example of that.  Nightwing (Dick Grayson, who began the series as Robin but eventually became a superhero on his own) returns to Gotham and clashes with Batman and his new crime-fighting team: Batgirl and the new Robin, Tim Drake.

8.  Knight Time — With Batman missing, Superman must fill in for him in order to prevent chaos in Gotham City.  A fun crossover between Warner’s animated Batman and Superman shows.  Watching Robin coach Supes on how to be more like Batman (”hit him!”) is a riot.

9.  Over The Edge — The show’s version of the last Batman story.  This has got to be the grimmest, most bad-ass cartoon ever aired on American TV.  I will say no more.  If you are a fan of Batman, this is a must-see.

There are, of course, so many more great episodes, but those are my favorites.  Did I miss one that you love?  Drop me a line to let me know!  In the mean-time, I think I’m gonna go re-watch a few more of these great episodes myself right now…

In 1992, the groundbreaking Batman: The Animated Series premiered on Fox.  To this day, despite some mighty competition from the last two live-action Batman movies (especially the magnificent The Dark Knight), this show still stands as my favorite non-comic book depiction of Batman, the one that is most true to the character I have always pictured in my head.  Gorgeous animation combined with terrific stories that played Batman serious and scary made the show a knock-out right from the beginning (and ensured that the episodes would be as strong upon repeated viewings over 15 years later as they were when the show first launched).

But when considering all of the elements that made Batman: The Animated Series such a terrific success, we would be remiss in neglecting to mention the magnificent music.  In support of this point, La-La Land Records has recently released a phenomenal two-CD collection of the soundtrack from the show.  Unlike most cartoons of the time, which relied on a lot of recycled music, each episode of Batman: TAS had its own original score, performed by an orchestra.  The music was masterminded by Shirley Walker, ably assisted by a team that included Lolita Ritmanis and Michael McCuiston (all three of whom have a lot of work represented on this new CD collection).  Like the very best film score, the music from Batman: TAS was a critical element in creating the over-all tone of the piece, and it is strong enough to be tremendously enjoyable when listened to on its own.

The CD begins with a presentation of the Batman: TAS main title theme, which was composed by Danny Elfman (creating an interesting and catchy variation on his theme from Tim Burton’s Batman).  We are then presented with music from eleven notable episodes from the series’ early run.  

I am not a musician, so writing about music doesn’t come easily for me, but let me try to share how much I enjoyed listening to these CDs.  What is incredible is the way each episode has its own unique themes, composed to reflect the action and the characters (heroic and villainous) featured in that particular show.

Right away a stand-out is the work on the series’ first episode, “On Leather Wings,” in which Batman is blamed for crimes committed by a mysterious and monstrous Man-Bat creature.  The Batman: The Animated Series theme is wondrously woven in to the adventurous, exciting score that the conveys the energy and action of Batman’s vertiginous mid-air battle with the Man-Bat while establishing the series’ dark, brooding tone.

Other stand-outs for me include the creepy, almost child-like theme for Harvey Dent, tracking his descent into madness as he becomes the creature Two-Face in the episodes “Two-Face” Parts I & II; the way the score  from “It’s Never Too Late” evokes the feel of the classic Warner Brothers gangster films; and the wonderfully ominous music from “Vendetta,” an episode that investigates the rather un-heroic Gotham City police officer Harvey Bullock.

I also particularly enjoyed the final track on the collection, “Music of the Bat 101.”  In this short piece, Shirley Walker gives an account of the different elements of the Batman: The Animated Series theme — how it breaks down, how the different musical components of the theme work together, and how they can be slightly varied to create wildly different effects.  This is a fascinating little bit of business, and a really fun surprise at the conclusion of the second CD.

If I have any complaint about this collection, it is that three of the eleven episodes are episodes that featured the Joker (”The Last Laugh,” “Christmas With the Joker,” and “Joker’s Favor”).  To me, those are decidedly lesser episodes of the series, and I never really cared for the carnival-esque musical themes that were used to depict the Joker and his gang.  But, on the other hand, I know some people who love those episodes, and those scores, so to each his own, I guess.

I could also complain that the episodes represented in these CDs are all from very early in the show’s run, leaving off the amazing music from so many later classic episodes (such as “Robin’s Reckoning,” “Feet of Clay,” and “The Demon’s Quest”).  But I can only hope that this means that we’ll be seeing additional, future collections, that might contain the fine work from those later episodes.

Please let it be so, La-La Land Records!  Listening to this set only confirms what I had known since 1992, that the music from Batman: The Animated Series is truly extraordinary work.  This soundtrack easily ranks among the best of the movie and TV soundtracks in my collection.

I am almost speechless.

For the past two and a half hours I had my brains pretty much blown out the back of my head by the The Dark Knight in IMAX.

This is a SPECTACULAR film.

It is dense. It is dazzling. And boy oh boy it is dark. It is SHOCKINGLY dark — not in terms of gore but in terms of how brutal it is towards all of the major characters in the film. I’ve heard people compare this sequel to The Empire Strikes Back (sort of the geek Mount Olympus in terms of a sequel), and one way the two are very much alike is that both films are not afraid to pretty much beat the hell out of “our heroes,” both physically and emotionally, for pretty much the entire running time.

This is a Batman story. And the best Batman stories, in my opinion, are the downbeat ones. But the Batman movies to this point, even the very excellent Batman Begins, have always seemed to be rather afraid to veer too far away from the happy ending. In the films we’ve seen previously, Bruce Wayne and co. always seem to be able to find fairly painless ways out, narratively, of the troubles they find themseves in. But not here. Time after time in The Dark Knight, our characters are faced with difficult situations and impossible choices, and no easy exit is presented to them. This makes for an extraordinarily compelling film.

There’s great action in this movie, no question. But this movie isn’t driven by action set pieces. It is driven by STORY, and by CHARACTER. The scenes that I can’t stop thinking about aren’t the car chases (they are awesome) or the fight scenes (they are bone-crunching). Its moments like the scene in which Batman and Jim Gordon must confront a deranged, hopeless man with a gun to the head of an innocent. Or Bruce Wayne’s dinner with Rachel Dawes and Harvey Dent. Or the Joker talking about his scars. Those are the scenes that are staying with me long after the lights went up in the theatre. And it is those sorts of intense emotional moments that propel the plot forward, rather than just fight scenes leading to more fight scenes.

Its a long movie, but I was on the edge of my seat right from the opening bank heist through to the absoultely note-perfect ending. Seeing the movie in huge, loud, glorious IMAX certainly enhanced that, but I simply cannot imagine anyone watching this movie in any sort of movie theatre not being intensely gripped by this film. I suppose some might complain that the film is too downbeat. But for me, this is the most perfect filmed realization of Batman I have ever seen. Can I say again that this film is SHOCKING? There are some narrative turns about two thirds of the way through this movie that had me absolutely FLOORED. I will say no more about that.

Instead, let me take a moment to praise the cast. As you’ve certainly heard by now, Heath Ledger’s performance as the Joker is astounding. When Batman Begins ended with the promise of the Joker in the sequel, it seemed impossible to imagine any actor trying to compete with Jack Nicholson’s iconic performance in Tim Burton’s Batman. But after seeing Ledger’s depiction of the character, Nicholson’s version seems as silly and light as Cesar Romero’s. This Joker is SCARY. I loved the look of the character. I loved the way his origin was dealt with. I loved his laugh. This IS the Joker.

Similarly, Aaron Eckhart to me IS Harvey Dent. This is not a background, wink-at-the fans cameo the way Billy Dee Williams’ Harvey Dent was in Burton’s Batman. No, Harvey is CRUCIAL to the story being told, and the way the narrative weaves the tale of his fate with that of the Joker is very clever and very powerful. THIS is the way to incorporate multiple villains into your movie, all you Batman and Robins and Spider-Man 3s out there!! Eckhart brings such life to the character, and such charisma, that it is positively torture (in the best way, of course!) watching Harvey Dent slip down the path that we know is his destiny.

Everyone else is great as well. Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and of course Christian Bale as Bats himself, are all excellent. Once again let me lavish praise on the script — not only are all these actors terrific, but each character is given a strong arc to play. Each character has his or her own journey in this movie, and none are extraneous — every one is, in his or her own way, essential to the story being told.

And what a story.

In case you couldn’t tell, I was pretty much giddy watching this film unfold. This is the Batman movie I always wanted to see. I don’t know when I’m going to see a movie next, but I know for damn sure what I’ll be seeing: The Dark Knight, for a second time.

Oh! And!! Before the movie was an AMAZING trailer for Watchmen! I am still dubious that this extraordinarily complex graphic novel — probably the greatest graphic novel ever written — can be faithfully adapted into a feature-length movie…BUT wow was this trailer stupendous. I will post a link once this beauty finds its way on-line..

As an addendum to my list of my five favorite super-hero movies posted at the start of this week, here are three super-hero movies that I consider to be tremendously under-rated:

Superman Returns — I just don’t understand the almost universal apathy or even dislike towards Bryan Singer’s Superman relaunch. I love that this film has a somber, melancholy feel to it. I love that the story creates complicated character conflicts (the Clark-Lois-Superman-Richard love tangle) that aren’t easily resolved by the end of the film. (I was SHOCKED that Richard lived through the movie — and I really respect the filmmakers for not killing him off, thus providing an easy way for Lois and Clark/Superman to get back together.) I also love reverence the filmmakers showed for Richard Donner’s Superman movie — it really tickles me all the times the movie refers to Donner’s films, both visually (the design of the Fortress of Solitude, the use of Brando as Jor-El), and in the echoing of lines of dialogue in the script (such as Superman’s “statistically speaking, its still the safest way to travel,” and the reprise of Jor-El’s message to his son: “You will make my strength your own. You will see my life through your eyes, as your life will be seen through mine. The son becomes the father and the father… the son.”) The film has weaknesses — there’s not enough action, and Lex Luthor’s plot is pretty stupid. But watch again the plane crash sequence in which Superman reveals his return to the world, and tell me that’s not a magnificent moment of pop-fantasy magic. I’d love to get a sequel to this film to see where Singer takes the story from here, so I hope Warner gets around to making one.

Daredevil – Here’s another movie that I seem to be the only one who likes. As with Superman Returns, there are weaknesses to this film, like some embarassingly dodgy CGI effects. But there’s so much that I enjoy about this movie. I love how down-beat it is. I love how the filmmakers differentiate Daredevil from a more selflessly heroic character like Spider-Man. (This is epitomized by the scene on the rooftop between Matt Murdock/Daredevil and Elektra, in which he hears someone in trouble — but when Elektra asks him to stay with her, he does. Peter Parker would never make that choice — and I love that.) Speaking of Murdock/Daredevil, I know that its a popular sport to make fun of Ben Affleck, but I actually find him to be extremely watchable as Matt Murdock. And the rest of the cast is strong as well — Michael Clarke Duncan, Joe Pantoliano, Jennifer Garner, Colin Farrell, and Jon Favreau in a terrific turn as Foggy Nelson. Although just a moment ago I criticized some of the visual effects in this film, let me take a moment to praise the clever way in which Daredevil’s “radar sense” is visualized. Like Superman Returns, this is another movie to which I’d love to see a aequel (although I’ve resigned myself that I never will), as the movie ended (with the Kingpin aware of Matt Murdock’s identity) in just the right place to take on one of the best Daredevil stories ever from the comics: “Born Again,” in which the Kingpin uses that knowledge to pretty much destroy Murdock’s life.

Hulk — As with Superman Returns, this is another film that I love for its slow, melancholy nature. Ang Lee’s movie is derided for its lack of action, but I think it has some TERRIFIC action sequences, like the Hulk’s desert battle with the army. Its just that the movie takes its time to get to those sequences. That would be a problem only if what was going on wasn’t so compelling. Again, this is a movie that is made by the strength of its cast. Eric Bana gives what I find to be a mesmerizing performance as the haunted Bruce Banner. Sam Elliott is terrifically cast as General Ross, and Jennifer Connelly and Nick Nolte are strong as well. Sure the movie is weird, and it does take some liberties with the comic continuity (particularly Bruce Banner’s father’s involvement in his origin), but I really enjoy this more cerebral, psychological telling of this story. I also find the comic-book panel scene transitions to be immensely clever.

If its been a while since you’ve seen one of these three movies — give ‘em another chance on DVD! I don’t think you’ll regret it.