"Superman: Legacy" - Review

The world is coming to terms with the existence of a supreme, powerful alien being known as "Superman" (David Corenswet), who intervened in an invasion by an ally of the United States government, courting controversy with his unsanctioned actions. Billionaire Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult) is determined to bring him down by any means necessary, aided by technology, brains and an endlessly ambitious ego. Forces collide, with the world as their battle ground, over ideologies and symbols on the line.

The movie is a good fun, a throwback to the bright, garish, colourful Saturday morning cartoons one grew up with and would associate with Superman, and in a good way it feels like those old movies and shows designed to sell toys: Lex Luthor has a detachable spaceship in his tower, there's a revolving crystal fortress, eclectic superhero trio "The Justice Gang" do battle with intergalactic imps in the background, etc. We get things like Superman discussing things with a rather excellent Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) illuminated by a battle between a neon "Dimensional Imp" and the "Justice Gang" in the night skies behind him, pretty stuff and all good fun. There's even that cute little quirk/trademark of Gunn's where he has a character (here Edi Gathegi's "Mr Terrific", a character I was unfamiliar with, showcasing Gunn's wonderful nerdy love of comic books, and here played as a genius done with life and the bullshit of idiots around him) do a creatively done fight scene well-shot, to a pop song you've not heard in years (though here the song's one I don't really like, so... great job there), and Gunn embraces the weird stuff. It feels, in some regards, very much a "Gunn Film" - harking back to his "Guardians of the Galaxy" trilogy and, to a lesser extent, "The Suicide Squad", what with its bright colours and garish pastels and overwhelming sense of anarchic glee.
The character work is strong across the board, always a strength of Gunn's:
Corenswet is endearing, wonderfully cast as Superman: he's a big joyful good boy trying to do his best, and going out of his way to save squirrels and little girls so they don't get squished in his monster battles, he dives in headfirst to resue his asshole dog (a highlight of the film, and set to become a fan favourite. Because of course he is: it's Krypto!) because "he's scared and alone". He's a great Superman, what you think about when you think of the character.
Rachel Brosnahan (fantastic name) is also marvellous as Lois Lane: she's integral to the plot, investigating and poking and solving things whilst Superman does the smashing, yet also questioning him and forcing him to confront his own actions and morality (there's a bloody excellet scene of a mockup interview between the two of them), and is not merely relegated to doe-eyed love interest or sassy quip machine, I enjoyed her very much. Her sugar scene was nice.
Nicholas Hoult was one of my favourites going in, one of the most interesting actors working today, and his Lex Luthor is suitably cartoonish, over the top, grandiose, arrogant, and a foil for all that is good in the world. He gets an excellent scene where Superman tears through his office like a hurricane and he is unfazed, and a great speech at the end about his grandiose desire for attention, humanity's need to innovate, and why he despises Superman. Lex Luthor is not "relatable": he's a billionaire who despises a man for being good. I'll save the scholarly examinatons of Superman and Lex Luthor and how they relate to current events for other blogs.

As is par for the course with Gunn: we get excellent character work even in the smaller parts, again proving the adage that there are no small parts, only small actors. Skyler Gisondo (another actor I was excited to se cast, he's great in "Santa Clarita Diet" and yet another arrow in the quiver of "Everything Gets Better if you Cast from the Booksmart Cast") is a delightfully cast Jimmy Olson, played here as a complete pussy magnet and a joy to watch, who weaves into the plot masterfully. On a similar note is Sara Sampaio (I appreciate that Gunn focuses on talent rather than names) as Luthor's selfie-obsessed girlfriend Eve, who kind of stole the show for me and got a brilliant payoff to her writing, making her more than a gag character: pictured here imprinting herself in my brain and heart forever:

Nathan Fillion shows up as Guy Gardner and nails it, the ever-wonderful Isabela Merced shows up (side note: her "Dora the Explorer" is still an all time favourite performance) for about 5 minutes as Hawkgirl and whilst I was gutted her dialogue was not entirely screeching and feral screaming she was good fun.

It's a breezy ride.
Unfortunately it is also a ride of one central paradox: it's simultaneously not James Gunn enough, whilst being too James Gunn.
I've followed Gunn's work since the start: I love "Tromeo and Juliet" and maintain "Super" is the best superhero movie ever made, hell I had him respond to me on Facebook about "The Specials" years ago. I've been in his corner forever, and so beyond happy to see him come so far and do well. He loves films, making them and creating in general. But "Superman" has been somewhat neutered of 2 of things which made him great: the anarchic blood and guts DIY filmmaking and chaos bred from the Troma mines (the CGI and backdrops and gleaming things all seem to blur together after a while), and his attention to leting emotional beats land by weaving the darkness and sorrow into the proceedings (here the characters are a tad glib and cartoony, which whilst fun does undercut it all a bit). I'm not an idiot: I'm not asking for "Superman" to be a bloodbath. The movie's constant clamouring for activity and action and fun and hijinks and jokes is never on the scale of a Marvel production (though there is a forced and somewhat excruciating joke about a Harem which feels too forced for my tastes), but it does mean that the emotional beats don't get as much of a chance to breathe. I was missing that soaring emotional high I wanted from it all in favour of fun, and it felt more like a James Gunn movie than a Superman movie in some of its dialogue, but never enough to be quite subversive. The touches were there (an alien baby so ugly it became adorable, a gang of oddballs, hints at body horror with the character of The Engineer) but pulled back a little too much. It's a good intro, and I look forward to when it can breathe properly and spread its wings.
It does well as a blockbuster and breezy fun time, its tone is all over the place, and it's a wild and crazy time. But despite my flaws and ranking of it in the middle of Gunn's ouvre (below "Super" and above "Slither"), the central messages are still good: kindness is decent, billionaires and corporations are bad, and we should (and can) all strive to be better people by remembering what makes us human. There's a lot to love, maybe too much, but it has Frank Grillo and a cameo from the golf club wielding Flo from "The Suicide Squad" too, so endeared itself to me.

"Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom" - Review

Now the king of Atlantis, and ruler of the 7 kingdoms, Arthur Curry (Jason Momoa) juggles a job he doesn't like with fatherhood and his bawdy, drinking, jock-like tendencies. An old face (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) returns, armed with ancient Atlantean technology and a burning vengeance against Curry, forcing Aquaman to team up with his brother Orm (Daddy Patrick Wilson) to seek out a long-forgotten kingdom and its magic trident.

The perfect crescendo to the "DCEU" experiment: it's bloated, hacked to pieces, rushed, overloaded with CGI, a lack of focus and underbaked storylines. It doesn't know what it wants to be about, lacks a constant throughline, and even screws up who its final villain is: tossing aside Black Manta in favour of a largely unseen Sauron knockoff with CGI backdrops and a motive which puts me to sleep. It encapsulates the whole thing perfectly.
I wouldn't know that James Wan (fond of Baroque madness and Gothic horror, and the goofy, weird side of things) had directed this unless you told me, even though Patrick Wilson gets possessed by a monster. Hell, the character development and screen time goes to the wrong character: Randall Park's Dr Stephen Shin, a henchman/reluctant ally of Black Manta who just wants to see Atlantis, and struggles with this situation he has found himself in over the course of the film, before deciding which team he is on. Honestly, that works, unequivocally: Shin is the only character I was actively rooting for, the only guy I wanted to survive and would have felt emotions about had he died, and it came close a few points. Kudos Randall, and that's a good little character.
But why is the focus on him, and not, you know, our leads? Why is it not "Tango and Splash"?
Because here's the thing:
The movie is not good, not really, but I can sort of talk myself into maybe, sort of, kind of defending it.
The props and sets (where they DO exist) are a 50s retro-futurism matching the "Flash Gordon" vibe of the first one, and there are things like an underwater fish pirate haven market, which could be a delightfully goofy mad-libs set piece.
But again, it's rushed.
On paper, the buddy cop adventures of proud, haughty, fallen-from-grace Orm and his douchebag Jock brother Aquaman should soar, and true to form those are the parts where the movie threatens to get good: Wilson and Momoa try their best with the material and the underwritten banter. If it kicked in earlier, and was the focus of the film, it could have worked. I appreciated the "what is this puny human world? Your realm lacks the grandeur of mine!" energy: it could have been the fun, campy siliness we needed. It comes together a bit at the end with a gag about trying human food.
Patrick Wilson fucking Naruto-runs in this movie, which may be the greatest thing caught on camera, and I unironically adore it, and that will be my takeaway from it: that is a little snapshot of how good the film could have been.
Dolph Lundgren and a crab-king voiced by John Rhys-Davies return in the last act for attempts at an epic, with large scale battles and "I'll hold them off!" moments, and a whole "You're alright after all, kid, maybe I was wrong about you..." part: again, holdovers from a better script, and a focus on some characters much missed and very much needed. Hell, the movie throws back to the introduction of Aquaman in the God-awful "Justice League" movie where he was shown rising from the water to dubstep, by having a FUCKING TERRIBLE dubstep cover of "Born to be Wild" over the ending credits, a throwback which I think only me and like, Wan caught. The rest of the score is nice though, there are some funky, weird theremin jams, and it feels weird and wacky.
Is the movie about Aquaman learning to be king? No, that is sort of thrown aside.
Is it about the importance of family?
Well, not really, his wife is written out, his son is a plot device kidnapped by Black Manta, and I've already talked about his brother stuff.
Is it the revenge of Black Manta? Well again, no: he's replaced by a character I did not even know was played by Pilou Asbaek until that one flashback of him in human form, not a good sign (side note: I watched "Overlord" again and that fucking rules).
Is it a wacky romp? I wish it were, it threatens to be that.
This has the hatchet of corporate mandated drama and horseshit behind it, and whilst there was never a forgotten, misunderstood masterpiece beneath it: it would have been nice to see something.

"Blue Beetle" Review

Jaime Reyes (Xolo Mariduena) has returned from college to his family, delighted to have him back in Palmera City. Unfortunately they are set to lose their home to the greed of the ever expanding Kord Industries, headed by Victoria Kord (Susan Sarandon), and Jaime's father Alberto (Damian Alacazar) has just lost his job after a heart attack. On the ropes, broke, but surrounded by love: Reyes is forced to get himself a job to support his family. The kid gets caught up in a hunt for a mysterious artefact, and adventure ensues.

This movie was just fun.
It's a bright, vibrant, 90s as hell poppy explosion of delights, all about family, fun, and the plight of migrant communities doing battle with corporate overlords and laserbeams. IT has a breezy sensibility to it, but doesn't forget the characters along the way: a lovable family surrounding Reyes, who is himself a good wholesome boy. His banter/rapport and growth with the bloodthirsty robot alien parasite Khaji Da (Becky G) is the throughline of the film and where much of the jokes and humour come from, and the payoff is exactly what you want and need and expect from this film, and it works wonderfully. I'm a big Ted Kord fan, so having his robot spout "Kickstart My Heart" is the most Ted Kord thing. That's just a cute side note.
I was told that this movie (with its odd couple boy and his robot, the lovable George Lopez conspiracy theorist uncle, fighting corporations with an old robot taken from the cave of "Batman but with ADHD" which spouts out Motley Crue songs, and its anti corporation message and sweet heart) was something I would write.
I wish I could write something a tenth as good as this.
A breath of fresh air for superhero films.

"The Flash" - Review

Crime lab technician Barry Allen (Ezra Miller) is a super-fast superhero known as "The Flash". Desperate to clear the name of his father Henry (Ron Livingston), who has long been in prison for the murder of his mother Nora (Maribel Verdu), Barry throws himself into his works. When he figures out that he can move fast enough to travel in time, he decides to prevent his mother's death from ever happening. However, these efforts backfire and alter the timeline, forcing Barry to team up with his younger self, in order to figure out how to fix things...

The story around the making of this movie has been a trainwreck not seen since the days of "Fantfourstic", and I think everybody following it is longing for a documentary/fly-on-the-wall tell all about everything which went so deeply, intrinsically south. Changes in directors, an 8/9 year development cycle, reshoots, connections to a truly dire, wet fart of an "extended universe" (our titular character showing up in one of the most cynical, messiest, compellingly unpleasant watches in recent memory, only adding to that movie's litany of problems) and the... "antics" of its lead have made for a movie doomed on arrival.
Don't get me wrong: this movie is pure product, and a reprehensible exercise in the current trends of cannibalising franchises, names and "IP" (probably best exemplified by the metaphor of Barry Allen breaking apart and vandalising a Michael Keaton Batman suit in order to make his own new costume, complete with close ups and lingering shots of it beforehand), complete with hammering of that excellent Danny Elfman score whenever Michael Keaton is on screen in an attempt to stir some sort of nastalgic high...
However, the movie is more frustrating than actively a trainwreck, in the way something like "Fantfourstic" and "Morbius" were. The opening is a key area in this: on the one hand it is some of the most nightmarish, horrifying, atrocious, rubbery CGI horror babies screaming from the void and doomed to loom and leer at me from my the deepest recesses of hellish sleep paralysis. But on the other hand, it's part of a genuinely rip-roaring, silly little adventure where our hero has to rescue a bunch of babies from being smeared on the pavement because a hospital is collapsing and the maternity ward has a hole in the wall. That kind of thing you want from a Flash movie, right down to his calorie counter being low so him having to stop to grab a burrito halfway through. The rest of the movie is at its best when it's doing that kind of thing, being silly, carefree, fun, it feels natural.
But then the plot and the tomfuckery kick in.
The 2 biggest load stones around the movie's neck are its corporate mandated profiteering, and its lead.
Occasionally Ezra Miller will actually be alright in the part, especially in parts of the time travel plot where they have to interact with themselves, showing a charm and goofiness and awkward weirdness which works for Barry Allen. But then, sometimes in the same scene, the line delivery and acting will be flat, bland, and actually atrocious in parts. It's particularly noticable early on... It's a fascinating study in contrasts for the most part, and also a shame that this is the most prominent movie with a non-binary lead in it...
Then comes the plot and CGI product.
Michael Keaton shows up, as has been plastered over the announcements and internet, as Batman once again. Oh boy does the movie want you to know it! Every appearance is punctuated with hammering of the Danny Elfman Batman theme, there are lingering shots of the suits he uses, and as fun as Keaton is in the role - okay, why? The movie makes hay about its time travel plot and its efforts to get Barry back to the modern world, and almost seems fun and interesting (the one who knows what's going on loses their powers, and thus has to guide an idiot younger version of themselves to the plot), only for it to have more of the atrocious CGI, this time that of the corpses of George Reeves, Christopher Reeve and Adam West, as well as terrible deepfake CGI versions of Helen Slater (but no Brandon Routh, poor bastard, though I suppose he dodged a bullet here) and Nicolas Cage fighting a "Thandanarian Snare Beast" (a joke which, sure, is funny to those of us in the know, but here? Jesus Christ it's out of place...) - all to the admittedly quite interesting visual idea of worlds literally colliding.

A highlight, for the 10 minutes she is allowed to be on screen, is Supergirl, played by Sasha Calle with a cool haircut. In her limited screentime she's allowed to be a more heroic, and majestic figure than Cavill was in his shitty scripts, and she deserves a better movie.

I hope she goes far.
The humour and bouncy, interesting parts are laboured by a mixed performance from its lead, and the knowledge that this was a corporate obligation (but we couldn't get our "Batgirl" movie... funny that) and another Warner Bros corporate cum-fest...
I hope that the majority of the artists involved get allowed to make art (I'm always happy to ahve Ron Livingston in things, and am maybe the last defender of "It: Chapter 2"), and wish them all of the best. In another universe (hah) there would be a fun Flash movie...

"The Batman" Review

In the city of Gotham, Mayor Don Mitchell Jr (Rupert Penry-Jones, for some fucking reason) is murdered on Halloween. His murderer leaves a riddle which mystifies the police, including Lieutenant Jim Gordon (gold mine owner Jeffrey Wright), and it falls to the 2-year vigilante Batman (Robert Pattinson) to solve the mystery, putting him into the orbit of "The Riddler" (Paul Dano, more on him later...) and his murderous plot against the worst of the worst...
Okay... So... Where do I begin?

There is a lot of aesthetically pleasing, Gothic, baroque shots which feel right at home in "Batman", and it aims for a brooding tone. Particular favourites still fresh in my mind are Catwoman dropping down into a crime scene. There is a recurring voyeuristic, almost perverse way of shooting things: lots of POV shots, characters framed through windows and the like - I like it. It's kind of cool, and it is trying to tie into a theme and idea. And there is a lot of the Batman stuff people will get a kick out of: Carmine Falcone (John Turturro, ALWAYS welcome, even in a "Transformers" movie) shows up, the story pinches bits and pieces from "The Long Halloween", "Year One", Hush" and even "No Man's Land" for some unholy reason, but I get ahead of myself.
The Batman suit, if that's your jam, looks cool enough, and is even fucking bulletproof here, and Reeves does add some fairly good fight sequences: despite a rather bravura sequence at a stadium towards the end, my favourite was the one illuminated by gunfire in a corridor head-on. In another movie it would seem hacky and out of place, but for a "Batman aesthetic" it works, even if everything is too fucking murky and dark, and not for effect. It works for a while early on, as Batman is monologuing about being in the shadows, and criminals flinch from them in a fairly fitting opening sequence, but when trying to be a mystery movie, full of clues and intrigue, you need to be able to see these clues, and hear what is going on: maybe don't have every single character mumble or growl their dialogue or (in the case of Dano, I'm getting to you) have them talk through a mask which muffles every word. They have taken the wrong lessons from "The Dark Knight Rises" and Christopher Nolan's sound mixing in general...
The Bat-Mobile I guess is a kind of cool rocket car. But it also highlights the tonal issues the film has: Batman is inherently silly, and needs to embrace that angle of it, or go full-on Goth baroque ludicrousness. There are times it attempts this (Falcone's office looks like the city of fucking Rapture, which is fantastic) and there are some flashes of brilliance (the aforementioned shots, and parts where thugs promptly shit themselves upon discovering that Batman is bulletproof, and run away) but when you throw in a rocket car chase with a disfigured crime boss called "Penguin" and have a bulletproof man ninja-kicking rejects from "The Warriors", it can throw a wrench in the class system serial killer story you are trying to tell.

Alright, I've danced around it enough. There are spoilers here (arguably there are spoilers already, but you know, Stephen King once said that a good story cannot be spoiled), so maybe make yourself a cup of tea or watch the Adam West "Batman" series or look up who Rupert Penry-Jones is... okay? Got it?

The film is juggling two or three different things, which is fine (Heaven forbid my movie be ABOUT stuff!), but its central issue is poorly sketched: the mystery of The Riddler's plot is underbaked and takes a sideline to... brooding? It threatens to soar when it has Batman solving clues at crime scenes, uncovering things that the police missed, solving riddles and the like, and encountering suspects in both guises, but these are few and far between. And tying it into "Bruce Wayne" and the "Wayne Family" with a half-concocted backstory cribbed from the Wikipedia notes for "Hush" is a bold choice which doesn't quite pay off.
There is also the issue of the brooding and the themes themselves. This isn't a Zack Snyder situation: Reeves has talent as a film maker.

(Pictured: Zack Snyder's ouevre.)
But they aren't developed, the film makers (correctly, I must add) assume that we kow who Batman is and what he's about, but instead of developing on that, assume that this takes the place of backstory. He is placed as a contrast to the cynical Catwoman (an excellent Zoe Kravitz) but his ideas and world views are not quite explored, we are only ever put into his headspace in one admittedly quite creepy scene where he creates a conspiracy board on the floor and, unkept and barely dressed, he obsesses over the puzzles with his black eyeliner still on. Again, the visuals go a long way to compesating for many parts. Some will prefer these renditions of the characters, is all I'm saying before angry Batman fans pour into my mentions (who am I kidding? Nobody reads this), but insofar as what the film is "about"? Well that's where we get a little wonky...
Dano's Riddler is attacking the wealthy and elite of Gotham. Fine, gottcha, good, I like this plan and understand this plan. Dano is having some fun with the part (when he's allowed to be in the movie, and when he's not muffled by a weird mask that makes him look like Slipknot's fan club president with the budget of 8 quid) right until the film makers tell him what they actually want:

The Riddler is a cunning, brilliant, flamboyant mastermind who wants to prove he is smarter than Batman. He is NOT the cult-like overused shitsack paint-huffing scrotum tearingly overused ballache that is "The Joker". The film makers could not fucking help themselves, they had to do it, they HAD to try and tie it all into Joker and his "deep meaning" (if I see a Batman movie which does not include the fucking Joker in any way, shape or form: I'm going to personally give that script-writer a handjob). Using "The Dark Knight" as their base (it's an inevitable comparison, I'm sorry. Please reset your clocks) has really given them some poor ideas as to what the Riddler is supposed to be...
Oh right, themes and plots and the mystery... A good mystery, I have said many may many times, you can figure out in the first 20 minutes if you're particularly clever, because the main characters have the exact same information that you do and merely look at it differently. This one... never comes together. They catch him, he's some fucking guy, he reveals his backstory as an orphan in Thomas Wayne's orphanage programme, he hates the rich. Cool. Great. Then he delivers a rather cringe-worthy "We're the same Batman! You and me!" speech in his cell-
OH I have to give this tangent because FUCK: so early on Police Commissioner Trevor from Eastenders is yelling at Gordon for allowing Batman to come onto the crime scene, and gives the really clunky line "I let you get away with this because we have some history" and I dunno, that just really made me laugh. That's the kind of shit I'd write, and there are never quite as many amazingly clunky lines as that again... it's a shame...
Anyway, they catch the Riddler, and STILL add an hour's worth of runtime because they want to have another action scene, I guess? And have the Riddler turn the city into a chaos fuelled wasteland which kills and harms the poor because... wait wasn't this about fighting the rich and corrupt? They're fucking fine mate, they've got fucking skyscrapers and live on hills and shit! And don't give me that "he's insane" shtick!
Also he's put into Arkham SUUUUPER quickly after being captured. That's not me nitpicking (well it is) but it just made me giggle. A couple of scenes are like that. I dunno it just flicks between wanting to be grim dark serious and Gothic noir, so those two styles mesh weirdly...
And in one final "Josh can go fuck himself" moment: they couldn't fucking resist.
They could not FUCKING resist it, could they?
The Joker is in this.
FUCK.
OFF.
DO.
A
NEW
THING.
Fucking Christ. And don't give me that "Sherlock and Moriarty" business - you know how many stories Moriarty was in? Fucking 2.
I've gone through a lot of nitpicking and structural issues (that entire last hour can get in the fucking bin) but if you like your Batman mythos and aesthetic, I reckon you'll like it.
Maybe I'm just sick and fucking tired of fucking "grim noir" Batman movies...
Oh, and Paul Dano DOESN'T get beaten up! That's a win!

I don't use the word "pretentious" a lot, as I find it reductive and overused (like The Joker, to be fair...) but here I think it applies.
I know that a lot of wankers are going to dislike it (Ben Shapiro has already shat out a Tweet about it) for terrible reasons, so please, in advance, don't pool me in with them: this has nothing to do with "wokeness" (whatever that even means) or "they got this costume wrong", it's my terrible thought process on a movie.
I find it kind of sad I have to state that, with how toxic discourse about movies has become...

"Suicide Squad" Review - From the Vaults

 So, "Suicide Squad..."

If this were made in the 90s (which it feasibly could have been, keeping the Will Smith character, replacing Leto with Matthew Lillard, replacing Robbie with Alyssa Milano, casting Freddie Prinze Junior as El Diablo etc) with the same plot line, style and soundtrack (give or take a few of the more modern songs), this would have been ahead of its time and pretty good.

As it stands, it's messy and clunky, with big pacing issues particularly at the start, but still fairly fun and watchable, carried by the charm of its cast and the few moments when the film is allowed to breathe. The villain is absolutely awful: They have two conflicting plans (I think) and about as many minutes of proper screen time, and I am struggling to remember a single thing about them, their motivations or their lines.

The fight scenes are fun, if also cluttered, and there are a few bright moments and colourful things going on to keep it afloat. There's a sort of funky, neon coloured graphic for each squad member with a quirky fact about them, the colour scheme is something other than black or very dark grey, and a few lines here and there do make me chuckle. Plus there is a simple joy in this sort of set up (Fiery Mexican gangster, Will Smith, annoying pop cultural void, Adewale Akkinouye Agbaje, the dude from the Robocop remake, a shitbag armed with boomerangs and a 90s anime depiction of Japan go forth on an adventure from which few of them shall return) 

Will Smith can carry this sort of part in his sleep, and Robbie makes what has ALWAYS been an irritating character into something watchable and not too grating. For every one of her gags that misfire, she has one which hits. Her arc isn't too horrific either.

Smith lands a good line every time he's required to make a joke, he's still as charming as he always is, and it's a wise move to make him the lead character. 

Joel Kinnaman, looking very much like an addled heroin addict taking on the form of a badger in a military fetish outfit, takes on the part of straight man, and has a somewhat interesting arc and pulls off his part admirably. 

Adewale Akkinouye Agbaje is ALWAYS a terrifying force of ungodly nature on screen, and it is only by his good graces that the part of Killer Croc succeeds. They're trying to go for a Drax the Destroyer vibe, but with a playful undercurrent, but most of his lines backfire, and it would have been nicer to have the man remain silent, or say some actual Adewale Akkinouye Agbaje lines. He still got the odd chuckle out of me.

I know literally three things about Cara Delavigne: she's frequently in the celebrity section of the i, she has a stupid name (both in this movie and in real life), and she is in this film. That is how much of an impact she makes.

Viola Davis actually is another who brings something to the table. Her character is unnerving and a bit of a knob, to be honest, and it's an excellent example of the true "grey area" that this film was trying to convey. I really wanted more of her.

But the star of the show, for me at least, was also indicative of the problems of the film. 

Captain Boomerang is played by Jai Courtney, and he is actually the one character (aside from Deadshot) who I'd be interested in following a movie about. All of his jokes hit, he's fun, his part is zesty, he brings humour and joy to the screen, he's an unrelenting shit-bag who brings some sort of drama to the dynamic, he carries a pink fluffy unicorn for some reason (in a quirky touch that actually seemed to fit the tone of the movie and its director) and I watched the movie legitimately hoping that he would not die (fully aware that Will smith and Margot Robbie's characters were as safe as Fort Knox) . Heck, in the final battle, he throws an ordinary boomerang at the main villain and I legitimately hoped that it would actually kill them, as that would have been pretty funny.

But he's a problem here, because he's underused and interesting. Much like Karen Fukuhara's "Katana", who arrives seemingly from another movie (and is the WORST bodyguard since Kevin Costner) only to be sidelined for everything save the fight scenes, despite being WAY more interesting than many, and her backstory about a soul-stealing sword containing her dead husband and a one-woman war on all organised crime being dropped in a single sentence. That's not something that you can just throw in there like a boomerang, that's a pretty interesting thing.

Same for Jim Parrack (yes, Jim Parrack's in this) as the henchman of the Joker, alongside a dude dressed as a panda. What's their story? I'd kind of like to know how they got to this point in their lives.

The plot has a simple set up, a definite end goal, and yet a muddled way of going about it. The gang seem to find out the power of friendship rather quickly and the introductions of the characters come thick and fast. 

But the soundtrack is good. It's not "Neon Demon" good, but is has a few gems in there even if it does have WAY too many music cues, as if trying to out-gun James Gunn. It does play "Fortunate Son", which made me happy, and there is some AC/DC in there.

It's a fun B-movie which is good for a couple of hours of entertainment. Take your brain out and watch one sitcom character (seriously, it's nice to find a movie that Jai Courtney feels at home in after all these attempts to make him a leading man)  and his buddies of varying interest go on a quest. Yes, it's a cynical attempt (more than most) to make Halloween costumes and play to success, but it's still fun.

I'll forget about it when I try to list the movies I saw this year, but it's not awful. This is certainly not (as one cro-magnon put it) worse than Fant4stic.

"Batman VS Superman: Dawn of Justice" Review - From the Vaults

"Man of Steel 2: Electric Boogaloo" is not a good movie. 

Let me have the easy jokes, please!

This is frustrating, as there is a good Ben Affleck fascist-vigilante movie in there somewhere, but it remains distant, mired by crap, like me trying to watch pornography when I haven't cleaned my glasses.

It suffers from all of the same problems which plagued the first one, only now it is a clusterfuck written (though I hesitate to use that word, more on that presently) by a fanboy, which serves only to make it insufferably smug about itself.

There is no plot, only things which happen. Yes, Fanwank Man does battle with Henry Cavill, but you have to sit through two hours of awful dialogue riddled with such heavy and blunt metaphors and clunky "wacky" references (such as Alfred referring to Batman as "A Phantasm") that when this tiny, almost inconsequential fight finally happens (though, not as a result of two characters, for there are no such things in this move, growing to hate each other and having at it, but as a result of some convoluted idiot scheme by a character I will get to momentarily) not even Ben Affleck hitting a man with a sink and delivering some of the few good lines of the movie can save it. Besides which, there is a tacked on fight with a cross between Tim Roth from "Incredible Hulk" and the alien from "Prometheus" at the end which also pads out the run time even further, in between enormous plot holes, contrivances and a complete lack of characters, arcs and any semblance of plot.

The film is like a comic book fan has taken the "coolest" panels from the few "serious" comics which are not downright embarrassing and mashed them together in an AMV whilst simultaneously trying to remake "Watchman", particularly ironic considering the director. I am pretty sure that Snyder has gone insane and believes that Rorschach and Dr Manhattan ARE Superman and Batman, as well as the fact that he can make good movies besides "Watchmen". 

The movie is dull, overlong and anemic in equal measure, but the biggest, most annoyingly glaring flaw (besides the whiplash inducing editing and fight sequences and fan wank) is, unfortunately, one of the few things I had been looking forward to:

Zach Snyder and his "Snyderverse" - Colourised.
Of course I'm joking: he wouldn't let non-white people do stuff

Jessie Eisenberg brings something to the table, in that he tries to add colour to the screen. Unfortunately, he was told to play it as Heath Ledger's "Joker", when he was meant to be playing Lex fucking Luthor. Every line from his mouth, every tic, every jolting, jerky movement and strange "eccentricity" he does are like chalkboards having fingernails dragged across them. The film grinds to a fucking halt whenever he appears on screen, which is a shame, as the character of Lex Luthor is a great one ripe for flamboyance, exploration and depth, and Eisenberg is a great actor. Unfortunately the corpse of Michael Shannon manages to be more intimidating as a villain than he does, and Tao Okamoto (who has three lines and is murdered brutally an hour in) is more interesting and threatening than he is, and also seems far more enigmatic and clever.  She and other amazing actors are completely wasted. Heck, it was only when I read the credits that I realised Patrick Wilson and Carla Gugino were in this. Diane Lane and Holly Hunter are incredible actresses, also totally wasted here (though Diane Lane still manages to carry herself with dignity, grace and pathos in a movie like this, Hunter is given virtually nothing to work with and still does her best) in favor of a grimy filter in place of us actually caring, or any real "Darkness."

However, there is one thing which sums up the cynical, horrible, pugnaciously repellent nature of a film this sneering in its contempt for the audience and the concept of fun and joy:

Senator Patrick Leahy has had a cameo in pretty much every Batman movie ever made. He is an old man who simply loves Batman and comic books, who always donates his fee to charity and is simply delighted to be there when Batman movies are made. Indeed, he has a cameo in this one (which I was searching for throughout) as a senator at the hearing alongside Holly Hunter. When this lovable old man who has nothing but love for the character showed up, I was happy, as he'd been given a cameo once again.

Then he was blown up, alongside Holly Hunter and Tao Okamoto, brutally, quickly and without any remorse. He was the last remnant of joy, a symbol of the love people have for a character or a medium and how it brings people together, and it was destroyed in a quest for "darkness", "gravitas" and "gritty realism". 

Fuck off, Snyder.