The tricep-ian directorial style of Zack Snyder.

Justice for the Justice League.

A harrowing journey from Zack Snyder’s brain to our eyes, but at long last the true vision of JUSTICE LEAGUE has been realized. And it is everything a superhero movie should be: gods and devils, bombast and quietude, punching and mind-games, good and evil, sacrifice and hope, with the fate of the Earth hanging… on a glowy thing.

the journey…

Writer-Director Snyder stepped away from post-production of JUSTICE LEAGUE in March 2017 after the suicide of his daughter, Autumn. He told Cinemablend, he was in the midst of arguing creative differences with the studio anyway, and had no energy left for that fight. “I was just kinda done with it… my family needs me more than this… and I just need to honor them and do the best I can to heal that world.” Out of respect, let’s not forget Deborah Snyder, Zack’s wife and Autumn’s mother, who also left the film. She was the producer – a heavy hand in any movie’s realization. With both of them absent, and a release date approaching, Warner Brothers brought in writer-director Joss Whedon, veteran of Marvel’s AVENGERS, not so much to deliver Snyder’s film on time, as to deliver the film that THEY wanted on time, tasking Whedon with massive re-shoots (which resulted in Henry Cavill’s philtrum malfunction – honestly, if the mustache imbroglio wasn’t leaked, no one would have EVER known). Cavill had to contractually retain a pornstache for MISSION IMPOSSIBLE: FALLOUT during the LEAGUE reshoots. So the LEAGUE digital artists painted over it. And the internet collapses over a CGI non-mustache that no one can see. Warners ran roughshod over Snyder’s vision with poor Joss Whedon caught in the middle. So let’s not pile on Joss too much – he was just doing his job… (Same excuse the Nazis made at Nuremburg – just sayin’…) And Snyder still retains the directing credit onscreen for that movie, with Whedon only credited as a writer, with Chris Terrio. Gotta admit, I enjoyed Whedon’s theatrical version – now being called JOSS-TICE LEAGUE – because we saw our childhood heroes in full flight. It wasn’t all bad. It was studio approved. Which means it wasn’t great either.

Zack stepping away from his superhero film – was a superhero move. And then, after his art was rendered as less than stellar, to return to it after such a personal tragedy to re-consecrate his vision and re-render it as mythic – proves he IS a superhero. The final title card: For Autumn.

This ain’t THE RICHARD DONNER CUT with 1981’s SUPERMAN II, another Superman movie where fan outcry prompted studio heads to cobble together Donner’s original vision 25 years after director Richard Lester made a hash of it – and it ended up just as mediocre as Lester’s – because it sometimes used test footage and cutting room fodder, but mostly because Donner was not involved. No, THE SNYDER CUT is Snyder at the helm, 80% of it previously unseen, all ORIGINAL footage – not re-shoots (so Superman has a stiff upper lip), dynamically fleshing out each character that limped flatly into the theatrical version. It’s rated R, so can be more blunt about arbitrary killing of innocents – something which I’ve always said DC movies have done better than Marvel, to highlight the LIMITS and SELF-REPROACH of super beings; there is swearing, imperiling children, cruelty to animals, nudity all up and down Wonder Woman’s thighs, the only thing missing is blackface – no wait – [Darkseid]. At 4 hours long, Snyder’s vision is a monument to what superhero movies CAN be if given the time to breathe, and also a shot across the bow to the moribund theater system that tyrannizes filmmakers into 2 hour releases; you know, so they can get a maximum amount of screenings in; with longer films, they lose income because less screenings equals less butts on seats per viewing day. So with all the new platforms for viewing movies, filmmakers – especially auteurs – need not bow to the stranglehold on their art. This epic movie proves: If you film it, they will come. But – a caveat that a movie has to be GOOD to sustain interest over multiple hours, so don’t all rush out and film 4 hour rob schnieder movies. Jesus…

In its first minutes, ZACK SNYDER’S JUSTICE LEAGUE impresses, as we see Superman dying at the hands of the monster Doomsday, yelling in agony (the climax of 2016’s BATMAN V SUPERMAN); and it is elegantly portrayed how his death cries reverberate around the world – waking three alien artifacts called motherboxes, and alerting the races who guard them – Atlanteans, Amazons and Americans.

So once again, JUSTICE LEAGUE opens with Superman, but not like the 2017 version in cutesy cellphone video for kiddies rather, depicting an elemental force whose power is so great it triggers the boxes which, we would learn, are “change machines” that sensed cataclysm in the very fabric of matter when such an extraordinary power was extinguished. Are you starting to perceive the high ground Zack Snyder is hailing us from?

– – – – – SPOILERS – – – – –

the story…

A lumpy, down-syndrome demon named Steppenwolf (voiced by Ciaran Hinds) wormholes to Earth, to collect the motherboxes that were lost here by his sugardaddy, a lumpier demon named Darkseid, the Thanos of DC (voiced by Ray Porter); originally slated to appear in JUSTICE LEAGUE 2017, Darkseid is reinstated here as the conqueror of worlds. (Also, just to be precise, Darkseid was created by Jack Kirby in 1970; before Jim Starlin created Thanos in 1973.) Not only has the silver-spiked Steppenwolf been upgraded from his X-box Liam Neeson version, he now has pathos and motivation; for betraying his sugardaddy in some way, retrieving the boxes is his penance to return home, but you gotta admit, the poor boy looks like he’s on the spectrum.

After Steppen captures the boxes from the Amazons and the Atlanteans – in battle scenes much better than 2017’s version, Batman (grizzled Ben Affleck) recruits a team of metahumans to repel him (it’s not kewl enough to just call them superheroes): The Aquaman (warrior Jason Momoa), and Barry Allen not-yet-called The Flash (hipster Ezra Miller), while Wonder Woman (salubrious Gal Gadot) recruits a man-of-steel-parts known as Cyborg (stoic Ray Fisher). But even with battle-posing as cheesy as a German cheese festival, their combined punching of Steppenwolf proves inadequate and they need the o-boy punching of Superman as well (Henry Cavill). But he’s DEAD. With Cyborg holding the last motherbox, the gang hits upon a great marketing ploy – bring back Superman. They realize that this instrument Darkseid uses for death can also be used for life – because it’s magic who cares fuck you.

After the resurrection of Superman, Steppen gets the last motherbox, and now it’s up to the gang to stop Steppen from joining the three boxes into one box called The Unity, which would destroy the planet. Hmm, three into one – how Christian of them! And just like Christianity – destroying the planet. Congruent with this evil quest for unity is Batman’s quest for unity – to unite the League.

Motherboxes are “made from a science so advanced it looks like sorcery.” Ah, Arthur C Clarke’s immortal dictum: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” – Arthur C. Clarke.

Which makes all these Braveheart scenes pointless, no? They’re charging at SPACESHIPS with horses and spears. These ships crossed interdimensional space – and don’t have rocket launchers and laser beams?

The whole film LOOKS gorgeous – the color palette is muted, and they’ve overhauled its color grading and tonal lighting, rather than 2017’s splashy rainbow – in other words, it’s lit like a drama rather than a comedy – but there’s no sense here –

So these magic dudes could make motherboxes to destroy planets – and are taken down by arrows? You couldn’t scare up the ectoplasm to throw up a forcefield around yourSELVES, dudes? The only things that SHOULD be able to get you guys are the Green Lanterns or the Gods fighting alongside the humans, with their OWN magic who cares fuck you.

But everyone is missing the big picture: Steppen and Darko are meant to be “New Gods” implying they are ABOVE mere mortals, meaning their methods should be “indistinguishable from magic.” As an analogy, the modern military is set up for punching, that is, physical warfare, when ACTUAL warfare is now cyber. We’re not in the Agrarian Age any more; we don’t have to meet in a field wearing kilts to extend our domain; wars are fought on battlefields inconceivable to William Wallace. Thus, actual gods would conquer on a level incomprehensible to mankind. But no! – punching.

Zack and DC, these are all the inconsistencies and stupidities that critics point to and call us childish. This is why Martin Scorcese says Marvel movies – by association, all superhero movies – are not cinema. We’re gonna suspend our disbelief that beings can fly and shoot beams and run faster than light, and even possess magic who cares fuck you – but let’s have some consistency WITHIN this make-believe world.

the aquaman…

“He comes on the King Tide.” (I dunno – I just love that line!) Bruce Wayne meets Arthur Curry, The Aquaman, in an isolated arctic village. Cast your mind back to 2017, Movie Maniacs – this was the first time we laid eyes on Jason Momoa’s new testosterone take on the future king of Atlantis. Lion-maned, body-painted, leather-panted, Momoa ain’t your daddy’s orange-and-green sea-queen, as he polishes a bottle of whiskey before diving shirtless into the tempest. A tragic king without a kingdom, when it comes to rebooting, Aquaman – with his Haight-Ashbury ethos and roaring masculinity – is surely the coolest reboot in superhero history. And wettest. YOU know what I’m talking about!

Johnny Depp’s domestic abuser, Amber Heard, is Mera, queen of double-standards. When Steppen fishes out the Atlantean’s motherbox, why does she tell Arthur it’s HIS duty to retrieve it? His half-brother Orm is the reigning king. Anyway, why don’t all the sea people back up their most powerful of all sea men?

the lover…

Amy Adams as Lois Lane has little to do amongst this sprawling epic – and so much gorgeous to do it in. Her poignant scenes as Superman’s love left behind, take us into her emptiness as she visits his monument, as she wakes in a lonely bed, as she meets Clark’s mother, Martha (Diane Lane aka “Why-Did-You-Say-That-Name?!” –  That meeting scene has its own problems – sacrificing real emotion for fangasm – no room to discuss here – I just wanna mention: when Martha Kent laments, “Everywhere I look I see that S” a tiny knowing smile flits across Lois’s face – we’re thinking the same thing, “It’s not an S.” It was her first real connection with the Man of Steel and now it connects us to Lois. These are the small things that make this film brilliant.)

So when Lois is convinced to move on, and she visits Heroes Park “one last time” (giving coffee to Jimmy Olsen from 1978), when she turns back to see a small figure hovering high in the sky, we FEEL her trepidation: she is bereft, haggard with love lost, weeped out – DARE she hope that THAT is the love she has just decided to leave behind? Would it not crush the soul of any human if this was a hoax?

In the Snyder Cut, Lois is not brought in as “Batman’s secret weapon” – she is there! – about to turn her back. Until she remembered, It’s not an S.

the wonder woman…

Enter Wonder Woman and her vaguely Mediterranean theme song – every time she is onscreen. Every. Single. Time.  It’s like they’re trying to wipe some other song from our memory (“…Imagine all the people…”). Her introduction is a fantastic scene, as a superhero vignette and a woman-empowering inspiration. (And notice how Snyder has crafted the shots so that we don’t get so many views of her black nun’s panties?) She stops terrorists from blowing up a bank – then she blows it up herself. Oh, but she needed to dramatically kill a bad guy, so that’s okay. A little girl asks, “Can I be like you someday?” And Wonder Woman lies to her, “You can be anything you want to be.” Are we still selling this shit? Or was the girl talking about being a murderer?

Her people, the Amazons – we feel their power. They are now not just toyt abs for us to drool over; we see the relationship of those toyt abs to their extraordinary strength and singleminded purpose. When Steppenwolf attacks the motherbox fortress, not only do they nearly bring him down, they sacrifice their lives for their queen and their cause.

The two Amazons holding up the falling rock slab so their queen might escape, and then being trapped inside as the edifice crashes to the sea – THAT is super.

But again, why don’t they help their princess in the “world of men”? Nah, just shoot an arrow at her and she’ll know what to do. I mean, you and the humans and Atlanteans all joined forces millennia ago – this new threat to your very existence isn’t a big enough reason to step outside your nunnery?

Without seeming like wokeness, the demi-god Wonder Woman is more integral to the fight against Steppen, and I do like the way he gets in her head with lies, about abandoning her homeland and placing their deaths on her head. In the end, she takes his, in Snyder’s original dynamic climax, as he tells us: “I use gods to kill gods.”

the cyborg…

Cyborg/Victor Stone was created in 1980, while the original Justice League of America premiered in 1960, with Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter, Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman, Aquaman and Flash. No one from the Silver Age grew up with Cyborg – he was retconned as a founding member in 2011, so I don’t really like the guy. [Victor: “Fuck the world!”] — I like the guy!

Victor has a … complicated relationship with his father, physicist Silas Stone (the excellent Joe Morton) – he was never a caring parent, busy with work, yet he saved Victor’s life with that work – a motherbox – but to do so, he had to make Victor a cyborg. Later, we see them gaining trust for each other when Victor creates a diversion and Silas supports him against his own scientists.

Silas would make the ultimate sacrifice for his son. And the heart-rending scene of Victor lamenting, “I didn’t save him – I couldn’t!”– which I love, showing the downside of super powers – they have limits.

Not only an orphan, but feeling not even human, the League would help Victor realize he was not broken – and not alone.

Victor is not just a simple Iron Man ripoff; in Snyder Cut we can now fully understand his role: as a futuretech hacker in this digital age, striding amongst the cyber world like a Colossus. Remember what I said about the new wave of warfare being cyber and beyond? So Zack got it right when he rebooted Victor as a CYBER-entity – the machine-man who could infiltrate the motherboxes… well, half-right, because how does Victor’s digital prowess access the magic of the motherboxes?

Uuuh, okay everyone – keep punching!

the batman…

As far as I’m concerned we got gyped out of a proper MAN OF STEEL trilogy AND a proper BATFLECK trilogy, from the two best proponents of their superheroes ever. I said it. I mean it.

And it’s sad that in Snyder Cut, Batman is actually diminished by what Snyder leaves OUT: his arc from BATMAN V SUPERMAN, of becoming more ferocious to match the intensity of the criminals he was up against, has been negated with this movie because he’s facing off against supernatural things. I hate to complain because we get to see this best combat Batman in action, but it’s not as compelling when it’s all CGI. I would have been more invested had he been fighting thugs – that’s his forte. That’s what his batsuit was built for – to scare humans – when the things he’s fighting are beyond human, they’re probably just laughing at his Halloween costume, like Aquaman does.

The 2017 film opened with Batman capturing a parademon. It was a good scene – lost here, not necessary. And I’m very sorry that Snyder removed the scene where Flash confesses to Batman his fear of battle, and Batman’s empathetic reply, “Save one!”  – but I understand. It made Batman look big and Flash look small; and Batman doesn’t need to be bigger, but the unknown filmic property Flash needs every foot of his presence right now. (Every foot – see what I did there?)

Also removed, Bruce saying, “Even if there’s a fraction of a chance…” to revive Superman, which was a nice mirror image of his rationale to kill Superman, “Even if there’s a fraction of a chance” that he would burn down the planet… And here, Bruce does not voice that Superman is, “more human than I am” which again, would have been a good arc from him regarding Superman as alien. His guilt is, after all, fueling his drive to unite the League. So yes, there WERE a few good characterizations in Whedon’s script.

fun fact…

Ben Affleck: the superhero we didn’t know we kept hiring.

An observation on roles for aging men and women: In 2006, Ben Affleck played Diane Lane’s illicit lover in HOLLYWOODLAND, where he actually portrayed the George Reeves Superman –making him the only actor on Earth to have played both Superman and Batman (and Daredevil!). Now, I love Diane Lane, but 14 years on, Affleck is still a hulking symbol of sex – and Lane is playing someone’s mother. Don’t hate ME – I’m just the observer.

the butler…

When Bruce introduces the League to Alfred, “Everyone, this is Alfred. I work for him,” that was touching. Jeremy Irons is not only the funniest, snarkiest Alfred, Bruce himself just testified to him being the brains of the operation, not just the manservant who darns his cape and butters his croissants. Obviously a veteran, Alfred stands equal to Bruce in creating tech and bringing down crime. Makes that line in BATMAN V SUPERMAN more poignant, (“We’re criminals, Alfred. We’ve always been criminals.”) WE… I mean, Alfred never said, “Who’s WE, sucka?!” I always wanted more of this Alfred, and our wishes are granted.

Then there is the moving scene of Alfred meeting Superman, removed in the 2017 version. From its music, to the staging and dialogue, everything about this controlled, integral scene screams, “Removed by asshole Warner Bros. execs who know nothing about telling an inspiring story.” From the deference they show each other, to the underlying joy on Alfred’s face, to that word, hidden in Alfred’s final line: “Now let’s HOPE you’re not too late.” It’s not an S.

the superman…

Is there such a thing as the perfect superman? Look at that face! Look at that jawline! Look at that nose! Look at that manner! Look at his flight! Look at those lats! The way he wears those bellbottom sweatpants– Look at– What was the question again?

The plot point with the largest potential for being idiotic – the resurrection of Superman – is handled much better in the Snyder Cut. It’s not a quick “Let’s do this, Scooby!” – it’s a conflict until the very last second, as the computer incessantly warns “This process is irreversible” fighting Cyborg’s override all the way.

And what was originally the absolute best scene – Superman battling the League and Flash trying to outflank him – is now just one of many great vignettes that make up this colossal movie. But why is Aquaman surprised? Superman is confronted by people he’s never met (except Wonder Woman briefly), all ATTACKING him. And they’re saying something’s wrong with HIM? What would Jesus do? Well Superman IS Jesus, so…

Shirtless Clark is calmed by Lois, and they visit his farm, to get his mind back. Then Lois does a terrible thing – she gives him a shirt.

In his short screentime, even Superman has a powerful arc. He comes back alone, afraid, lashes out. Then he connects with his love, his mother, his past, and finally, comes into full power when he joins his “family” of metahumans, the League.

Clark visits his Kryptonian ship to get – his BLACK SUIT [dun dun dah] But hold on, fanboys, this is not the Regeneration Suit from Reign of the Supermen – this is just a “black suit” – that Snyder uses here to link to Kal-El’s homeland, where everyone, if you remember, wore black. And here’s the kicker for this scene: as Clark walks the hallowed corridors, we hear two voices in his head inspiring him to Be Best – his blood father Jor-El and his adopted father Jonathan Kent, in alternating lines, preaching their truths. Russell Crowe, great in the role of Jor-El, and Kevin Costner even greater in the role of Jonathan Kent. Man, every time Kevin Costner speaks, I cry. Every time I think of the perfection Henry Cavill brings to the role of Superman, I cry. Every time I hear this soundtrack, I cry. I cry more than a grown man should.

This movie’s ORIGINAL slogan was, “You can’t save the world alone.” And everyone, including me, made the joke, “Well, you can if you’re Superman.” But in Snyder Cut, they truly are a team.

the flash…

In 2017, Barry was introduced by Bruce throwing a bat-shuriken at him. A spectacular scene, just for the sound design alone – but we go even deeper in the Snyder Cut, as we meet Barry saving the life of a young girl – she’s meant to be Iris West – Barry’s love interest since the Silver Age. As her car slams a truck and she is thrown forward, Barry smashes through a window to save her. This glass smashing is actually part of Barry’s arc – he has not yet learned to vibrate his molecules through matter. Snyder has chosen his source music perfectly, in this scene, “Song To The Siren” by Rose Betts; I noticed that the song isn’t quantized – it breathes with its own timing; Barry is so fast he can take the time to marvel at the girl’s face and hair, as the song takes its time as well – brilliant! – as he eases her gently to the ground, and her car triple-flips like a Michael Bay movie.

I love the breathtaking representation of Barry’s speed, with the arc-lightning searing the air around him – definitely some physics tied up in that, like the friction with the air molecules creating static electricity – and I love the way his body strides, tilted forward, arms swinging, really unique and cool. His quirky personality, though not canon, is very entertaining – Snyder has made HIM 80% of the comic relief, and removed a lot of the clumsy humor from other characters in the 2017 version.

Also very refreshing – we see these heroes performing small heroic deeds: Aquaman rescues one man from a sinking trawler, Cyborg fills a poverty-stricken mother’s bank account, Wonder Woman nullifies a hostage situation, and Flash saves one girl from a crash; whereas Whedon showed muggers kicking over fruit stands to represent crime running rampant in the streets, when that’s the bottom-rung SYMPTOM of the true crimes being perpetrated in high office – Snyder opts to show unfortunate people just being beaten by the exigencies of life.

Y’know, I coulda regarded JUSTICE LEAGUE as a kiddie film all the way up to… Flash. Turning back time to save the world. They got me. The culmination of Flash’s arc is the culmination of everything – As the motherboxes achieved unity – so did the League: it was Flash who yelled in their first battle, “Guys, this is NOT together!” – at the end, they are together. The first battle, Flash tripped, now, sure-footed. He was an outcast from society, now, society’s only hope.

With the resurrection scene, we saw a foreshadowing of Flash’s powers to turn back time as the motherbox rose from the liquid to meet his electric touch – didja notice that?; now…

The ticking clock runs out. The Justice League fails. The boxes annihilate creation. In that nanosecond, Barry sees the shockwave heading towards him – he once broke glass to go through it, now, he vibrates his particles so that the shockwave passes through HIM! That eerie soundtrack as Earth’s disintegration expands into the distance behind him – Tom Holkenborg’s orchestral score is a sweeping exhilaration that makes you wish you had done more with your wretched life.

And Barry runs. Faster than he’s ever run. Toward the source of the explosion, faster than light, faster than time, pulling the particles backwards, re-integrating reality.

During this arc lightning, his arc is achieved – all his life he’s been trying to make something of himself – to please his dad (the great Billy Crudup); he’s even trying to earn a law degree to litigate his father’s wrongful imprisonment. Now at world’s end, his thoughts turn to his father, telling him he fought alongside the best of the best. We were ALL this guy! Seeking the approbation of our parents, and then one day, finding that we were running toward our destiny!

In 2017, Flash pushed a truck out of the way – here, he saves Earth… KNEEL BEFORE FLASH!

epilogue…

The super man, the black suit, the punchaboo…

JUSTICE LEAGUE is told in 6 chapters and 1 epilogue with seven LORD OF THE RINGS endings, and Amber Heard speaking British. I personally think Zack blew it here. There’s too much setup for future movies and nothing of substance. I loved the 2017 ending: “All you have to do – is look up in the sky…” with Superman ripping from the ground into a sonic boom – but then, I’m partial to Superman, and I realize he did NOT play a big part in this movie, so I understand the decision.

Here… it’s touching narration by Silas Stone. Fitting, considering Cyborg’s major role.

We also see Jared Leto’s Joker (from SUICIDE SQUAD) in a dream sequence. Taking a cue from Heath Ledger, his makeup is now smeared. And fanboys, he only says, “We live in a society…” in the trailer – a phrase from a Joker meme. Then 2 cents worth of Martian Manhunter. All of this tease and setup is just conjecture at this point, because we’ve lost the two best top-tier superheroes we will ever have – Ben Affleck and Henry Cavill. Unless some hashtags can save the day.

9 STARS…

… because no matter what Martin Scorcese or Bill Maher say, a great superhero film should fulfill every aspect of what makes any NON-superhero film great – excellent production, sincere intent, compelling story, identifiable characters, nuanced performances, adult themes of existential crises, and arcs of redemption or damnation. Check. Check. Check. / Check. Check. Check. Check. And if there is sacrifice– bonus. If the soundtrack makes me weep- bonus!

It’s grand enough filmmaking to take us along for the ride once we accept its contradictory world. [aside]: Exhibit A, Your Honor: STAR WARS A NEW HOPE is in the same bucket.) Yes, there will always be fanboys complaining about SOMETHING, however, as far as DC aficionados are concerned, ZACK SNYDER’S JUSTICE LEAGUE is canon now. Warner Bros. disagrees, maintaining that, even though Snyder just proved how big his balls are, they’re still gonna throw him off all future DC projects.

Onto the next hashtag: #RestoreTheSnyderVerse.

Movie Maniacs, use the Speed Force and buy it, rent it, steal it – what I’m saying is: “If you seek his monument, look around you” – it’s the writing on the dais at Heroes Park, it is originally from the tomb of architect Christopher Wren at St. Paul’s Cathedral. Look around you, Movie Maniacs – JUSTICE LEAGUE is Zack Snyder’s monument.

KNEEL BEFORE ZACK!

END

The League of Extraordinary Superpeeps.

Nobody should come to the movies unless he believes in heroes.
— John Wayne.

An interstellar villain tries to destroy Earth, but is vanquished with punching and computer jargon, by a fresh clique of supers called the JUSTICE LEAGUE.

Batman (grizzled Ben Affleck) recruits The Aquaman (warrior Jason Momoa), and Barry Allen not-yet-called The Flash (hipster Ezra Miller), to combat an otherworldly threat; while his potential love interest, Wonder Woman (salubrious Gal Gadot), recruits a man-of-steel-parts known as Cyborg (stoic Ray Fisher). Together they beat on the supervillain called Steppenwolf (voiced by Ciaran Hinds). And then Superman (Henry Cavill) shows up, so everyone can go home.

For all the deflective advertising, director/co-writer Zack Snyder and writers Chris Terrio and Joss Whedon might have called this movie TRAILERS WITHOUT SUPERMAN; or maybe HOW MUCH YOU BENCH, BRAH? Instead, they went with the name that DC comics dubbed their second ever supergroup, The Justice League of America, honed to JUSTICE LEAGUE for millennial cred. (The first ever group of comicbook supers that banded together was DC’s The Justice Society of America in 1940. The League debuted in 1960. And for historical context, Marvel’s Fantastic Four became supers in 1961, and the Avengers and X-Men teams both started cos-playing in 1963.)

And I find it hard to fathom – what – the – hell – everyone is whining about.

JUSTICE LEAGUE, which seems to have attracted every NON-lover of comics as a critic, is a fine superhero film, Movie Maniacs! It won’t win any awards, but not only does it feature literally the greatest superheroes in world history – Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Aquaman and Cyborg – it is crafted with sincerity and humor, enough quiet interactions to humanize its gods, and enough bombast to satisfy a CGI nerd.

Steppenwolf: Born to be mild.

There is but one overarching problem with JUSTICE LEAGUE – the villain. As we all know: A hero is nothing without a compelling villain; The more interesting the villain, the more exciting the hero; Two sides of the same damaged coin; Yin and Yang… However you phrase this, JUSTICE LEAGUE is an example of the misstep of presenting a literal two-dimensional villain, thereby making all its heroes look flat.

A wormhole opens on Wonder Woman’s island of Themiscyra (featuring Connie Nielsen as Queen TouchMyBottom), and down flies the CGI villain Steppenwolf. Myriad ideas have been posited on why JUSTICE LEAGUE “fails” – from the Amazons showing too much man-ab, to Superman’s ‘stache – but it’s the not-quite-realistic computer-generated villain! Looking vaguely like Liam Neeson fashioned from runny candle wax, this Steppenwolf is no magic carpet ride. He’s a video game. It’s BEOWULF meets I AM LEGEND. DC, you idiots! You couldn’t afford one more above-the-line actor (Gary Oldman, Geoffrey Rush, Eric Bana, Dolph Lundgren, et al) to give this villain heft? Even the guy voicing this abomination, Ciaran Hinds, would have made a fearsome bad guy; instead, we get the laughable confrontation between humans and cartoon.

To make matters worse, Steppenwolf doesn’t have any compelling backstory or characteristics, except that he enjoys elocuting like Shakespeare in the Park, and comes with a big side of winged mothmen that DC lovingly calls parademons – simpleton minions that feed on fear. There is a hurried exposition on his absurd motivation: gathering three “motherboxes” that will allow him to destroy the world blah blah (although, like so many supervillains before him, he seems to have all the power in the universe at his behest even without the motherboxes – I mean, if you can take a punch from Superman and still be able to sire kids, that goes on the top of the résumé for life!). But with no foreshadowing of his reputation, without the first idea of his powers or limitations, the role itself is merely a shallow antagonist trope. There is no ambiguity in Steppenwolf, no mitigation of his evil that might turn our sympathies. He sticks the superhero landing in Themiscyra, bitchslaps a few trannies and quite easily steals the first of the three motherboxes…

Why should we care, when the Amazonians kept this coveted, planet-crushing box in an open room? The Atlanteans (Aquaman’s people) are no better, keeping their entrusted box in an open underwater room. Step two for Steppenwolf. At least the humans – who are criticized for burying their box merely three feet underground – BURIED their box!…

It is this last motherbox that Cyborg acquires, that primes the plot to reanimate Big Blue [can we get a snatch of John Williams’ epic Superman Theme? Just a snatch? No? DisaPPOINted!]– But hang on! Did the humans leave their box unguarded? Of course they did – it was buried! But if it was that easy to locate, why didn’t Steppenbro grab this one first? Or did Cyborg have to punch someone to acquire it? If so, it was so easy that the battle isn’t even shown. And if they just gave it to Cyborg, how could they know he was a good guy? Avoiding these pertinent questions, Cyborg just lands with it, and the League rendezvous at Bruce Wayne’s bat-mansion to have coffee over it.

After finding that punching and flashing and wondering and batmobiling and aquamanning and borging are not curbing Steppenwolf’s steppin’, Batman lightbulbs on a great marketing ploy – bring back Superman! The same conscience that caused Batman to attack Superman (in BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE) is now eating away at him; he harbors the guilt of destroying a person who was “more human than me.” And DC can sell more dolls.

The League’s debate over using the otherworldly motherbox to resurrect the man from another world, reminds me of that discussion in STAR TREK IV to “slingshot around the sun to travel back in time.” That science-y TREK debate went something like, “blah blah slingshot around the sun to travel back in time” and someone said, “Why, that’s crazy!” and someone else said, “But it just might work!” and they did it and it worked and everyone was happy. In JUSTICE LEAGUE, the conversation was much more realistic, and went something like, “blah blah use the motherbox to bring back Superman” and someone said, “Why, that’s crazy!” and someone else said, “But it just might work!” and they did it and it worked and everyone was happy.

It’s ironic how Bruce, arguing to bring back Superman (even against Barry’s caveat of turning into PET SEMATARY), says, “Even if there’s a fraction of a chance that it might work, we have to try,” for that was his exact reason for killing Superman – the “fraction of a chance” that Superman might destroy Earth. “The world needs Superman, and the team needs Clark.” That would be Superman’s alter ego, Clark Kent… you know, the guy who DIED in the last movie. Since Clark doesn’t interact with society in this film, the explanations of his return to life can be left for another sequel. And his dolls weren’t selling anyway.

Now here is an example of the “Interesting Villain” clause in action: When Superman is resurrected (like Jesus!) he is discombobulated enough to attack the entire League, thereby making him the villain for a few moments. Why is this segment compelling? No, not because Henry Cavill is shirtless, but because Superman is an interesting villain – more interesting than as a hero, even! – and the League superheroes (called “meta-humans” by Bruce, because – street cred) seem more relevant when trying to quell Superman’s anger at being woken, even if they are ineffectual against his awe-inspiring might.

One of the coolest scenes is when Superman grabs the whole League by the pussy, and Flash ramps into super-speed to try to outflank him… and we see Superman turn his head to follow the Flash! Such POWER that makes even a cucumber… moist.

Superman. Clean shaven.

JUSTICE LEAGUE opens on Superman. Cellphone footage, with excited kids asking him questions. Here’s a prime example of another reviewer going overboard derogating this movie for the sake of being kewl. Reviewer writes that Superman comes off as aloof and doesn’t interact well with the kids. No such thing! Superman coolly answers their questions (describing the symbol on his chest as “hope”), and when they ask him, “What’s your favorite thing about Earth?” he gets a faraway look, and we are allowed to substitute anything we want (Lois Lane, his job, Lois naked, the yellow sun, Lois moaning, Chinese food, Lois in doggy position, Paris coffee, Lois choking on his—it could be anything!), and it cuts away before he can answer. That’s good storytelling! However, Reviewer read that look as ‘…a somber Superman that makes us yearn for Christopher Reeve.’ You’re an imperceptive tool, Reviewer. I just wish I remembered your name.

And why this sudden love for Chris Reeve? He cut a fine visual as Superman, yes, and he was a tireless activist, and his life ended tragically, but don’t imbue him with qualities that are demonstrably absent. Remember all those jokes about The Man of Wood? 40 years later, he’s Olivier?

Movie then cuts to a world devoid of Superman. After his death in BATMAN V SUPERMAN, giant black banners bearing the “S” symbol adorn world landmarks (giving hope to fanboys that they might see Superman return in his seamless black ballet outfit and rock star mullet). Crime rages in the streets – and once again I will thunder that I DETEST the way “crime” is represented by movies like this: thugs being arrested and tipping over fruit crates in their anger; as if “crime” is these small-time hoods, when these are the bottom-rung symptom of the true crimes being committed by people in high office. A world without hope. Because of thugs in the streets. Not because Russia tampered in American elections, and the president committed high treason, no.

The first hero shot is a low angle upskirt, showing us Wonder Woman’s glorious black nun’s panties. (What was that again about empowering women?) A re-introduction to her powers as she saves civilians with her bracelets and super-speed, and prevents terrorists from blowing up a bank by kicking them sensually.

Aquaman is no longer for the fishes. He’s for the laydayz!

Then we see Bruce searching the arctic wasteland for Arthur Curry, “the Aquaman.” The best line: “He comes on the King Tide.” (I dunno – I just love that line!) Lion-maned, body-painted, leather-panted Jason Momoa ain’t your daddy’s yellow-and-green sea-queen, as he polishes a bottle of whiskey before diving shirtless into the tempest. When it comes to rebooting characters, Aquaman – with his Haight-Ashbury ethos, quindent (not trident!), his haughty derring-do and laughter in the face of overwhelming odds – is surely one of the coolest in superhero history. And wettest. That means YOU, ladies!

Then another great scene, done to death in the trailers: Bruce visits young Barry Allen’s man-cave and throws a bat-shuriken at him. Barry steps aside and plucks it out of the air. Listen to the sound design on this scene alone – sparkling steely shinks and crackling electricity. (Or the sound design on Cyborg walking, or the snippet of Danny Elfman’s Batman Theme when Batman appears to Gordon; throughout, this movie’s sound and music are pitch perfect.)

And the representation of Barry’s super-speed is breathtaking! An aspect which filmmakers got so wrong with Jeff East running alongside the train in SUPERMAN, the Flash’s running scenes here are accompanied by arc-lightning searing the air around him, the scarlet speedster himself tilting forward in dynamic-momentum slomo, which gives the impression he can travel much faster than Evan Peters’ Quicksilver. Flash’s quirky personality, although not canon, is very entertaining. They’ve made him post-teen (in direct competition with his ambiguously-gay TV counterpart), and he’s not a forensic scientist – he’s some kind of millennial nerd just discovering his powers, although I don’t know why they had to mess with his sleek comics costume and make him look like a Transformer.

The Flash: faster than a teening bullet.

Flash confesses to Batman before a fracas with parademons, that he is not ready for battle, that he has only “pushed people and run away”; it makes for the most poignant moment in the film, when Batman, ever the tactician, quickly gives Flash a purpose. In that gritty voice: “Save one.” That’s how heroes begin. “Save one person. Don’t talk. Don’t fight. Get in. Get one out.” He really heard Flash. It gave Batman’s character such empathy and heft.

Billy Crudup as Barry’s dad, Mr. Flash. In jail. Canon. Another solid aspect of this film is how they tie up all these minor characters in the end.

Cyborg/Victor Stone (a character created in 1980) was not in the original 1960’s Justice League (and retconned as a founding member in 2011), and I don’t care much for the character, but I understand the marketing reason he is here – for the Iron Man demographic. Doing double duty with the minority demo. Nice seeing Joe Morton (who died after creating Skynet) as Victor Stone’s father, Mr. Cyborg. Trying to keep his son alive by using the motherbox, he only succeeded in turning Victor into a cyberfreak. So Victor also fulfills the Spidey demo, by being a troubled youth (“Ever since Superman, people have been waiting for the next alien invasion. Now I gotta wonder if I’m it.”) He discovers various powers as he goes, like a constantly upgrading iPhone.

Amy Adams, as Superman’s love, Lois Lane, has so little to do and so much gorgeous to do it in. There is no time to re-establish her as investigative journalist, or even to visit with Perry White and The Daily Planet. Adams merely fulfills the role of pining girlfriend, and secret weapon to stop Superman angrily grabbing the League, to romantically grabbing hers. And I think they filmed all her scenes before Hair and Makeup could even smooth out her bed-head. Her scenes with Supes are short but poignant, and it almost seems Adams is way too talented to be “wasting” her time on a superhero movie – but her depth and crystal sotto voce lends weight to the romance. She is also the link to Superman’s mother (Diane Lane), whose reunion with her son is touching.

J.K. Simmons takes time off from abusing musicians to play Commissioner Gordon like a tight snare. (He was already J. Jonah Jameson in Raimi’s SPIDER-MAN movies. Shouldn’t there be some rule that if you were already in a Marvel movie, you can’t be in a DC movie?) Aren’t there any other actors to hire? If you want the fucking part, earn it!

“Trying to please these fan-dorks is a mission impossible…”

One of the minor characters is a major player: Bruce’s liege, Alfred (Jeremy Irons). His few lines are profound, and I wish we had time for more. Maybe he could have reminded Batman of that batsuit with the glowing eyes that made him as strong as Superman, which would really help right now with Steppenguy. Is it at the cleaners?

The most minor character is actually the Justice League’s greatest villain in the comics, and is relegated to an Easter Egg mention by Steppendude, “For Darkseid!” simply for fanboys to gush over. Who else would be aware of this hulking New God (the analog to Marvel’s Thanos) except people who attend the theater with wraparound Steppenwolf horns?

For a movie that seemingly moves at breakneck pace, there are many heartfelt moments between the group’s members. Barry and Victor actually dig up Superman’s coffin, with Barry trying to get a fist-bump, which Victor denies him. During the final hero shot, Barry gets his fist-bump; it’s not highlighted, simply another small detail that the film gets right, and that its critics will never be attuned to.

Wonder Woman/Diana does the old “tending-wounds-intimately” scene with Batman, where they philosophize over lost loves. However, whatever sexual position Bruce is cultivating with Diana is shredded when Superman appears, and Diana is the first to gush, “He’s back!” All talk of her lost love (Steve Trevor from WWII) is forgotten, as this super woman realizes the only person who can properly pound her is a super man, and her eyes go directly to the place where he now doesn’t wear panties.

During the League’s darkest punching hour, Superman appears with the cheesy line: “I believe in truth… I’m also a big fan of justice.”

When Batman sees this, he spurts a little in his tighty-blackies.

Possum codpieces and black nun’s panties – a winning combination.

As soon as the man of steel addresses the problem, it is resolved within minutes. This includes: saving civilians, preventing the motherbox from melding three-into-one (how Christian of it!), and defeating Steppenwolf. Quod erat demonstrandum. This movie’s slogan is, “You can’t save the world alone.”

Well, you can if you’re Superman.

And in modern film, his powers can be depicted as the most breathtaking we’ve ever seen. Every time he takes off, there is a sonic boom as he disappears in a haze of blue blur; his flying is seamless, his strength simply awe-inspiring – as when he shows the youngster Flash how it’s done, by carrying a building full of people, as Flash saves just one van-full.

But what’s the big deal with his mustache that no one can see? Poor Henry Cavill had to contractually retain a giant porn-stache for his role in MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 6, during reshoots of JUSTICE LEAGUE. So the LEAGUE digital artists painted over it. And the internet collapses with this news. And critics sacrifice their viewing pleasure to gaze intently at Cavill’s philtrum to nitpick single frames… Go on. Stare all you want. You’ll get so bored trying to find fault with Cavill’s perfect features, you might even start paying attention to the movie again. If it weren’t for the studios leaking the mustache imbroglio, no one would ever have known!

One of the two post-credits scenes features my two favorite supers: Superman and The Flash. They both gots to know… as they take their marks on a deserted road…

JUSTICE LEAGUE’s faults are more to do with expectations than lack of quality or fun movie-making. The plot is simple, the villain unremarkable, the story sometimes lacking in logic and depth; however, the movie itself features the greatest incarnations in filmic history of the superheroes of DC’s Golden Age, taking every aspect into account, from the production design to the performances, from the casting to the special effects.

Different age groups will have their faves – Kirk Alyn’s 1948 SUPERMAN, Chris Reeve’s 1978 SUPERMAN, Michael Keaton’s 1989 BATMAN, Christian Bale’s 2008 DARK KNIGHT; with television lagging far behind, with Linda Carter’s 1975 WONDER WOMAN, and John Wesley Shipp’s 1990 THE FLASH; with Aquaman and Cyborg never represented on the silver screen until now – but we arrive at a pinnacle in movie history with JUSTICE LEAGUE.

Cavill, with his angular face so like Reeve’s and his body built by Adonis, purveys the nuance and silent majesty of a being that can crush a planet, with creative flying scenes and mega-human power that packs a visceral punch; Affleck has shown his vigilante’s violent tendencies and a poignant side, as well as the most muscled bulk of any Batman, and tech that only a billionaire could possess; Gadot’s Wonder Woman charged onto the silver screen with female empowerment and tritones screaming, power like a goddess and thighs to match; while Jason Momoa rips apart the conventional image of the fey fish-talker to slam down his rambunctious brawler – He comes on the King Tide!; and only with modern computer graphics could we begin to visualize the surreal time-warping ultrasonic velocities of Ezra Miller’s fastest man alive.

It’s for those of us who believe in heroes, Movie Maniacs!

JUSTICE LEAGUE ends with narration that brings a tear to my eye, telling of:

“…heroes, to remind us that hope is real.
All you have to do…
is look…
up in the sky.”

Oh god, I nearly did what Batman did.

END

Okay you guys, bring it in for that group shot– oh, Hulk, didn’t expect to see you here, babe; how did you even read the call-sheet? Liz honey, less ass, more side-boob, okay? Oh, and Quickie, babe, don’t look so dangerous. You can run fast, honey – not dangerous. Thor, more tricep. Will Iron Man and Captain America PLEASE GET YOUR MASKS ON? You’re superheroes – not astronauts! Vision? Where’s Vision? Someone go get his interdimensional ass out of bed, will you? Cap, lose the shield, you’re covering the pearbottom responsible for the funding. Uh, Hawkeye, face the camera son, there’s only so much introspection we’re gonna buy from Marvel’s least lucrative property.
And will someone tell those robots to clear the shot?!…

Blammo Brigade finds Intelligence. Artificially.

AVENGERS: AGE OF ULTRON is not just your same ole blammo-fest with sugarbottom; merely the second movie in the AVENGERS franchise, ULTRON has moved leaps and bounds beyond its predecessor. Yes, there is blammo, but interspersed liberally with morally ambiguous characterization, tentative romance, quiet introspection, self-effacing humor and – that trend in modern plot devices – Artificial Intelligence. Oh, and there’s Vision – but we’ll get to that magnificence in a moment… Dare we call this movie a dark symphony? Ooooh, dare, dare!

The Avengers, once again consisting of a god, a titanium-armored physicist, a serum-enhanced soldier, a gamma-irradiated indestructible geneticist, a thigh-kwon-do espionage agent, and a guy who can aim real good. They will soon be joined by a hex-wielding empath and a guy who can run real fast.

Behold… The Poffy!

Like X-MEN developed into The Continuing Story of Wolverine, AVENGERS is merely The Continuing Story of Iron Man aka Tony Stark aka Robert Downey Jr. (They’re all the same person, right?) All the other Avengers’ roles may as well be extras who punch real good. There’s Thor (Chris Hemsworth; someone wake me when this thunder god decides to use his full powers), Captain America (Chris Evans; throw shield, flash dreamy eyes, punch, repeat), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson; just back dat pearbottom up, darlin,’ don’t say a word), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo, the old dog, enters the cast and steals Widow away from Cap), and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner, who is fleshed out here with mature backstory… TMI, Marvel Studios, T-M-I!). They will be joined by Russian twins, Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen, adding schoolgirl skirt to the pearbottom quotient; aka Wanda Maximoff, not really known as “Scarlet Witch” except through our a priori comics knowledge), and Quicksilver (Aaron Taylor-Johnson, also never called by his “superhero” name, but Pietro Maximoff).

There are also fun cameos by Idris Elba (as Heimdall, THOR), Stellan Skarsgård (as scientist Selvig, THOR), Andy Serkis (as a weather-beaten underground arms dealer), Anthony Mackie (as Falcon, CAPTAIN AMERICA: WINTER SOLDIER) and Don Cheadle (as War Machine, IRON MAN 2). Samuel L. Jackson is Nick Fury, Cobie Smulders picks up a pearbottom paycheck, Thomas Kretschmann is a HYDRA villain and Stan Lee is – Stan Lee.

But Stark is the one to watch, as he tips into megalomania, and creates the Artificial Intelligence “peace-keeping program” called Ultron, the supposed villain of the piece. (Wait! Didn’t Hank Pym create Ultron? –Get thee behind me, Comics Dweeb!) But if Stark is responsible for the creation of this “villain” then rightfully, ethically and technically, he is the villain. (Don’t blame the children – blame the parents.) He admits this himself in a soul-searching moment, “I’m the man who killed the Avengers.” But audiences will never grasp this nuance – not least because of the way Western moviemaking has conditioned us to regard any ambiguously moral “hero” as a “tortured genius” rather than an actual villain. Movie villains were easy to identify when they were mad scientists using blue bzzz things to make monsters, or Bond nemeses with designs on bettering the world through their fascism… It seems like a billion dollars, cars, chicks, quips, and hi-tech titanium armor will mitigate that “mad scientist” or “evil leader” tag to “playboy billionaire.” When all Tony really is – is an update of that age-old Dr. Frankenstein/Ernst Blofeld trope.

“By Odin’s blood, my knackers are sweaty! I need to change my skirt.”

Like any good leader who wants “peace in our time” Tony has turned fascist, with his ranting that he has “no time for a town hall meeting with the Avengers! I don’t want to hear the ‘man-was-not-meant-to-meddle’ medley; I see a suit of armor around the world.” At film’s opening – besides the cheesy/stock action sequence that would pull all the Avengers into a dynamic/wanky single frame – we see Tony’s cool Iron Men drones policing the skies. Even if it’s for peace, well, that’s one man’s version of peace.

Tony unilaterally unleashes Ultron (voiced by James Spader like Vincent Price reborn), who is a computer program, and represented physically by an 8-foot tall golden robot. Being an app, he can travel amongst the web and into innumerable other robots – cue Tony’s Iron Men drogues – so his ideology can be in multiple beings at once. The story is written and directed (by Joss Whedon) in such a way that Ultron becomes conscious by himself after number-crunching J.A.R.V.I.S., Tony’s supercomputer, but again, don’t let Western filmmaking fool you into giving Tony a pass.

A naked Iron Man shares a romantic moment with Ultron.

Being a “peacekeeping program,” Ultron comes at us with the line, “I’m here to help,” like the thoughtpolice in Orwell’s 1984, or like Republicans shilling for the Koch brothers while cutting your benefits and telling you it’s an improvement. Ultron takes “peacekeeping” to its logical end, using his A.I. reductive reasoning to discern that Mankind has to go. He means, like, totally. Poffy concurs. Mankind is now the Earth’s problem, not the solution. With the propensity for birthing more offspring than are being allowed to die, it’s not even Man’s miniscule augmentation to “climate change” that is destroying the Earth; nor his wars or reality shows; rather simply, overpopulation and its attendant logistical survival problems (which is why there is widespread poverty), which include raping Earth’s resources, making it unpeaceful for all life. That, and his CONFOUNDING STUPIDITY.

Tony’s mission statement is later repeated by Ultron – “peace in our time.” If Ultron was intentionally “evil” then it would be a sarcastic jab at Tony, but if Ultron sincerely believes that eradicating humanity will bring peace, then it is just a courtesy reminder.

Every synopsis you read will claim Ultron is the “villain” but he is NOT. He is an A.I. that runs a scenario to its logical conclusion and determines organic life is pointless because it ends in death. (Life is a means to an end – merely serving to propagate genetic material across lifespans). Humans are organic and they actively destroy all life as well. In the name of peace on Earth, they deserve extermination. Sagan and DeGrasse Tyson might remind us we are the same molecular material circulating as starstuff in a closed loop of unending beginnings. All nihilism aside, we’re still pointless. Self-awareness makes us erroneously believe in “purpose” but that’s debatable if the ultimate denouement is death. And reality shows.

When Computer Graphics fight, we ALL lose.

Though AGE OF ULTRON raises A.I. issues (to its credit), it merely scrapes the surface, rather than dive into intricacies (like EX MACHINA, THE MACHINE, or even CHAPPIE), to make way for blammo. And pray tell, the punching stylings of our supers need to be revisited from time to time to keep the Attention-Deficits in order. (That whole Iron Man/Hulkbuster sequence has got to be the most superfluous piece of eye-jiggering diabetes-candy since the last TRANSFORMERS debacle disguised as a movie. A friend suggested a title for this review: “Age Of Dulltron,” and Lord knows, I’m tryin’ Ringo, I’m tryin’ real hard to be the shepherd and make you the righteous movie, but with this collateral damage-fest, maybe it means that you’re the weak, and that CGI is the tyranny of evil men…)

So to the movie’s discredit, the A.I. element is simplistic. The Avengers tell Stark, “Ultron can’t tell the difference between saving the world and destroying it. Where do you think he gets that?” implying that A.I. is “bad” “evil” “contra humans.” (Almost like the JURASSIC PARK series misrepresents carnivorous dinosaurs – a natural cog in any ecosystem – as “evil” villains.) But how can any kind of “Intelligence” – artificial or otherwise – be villainous? Well, here it is, personified by the mechanical man with the faux-British accent, quoting the bible and Pinocchio in equal jest. (He loves his fantasy books, that Ultron!)

To be or not to be: that is the Vision.

Then, riding a bucking steed of electric lightning, comes… VISION!

Oh Captain my captain. Oh Vision my vision! J.A.R.V.I.S. and an Infinity Stone had a baby and his name was – Vision. (Wait! Wasn’t Vision created using the brain patterns of Wonder Man? –Get thee to a nunnery, Comics Dweeb!) Vision is Paul Bettany, eternally the voice of J.A.R.V.I.S., at last joining his actor cohorts in outlandishly colorful tights.

And he is uber cool. He is Mr. Ice. He is The Breeze.

With powers beyond imagining, wisdom beyond comprehension, and hued in deep purple like Jon Lord – so he must be a god… Martin Luther King should have said, “I have a Vision.” Survivor should have serenaded Rocky with “Vision Of The Tiger.” That guy cured by Jesus should’ve shouted from the mountaintops, “I was blind but now I have Vision!” He’s aloof, soft-spoken, incorruptible, inscrutable, all-knowing, all-powerful, the zero-Kelvin coolest Marvel cat of all. That scene of Thor, Iron Man and Vision in a line, like a rock band at a row of mics, all beaming power rays at Ultron – now that’s what superhero movies were made for!

I need to put my pants back on.

The key to Marvel’s and DC’s success in bringing “childish” superhero tales to modern masses is not so much the fantastic production values (although that doesn’t hurt), but moral ambiguity; less delineation between good and bad, right and wrong, evil intent and good intent gone awry. Rather than portraying outlandishly-garbed two-dimensional do-gooders foiling bank robbers (remember Kirk Alyn’s 1948 SUPERMAN and George Reeves’ 1952 series, foiling “crooks” in hats?), these are adult adventures with some blammo thrown in for the kids who can’t spell moral ambiguity yet (that would be everyone in America up to age 35).

Though Marvel has left DC in its dust with this “Marvel Universe” cross-pollination of movies (as opposed to DC’s oft-promised/ill-fated/off-grid JUSTICE LEAGUE projects) it’s time to go the whole hog and renounce this constricting PG-13 rating (I know it’s for box office reasons, but box office desperation can be mitigated with less outlandish salaries, less intrusive advertising/tie-ins and less unnecessary CGI), and move these summer tentpoles to a heavier grit with R-rated conundrums. These protagonists are already dealing with moral ambiguity, searching for the best way to be right in a world that is always wrong. Extend that to casual swearing and innocent deaths, and we’ll have real emotional powerhouses on our hands – movies that can probably win some of those hedonistic, hubristic, suckhole awards you people are always giving to the wrong recipients.

Many bystanders die in this movie, but it’s not graphic and it’s implied; disguised by the colorful action and quips and cutaways. You think not one solitary soul was killed or maimed in that Iron Man/Hulk battle? You think not one citizen just fell to their death when a whole city was levitated by Ultron and people were trying to evacuate in a panic? A car with a family in it goes over the edge and Captain America tries to hold it, triceps thrumming, dreamy eyes fluttering in anguish – but he loses it!… In slomo it falls – but no worries, little kiddies, suddenly raising it from below is Thor… everyone happy and gay. Goddamit! Show them lose a few people now and then, for the emotional impact. It would highlight the toll these heroes have to bear every time their vaunted powers do not necessarily fail, but are simply inadequate to deal with the enormity of the problem.

Sensing danger, Scarlet Witch
quickly pushes out her breasts.

Hawkeye says to Scarlet Witch: “If you go out there, you fight, and you fight to kill.” Let’s break it down: Wanda Witch has truly super powers – she can warp minds and shoot frickin’ laser beams out of her hands. (Her hex powers are represented very dramatically with her “Dracula hands,” ramped film and vermilion contrails. That schoolgirl skirt is just gravy. And that sugarbottom is dessert.) First of all, why would she be hesitant in killing things that are trying to kill her? I guess Hawkeye’s warning illustrates it’s not just the power – it’s the WILL to use it judiciously. The movie is hinting at that heavy emotional burden spoken of above, but it doesn’t follow through – because these robots she eventually burns down are just electronic drones; they’re not organic beings, or unwitting followers of a duplicitous leader. She might as well be hitting Ctrl+Alt+Delete.

Prime ass (as in assassin) Natasha flirts with Hulk. It’s official: bigger is better. But the movie will surprise us with its tragic denouements and unresolved throughlines. Marvel Universe offers us a myriad of upcoming films where fates will be decided (not to mention contracts merged, agents baffled, and Spider-Man traded like a baseball player).

In any media where humans are on the verge of being wiped out for their CONFOUNDED STUPIDITY, there is always always ALWAYS that Cringeworthy Speech No.5 that mitigates our idiocy. Unfortunately, it is Cool McCool Vision delegated to deliver that numbnut speech here: “Humans are odd. They think order and chaos are somehow opposites and try to control what won’t be. But there is grace in their failings.”  By definition, there is NO grace in failing – that’s why it’s called failing. And failing so calamitously so often means we are NOT worthy of being alive, much less presuming ourselves “rulers” of this planet, for which we are not even “stewards” or “butlers” rather a virus that is wiping out other life forms to the detriment of the ecosystem. Kill us. Kill us NOW, Ultron!

By the way, Mr. Ultron, if you really want to kill all humans, there’s no need for this much punching. The Avengers don’t ever need to be hit even once with all your Iron Man clones. They can band together and punch to their heart’s content (and there’s a very cool group sculpture of them doing just that during the end credits) but there’s a much better way to wipe out humanity. (I’ve advised Mr. Terminator and Mr. Decepticon on this exact same method – none of you dopes will take my advice.) You’ve got access to every computer system on Earth. Simply… shut everything down… and watch Mankind fall to its knees after five minutes of not being able to access their bank accounts, their launch codes, or a reality show.

If some writer would come up with an intelligent storyline (artificial or otherwise) that doesn’t insult our intelligence, now that would be a… VISION!

END

A ‘verse not big enough for Joss Whedon’s ideas.

Up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane!…Well, it’s kinda both. It’s a goose-shaped spaceship called Serenity.

Space cowboy and Gale Harold lookalike, Nathan Fillion, leads his hip crew of lovable space brigands, as they ricochet around the galaxy, avoiding government spooks, mutated killers and references to STAR WARS, onboard the Firefly-class spaceship called Serenity.

SERENITY is the big screen version of the small screen series FIREFLY (unfortunately cancelled after just one season). Written and directed by Joss Whedon, it’s bold and brash and throbbingly original even as it pulls every trope from the science fiction and action thriller handbook.

SERENITY is not exactly stand-alone. I find that every angle I come at it – as an objective observer, as a fan of good science fiction, as a fan of morally ambiguous characters – for SERENITY to work, there is that necessary connection to the bigger universe (nay ‘verse) of the television series which fleshed out these characters before we ever met them in Moviedom. If you’re coming to Whedon’s space opera blind, there is the tendency to ask: Just who are these people and what do they want with my willy?

Fly on, free goose, fly!

Movie opens at Exposition Central: a recap of Earth-That-Was and the global war that drove Earth into terraforming outer planets. Now if this movie had stayed with the theme of planetary conflict and played our outlaw heroes against that backdrop, subsisting on contractor guerilla jobs while serpentining across the galaxy to avoid capture, that would have continued the enjoyable dynamic established in FIREFLY. Instead – River Tam (Summer Glau).

River’s mind was a government experiment. She’s a psychic, or empath, or whatever the street cred term is now. Rescued by her brother Simon (Sean Maher), they are both passengers/fugitives onboard Serenity (he is also the ship’s doctor). Over the course of the TV series, Whedon had plans to gradually unveil River’s grand arc, and since the series was cancelled, he chose to use this 2-hour swashbuckler to finalize that arc, skewing the attention away from the other lovable characters. And it’s distracting. Because we realize all the characters’ motivations, actions and reactions are driven by River’s presence and ultimate “purpose,” whatever that is. (Now that’s not necessarily a bad thing, but we are definitely sacrificing other fun dynamics, that we relished in the series). The actual “heroes” are playing second fiddles! – Fillion as macho captain Malcolm Reynolds (Mal), Gina Torres as lethal first mate Zoe, Alan Tudyk as insouciant pilot Wash, Jewel Staite as cutie engineer Kaylee, Adam Baldwin as mercenary muscle Jayne. Even the sexual tension between the “companion” aka prostitute Inara (Morena Baccarin) and Mal, which had the tensile strength of Golden Gate bridge cables in the series, is downplayed in this movie so we don’t get tangled in subplot. Sure, all the characters get their time in the sun, but everything they do is predicated around River.

“I have commanded it! Now go – from my plastic set which screams Afternoon TV Series…”

Chiwetel Ejiofor is The Operative – great actor in a great role – chilling, eerie, emotionless, an assassin pursuing River for The Alliance (the evil gubmint, not the STAR WARS rebels). His fight choreography is cool aikido with katanas, and his stage patter is Bond Villain. But though he seems like an Orwellian cog in a system that he never questions, he is aware of his place in it: “I’m a monster. What I do is evil. I have no illusions about it, but it must be done.” (Well, now we know why he later did 2012 and SALT.)

The little things separate SERENITY from its ilk; as Whedon notes, he really wanted to break with traditional space movie tropes, so there is a unique combining of 1800’s American Western vernacular with futuristic spacefaring dialect – the dialogue, costuming and environment all reflect this verisimilitude; there are no Cantina Sequence aliens to be found anywhere in the galaxy, everyone is human – except the Reavers, who are mutated humans; the DP is Jack Green (Clint Eastwood’s man!) so we know we’re getting quality avenger hero angles; and there is no sound in space! It’s the little things…

And the big things? Surprisingly, the space battles rival Georgie Lucas. SERENITY is not overloaded with sky traffic and zwooshing star fleets, but when it needs to take us into the vacuum, it does so in the most authentic fashion. The scene where Mal leads a horde of pursuing Reaver ships out of a stellar cloud straight toward the Operative’s fleet is a sight to behold. And Operative’s reaction is worth the bittersweet laugh, “Target the Reavers! Target everyone! Somebody FIRE!”

That scene notwithstanding, there is not much levity on this voyage. It is much darker than the TV series, and almost trips into a bottomless pit with the malicious murder of preacher Shepherd Book (Ron Glass, a character whom I considered redundant anyway), as Mal descends into a fatalistic funk that makes his crew doubt his leadership.

Mal’s search for answers (to the River question, of course) will lead Serenity to a planet named Miranda, which they surprisingly can’t find on any charts. (‘Surprisingly’ because even if they can’t find a current planet by that name, Miranda is one of the major moons of Jupiter! I’m sure it’s not so far into the future that they’ve forgotten the nomenclature of the original planets and moons from Earth-That-Was. Why couldn’t they at least find Jupiter’s moon in the files?) On Miranda, they discover the origins of the Reavers, and a secret that The Alliance will kill to keep. River is somehow tied to this secret (because River is tied to everything, so sayeth The High Lord Whedon from his BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER lair…)

Their task now is to publicize the damning secret. Gee, if only the future had internet. The closest dial-up service is with Mr. Universe (David Krumholtz), and Mal’s fuuuurious anger at The Alliance’s lies to the people (“Half of writing history is hiding the truth”) makes him vow to fight past the Operative to send the secret out through Mr. Universe’s social media, “I aim to misbehave.”

“Do you think we should shoot her now that we have these guns aiming at her and everything?”

River meanwhile, is falling in and out of cognizance as demanded by the level of trouble they’re in. When she’s “on” she is an unstoppable force. So to avoid being able to unleash this superhero killing machine at will, Whedon writes a Rain Man device into her character, where she is usually introverted and fetal-position, turning into a deus ex machina when our heroes are neck-deep or higher in shit.

Towards the climax, it feels like THE DIRTY DOZEN or THE WILD BUNCH or SEVEN SAMURAI, as each of the characters we’ve grown to love (or at least tolerate) is in actual jeopardy of being killed in a shootout (after all, this movie had no guarantee of continuing the series or making a sequel; it was a stroke of luck for fanboys that would never be repeated). Then the deus ex River happens, as she announces to her effete brother, “It’s my turn to take care of you now,” and becomes Uma Thurman against the Crazy 88s.

The last great rockstar battle is between Mal and the Operative, on a catwalk over a giant shaft with two giant spinning fans. Really? Was the set with the giant crushing iron things being used?

SERENITY closes with three grave markers. Sad. But on a note of outlaw hope, she rises into the overcast skies on Mal’s velvet leadership and the vapors of fandom. “I am a leaf on the wind. Watch me soar…”

END

A Hip New Reason for Tired Old Slayings.

THE CABIN IN THE WOODS is about four painfully pretty college kids (and one Shaggy) being slasher-slain by zombies at said cabin. Seen it all before, right? But there’s a twist: the cabin is a front for a religious cult, who are in the business of luring college kids to this technologically advanced hideaway and sacrificing them to their insatiable god. Well… at least the movie is trying. Veeery trying…

After an excellent false-opening credit sequence, we meet Bradley Whitford and Richard Jenkins, two office guys in short-sleeved white shirts and ties, around a water cooler. Cut back to – what the teen demo are here to see – a chick in panties, getting ready for a trip to the woods.

The four pretty kids are Chris Hemsworth (THOR), Anna Hutchison (The Slut), Jesse Williams (the Jock) and Kristen Connolly (The Virgin). The fifth wheel is Fran Kranz (The Shaggy). Stereotypes just waiting to die.

In the woods, a falcon flies into an invisible force shield, which tells us the cabin is surrounded by this unseen electric fence. Intriguing…

We quickly discover the ulterior agenda of the office guys, as they command a war room outfitted with banks of computers and monitors, showing… you guessed it – the cabin in the woods. And though they’re quite flippant about their job of monitoring the kids, they speak in more reverent tones of appeasing their bloodthirsty god. Through levers and pulleys that the cabin is surreptitiously retrofitted with, the office guys manipulate the walls and doors to lure the kids to the basement, “then we let them use free will from there.”

It’s an interesting twist on tired old slasher genre. And a peek into what modern religious cults might be doing, considering technological advances. But after the initial jolt wears off, it’s still just murders and screaming and stuff.

A guard in the war room objects to the staff gathering around watching Thor nail the naked Slut, “Do we really have to watch this?” – then doesn’t object to the horrific manner she is murdered two minutes later. I can see where he gets his twisted priorities – his sniveling mindset is the exact mindset of the idiotic Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), who blanch at depicting all things that create Life, but have no problem rating a movie PG-13 that depicts all manner of Death.

CABIN is written and produced by the great Joss Whedon (FIREFLY), so I was expecting a little more. Still, a few good ideas with the final scenes, showing all the monsters of myth kept locked in cages under the cabin – and escaping! And when Thor tries to ride out of the woods – one hell of an unexpected demise! And I guess it’s always a plus when a culty god escapes his subterranean abode to wreak havoc on the Earth.

Which is what happens at the end, so if you’re reading this, you’re one of the few survivors on this desolate Earth.

END

Hero-Palooza

Shakespearean lightning and thunder arrows, red white and blue shields and golden armor, emerald rage and badass Morpheus longcoat, and Scarlett Johansson’s leather pearbottom. Oh AVENGERS, how sweet thou fury!

The god Loki (Tom Hiddleston, Brit-leering and still looking like Data from STAR TREK GENERATIONS) has come to Earth from Asgard to conquer and destroy. And Earth’s mightiest heroes are there to punch him a lot.

Poffeye

Seems kinda ineffectual and unimaginative that against literal magical/divine foes, the best retaliation that can be mustered by the writers of this mega-superhero tale (Zak Penn and Joss Whedon) is that the heroes “punch” demons flying around on bad motor scooters. (Even the grand resolution, though a jaw-dropping sequence, is nothing more than the old “destroy-the-source-to-destroy-the-minions” gambit.)

And what does Loki want with Earth anyway? As we saw in THOR (2011), Asgard was a pretty bodacious LSD-colorized dazzlegarden. Is he here for the fabulous Grilled Prime Côte de Boeuf at Spago? Is Loki after our Arab oil? Our blood diamonds? Our white women? Taking his cues from Dick Cheney, his plan seems to be conquest for the sake of conquest, no exit strategy, no goal. And he’s using a cutting-edge science concept to do it: the tesseract (or hypercube theory), a wormhole joining two distant points in spacetime. Loki allies with a croaky guy named The Other (whose helmet looks like it was fashioned from dog turds) and they order their Chitauri demon-riders to spurt through the wormhole to Earth and break things. Some plan!

Dim plot aside, THE AVENGERS is overseen by Marvel (the studio that can do little wrong when pumping out A-List superhero blockbusters) and fashioned by writer-director Joss Whedon (the man from FIREFLY, who can also do little wrong with his iconoclastic approach). Highly enjoyable/dimwitted movie experience ensues.

Not only are there big stupid CGI whale-things and Pretty Orange Explosions aplenty, there is heart and poignancy and humor, uncertain alliances between heroes, petty arguments, snappy dialog, human frailty and godlike wrath. And Scarlet Johansson’s leather pearbottom.

avengers assemble

Whedon does it again – imbues this ostensibly kickapoo punch-em-up movie with real personality. Even if you did not meet the individual heroes in their own films over the past few years, they are each presented as a throbbing personality crisis, no emotion spared. Except maybe for Captain America/Steve Rogers (Chris Evans), whose wooden delivery makes us suspect he landed this job on the cerulean dreaminess of his eyes. You see, he’s frozen his facial muscles in place, for fear that if he moves them one iota, he’ll stop looking like a Chippendale’s dancer. And Jesus! – look at the size of his biceps!

And then we see Chris Hemsworth‘s biceps – and they’re even bigger! Hemsworth brings the hammer as thunder god Thor on rad steroids; half-brother to Loki, and therefore forced to speak in a British accent (for an Aussie, that’s an eternal annoyance).

Robert Downey Jr. is Iron Man/Tony Stark, now plonking his ginger assistant Pepper (Gwyneth Paltrow cameo), and bequeathed the best dialogue; so cheeky, arrogant and sarcastic that Brad Pitt called from OCEAN’S ELEVEN and wanted his insouciance back. His armor is the damned coolest thing about this movie, and when he is flying around firing his hand-blasters at demons, his power is awe-inspiring. Now if only he had an iron pearbottom…

Samuel L. Jackson is Nick Fury, director of S.H.I.E.L.D. (which stands for Stupid Homeland Idiots Evoking Love of Dicks); he’s been elevated from that of annoying harbinger of doom in post-credit Marvel cameos to annoying harbinger of doom in a starring Marvel role; wearing his custom leather, eye-patch flaunting, flying around in his invisible aircraft carrier like a pimp, and constantly whining that Earth can’t handle these threats so we have to assemble a team that can. May I suggest Craig’s List?

As soon as Fury assembles Captain America and Iron Man, Thor descends from Asgard and they all get into a threeway, pounding each other in the forest as only men from Craig’s List can. Thor wants to take his brother Loki back to Asgard for some of that sweet Asgardian justice, but Tony and Steve want to punish him right here on Earth with their totally functioning American Justice System that also works on gods. (I wonder what his bail will be set at – 4,000 Asgardian shekels?) After they decimate more of the forest than any super-criminal trying to destroy the environment, they agree to disagree that Hemsworth has the biggest biceps.

Hulk/Bruce Banner is dork-cool Mark Ruffalo. Love that guy; perfectly cast as the most unruffled guy in the room (unruffaloed?), even though harboring the most internal rage. In this third major movie featuring the Hulk (after HULK and THE INCREDIBLE HULK), he can apparently change green and fluffy at will. “That’s my secret – I’m always angry!” (Hey, I must be a Hulk!) Banner and Stark engage in much tech jargon that means absolutely nothing, but their quiet moments are powerful, almost poignant. Matter of fact, all the heroes have their quiet time for feelings, which director Whedon effortlessly makes compelling, and their dissent is the most interesting element of the movie, especially Steve’s and Tony’s argument about “Take that suit off – what are you?” “Go get your suit on!” “No, *you* take your clothes off!” “No, *I’ll* take your clothes off!” etc. Marvel Comics was always canny at creating Marvel Team-Ups where the moral ambiguity of the situation set heroes at odds with one another – and Whedon somehow captured that lightning.

Down the list, we have archer Hawkeye/Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner), who can apparently claim superhero status because he has good aim and his arrows explode. I guess Rambo can fill out that application form then. Renner was apparently unhappy with his role, because he signed up to be a superhero and for half the movie, he is a possessed bottom bitch for Loki. He is brought back to his senses when his woman bashes his head on a metal pipe, which is the correct way to bring a man back to his senses. Hawkeye and thigh-jitsu expert Black Widow/Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) have been re-rendered by this movie franchise as two CIA assassins with a spanky sexual tension. One would think these two mere humans would get lost amidst the super soldiers, iron men and gods, but again, Whedon can even turn focus to their little patticake moments without losing our interest. And did I mention Scarlett Johansson’s leather pearbottom?

Clark Gregg appears for the umpteenth time as SHIELD Agent Coulson, now with a first name, Phil, and a predilection for Captain America trading cards (like the rest of us he-men, going bi for Cap’s biceps). Two of the film’s surprising touching moments involve Coulson’s trading cards and his first name. Further, deponent sayeth not. “…and this one’s for Phil!…”

Cobie Smulders is here as eye candy. I guess one leather pearbottom just wasn’t enough.

avengers minutiae

All the subtle details that make THE AVENGERS a class act:

• The foley of Thor’s hammer returning to him (zwip!), Cap’s shield returning after being thrown (zwing!), Iron Man’s movements as his servos straighten his knees or bend his body (shree!)…
• Thor summons his hammer Mjolnir through the innards of the aircraft carrier, and there is a shot of Thor simply waiting, arm outstretched, as we hear Mjolnir in the distance decimating the walls and rooms of the ship’s innards as it makes a beeline towards him.
• Iron Man’s suit-removal machine (much like a love removal machine, but less culty).
• Atop Stark’s building, the final shot shows us the STARK name with only the “A” remaining, fashioned like the Avengers logo – a nod to canon: Stark’s place would become “Avengers Mansion,” as they use it for headquarters whenever they need to strategize on punching people.
• Yes fans, stay for the post-credits. One word: Thanos…

avengers philosophize

As much as these super beings inspire us to be more than we can be (pansy do-gooders), there is something very dangerous about their existence. Modern comics in the ’80s started addressing incredible power coupled with vigilantism. And in this movie there are dark overlords whom Nick Fury answers to (featuring Powers Boothe and the spunky Jenny Agutter, now sadly old) who want the Avengers on a short leash. Bruce Banner knows the danger when he argues, “We’re not a team, we’re a time bomb!” And that is true for any entity with inordinate power and no constraints on that power (cough-American military). Whether Whedon and Penn intended for that statement to be political, it hits home in this belligerent nuclear age, where the constraints to using/abusing America’s military forces have been eroded since Reagan’s Iran-Contra treason. It hasn’t been drawn down through any American administration since, only exacerbated.

Loki (suffering from General Zod Syndrome) tells the kneeling humans before him, “Freedom is life’s great lie!” Coupled with the above time bomb analogy, we recognize something deeper in this movie than just punching. It’s small, but it’s there. [Poffy: “That’s what SHE said.”]

Later, Loki calls Scarlett Johansson, “You mewling quim!” Now that’s just gravy.

In the final telling, THE AVENGERS will thrill with its stunning action, thoughtful characterization, and the simple fact that Marvel managed to cram all these colorful icons onto one bombastic piece of celluloid. And did I mention Scarlett Johansson’s leather pearbottom?…

END

Gorram good – once you get past the rutting cheapness.

Am I that shallow? Do I only dig Nathan Fillion because he looks exactly like the great and powerful Gale Harold from QUEER AS FOLK? Yes, I am that shallow.

Fillion is Captain Malcolm Reynolds, helming a “Firefly class” spaceship named Serenity, five hundred years in the future. And it makes no sound in space. Repeat: no sound in space. For this small aspect alone, we must light a taper and kneel at the altar of creator-director Joss Whedon and praise him for pushing back against 30 years of ignorant filmic indoctrination.

That, and the Gale Harold thing count light years toward the quality of the action-adventure sci-fi series and cult phenomenon that is FIREFLY.

Drawing deep from the well of archetype, Whedon imbues his space-based television series with a Wild West iconography that gives it a familiar roll around the tongue, the 1800’s Zeitgeist lending a unique spin to the space campiness. Snappy writing, colorful characters and a curious juxtaposition of Old World outlaws and technological mercenaries, FIREFLY is chock with Western ‘types’ embedded in our limbic consciousness, yet our heroes live onboard a spaceship (which they call a “boat”); each moon settlement suffices for wild west outpost colonies untouched by civilization and toilets, yet everyone uses a post-modern American vernacular sprinkled with lapses into Chinese; combatants deal in lead, with six-shooters and rifles, yet they can travel faster than light; the priest is supposedly a cornerstone of conscience for the crew, yet the most respected member onboard Serenity is the prostitute!

Now I really like it!

Interesting that there are no extraterrestrial aliens; no Cantina Sequence or inexplicable mingling of humanoid creatures amongst the pioneer outposts, which happen to be whole planets instead of new lands. Closest thing to “alien” life forms are mutant humans called Reavers, who skulk on the periphery of many episodes, awaiting their chance to swarm in and mass-kill like hillbilly axe-murderers. Creator Whedon knows that just mixing humans from different moons, different cultures, different spaceships, will create enough friction, guardedness and fear, in an untamed galaxy short on medicine, civilization and law. And toilets.

 

Malcolm Reynolds (Fillion channeling the ironic masculinity and cowboy swagger of Gale Harold) is a loner, a killer, an atheist, a thief (as Jack’s Joker might say, “I like him already!”); an ex-soldier in an ongoing battle against the corrupt government (known as The Alliance – a middle finger to STAR WARS nomenclature).

Malcolm starts out ruthless, mayhemic, not susceptible to the wiles of women, and in it for the money, but steadies as a formidably moral leader as the series wears on, which detracts from the black fun of the opening episodes. The writers were trying to keep him likeable, unlike THE SOPRANOS, where creator David Chase retained Tony Soprano’s ugliness of spirit throughout all six seasons – and either the audience went with him or they didn’t. We realize after a few episodes that Malcolm’s smart-mouthing and devil-may-care swagger disguises a very principled ongoing hero pose.

Malcolm leads a crew that have coalesced around him ideologically rather than militarily; pirates, rebels, outlaws, call them what you will, each with an illicit reason to be onboard Serenity, performing dangerous, illegal jobs and heists which pay their way in fuel traversing the galaxy one step ahead of covert agents and lawdogs alike.

Malcolm’s second is Zoe (Gina Torres), resident Ripley, tough, black, big lips, big eyes and big… guns; this warrior woman was in The War with Malcolm (as one of the soldiers called Browncoats) and would follow him into the heart of any inferno. She is married to the ship’s pilot:

“Wash” (Alan Tudyk), crazy-go-lucky ginger, whipcrack flyboy of the goose-shaped spaceship, with a purdy mouth always ready with a quip, and looking like the Least Likely Renegade – until we meet the ship’s engineer:

 

Eternally optimistic Kaylee (Jewel Staite), the cutest thing on two legs in three galaxies. And suddenly we all agree that raiding government supplies and selling them on the black market ain’t so bad. Especially when you’ve got the muscle, in the form of:

Ruthless mercenary Jayne Cobb (6’4″ Adam Baldwin – remember his first role as that kid’s bodyguard? Same role); all brawn above the neck, with a ferocious loyalty only to Malcolm – the rest of the crew, dispensable. When Malcolm is stranded, Jayne doesn’t take kindly to Wash assuming control of the ship: “Do you know what the chain of command is? It’s the chain I go get and beat you with until you understand who’s in rutting command here!” Always ready for a fight or a better deal; and if it takes a fight to get a better deal, well, that’s just gravy.

Morena Baccarin is the onboard whore, Inara, whose luminescent smile and firmly-rounded tey-teys compensate for her almost-average acting talent.

Called a Companion, Irina is the classiest and most cultured person on the ship; an independent flesh contractor who can unjam diplomatically sticky situations by openly getting sticky with the elites who need unjamming. In this future, Companions are the most respected members of society – a beautiful turning of a stigma on its head. When the priest suggests “someone respectable” should rescue Mal and Zoe from a colony sheriff, we imagine he is referring to himself – but he means Inara. Joss Whedon presents a society where they’ve got it right at last: whores promote the act of procreation, which is the most beneficial practice of all mankind, while priests are still talking about invisible crap.

Like every blue-balled series that came before it (I DREAM OF JEANNIE, WHO’S THE BOSS?, CHEERS), the eternal question in FIREFLY is: Will Malcolm ever do Inara? You can cut the sexual tension with a lightsaber.

Dr. Simon Tam (Sean Maher) boards the ship with precious cargo. As smooth and naive as a Catholic altar boy (bonus tween alert: Zac Efron plays a young Tam in one episode!), he provides the medical prowess that Malcolm’s ship lacks. His precious cargo is – his sister:

River (Summer Glau), the most annoying character in FIREFLY (besides the priest). Her role was created for some massive overarching subplot, which would reveal her as some kind of superhero in future Seasons, but it was not to be, as FIREFLY was inexplicably cancelled after Season One. Tam rescued her from the Alliance (sinister guys with blue hands – who disappear from the subplot after a few episodes), who experimented on her brain because “she’s ten times smarter than me,” yet all she does is whimper and whine, lapsing into lucid periods where only she knows what she’s talking about, then retreating back into her own head when someone tries to communicate with her. There’s a name for that specific disease: it’s called “being a woman.”

Diametrically opposite to Jayne’s brawn is the supposed “brain” – the priest, which this future society have taken to calling Shepherds, probably because they’ve got the wits of folk who consider watching sheep a challenging task. Ron Glass (channeling BENSON) is Shepherd Book, as sanctimonious a hypocrite as any irrational god-basher walking the Earth today. I hate Book. I know the writers think he is the “conscience” of the ship but everybody already possesses a fine moral compass without his religious poking. In The Train Job, Mal didn’t return that stolen medicine because Book told him to – he made the choice himself; in Our Mrs Reynolds, Mal makes the decision not to molest the innocent girl not because of Book’s intervention – again, his own morals. These are two major moral decisions that are usually entrusted to a priest in lieu of thinking for yourself, but if Mal makes the correct decisions himself – even whilst being atheist – well, maybe he should make good his threats and dump Book on some deserted planet, or better still, in deep space. That’s where those indoctrinaires think their god resides, right?

Zoe doesn’t need Book – Malcolm is her god; Wash doesn’t need Book – flying the ship through heaven doesn’t need prayer, just three switches and a lever; Jayne’s morality is based on Might is Right. And Kaylee? Like she needs to be any nicer. And the hooker is legal and proud. Doc Tam doesn’t need Book because all doctors are God; and River takes the time to correct irrationalities and contradictions in Book’s bible, for which Book only has mealy-mouthed platitudes in retort. She tells him, “It doesn’t make sense!” He replies, “It’s not meant to make sense.”

Even though these closeminded god-bashers claim to be “searching for Truth,” it looks like 500 years in the future they still haven’t opened their eyes to see it: No one needs you, priest. No one ever did.

I rest my case, yeronner.

Though it is lauded by critics and fans, FIREFLY takes a few episodes to grow into your bloodstream, and I’ll tell you why: It looks cheap. It IS cheap. It’s a television production with grandiose ideas that cannot be realized on the small screen with a G-Rating and an F-budget.

I’d guess that everything good about this show – from its depiction of the imperfect societal structure, its nod to terraforming, its reference to Earth-That-Was, to its colonial soundtrack – was the writer-director’s choice, and everything that was a failure was an executive choice.

For example, the very first episode (Serenity Part I) opens amidst a ground battle that looks like someone collided in a hallway and mixed up the reels of a western, a WWI movie and BATTLESTAR GALACTICA. And who are all these beige extras whom we fear might actually be the stars of this series? And is that Gale Harold? The “explosive” opening didn’t introduce the characters with any impact or clarity – and we would learn that director Whedon didn’t approve of this opening, but was overruled by “executives.” And what were they hoping to achieve? After the authenticity of SAVING PRIVATE RYAN, you’re not impressing anyone with those $10.50 explosions and smearing poo over everyone’s face to imitate bloodied mud. Consequently, we are not introduced to the characters, we are introduced to cheap battle.

And when the series aired (September 2002), the execs once again brought their mindless, ponytailed authority to bear on the writer-director who gave them the successful BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER series, and decided not to trust his running order, instead airing the third episode first, The Train Job.

Look past all these obstacles that the ostensible minders of the show put up and you will be rewarded with an intelligent, witty, slightly askew science fiction ‘verse. All this and Gale Harold as well!

END

”Buzz, maybe you can help Tim Allen with his career.”

Plastic Fantastic.

Y’know, I always suspected my toys were coming to life when I wasn’t looking!

In TOY STORY, young Andy’s toys lead lives of noisy desperation come every birthday and Christmas – no one wants to be one-upped by a new addition to the toy box. Led by Cowboy Woody (there’s a BROKEBACK joke just waiting to happen), Mr. Potato Head, Rex the Dinosaur, Ham the piggybank, Bo Peep, Slinky the dog and a smattering of other playthings go about their toyish business of playing checkers, hanging around Andy’s room, and “plastic corrosion awareness meetings,” until Andy’s birthday party, when they gather expectantly around a transistor radio, listening to the reports of their toy soldier troops “in the field” (downstairs watching Andy’s gift-opening), hoping that no gift will be exciting enough to cause Andy to neglect them.

There is. His name is Buzz Lightyear, Space Ranger.

Poffy Lightyear

Directed by Pixar mainstay John Lasseter, with the voice talents of Tom Hanks as Woody, Don Rickles, John Ratzenberger (forever Cliff from CHEERS), R. Lee Ermey, Annie Potts, Jim Varney and Tim Allen as Buzz (“To Infinity and Beyond!”), TOY STORY is that rara avis that succeeds on all levels – animation, storyline, character development, messages of friendship and self-realization and, most importantly, entertainment value. The fact this is a cartoon (the “first ever computer-animated feature” – just what DO we call this new wave of 3D cartoons?) is incidental. The slightly dodgy animation of the “real people” is irrelevant; TOY STORY gets the point across with or without technological finesse.

The “Disney Movie” has become synonymous with maudlin messages, redneck fundamentalism, anachronistic family values, boneheaded parents, smart-mouthing youngsters, too-hip-to-be-smart teens and insufferable pets. Though Disney’s tyrannical umbrella overarches this film’s production studio, Pixar Animation, TOY STORY somehow avoided all trace of Disney’s craven hand. It becomes doubly surprising when we consider this is Pixar’s first feature length film after years of experimentation. Right outa the gate and right outa the field.

Sure, there are “messages,” but they are heartfelt, rather than maudlin (Woody tells Buzz during Buzz’s greatest depression that it matters not what Buzz thinks of himself, what makes him important is what his owner, Andy, thinks of him); there are emotional segments, which are truly heartbreaking, rather than cheesy (when Buzz’s escape attempt lands him with a broken arm, proving he is Not A Flying Toy, the lyric, “Clearly I will go sailing no more,” launches a thousand hankies). And the portrayal of Andy’s family is Pixar’s triumphal achievement – boldly contravening Disney’s idée fixé of the 1950’s nuclear family and Norman Rockwell fantasies, one of the many incarnations of a modern family is presented: a single mother with two kids, who are neither geniuses nor monsters, just normal children, happy to visit Pizza Planet and disappointed when favorite toys are lost.

Buzz – who believes he is a real life space ranger on a mission to save the universe – becomes Andy’s favorite toy over Woody. The amusing thing is: though Buzz believes he is real, he still adheres to toy protocol of “playing inert” when humans are in the area. When he mentions saving a toy from Sid, the vicious boy next door, how does he propose to do it while adhering to the inert protocol?

Buzz’s ingenuousness regarding his toy role infuriates Woody to the point of attempted toy-assassination. Through a concatenation of accidents, both he and Buzz become lost and must use teamwork, trust and ingenuity to beat their path back to Andy, which finds them ensconced in scorchingly funny vignettes (Buzz fastening himself in an oversized seatbelt; Buzz and Woody falling in with green, three-eyed alien toys who regard them as gods; Buzz hyperventilating as “Mrs. Nesbitt”). During a climactic rocket ride, the callback line, “This is not flying – this is falling with style,” seals this movie’s greatness.

At least I now have a plausible explanation as to why my toys always got lost: after going about their toy business, they would just go inert anywhere they happened to be, instead of paying attention to their master’s infallible toy filing system….

END