This is my rant about the good and bad that has come upon Sci-Fi/Comic Book heroes being reexamined over and over through countless sequels and reboots...enjoy!
Sometime you wait and wait for the next part of a story and the wait is justified. "The Dark Knight" is a prime example of how "Batman" fans FINALLY had their patience rewarded by seeing not only Batman himself, but also his arch enemy The Joker portrayed onscreen in such a way that we were all satisfied and relieved...I'd imagine it's kind of like how a parent feels when their kid finally straightens out their act and graduates from high school or gets married or something along those lines. We got such a deep look at a complex and gritty Gotham City and the evil doing of the Clown Prince of Crime that we didn't feel like we had been robbed, or that the story could have been better. Even if the story COULD HAVE been better, we still would have defended it and acted like anyone who disliked it was crazy (Like all the "Superman" fans did for that HORRIFIC movie back in '06). The point is that Nolan got it right and we appreciated that, Batman had lived up to his POTENTIAL.
This can also be said of James Bond in "Casino Royale" where Bond finally had more depth than a man-whore with cool gadgets...he had a purpose, and coflict, and kicked a lot of ass while exploring those parts of his soul! (Too bad "Quantum of Solace" sucked so bad). "Star Wars" on the other hand was like a slap in the face (and I know die hard "Star Wars" fans are gonna tell me to go to hell for this but it's the truth and they know it). We wait like, 16 years to get our next fix of Star Wars goodness and we get those craptastic prequels which only had one DECENT one to it ("Revenge of the Sith"). Turns out this closer look at the tragic character of "Anakin/Vader" was basically like watching one of the kids from 90210 piss and whine and throw a tantrum. And to make matters worse, Lucas just keeps piling more crap on this thing with his cartoon and his anticipated live action show. Why not do this for the original series which was so much better and much more FUN!?
This summer we got a new look at two pop-culture legends, Captain Kirk of "Star Trek" and John Connor of "Terminator". While Star Trek kicked major ass at the box office and turned what was at one time classic tale that was for a special minority class of geeks, into something that reached nearly ALL geeks and beyond, Terminator just straight up sucked. Chris Pine's Kirk was great for many reasons. For one thing, he didn't try to imitate The Shat, and for another, he wasn't super-human. He got his ass kicked in almost every fight. But he was a believable leader who took charge and took on the bad guys.
Bale's John Connor on the other hand, came across more like a scared little man who complained when kids trampled his rose bush. The dude was the savior of mankind and yet he holed up in his cave for 95% of the movie and got ZERO respect from his commanding officers. Come to think of it...why the hell was HE not in command of the resistance...I mean, did he not have AMPLE proof that he knew who and what the enemy was? Did all the military people of the world just ignore him? What happened directly after T3? At any rate, he came a cross like a real wuss, and all that charisma and heart that Connor was supposed to have...was totally void on screen. People were right when they said that Sam Worthington's "Marcus Wright" was far better, but how the hell can the dude use three different accents in a movie and get away with it? Was McG too drunk to notice? The stand-out star of that movie was really Anton Yelchin. That kid was great and will go far. Moon Bloodgood was okay, but woulda been a lot better if they left her topless scene in (shame on you McG).
So where am I going with this? I guess that, the way we envision these characters is sometimes better left alone, rather than expanded on by $hitty movies. I don't think it's hit or miss really, because I don't see how someone who read "Terminator: Salvation" or "Superman Returns" scripts could possibly see them as more valuable than usage as a kleenex...but hell, they make the big bucks, right?
*image from wikipedia.org
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TheDurkinKnight
6/10/2009
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