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I’ve been a skeptic and a flag waiving supporter of this game back and fourth for a long time now… all I can say is check out this footage and tell me you don’t want to play it!

It was pre-ordered long before it was over!

Popularity: 3% [?]

I’ve been writing movie reviews for coming up on 10 years now, and never before has one been as tough to actually talk about as this review for The Dark Knight. It’s a rare case where everyone who has seen it agrees that it’s amazing, and in one small sentence you could sum up the whole movie.

“No one can ever play the Joker again in the history or future of cinema.”

Which is exactly how I can sum up the movie experience, but lets take it back a little bit – let’s forget the initial hype, let’s not concentrate on the tragic ending of Heath Ledger, let’s not remember the poor stuntman who died — just for a moment. Does The Dark Knight work on all the other levels that we judge cinema by?

The screening I went to was a perfect screening to do a review from, it was an empty Drive-In just me and a few friends, and a clear night. While the video and audio quality may not be as maximized as it would in an IMAX theater or through Digital Projection; the drive-in is still one of my favorite places to see films, but that is another story for another day.

I sat back and watched the screen in such an eager anticipation as the Warner Bros. logo stood before me and then began what can only be described an action packed kick to the senses and your emotions! It’s easy to fall back on previous winning patterns; especially with such a success as Batman Begins. They could have easily just sat back and repeated the same formula and it’d be a success and probably entertaining as well, but they took everything we knew and injected it with such a heart that this shouldn’t be seen as just another comic book film, but should be seen as a crime drama, and just a glorious piece of storytelling.

There are moments during this film when you are drawn so deep into the characters and the story they are telling that when something unexpected happens it feels like a kick to the ribs. Yes, a kick to the ribs is a good thing in this context. You get so emotionally attached to all the characters that you lose yourself, something you couldn’t really say during Batman Begins especially with Katie Holmes’ wooden performance as Rachael Dawes.

Luckily that problem has been more than taken care of with the re-casting of Maggie Gyllenhaal in that role, however though the part of Rachael Dawes still seems to be horribly under written. The main reason for her to be around is as a crutch for Bruce to hold onto during his darker times during his eternal inner struggle, something she still could have done with out being involved with Harvey Dent.

In fact the film focuses much more on Harvey Dent, the way it should be, and the addition of the Rachael Dawes character could have been any random female in all of Gotham to be honest, and would have been much better overall if it was his already established Wife (much like in The Long Halloween plot line). But that doesn’t really distract from the movie.

The one thing that does however is Christian Bale’s Bat-Voice. While it was semi-annoying in Batman Begins; now it borders on obnoxious. At times during the film it almost seems as if he is having problems moving his mouth inside the mask where you can physically see him slurring words as if that’s as far as he can move his mouth. It doesn’t ruin the movie but does bring forth the ‘bat voice’ as a common hindrance to full emersion in certain moments.

With all that said we come to the one thing that I dread talking about; Heath Ledger’s performance. What hasn’t already been said about the subtle nature of his performance? Let me get this right out there in the open, I am not a huge Ledger fan – in fact the only things I remember fully enjoying him in were 10 Things I Hate About You and Lords of Dogtown (another FANTASTIC performance). However I am a GIGANTIC Joker fan. Out of all villians of all comic books of all time The Joker has always and will always be my overall favorite. I may have my moments of falling for another character for a week or month but I always come back to The Joker.

From the second Heath appears on the screen all the way until his final scene; Heath Ledger doesn’t PLAY The Joker — He IS The Joker. He’s the embodiment of what I felt the Joker always was. Caesar Romero, Jack Nicholson, and Mark Hamill all had their own visions and interpretations of The Joker; Romero had the campy joking nature. Nicholson… well he had that suit didn’t he. Hamill had the voice and maniacal nature almost perfect. I only say almost because Heath Ledger blew them all away.

People may talk about the creepy overt performance, but they won’t realize it’s all in the subtleties. The way his body moves, almost as if its deliberate chaos. The way he constantly is aware of his appearance and is fixing his hair and licking his scars on his mouth, it all adds up to an amazing and award worthy character. He absolutely IS the Joker and at least in my heart and mind he will be the ONLY Joker worth talking about years to come.

This truly was The Dark Knight.

-Stevo

Coming Soon: Stevo Compares The Joker’s of Cinema!

Popularity: 4% [?]

Look back on the history of comic book movies and you’ll see a plethora of successes and failures. From the old serials based on comic strips all the way up to the most CGI intensive summer blockbusters comic books have had a strong presence in the world of Hollywood.

I admit I am a film geek more than a comic book geek, but I love my comics and will love them until the day I die!

Now I wasn’t around for the early film serials of course, and i’ve unfortunately only have seen little of them. I recall seeing bootlegged VHS copies of the old Captain Marvel, Batman, Superman, and Dick Tracy serials and enjoyed them for their campyness at the time. However I wish I still had that VHS so I could look back on them with the eyes that I have now for film and film making.

My earliest memories weren’t of Christopher Reeves Superman, they weren’t of Dolph Lundgren’s Punisher, oddly enough my first memory of a comic book based movie was… HOWARD THE DUCK.

I know I can hear the collective groan coming from everyone, but this was a magical movie to me when I was 5 years old. Something about the talking crude smoking duck, seeing Ferris’s principal as a demony thing from another world, and the ever so exciting mini-plane action scene that worked for me. Now when I first saw Howard I was unaware that it was a comic book, and once I found out I searched in vane for Howard the Duck comics… once I did find them and read them– I realized how bastardized the movie was.

Looking back at the movie I see all its flaws, its acting, etc. but the one thing I can credit it for is getting me into understanding that comic books CAN be movies… least I thought so.

Now being this is all about Marvel I won’t touch too much on this but all I am going to say is i was OBSESSED with Batman, and when I saw THIS:

I was out of my mind excited… to sum up my theater experience of Batman… I fell asleep. This would be the first of many Tim Burton let downs. But thats another story.

Marvel would go through a bit of a lack of movies/good movies for a long while. The Punisher came out and changed everything around to near unrecognizable states (Even though its my favorite Punisher film to date…), Captain America had TV movies in the 70’s and another movie in 1991, nothing new was coming out and this had me go back in time and check out other movies based on comics…

Conan and Red Sonja – I knew they were books and comics, I never read them however — but I was excited to finally see a comic movie that looked really REALLY good… plus it had Arnold Schwarzenegger in it — how could it be bad?!

Luckilly it wasn’t, and Conan the Barbarian made huge strides in my outlook on comic movies, they didn’t have to be as goofy as Howard the Duck was… however in the Marvel Universe there would be 7 years worth of time between Captain America and Marvels next major film.

BLADE

Forget the lame 3rd movie, Blade and Blade 2 are amazing. Most peope didn’t know they were comics, and those who DID know they were comics were amazed at the accuracy of the film when it came to NAILING the tone and look of the comics. People sited Batman (1989) as the First film since Superman to really be a comic-to-film adaptation that succeeded. Frankly no. Blade is. Sorry.

2 Years after Blade is when the shit hit the fan… 2000 saw the release of X-Men.

At this point it was a full on nerdgasm – it was the perfect origin story for one of Marvel’s most beloved properties. I ended up seeing X-Men way too many times in the theater, and on DVD even more, problem with X-Men was the flaws that started showing up after repeat viewings. Two years after the rush of X-Men — it was outdone by the debut of Spider-Man!

Tommy’s absolutely favorite comic of all time is Spider-Man, so he was hyped for this as was I. The time around when Spider-Man hit theaters was a very hard time for me, in late 2001 I lost my Mom to lung cancer, and 2 months before Spider-Man was released I lost my father to the same fate. Tommy and his family moved up here for a while to help me through the times, and we all ended up seeing Spider-Man together.

It hit me hard.

At the time it was my definition of the perfect comic book film, and an amazing film in general. It resonated with me at a level I never thought it could… and it’s sad that when I look back on it all of the initial magic was lost.

Sadly the same could be said for the next 5 or so years of Marvel Movies…

Check back soon for part 2! Sequels! Flops! Tom Jane! and the rise of Marvel Films.

Popularity: 51% [?]

Cravate-O-Clasm posted this over on the ChikaraFans.com messageboard and of course I LOL’d and had to share with everyone!

Popularity: 3% [?]

It’s no secret that I am one of the few, the proud, the true… the wrestling nerd. I’ve talked tons of times about my love of wrestling, and Chikara a little bit as well. Some people though don’t really understand it still. They just don’t get why I am so into something that is consitered a ‘joke’ by so many people.

So with that said, on the day of “Tragedy and Triumph”… I give you – Chikara Pro Wrestling:
(clips courtesy of my friends at CHIKARAFans.com – check them out!)

Those who know Chikara Pro know it’s an amazing blend of comedy and excellent wrestling… one thing that proves this is… HYDRA!!

and his new partner since being let go by the Order of the Neo Solar Temple: TIM DONST.

Of course what would Chikara be without it’s absolutely amazing promos. Here’s a prime example from Ultramantis Black:

Seriously this is only a small smattering of the greatness that is Chikara… a real tribute would be heading over to Chikara’s Official Site or even go to Smart Mark Video and order some videos and enjoy it first hand.

Popularity: 3% [?]