BLACK WIDOW (2021)

                        Natasha (Scarlett Johansson) and Yelena (Florence Pugh): Total badasses.

So, BLACK WIDOW is good enough to have held my attention, but it’s definitely a lesser Marvel flick. Not bad, per se, just lesser.

The plot finally gives us an origin for Natasha, and it's a tragic one, revealing more secrets of the Red Room. It opens with a look at barely-pubescent Natasha and her six-year-old sister, Yelena, living an idyllic life with their mother and father in Ohio. But, this being an espionage story, nothing is as it seems, and soon enough the girls are turned over by their father and drugged, subsequently spirited away for Red Room indoctrination. If you were paying attention to details dropped by Natasha in the AVENGERS films, you have a pretty good idea of what she and Yelena endured while being molded into elite professional killers. The story then skips ahead by 21 years, and we see Natasha still on the run after the events of CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR. After that, I will spoil nothing, other than to state that the now-grown Yelena is still under the mind-control of the Red Room, but not for long...

Scarlett Johansson as the Black Widow has only really shined in a handful of the MCU movies, and while I'm sure the scriptwriters and directors instructed her to mostly play Natasha as something of a personality-void badass — with the exception of her turns in CAPTAIN AMERICA: THE WINTER SOLDIER and AVENGERS: ENDGAME — the blandness of her standard performance as Natasha makes me sad because I love the character as portrayed on the page, and little or none of what endeared me to her in the first place — 50 (!!!) years ago — has been present onscreen. Instead, this film is utterly stolen by Florence Pugh as Yelena Bolova. Once freed from the stranglehold of the Red Room, she displays personality to burn, which is good because she's clearly being set up to replace Natasha after the events of AVENGERS: ENDGAME. David Harbour and Rachel Weisz are also quite good as Nat and Yelena's parents, and that's all I'll say on that.

The film does not need to be 133 minutes long, and at times it has serious issues with pacing, a state of affairs familiar to anyone who's seen a Bond or Bourne movie over the past 25 years, and it’s needlessly over-long at 133 minutes, nearly ten of which are credits. Other than it being set in the MCU, it’s just another big-budget espionage flick. It takes place immediately after Captain America: Civil War, and it should have been released in sequence. Releasing it now comes as a case of too little too late. The time to strike would have been during the height of Avengers-Mania, when everyone and their parakeet would have shelled out the movie theater ticket price to see it. I was fortunate to have access to a friend's Plex account, and thanks to that I can honestly say that the film is in no way worth the thirty bucks Disney+ wants for it.

Lastly, by now you all know the drill, but I'm saying it anyway: If you do allow yourself to be rooked for thirty bucks, make sure to stay for the stinger at the end. I am intrigued...

Poster for the theatrical release.

MUSINGS ON BONDAGE — 007: FROM WORST TO BEST

 

My Facebook page often ventures into discussion of the James Bond franchise with like-minded buffs, and the discussion often get heated. I prefer the more grounded entries, with a minimum of gadgets and groan-inducing puns and gags, while others eat that stuff up and favor stories where there more outlandish, the better. As NO TIME TO DIE, the pandemic-delayed 25th entry in the series, looms,  I was recently asked about my thoughts on the overall series, so after much pondering and shuffling of placement, here's my ranking of all 24 official James Bond films from Eon Productions, from least-favorite to the cream of the crop. Please write in with comments and your take.

24. DIAMONDS ARE FOREVER (1971) 

 

James Bond: dockside rent boy.
 

 After the excellence of ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE, George Lazenby vacated the role of 007, so the studio lured Sean Connery back by paying him an obscene amount of money, plus other assorted perks. Irredeemably idiotic trash that ignores the tragic events of the previous film's conclusion, this mess moves Bond into the 1970's, and it's a transition that just does not work.  A complete waste of Connery in his last film for the official series, this one includes a pointless moon buggy chase, a pair of acrobat females for Bond to battle, a tandem act of homosexual hitmen, and Charles Gray as a laughable iteration of Blofeld. For completists only. Otherwise, you can skip this and miss nothing.

 

23. A VIEW TO A KILL (1985) 

 

 Musical accompaniment: the Beach Boys' "California Girls." I shit you not.

 

Cringe-worthy garbage featuring a 130-year-old Roger Moore who hot dogs while snowboarding. Not even Christopher Walken and Grace Jones as the baddies can save this disaster. Exceptional theme song, though.

 

22. SPECTRE (2015) 

 

Bond endures the unspeakable torment of sitting through this film.
 

Terrible across the board, with the exception of a stunning opening on the Day of the Dead in Mexico. Wimpiest theme song of the entire run, and the idiotic development regarding Blofeld is worthy of earning the screenwriter a severe caning.

 

21. QUANTUM OF SOLACE (2008) 

 

Bond valiantly attempts to flee from this film, but no such luck.
 

Marred by massive production difficulties, this is more like "Quantum of So What?" Incomprehensible, with headache-inducing editing. That said, I only saw this one once, so I would be willing to give it a second chance, but I fucking hated it upon seeing it on opening weekend.

 

20. THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH (1999) 

 

Bond opts for death by torture, rather than be bored to death like the audience.
 

Mediocrity defined, all involved just phoned it in for this lifeless time-waster. Denise Richards, the human bobblehead, fails to be believable as a scientist, though I have to give it up for Elektra King (Sophie Marceau), the series first female Big Bad.

 

19. DIE ANOTHER DAY (2002)  

 

James, please... Invisible car or not, we see you trying to sneak out of this idiotic turd.
 

A festival of bad tropes with an awful theme song, an invisible car, a Chinese villain who turns into a white man, the unwelcome presence of Madonna as a fencing instructor (!!!), and Bond parasailing while surfing atop a tidal wave. Redeeming factor: Halle Berry as Jinx, rocking a nod to the Ursula Andress DR. NO bikini.

 

18. THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS (1987) 

 

Though surrounded by a bevy of beauties, 007 fights to stay awake.

 

Great opening sequence that returns Bond to gritty basics, let down by every other aspect being boring and painfully overlong. Wholly unmemorable theme song by a-ha...SERIOUSLY???

 

17. LIVE AND LET DIE (1973) 

 

Surprisingly, not a scene from MANDINGO.

 

Bond and blaxploitation do not mix. Embarrassingly racially offensive, even when it came out, it also features possibly the most overrated theme song out of the lot — Yeah, I said it! Come at me! — and the noxious presence of "comic relief" redneck stereotype Sheriff J.W. Pepper (Clifton James). For a long time, before I rewatched the majority of the series, this ranked at the bottom of my list. Redeeming features: Jayne Seymour as the toothsome Solitaire, and the hilarious/ridiculous demise of Mr. Big.

 

16. MOONRAKER (1979) 

 

When 007 joined the Rebel Alliance in the struggle against the Empire.

 

Like LIVE AND LET DIE, this is the tragic result of the Bond series attempting to cash in on trends instead of setting them. Having nothing to do with the source novel aside from some character names, this is 007 in the wake of the ultra-blockbuster box office success of STAR WARS (1977) and by this point the series was too jokey and outlandish for its own good. Balls-out awful, but hilarious if approached as a piss-take.

 

15. OCTOPUSSY (1983) 

 

The tears of a clown in the employ of MI-6.

 

Barely passable, ridiculous plot, forgettable theme song, and Bond un-ironically disguised as a circus clown. (see above) Acceptable if you have nothing better to do on a rainy afternoon.

 

14. GOLDENEYE (1995) 

 

007 meets Xenia Onatopp and her homicidal vagina.
 

Decent but overlong and occasionally dull, but somewhat redeemed by the homicidal hilarity of Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen).

 

13. THE SPY WHO LOVED ME (1977) 

 

Having banged every female on the planet, Bond explores new horizons.
 

 I'm gonna get shit for this, but this one is simply far too '70's/disco era for my tastes, plus its an almost beat-for-beat remake of YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE, which struck me as the height of creative laziness. I also was not fond of Jaws (Richard Kiel), a hulking assassin who's pretty much a cartoonish "upgrade" of GOLDFINGER's Oddjob.

 

12. THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN (1974) 

 

It was 1974 and everybody was kung fu fightin', even in a James Bond movie.

 

Admittedly mediocre/bad, but mindless fun, this was released the year after ENTER THE DRAGON and Bruce Lee captivated the common zeitgeist, so, much like it had done with blaxploitation in LIVE AND LET DIE, the franchise again mined a popular trend, this time the then-still-exotic East and chopsocky ass-whuppin'. Bond travels to (among other locales) Bangkok, where he almost gets his ass handed to him by an entire martial arts school, until his bacon is saved by the most badassed pair of schoolgirls you have ever seen (see above). The rest of the story is mostly an excuse for another travelogue, but come on. It's all about Bond versus Christopher Lee. It's one of the few times when I genuinely rooted for the bad guy to win. Extra points for introducing the world to Herve Villechaise as the diminutive henchman Nick Nack. However, points majorly detracted for the unwelcome return of Sheriff J.W. Pepper, and the unforgivable inclusion of a slide whistle sound effect over an otherwise spectacular car stunt.

 

11. THUNDERBALL (1965) 

 

She's a man, baby!

 

One of the definitive entries, sometimes for all the wrong reasons, (which I have discussed at length here) this  is the first of the extravagant 007 travelogue spectacles, as well as being the first overlong installment, which is in no way helped by the turgid pacing. Features two of the all-time hottest Bond girls — Fiona Volpe (Luciana Paluzzi) and Dominque "Domino" Derval (Claudine Auger) — a terrific opening sequence, a villain who's as cool as 007 (Emilio Largo, played by Adolfo Celi), and my pick for the best of the theme songs. Tom Jones reportedly fainted after hitting that incredible sustained final note, and I totally believe it.

 

10. DR. NO (1962) 

 

Meet James Bond (Sean Connery).

 

It all had to start somewhere, and while it has its moments, it's primitive, basic, and has aged/dated rather badly, but we do get the introduction of the Sean Connery Bond, and he is nothing less than mesmerizing. The classic James Bond theme instrumental is introduced, and the film is pretty much stolen by Ursula Andress in what can only be described as an era-defining bikini. An unexpected hit that spawned a franchise which continues just shy of sixty years later.

 

9. YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE (1967) 

 

What the...?!!!? Where's 007? And who the hell is this Japanese guy???
 

 Bond fakes his death (for no good reason), goes to Japan to investigate SPECTRE stealing space capsules in a bid to ignite WWIII, flies the awesome Little Nellie (an autogyro with more ordnance than your average battleship), gets married, and receives plastic surgery that turns him into the least-convincing Japanese man this side of Mickey Rooney in BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S. Sporting a great theme song from Nancy Sinatra and some incredible sets by Ken Adam, this is one of the definitive entries whose tropes are frequently parodied. (The first Austin Powers movie cribs heavily from this.) It's a lot of fun, if occasionally sluggish at points, despite it coming off like a lavish episode of THUNDERBIRDS and Sean Connery very obviously fed up with being in these films.

 

8. TOMORROW NEVER DIES (1997)  

 

HK action legend Michelle Yeoh as secret agent Wai Lin: as badassed as 007.

 

My pick as Pierce Brosnan's most fun effort as Bond, this features memorable set pieces, a terrific theme song from Cheryl Crow, and, Michelle Yeoh as the coolest and toughest Bond girl of the lot.

 

7. LICENCE TO KILL (1989) 

 

Worst wedding day ever.
 

Bond is at his most savage and Flemingesque as he goes off the reservation to avenge the mutilation-by-shark of friend and colleague Felix Leiter (David Hedison), whose wife was also gang-raped and murdered (on their wedding day no less). This one polarizes Bond fans thanks to its hard edge and shockingly vicious violence, but I'm a reader of the Fleming novels, so I found most of the films up to this point to be lacking the sadistic nastiness of Bond's creator, therefore I dug this. It has a great SCARFACE-influenced villain played by Robert Davi and bears a sense of tension throughout as 007 pursues his vendetta without the approval of MI-6. Very good until the weak final third and the questionable inclusion of Wayne Newton as a superfluous minor villain.

 

6. FOR YOUR EYES ONLY (1981) 

 

Bond, ridding himself of a pesky assassin.
 

After the cartoonish excesses of MOONRAKER, it was back to basics, resulting in what is hands down Moore's best Bond effort. Minimal gadgets and quips, plus a nastier edge that evokes Fleming. A bit '80's-dated but still very good.

 

5. GOLDFINGER (1964)  

 

BOND: Do you expect me to talk?

GOLDFINGER (jovially): No, Mister Bond...I expect you to DIE."

 

Arguably the most iconic film in the series, Its every aspect carved the basic Bond template in stone, which was a bad thing because they more or less repeatedly remade it for the next two decades. It's also something of an oddity because Bond spends the majority of the running time a prisoner of the superb title villain, but that's offset by classic characters like Pussy Galore, Oddjob, the rolling arsenal that is the legendary Q Division Aston Martin DB5, John Barry's stellar score, and Shirley Bassey's indelible title song. This is the goods, kids, and if your mom saw it when it came out, Sean Connery in this made her wetter than a swamp.

 

4. SKYFALL (2012) 

 

London calling.
 

The second-best of Daniel Craig's run and a high point for the franchise. After the disappointment of QUANTUM OF SOLACE, I went to this with the lowest of expectations, but what I got was a superb modern entry and one of the very finest of the series. Solid plot, tough-as-nails 007, a great villain whose revenge plot against Judi Densch's M is understandable, and the full-force return of the Aston Martin DB5.

 

3. ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE (1969) 

 

Sean Connery is out. Enter George Lazenby.
 

The first Bond without Sean Connery, this has one of the strongest plots in the run, and newcomer George Lazenby does an adequate job as 007 in what would be his sole turn in the role. Too bad he didn't stick around, because he likely would have improved had he done more entries. The plot hews close to the source novel and this would have taken the #1 slot on my list if Connery had starred, but that minor quibble is made up for by brisk direction and incredible cinematography, a quick pace that belies its long running time, Telly Savalas as arguably the most formidable iteration of Blofeld, and Diana Rigg as the most tragic of the Bond women. The instrumental title theme is one of John Barry's best, and he kind of ripped himself off when more or less remaking it as the theme for the posthumous Bruce Lee film, GAME OF DEATH (1978).

 

2. CASINO ROYALE (2006) 

 

Enter the blonde Bond.

 

A superb, shattering modernization of the first Bond novel, as well as a soft reboot for the series, with not a missed note in the whole endeavor. Basically Bond's origin story, this one's so good, you won't care that Bond has a face like a bulldog and is a blonde. All of the elements fire on all cylinders, resulting in a top-notch 007 thriller.

 

1. FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE (1963)  

 

The rarest of the rare: an immediate sequel that far exceeds its predecessor. 

 

The second in the series and the most no-bullshit Bond of the entire run, as well as one of the best spy films ever made. This Hitchcock-influenced effort hews close to the source novel, largely eschews over-the-top gadgets and quips, and gives us a solid Cold War-era straight espionage thriller with excellent villains and arguably the best/most realistic fight scene in the entire series. Though it may come off kind of slow by modern standards, the strength here is the plot and the performances, all of which are top shelf. Especially memorable are Bond's Turkish ally, Ali Kerim Bey (Pedro Armendariz), Istanbul's more fun answer to MI-6's M; terrifying ultra-butch Russian SPECTRE agent Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya), whose overtly predatory dykiness must have been quite shocking some sixty years ago; psycho hitman Red Grant (Robert Shaw), and the lovely honey pot Soviet agent Tatiana Romanova (Daniella Bianchi), who is unwittingly played by SPECTRE and ends up in it way over her head. Simply put, this is everything a Cold War-era populist spy thriller should be, and it is in every an improvement on its predecessor. The apex of classic Bond and Sean Connery's favorite of the lot.

And here's hoping that NO TIME TO DIE ends the Daniel Craig era with a bang, rather than a whimper!

From "8 James Bomb Bomb Movies" (MAD MAGAZINE #165, March 1974)

 

WONDER WOMAN 1984 (2020): A Retraction

Back when WONDER WOMAN 1984 hit, I was in a bad place emotionally and I needed the comfort food of further adventures of my favorite Amazon warrior. I sat through the film and, while fully recognizing its many, many flaws, I still enjoyed it. But now it's months later and I have had a lot of time to mull it over while removing my comfort food need from the equation, and I finally have to admit that the film is a tragic over-long dumpster fire. The narrative is awful, they should have chosen one villain over the other and just focused on whichever they picked, Wonder Woman's barely in it in costume doing superhero stuff, and do NOT get me started on how the story turned Diana into a sex offender.

 

They've already greenlit the next installment and I hope they studio learned several lessons from the creative failure of this film. Patty Jenkins did a great job directing the first film, but she did not write its script. WONDER WOMAN 1984, however, was Jenkins's baby all the way, and if the results are anything to go by, she should not be let anywhere near a Wonder Woman script going forward. 

 

Seriously, when considering the roster of the DCEU movies, I place WONDER WOMAN 1984 only a notch above the Chernobyl that was SUICIDE SQUAD, and I do so purely for the major eye candy that is Gal Gadot.

BIRDS OF PREY AND THE FANTABULOUS EMANCIPATION OF ONE HARLEY QUINN (2020)

The return of Harley Quinn, and this time she's got a posse.

Four years after the cinematic debacle that was SUICIDE SQUAD (2016), finally fed up with being the Joker's physical and emotional punching bag, loony psychiatrist/gymnast/super-villain Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) breaks up with the Clown Prince of Crime and once that fact is made public and she is no longer under his homicidal protection, everyone she ever wronged in Gotham City comes out of the woodwork to exact savage vengeance. Along with staying ahead of the legion of people who want to kill her, a distraught Harley is tasked by vicious mob boss Black Mask (Ewan McGregor) with finding a young pickpocket (Ella Jay Basco) who stole a diamond encrypted with the codes to unlock a long-lost mafia fortune. With only a few hours in which to accomplish her mission, Harley must navigate a maelstrom of underworld mayhem, and along the way she gains allies in hardened veteran Gotham City detective Renee Montoya (Rosie Perez), mob princess turned crossbow-wielding assassin the Huntress (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), and nightclubs singer with a hidden superhuman attribute, the Black Canary (Jurnee Smollett-Bell). Much fighting, shooting, and out-of-control mayhem ensues.

After purposefully avoiding it for just over a year, I finally sat through BIRDS OF PREY AND THE FANTABULOUS EMANCIPATION OF ONE HARLEY QUINN and, despite being utterly oversaturated with its lead character over the past two decades, I liked it quite a lot. In fact, I'd rank it among the best of the DCEU films. (Which is admittedly not saying much, as that bar is set frustratingly low.) 

Margot Robbie, one of the very few saving graces of the incoherent and genuinely awful SUICIDE SQUAD, is once more a lot of fun as Harley, and the whole film embraces the fact that it's basically a live-action cartoon. That said, I wish it had simply been allowed to be a Harley Quinn movie and not also serve as a cheap way to launch a possible Birds of Prey franchise. BoP is one of my favorite DC properties, especially when written well, and by tying it in with the antics of Harley Quinn in the minds of the general moviegoing public, the filmmakers have squandered any hope of a straight BoP movie.

Also, while I liked Jurnee Smollett-Bell in the role, I was kind of annoyed at the filmmakers making the Black Canary a black woman. I'm beyond sick of the trope of black superheroes automatically getting slapped with "Black" as part of their name (despite having written a parody black superhero named "the Black Darkness"), and part of the fun of the comics Black Canary is that she's a brunette white chick who dons a blonde wig when kicking criminal ass. At least this version kept the status as a second-generation legacy hero, following in her deceased mother's footsteps.

Ewan McGregor was also fun as crime boss Black Mask, who was clearly coded as gay and, refreshingly, not played as a fey stereotype. In fact, McGregor appeared to be having a blast playing this quriky and psychotic baddie. And speaking of criminals, his "BFF," Victor Zsasz (Chris Messina), is a real piece of work who reveals in the torture and mutilation of his victims. The scene where he peels the faces off of a Chinese crime boss, his wife, and his daughter is truly unsettling. And though based on a family-friendly DC Comics property, I was surprised to find out that the film is rated R and quite violent, which certainly kept me interested throughout.

Fun and definitely worth sitting through at least once. 

Poster from the theatrical release.
 

JUSTICE LEAGUE-The Snyder Cut (2021) or "Four Hours...For THIS???"

Because YOU demanded it: Extended dourness and turgidity.

 

Okay...

I mulled over my thoughts on the Snyder cut of JUSTICE LEAGUE for the past two days, and after sitting through its four-hour run time, I honestly have to ask myself why I even bothered. The immediate answers to that would be 1. So I could speak on it from a fully-informed POV, and 2. To see any new or extended footage involving Diana — yeah, I'm a total Wonder Woman mark — but it really was not worth the time expended. Yes, it's a more coherent piece than the theatrical version and it is very much the work of one director's vision, but an extended mess is still a mess, no matter how much you tart it up. Also, there was no way in hell that any American studio would release four hours of this to theaters and expect to turn a profit. Hell, they even balk at a feature that's just a bit longer than two hours, so four hours? Forget about it.

Yeah, it does flesh out the characters to a much greater degree, but when you have what's basically a pack of either boring non-entities or characters that the director fundamentally does not understand at all, such fleshing-out is about as effective as pissing into a hurricane. And though this version excises the jokey material that was clearly the work of Joss Whedon, what results is a dour, dark, and depressing effort that feel like a four-hour iteration of the Bataan Death March. DC and its stable of superhero characters have always been light fare, some would not unfairly describe them as "whitebread," and what Snyder gives us is an angsty emo kid's take on them. There is neither fun nor joy to be had here, and even the resurrection of Superman is accompanied by the black version of his uniform. As if the film's overall color palette were not already drab enough, we get comics culture's most iconic exemplar of raw power wielded with hope and kindness showing up like he's ready front for My Chemical Romance. At least Darkseid is actually in it (not that he does anything) and the visuals on Steppenwolf are considerably improved.

And speaking of Superman, following the events of BATMAN V SUPERMAN, the entire world knows that Superman was dead and, to a lesser/more localized degree, the same goes for noted Daily Planet reporter Clark Kent. In JUSTICE LEAGUE, when the heroes use a Mother Box to revive Supes, he returns in a confused and aggressive state — as seen in the theatrical version — and both Batman and Lois Lane call out to him as "Clark," and they do so in front of an assortment of police officers and military personnel, thus outing Clark to numerous witnesses. And once the story wraps up, Clark Kent is suddenly back from the dead at the same time as Superman and no one finds that odd?

There really are no spoilers for this version, as it's merely the theatrical excised of the Whedon material and taffy-pulled to a nigh-interminable duration. The post-apocalyptic vision of a world in which Superman has gone bad is also lengthened and it serves zero narrative purpose since a sequel to this will hopefully never happen. In that sequence Batman leads a team of Deathstroke, Mera — who's toting around a couple opf gallons of water in an otherwise arid landscape — and Jared Leto's horrendous take on the Joker, now seen with long hair, smudged lipstick, and spouting a whole lot of nonsense that will never be paid off. Oh, and we also get two brief scenes where the Martian Manhunter shows up, but he serves little or no purpose in the story other than to announce his presence and, while in the form of Martha Kent, get Lois off of her grieving ass and motivate her to return to work.

If none of this sounds compelling, it's because it isn't, and you are advised to spend four precious hours doing something, damned near anything else, other than sitting through this glacially-paced monument to the power of fandom and its ability to bully a studio into making you see the same garbage twice, only now with more garbage to pad it out. For completists only, and maybe not even then.

GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS (2019)

Much ado about nothing.

 

Well, I finally saw GODZILLA: KING OF THE MONSTERS (2019), and my life would have been in no way diminished if I had skipped it altogether. (I refused to pay to see it in the theater.) At least it got me through most of today's dialysis session.

I know that there are a lot of people out there who will cream their jeans over anything with the Godzilla name attached to it, and that audience was more than likely satisfied by this bloated, needlessly overlong, bland studio gewgaw that amounted to the cinematic equivalent of jangling dangled keys in front of an infant, and they are welcome to it. It's a CGI orgy and pretty much nothing more. The characters, if you can even call them that, did not engage me in the slightest, and that's really saying something when you consider that Charles Dance plays the antagonist. (The film tragically squanders his talents.) And though the characters in the Japanese run can largely be described as annoying, corny, or silly, at least they had personalities that made them memorable and entertaining. Also, they were fun. (Some prefect examples: Astronauts Glenn and Fuji, Miss Namikawa, and the polar opposite of silly, boring, and unmemorable, Dr. Serizawa.)

As for the monsters, I liked what they did with Mothra, and Rodan's battle with the Mexican air force was spectacular, but I didn't give a shit about either Godzilla nor King Ghidorah. It was like watching clones of dear old friends trying to pass themselves off as the real thing. You see, for me the Toho monsters just do not work when handled outside of their native culture and specific context. In the better films of his Japanese franchise, Godzilla was originally envisioned as the embodiment of the horror of the atomic bomb as commented upon by a people who experienced it firsthand — TWICE — and he was later retconned to be the living vengeance of those who died at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which is extremely heavy stuff that lends the character true gravitas and terror. Removed from that context, all you have is a big lizard. Also gone is any trace of the personality displayed in the homegrown Godzilla films, and that personality, be it when he's an outright walking natural disaster or when he's something of a superhero, Godzilla had an identifiable character and swagger that is utterly absent in his American iteration, an aspect that I say stems from the American studio's fundamental lack of understanding of the character at his most basic. Sure, the special effects were among the best that money can buy, but they were in service of a dull, un-involving narrative that's as hollow as an ice cream cone minus a scoop.

Anyway, I'm glad that I had the good sense to avoid this during its theatrical run, as, to me, it would have been a waste of twenty bucks. It was every bit the empty corporate product that I expected, and now I fear the same may be the case with GODZILLA VS KONG. Thanks to how much I enjoyed KONG: SKULL ISLAND, I will see GODZILLA VS KONG, but the bar of my expectations is firmly set lower that a slug's ballsack. If it's actually good, I will totally support it, but if it sucks and it's boring, I'll bail on all further American Godzilla entries.

BATMAN: SOUL OF THE DRAGON (2021)

 

 (L-R) Richard Dragon, Batman, Lady Shiva, the Bronze Tiger. Sheer badassery.

A dear friend who's immersing himself into the DC animated movies strongly recommended that I check out BATMAN: SOUL OF THE DRAGON, and he was absolutely right. Its setting is the world of '70's-era kung fu and blaxploitation movies, or rather a blending of the two flavors, and it reimagines the Batman as one of several former students of a martial arts master who band together to take on an otherworldly evil. It's non-stop action from start to finish and it will all be quite familiar to those steeped in the films that it evokes.

The originally Caucasian Richard Dragon has been recast as Bruce Lee's ENTER THE DRAGON-style superspy, and it works like a charm. The Bronze Tiger is also present — voiced by Black Dynamite himself and real-life martial arts badass, Michael Jai White — and I'll be damned if his look is not meant to evoke '70's-era Luke Cage, which also works beautifully. Lady Shiva is her usual utterly deadly self (the story does not in any way shy away from her total willingness to kill), and the Batman in this story is definitely the Englehart-Rogers version, visually returning his look to that of his 1930's pre-Robin iteration (my favorite version, BTW). 

 

Batman, rockin' it old school.

BATMAN: SOUL OF THE DRAGON is a solid winner and it gets my HIGHEST RECOMMENDATION for those who are in on what it's laying down. The live-action Batman movies wish they were even 1/16 as good or as much fun as this 82-minute animated effort.

 

With these four united, the bad guys may as well dig their own graves and save the undertakers the trouble.