When I heard that Universal was abandoning a film version of Hasbro’s ‘Ouija’ board game, I was glad because, while I have nothing against using a board game to inspire a movie, I definitely have a problem with a board game being the primary basis for a movie.  This applies to Transformers as well, though to a lesser extent because as little as I think about those films, at least there’s a body of characters and stories revolving around them.

But ‘Battleship?’ Where’s the mythology?  Where’s the story?  This is a difficult question to ask because ‘Battleship’–the game–HAS NONE.  It’s like Tic, Tac, Toe in that they both have a history, as in a length of time that they have existed, but there’s no story.

What the point, you may ask?  It’s simply that why call a movie “Battleship,” based upon a game that many of today’s kids probably have no idea exists?  Couldn’t Universal have saved perhaps millions in licensing fees to Hasbro by simply making a movie about a flotilla of ships fighting some aliens?

Aliens?!  There are also no aliens in the game of ‘Battleship.’

But, as I have said, there’s also no story in Battleship either, so they had to add dramatic elements to make a movie worth seeing, and aliens are always popular.

That this film received a green light, while “At The Mountains Of Madness” didn’t is more than a little galling.