Tag Archives: the Avengers

Spider-Man: Homecoming – Trailer 3

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Cutting an effective trailer is a strange mix of art and science and too much of either can ruin it.

And they’re more important than you think.

Part of what saved Suicide Squad was the  trailer, which (unfortunatel) made promises the movie itself didn’t quite live up to, was so well-received by movie goers.

By the same token, they can give away plot points that might better be left uNSAIDs (such as when Doomsday was revealed in the Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice trailer).

Though just so no one thinks I am picking on the DCEU, there was a scene from the first Avengers when the Hulk saves Iron Man, who’s falling after having ‘delivered’ a nuclear weapon to the Chtauri.

It wasn’t a spoiler but it did reveal a scene that would have been better served seen first in the context of the movie.

And speaking of ‘scenes that would have been better served seen first in the context of the movie’ the trailers for Marvel Studios/Sony Pictures Spider-Man: Homecoming haven’t crossed the line into spoiler territory, but they have revealed moments that would perhaps be better served by not beight first seen in the trailer.

Such as learning that Spidey’s uniform is filled to the gills with Stark-tech.


It doesn’t break the movie to learn this in advance–besides, hints were laid out in Captain  America: Civil War that this is not your father’s Spider-Man costume, so it wasn’t a huge reach.

THough it would have still been a pleasant surprise NOT to know about it ahead of time.

Marvel’s Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. Are Back for Season 5!

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If there were an award for Most Improved Television Series, the likelihood is high that Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. would be a contender, if not the winner.  It started life not sure what it wanted to be, and seemed to survive primary on the strength of Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) who’s character had seemingly died in  2012’s The Avengers.

So, while it’s taken time to find its footing–arguably around the Second season–it’s developed into one of the best comicbook based series on television (seriously, if you haven’t watched since its first or second seasons you might want to give it a try because it’s really that good).

Though the bonus is that the series has been renewed for its fifth season!  Part of what aided in its renewal is the idea of story ‘pods’ by the producers, which is  a typical season consisting of three or four stories, as opposed to one or two,which has a curious effect of creating a faster-paced and much more enjoyable series.

Then there’s Ghost Rider (who arguably hasn’t been done better) and Inhumans.

Suicide Squad – Review

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Screenshot 2016-08-03 19.14.16

“David Ayer’s Suicide Squad is a better movie than either Man of Steel or Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.  Which unfortunately isn’t saying all that much.”

By my reckoning the greatest problems with Man of Steel and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was that director Zach Snyder forgot–or choose to ignore–two important things:

First, both Batman and Superman were originally made for children.  Now, I can understand the drive to make them more acceptable to adults, but what I don’t get is why he had to alienate younger folk in the process.

Though by doing so he removed two of the things that made them (particularly Superman) interesting to their millions of fans, which is a sense of wonder and possibility.

And while Superman was never my favorite superhero, I also never though of him as a god, something that Snyder has fixated on and feels the need to bludgeon viewers over the head with.

Zach Snyder’s fingerprints are all over Suicide Squad as well, particularly his tendency to equate murkiness and dreariness with darkness of tone.

And I’m also not sure that David Ayer was a good choice for the material (especially considering his filmography, such as End of Watch and Fury, though to be fair he seems to get that this stuff is essentially silly, so nothing’s any more serious than it needs to be) though he seems acquit himself well.

What’s more problematic is that the story–also written by Ayer–is way bigger than it needs to be.  Deadshot, El Diablo, Captain Boomerang, Harley Quinn, Slipknot, the Enchantress and Killer Croc are like the Avengers composed of lesser versions of Hawkeye, with the exception of El Diablo, Headshot and the Enchantress.

Which isn’t to say that they can’t be lethal, but if you’re looking for someone to stop an evil that threatens the world they probably wouldn’t be the first group you’d call.

But there’s a more serious problem that directly links to Zach Snyder’s treatment of Batman in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

Namely Batman, when he encounters Deadshot and Harley Quinn, he kills neither one. If you recall in Batman v Superman he was really keen on killing virtually every person that opposed him.

Here? Not so much.

It’s not a corner that half-decent writing couldn’t get themselves out of, though it’s also a place that Snyder shouldn’t have taken the character in the first place.

And I fully understand that the movie would have been quite a bit shorter if Batman killed off Deadshot and Harley Quinn, but it would have also been truer to what Zach Snyder was doing before the soft reboot of the DC Extended Universe, which Suicide Squad is the first movie in.

How StudioADI (Almost) Saved Alien: Resurrection

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Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s Alien: Resurrection, along with David Fincher’s Alien 3, are considered–and rightly so–to be the worse movies in the Alien franchise.

In reference to the the former, that’s probably true, but doesn’t tell the whole story.  For instance, Joss Whedon (Serenity, The Avengers, Avengers: Age of Ultron) wrote the movie, and had a few things to say about the casting as well as how he final product veered from his screenplay.

Another point is that, despite the issues revolving around the casting or story–what’s the point of giving the Alien Queen the ability to reproduce like mammals do, anyway?  Not only is it oftentimes painful (which may aid to bond the mother and her offspring), mammals typically produce much less offspring than insects, which the Aliens essentially are.

So when the entire premise of your movie is a wash, it’s typically a bad sign.

That being said, studioADI handled a lot of the practical special effects–Ripley models, the full-sized Alien Queen, etc–and their work is easily the best part of the movie.

And while it wasn’t  not enough to save the movie, visually speaking, it came damn close.

X-Men: Apocalypse – Trailer 1

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Screenshot 2015-12-10 22.51.01I have just watched the latest trailer for X-Men: Apocalypse, and it’s…okay.

It teases Apocalypse, his Four Horsemen, his origins and so forth but there’s a problem:  As far as superhero movies go, we’re in a time of wonders.

From the Avengers to Superman, some of the greatest in comics have, or will soon, pop up on either television or movies.

So this trailer had to up the ante somehow, to ensure that it’s sticks out from the pack–something the X-Men films never had to contend with.

Captain America: Civil War did it by the introduction of characters that fans haven’t seen before (The Black Panther) in a scenario from a renown storyline.

Superman v Batman: Dawn of Justice did it by showing two iconic characters in combat (credit it loses by seemingly giving away the entire movie).

X-Men: Apocalypse had to ‘Wow’ us to get noticed in such a crowded space, and it’s first trailer didn’t quite do it this time around.

The Avengers: Age Of Ultron – Trailer 3

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It goes without saying that the latest trailer for The Avengers: Age Of Ultron is all sorts of awesome.  This time around we get a little more on Ultron, as well as his motivations (and there’s a logic to his approach in that if you get rid of people you’re going to get rid of much of our problems, seeing that we’re at the heart of most of them) and ‘The Twins’ (Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch) as well as the odds that the Avengers are up against this time around and it goes without saying that they’re pretty overwhelming.

And this being a Marvel Studios trailer, stick around till the end because you have to have the ‘Vision’ to see where Marvel is going with this.

The Avengers XXX: A Porn Parody – Trailer

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I don’t typically like to mix my porn with superheroes, but I have to admit that this is very well-cut (pardon the pun) trailer:  You don’t see enough of how cheesy the costumes probably are, but what you can see looks really fun.

And sure, it’s not Marvel Studios’ The Avengers good–and I feel reasonably certain in saying that considering that Marvel’s superhero spectacular cost $220 million to produce that you could produce a few thousand parodies for its cost–but looks pretty good for what it is.

And speaking of Marvel Studios, it’s awesome that they haven’t thrown Mjolnir at Axel Braun–because The Avengers isn’t the only movie that he’s parodied–because some companies are insanely litigious these days.