Nerd reviews will have to be stratospheric for me to go see it. I don't mean good or really good or even the best damn thing I've ever seen. And here's why: I want Sony to get the idea that Spider-Man isn't a cash cow. I want them to start losing money on the property. I want Marvel Studios to get the rights to their own damn property. But, I know, despite my wishes, this movie will make fucktons of money and in a few years we'll see another one and then a third that will suck just as much as the last Raimi one and then a few years after that there will be another reboot that us dumbass nerds will flip our shit to see. Fuck, guys, have some goddamned pride, will ya? Shit.
Just got an e-mail from DC with an exclusive clip of Justice League: Doom. Not because I'm have an inside source mind you, but because I buy my comics electronically.
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"freedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order."
- Justice Robert Jackson, West Virginia State Board of Ed. v. Barnette
Justice League: Doom was pretty good, I thought. Nice touch, having most of the voice actors from the Justice League series reprising their roles. Seriously, Kevin Conroy is the voice of Batman, and Susan Eisenberg is the voice of Wonder Woman.
In some ways, I thought it improved on the original "Tower of Babel" story that inspired it.
For example, the way the villains figured out how to infiltrate the Batcave and to steal information from the Batcomputer was truly inspired, and it makes sense that not even Batman would anticipate somebody coming up with that scheme.
That having been said, some of the standard superhero/supervillain clichés were really out in force. Considering how they went to some trouble to make both the villains and the heroes come across as actually smart, some of the lapses in logic are pretty egregious. Couldn't the writers have bothered to have come up with some kind of remotely plausible reason why none of the villains actually killed the heroes when they could have easily done so -- and when it was explicitly stated that they've been trying to do exactly that for years now.
True, Vandal Savage was using Batman's contingency plans against the League, and Batman's plans were explicitly non-lethal. But it's not like any of the villains would have had any trouble killing the heroes, or like the plans couldn't have been made lethal with just a teensy bit of tweaking.
And Batman actually saw Mirror Master in the Batmobile's rear-view mirror. What the hell? He knows who Mirror Master is, and what he can do. And he didn't tell anybody, or just get rid of the danged mirror? Admittedly, Batman was wounded and perhaps near exhaustion at the time, but that was still a moment of real stupidity on his part.
So let's see. Bane has buried Batman alive. And he then just leaves? Confident that Batman will die ... eventually? This is Bane we're talking about; he's supposed to be dang-near as intelligent as Batman himself. And he explicitly stated earlier in the movie that he was trying to kill Batman, and had been trying for nearly a decade. So he just leaves Batman in a deathtrap and goes to collect his money -- despite knowing that Batman is crazy prepared and probably always carries a few devices on his person in case of emergency (just a pager to contact Alfred would have done the job nicely). Not only that, Bane knows perfectly well that Batman is in superb physical shape, is incredibly determined and disciplined (and so won't panic under such circumstances, and won't give up) -- and is a master escape artist. Under the circumstances, not finishing Batman off was just plain stupid.
Then there's Metallo. He's just shot Superman with a kryptonite bullet. And then he just leaves, confident that Superman will die of kryptonite poisoning ... eventually? Come on! Again, Metallo has made it abundantly clear that he wants to kill Superman, and he wants to do it with his bare hands. So it's totally out of character for him to simply leave. He could have killed Superman easily, and though the people of Metropolis would surely have tried to stop him, it's not like they could have prevented him from doing so -- or even slowed him down much.
Ma'alefa'ak wasn't actually trying to kill the Martian Manhunter, apparently. He claimed that the concoction would only disable J'onn for a couple of weeks. So he kinda gets a pass. Though in the comics, he usually is trying to kill J'onn, so it's not clear why he doesn't try to take advantage of this golden opportunity to do so.
Mirror Master's bomb really would have killed the Flash, and it was clearly his intention that it would do so. Had Batman not told the Flash how to defeat the bomb, Flash would have died. So, no complaints on that count.
Cheetah injected Wonder Woman with nanites that made her think she was fighting endless copies of Cheetah. The idea was that Diana would never give up, and so she'd keep fighting until her heart gave out. But if she could successfully inject some nanites, why the heck didn't she just inject a toxin? Why not just kill her outright, instead of relying on the notion that Wonder Woman would be too stupid to simply retreat from an un-winnable fight? (It was explicitly shown that Diana was still able to think more or less rationally, since Cyborg was able to talk her down. So it's not like she couldn't have eventually figured out that something was amiss, and so retreated to evaluate the situation.)
As an aside, though she thought she was fighting Cheetah, Wonder Woman was fighting ordinary humans. She threw a full-grown tree at a bunch of them, for crying out loud! I know that the comics tend to downplay the collateral damage that superhero/supervillain fights would inevitably incur, but how on Earth is it possible that she didn't slaughter dozens of people during her rampage?
As far as Green Lantern and Star Sapphire go, if she could successfully poison him with a variant of Scarecrow's fear gas, why not a neurotoxin instead? For that matter, once he had collapsed in self-remorse and given up his ring, why not have a second bomb go off?
In short, I hate it when the good guys win only because the bad guys behave stupidly and out of character.
As for the other main point of the show, it seems to me that Batman's absolutely right. There should be contingency plans to immobilize the Justice League. If Superman, Green Lantern, the Martian Manhunter, Wonder Woman or -- god help them, the Flash -- ever went rogue, the results would be catastrophic. Batman was absolutely correct to point out that they'd be idiots not to put plans into action to prevent that from ever happening.
True, it probably would have been wise to tell them that he had come up with such plans, without going into detail. It's perhaps understandable that the other League members felt hurt by what they saw as a betrayal of trust. But still.
After all, they live in a universe where mind control is fairly common. Superman has been mind-controlled on more than one occasion in the DCAU, for example, and the result was very nearly the enslavement of the human race by Darkseid.
Green Lantern's ring has been taken from him on more than one occasion. A sufficiently intelligent and willful villain could do tremendous harm with it.
There are various chemical agents that can alter personalities. Scarecrow's fear gas can make people turn psychotic, and Poison Ivy once managed to bring Superman under her control with a variant of her toxins.
Some of the League members are vulnerable to substances with unusual properties. Red kryptonite could potentially turn Superman into a murdering psychopath, for example. Shards of a crystal produced by Eclipso once enslaved every member of the Justice League except for the Flash. That very nearly resulted in the destruction of all life on Earth.
Body-swapping, either by magic or through technology, also occurs fairly often in the DC universe. For instance, Lex Luthor and the Flash once accidentally swapped bodies.
In short, there are lots of ways in which one or more members of the Justice League could "go rogue." It has happened on numerous occasions, and on more than one of those occasions, the results were catastrophic. On more than one occasion, the results were very nearly the extinction of all life on the planet.
So Batman's right. It's just plain stupid not to have contingency plans against that sort of thing. For all the talk from League members about the awesome and terrible responsibilities they must shoulder, and for all their endless talk about how they're determined to ensure that their powers and abilities are never used in the service of evil -- it seems to me more than a little hypocritical of them to be angry at Batman for coming up with plans to ensure just that.
It also seemed a little stupid of Superman to ask Batman if he had contingency plans for himself. He knows that Batman has people whose function is largely to ensure that he never crosses the line: Alfred, Robin, Batgirl/Oracle, Commissioner Gordon ...
Anyway, despite all that, I don't wish to create the impression that I didn't like it. I did. It's one of the best DCAU movies so far, I think.
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“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
-- Socrates
Last edited by The Lone Ranger; 03-01-2012 at 01:10 AM.
The creators of The Venture Brothers were absolutely ecstatic that Conroy agreed to do Capt. Sunshine. Though, on the commentary, they admit that Conroy got so into it he started to creep them out. They even asked him to tone down the . . . er . . . pedophile overtones. Granted, they were still smarting from fan rejection of Sgt. Hatred--whose voice they love doing with a pedophile overtone. Basically, it was a joke they enjoyed . . . that they thought was "wicked funny!" . . . that not a lot of fans shared. To their credit, they started flushing the joke--just as they dispatched two characters they also thought were "wicked funny," but fans did not like. They even had Dr. Mrs. The Monarch[!--Ed.] grouse that said characters, "are really beginning to chaff my ass!"
As for Capt. Sunshine:
In a fit of drunken regret after he and Dr. Girlfriend were split, The Monarch[!--Ed.] killed Capt. Sunshine's previous Wonderboy. Capt. Sunshine not a pedophile . . . he just has very bad luck with side-kicks. Hence the, "but . . . keep him away from my kid," and the constantly, "no, not another one, Sunshine!" remarks.
This episode is one of their best--of many fantastic--a fan favorite, especially if you are/were a fan of Batman from AaaaaDAM WEST to the very good cartoon animation series.
Had to look that up ... you learn something new each day.
Dude . . . srsly . . . if you love Batman and the like you NEED to see The Venture Brothers. Spoiler is a :tldnr: tangent:
Started by guys who wrote with Ben England of The Tick Fame. Originally sort of a "what if" satire of a Johnny Quest grown up, in his forties, addicted to multiple prescription drugs, suffering father issues and hating his kids. Kids are generic "Hardy Boys" with complete innocent . . . and they have a homicidal bodyguard voiced by Patrick Warbarton . . . Worbo . . . That Guy from News Radio and Seinfeld . . . oh and some other cartoon no one watches anymore.
Later, they discovered the company owns the rights to Johnny Quest and started using characters more clearly--such as the actual "Action Johnny"--revealing that Race and Dr. Quest were lovers . . . et cetera. Hilarious satire of various genres.
Seriously, if you enjoy cartoons animation, you need to see it.
There's a comics store not far from where I live. I stop in once a week or so to see if there's anything new that I want to get. There are three groups of people whom I remember because they seem to be there practically every time I drop in.
Two of the three are a father-and-daughter combination. I assume they're father and daughter, anyway. In each case, it's an adult male accompanied by a girl somewhere in the 8 - 12 age range. It's always interesting and kind of sweet to watch them browsing the comics together and asking each others' opinions on who are the best and most interesting characters.
The third group is a family (again, I assume). It consists of a mother and father, along with a boy who is perhaps 8 years of age. Again, it's interesting and kind of sweet to watch them browsing through the comics together.
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“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.”
Justice League: Doom was pretty good, I thought. Nice touch, having most of the voice actors from the Justice League series reprising their roles. Seriously, Kevin Conroy is the voice of Batman, and Susan Eisenberg is the voice of Wonder Woman.
In some ways, I thought it improved on the original "Tower of Babel" story that inspired it.
You are smart and I agree with everything you said.
It's not much of a defense, but I'd lay all the failings of the villains at Vandal Savage's feet. It's possible that he told the other members of Doom to do exactly as instructed, no more, no less. That's the only thing I could come up with on why the JLA was left alive. I guess you could file under the cliche of Arrogance of Evil, where "neutralized" is as good as "dead" and how can any of Batman's plans fail, right?
Wouldn't be surprised if in a couple decades that's what Batman looks like. What with exoskeletons and compact energy weapons becoming real now, one begins to wonder why a billionaire would risk his life in anything less than a powered armor suit armed with electrolasers and shit.
Of course it was already done, somewhat, in Batman Beyond . Never could grok why Terry wasn't armed with better non-lethal weapons. Like freakishly sharp batarangs are non-lethal anyway.