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Who knew “Come On, Eileen” was such a powerful song? Who knew Mindover Man was so powerful?
Hopefully this big panel makes up for the not-so-good previous one.
On a totally different subject, I just saw another one of those “spoof” movies that supposedly makes fun of a bunch of recent films. I’m not going to mention the title because I don’t want its name showing up in ads, but I am going to ask “who goes to these cinematic equivalents of dog vomit?” Lame. Lame. Lame.
The beginning of a day in the life of Reilly gives us a view of his home life and a small, but nice, new discovery of just how cool it is to be able to fly.
In this chapter: After dominating the commando video game “Ultimate Kombat Wreckage II: Battleplan,” gaming prodigy David Gilliam is surprised to find out who kidnapped him from a LAN party and why.
I’m well over 400 downloads for this series! Wow! Thanks to everyone who’s paying attention!
Reilly’s friend David proves his leadership skills playing the video game “Ultimate Kombat Wreckage II: Battleplan” at a LAN party. In the game, David leads a commando team trying to rescue hostages from a mosque in a Middle Eastern country. Using the game’s high-tech gadgets and some ingenuity, David has to figure out how to beat the computer — and someone’s watching with great interest.
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What can be said about this movie that hasn’t already been said? I saw “The Dark Knight” at the 12:01 a.m. showing nearest my house on Friday.
I can’t emphasize enough how nice it is to watch a movie at that time of night. Because at those times the people crowding the theater are those who really care about seeing the film. And they’re quiet, respectful, they don’t use their cell phones during the show, don’t bring kids who are too young for the theater, and, in the case of “The Dark Knight,” I don’t even recall anyone getting up to go to the restroom.
Heath Ledger has forever removed The Joker from the table for any other actor. No one will be able to do that character as well as him.
Christian Bale now owns the role of Batman. Hands down.
Gary Oldman is brilliantly understated as Lt. Jim Gordon. He has quiet heart and strength the perfectly complements the Batman at all times.
Aaron Eckhart brought Harvey Dent to life like no other iteration I’ve seen, animated or ridiculous (Tommy Lee Jones). I think of anyone, though, his screen time could have been cut down.
Harvey, in fact, is my only big quibble with this. I think Bruce Wayne and Batman, on several separate occasions, deferred to him too much. The Batman I’ve read for years and watched in several animated versions has always been the man. He doesn’t take a back seat to anyone. Now, I suppose the argument could be that this movie is still early enough in Batman’s career that he hasn’t fully developed the Batman persona, or that that’s part of the point as the movie develops, but it’s just a bit hard to accept.
My only other (hopefully original) thought is simply a note that Meryl Streep secretly must be some kind of supervillain. She has something against Superman and Batman. Her film “The Devil Wears Prada” came out the same week as “Superman Returns,” and now her “Mama Mia” is counter-programming the same week as “The Dark Knight” hit. She’s obviously evil. And I’m glad Batman did what Superman couldn’t: Totally overshadowing her.
This is a great motion picture, not “just” at superhero movie. It’s so much larger than that. Coming out of the theater, my friend and I had no words. We were still processing all that we’d seen. I still am two days later.
I must see it again … and again and again.
Director Chris Nolan should get an Oscar nod for this along with Ledger.
I promised a review of the animated DVD release of “Batman: Gotham Knight” and here it is: Excellent.
I’m not a huge anime fan, mostly because so many of them are a weird combination of sci-fi and magic. To me, that’s an odd mix. Plus, I’ve never invested time in any of their characters the way I have a lot of other animation I watch. To me, it’s analogous to the reasons I like the NFL more than college football: I just don’t have time or brain space to relearn dozens of players on dozens of teams.
That said, it’s really too bad I don’t watch more anime, because the six interrelated stories on this release were visually stunning. The landscapes alone would have been worth the price. Each story, crafted by masterful American writer (Greg Rucka, Brian Azzarello, David Goyer, Alan Burnett, Josh Olson and Jordan Goldberg) and highly regarded Japanese directors (nobody whose name I recognized much less could pronounce), explores an aspect of Batman’s character and career.
Each speaks in a unique visual language, and best of all, longtime animated Batman voice actor Kevin Conroy is back as Bruce Wayne/Batman!
For me, the last two stories are the best with regard to the animation. The one which focuses a lot of attention on Bruce was the toughest for me to get into just because the faces are so very anime-stylized. But it wasn’t a big problem for me.
I can’t say a lot about each story line because I don’t want to give away too much, and I’d have to give synopses of six different stories, but each would make a great issue of a comic book.
The last thing I’ll say about the gorgeous animation is that I’m glad we got a different look out of DC’s animation line. I like the Bruce Timm style that originated with “Batman: The Animated Series,” continued through the Superman series, “Justice League” and “Justice League Unlimited” then carried through to the first DC Universe direct-to-DVD feature, “Superman: Doomsday” and “New Frontier” (yes, I know that movie technically followed Darwin Cooke’s comic-book style, but they’re quite similar). But after that many shows and movies, it’s nice to have a change of pace. Alas, it won’t last long, though. “Gotham Knight” includes a preview of the next release, “Wonder Woman,” which returns to the familiar style.
I’d give “Batman: Gotham Knight” 4.5 stars out of 5.
Reilly finally gets Gar to safety and starts to head home, only to have a close call keep him from ever getting anywhere.
Here’s the latest episode of Hero is … um: Origins, in which we meet one of Reilly’s high school friends, David Gilliam.
David and Reilly have a lot in common, but something — or some things — have come in between their friendship.
Here’s an extra bonus relating to last week’s Chapter 4: A photo of a still-airworthy B-24 Liberator. The vintage World War II bomber was at an airport near my house this weekend, along with a B-17, B-25 and P-51 Mustang. The planes tour across the country sponsored by The Collings Foundation. For a small entry fee, the public can climb into the bombers and see just how cramped the planes were, how thin their aluminum hides were and how hard those flights must have been. It’s amazing anyone came home from those missions. If the planes come to an airport near you, I encourage you to take a look, honor the veterans who flew them and contribute to the foundation’s efforts to keep these bits of history alive and working.
Here’s the photo:
While hiking out of the mountains, Reilly tells Gar about his grandfather’s one amazing display of telekinetic power in a B-24 bomber during World War II, and his father’s only similar incident. The two of them compare that to what Reilly can do.
In this episode, we get to know a little more about Reilly and Gar as they try to find their way out of the Rocky Mountain wilderness. And we find out whether either thinks he can trust the other.
Let me know what you think of this, either via a blog comment or in the forum. If you really like what you’re hearing, please think about posting an iTunes review, too.
Thanks to my kids making Father’s Day a wonderful holiday, I was unable to complete a new podcast for this week or a new comic strip for this Monday. But given that I had all of last week off for vacation and still worked on the comic and the novel, I consider myself ahead of the game. Probably should have staved off burnout by taking a FULL vacation from all work, but I tried to stay loyal to my imaginary audience. We’ll return to regularly scheduled posting on Wednesday. Hope you remembered to express your gratitude and love on Father’s Day. My kids did, making it a GREAT day!
