Movie Review #20: Wonder Woman 1984 (2020)

 

I do believe that this is the first time I've talked about comic book movies on here. I have to say that for the most part I do enjoy watching them but I must say I like comic books better. The ongoing lore of the stories works better there. I just like that better. Also it seems the tropes of action movies makes it hard for villains to return. Seeing as in most of these movies the villains die. I mean I'd like to see Angle Man and Dr. Psycho to show up but there's only a limited number of bad guys that work well on screen. I mean for most people who aren't sad nerds. Anyway I will probably end up watching every comic book movie that comes until they stop making them. I do like most of them but I don't get excited as I once did for them coming out. 

I must say that for the most part DC movies since Man of Steel have been pretty good. I did not like Man of Steel or Batman Vs Superman. I didn't like the Joss Whedon version of Justice League and you'd have to pay me an insane amount of money to watch the Zack Snyder version of Justice League. I have more important things to do like watch The Facts of Life. I liked Shazam a lot. Fun movie. I haven't seen Aquaman but it looks like a bunch of fun.  I also liked Birds of Prey that people on the internet who care way too much about angering woke people wanted to make sure everyone knows it was a failure at the box office. Jokes on them, I like Nothing But Trouble and Hudson Hawk and those movies made about 5 dollars in the box office. Stupid jerks.

I think the Wonder Woman movie from 2017 is my favorite of the more recent DC films. I liked the World War I setting, I dig it a lot when they put superheroes into different genres. I liked pretty much all of the characters and thought they worked well together. I felt the comedic scenes were fun and the dramatic scenes were well done. I even liked the last act that most people complained about. It was probably the most well made movie out of them. It's a shame that I really did not like Wonder Woman 1984.

This movie is pretty unremarkable and feels like a mish mash of a lot of other movies. The Cheetah is clearly Catwoman from Batman Returns or The Riddler from Batman Forever or Electro from The Amazing Spider Man 2. You know the weak meek person who as weak and meek loves the hero but becomes POWERFUL and then wants to smash the heroes face in. I guess these characters had more fun and creative comic book origins and it's sad to see them just get a boring origin like that. I dunno. That's just me. I also don't like when a lot of these movies use two or more villains. One of them just gets lost in the whole thing. Like In The Amazing Spider Man 2, Harry Osborn just becomes the Green Goblin in the last like 10 minutes. No joke. It's done a bit better here but it still feels like you could have removed The Cheetah from this entire film and nothing would have been missed.

The whole plot of this movie involves a magical wishing rock thing that Maxwell Lord gets and then becomes the rock and then at the end Wonder Woman gives off a whole Care Bears like speech about truth and Maxwell Lord gives up his wish which is something the evil bad guy God should have not made possible. I'm like did this stuff happen? Will people forget about all of this because he renounced his wish? They must because they forgot about Wonder Woman when she returned in like Batman V. Superman and they'd have too because she was a big part of this whole thing and people would remember the warrior lady who SAVED PEOPLE FROM NUCLEAR WAR.

I wouldn't have cared about any of these plot holes or tropes if I was amused by this movie but I really was not. I liked some of the action scenes but for the most part this film was a slog to watch. Also body swapping works in goofy comedy movies and becomes weirdly creepy when you put it in a more serious film. Like to be serious did Wonder Woman like sexually assault that guy who Steve Trevor's body was in... It's weird and creepy. Leave body swapping to the 8th Freaky Friday remake. It will be more fun to watch.

FINAL VERDICT: A poor slog of a sequel to a pretty good film. I watched both back to back and it would probably been more enjoyable to just watch the first movie two times in a row.

Comic Review #18: The Flash (1984) #338-340

 

It's time to get back to this column of comic book reviews. I really should put a review order in place because this ain't Random Reviews or anything! That's my friend Dom's blog. You should check it out! It's good! Anyway I really should keep at least an order of what I do things in so I can know "This is time for you to find some weird comic book like Mighty Morphin Rump Rangers, a weird parody porn comic of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. Yes, I'm sure I will get to it. I just remembered this story within the pages of the Flash that I have to talk about because it's really bad. 

Anyway I will start the review off honestly saying that while I did not enjoy this story I did like a good majority of the stories done by Cary Bates. He started working for DC more or less when he was a teenager. He would create story ideas and covers for them. I believe his first was Superman #164 in 1964. You know the cover with Brainiac and Luthor looking at a  Superman whos now tiny and stuck in a bird cage. It's a great cover. I don't know how the story within is but it's gotta be at least more fun than this. 

Cary worked for DC for almost 3 decades. I believe his last comics were written around 1991 (until a return in like 2010 for an Elseworlds story), which he did with Greg Wiseman. He worked on Superman, Justice League, Flash (every issue from 218 to 350 was written by him.) He had some clunkers (like this story) but he genuinely wrote fun and entertaining Superhero comics and most of the time I was pleased with the story done by him.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

Carmine Infantino was a big name in comics for decades. He worked during the Golden Age, The Silver Age, The Bronze Age. At DC and at Marvel. He was even the EIC of DC Comics during the 1970s. The man was an really great artist in his day. He had lost a little spark during this time but I'll get to that during the review. Sadly he passed away at the age of 88 in 2013, but his legacy lives on in probably the saddest place, comic book facebook groups. Sorry Carmine...

Now before I really get into this story I have to talk about the entire Trial of the Flash storyline. In one issue it looks as if The Reverse Flash (you know the guy in the yellow costume) was killed by the Flash. He was trying to kill the Flash' girlfriend and you know that sounds like a great story. Really great, even could have been a classic of the Bronze age. The problem was that the Reverse Flash died in issue 326 or so. This is a discussion of issues 339-340. It doesn't stop until issue 350. I believe I read somewhere, so I do not know if this is the God's honest truth or what, that they were already planning Crisis and Flash's death.  It makes sense because The Monitor whos a big name in that story is mentioned in this one.  DC Comics had him keep this Trial story going for 24 issues so they could get to number 350 and then cancel the book. Probably to get an extra 75 cents by upping the price for an anniversary issue or something. I don't know I don't own the issue.

That to be completely fair is all hearsay. I do not know a single person who worked at DC Comics at that time period or any other time period. I cannot speak for them, I can just read what's on the page and what the page says is that holy shit this was dragged out to hell and back because you can tell Cary would have liked to see this end at issue 340. Issue 338 continues from 338 where The Flash was fighting The Pied Piper. All you need to know about that issue is that the Flash defeats the Pied Piper and drives the Piper crazy. It's really forced even if later they were all like "oh hey the Piper was on the brink of insanity for months!"

Captain Boomerang and Mirror Master try to break him out of the looney bin and get really mad that The Flash drove him bonkers that they pick up a man named Dufus Ratchet (yes that's the guys name) and put him in a specially made suit to fight the Flash.  This is what makes me remember this story you see, this guy Dufus, has the mental capacity of a child. Yes, they decided it was okay to have the Flash fight a mentally disabled man. Sure the fight isn't much but still it's in really bad taste to be like "Yeah let's have our hero fight this guy with the mind of an 8 year old". They get him to fight the Flash by saying he killed a mouse. Big Sir (Dufus' supervillain name) is shown that the Flash is a hero and he was duped when the Flash saves a bear cub. This takes place over 3 issues. It's totally maybe a 2 parter made into a 3 parter because they needed to keep the Trial story from ending.

The art in most places is really good. Carmine was almost 60 years old at this point and was still doing really good work. Most people seem to not like it but I like this cartoony style of his art at this point. Some stuff doesn't work as well but I assume he didn't have the time to fix it. Most of my issue is this weird splash page that just looks weird to me. I'm no art scholar but I don't think it works well. I dunno. I liked most of his stuff.

FINAL VERDICT: This is not a very good story.  It feels like they are just pushing an overall story arc (the stuff that's interesting in this story is trial story arc stuff that's in the background and all). I also think that having the Flash fight a mentally disabled man even for a second is a bad idea. Just a comic to be avoided. Thankfully Cary Bates actually probably did the best work of his career with Greg Wiseman in the Captain Atom book. They would also go to work on episodes of Gargoyles too. As for Big Sir, they actually used him again but turned him into your regular Dumb guy for the Justice League International of the late 1980s. A good decision by the people behind that classic stuff, being seen as a comedic dumb guy is streets and avenues ahead of being a literally mentally disabled man. I still don't know what they were thinking.

TV Review #11: Radio Active (1998 - 2001)

 

I think I will take this time to sing praises upon YTV. It was a really great little channel. It has a lot of variety in shows. Shows for little 3-5 year old kids. Shows for kids 6-12. Shows for teens. Animated shows. Comedy shows. Live action shows. Game shows (yes we will get to that one day). Even stuff like Dr. Who for sad nerds still up at 3 in the morning to watch. They would show movies, in my day YTV AT THE MOVIES or whatever the hell they called it would show stuff like Moby Dick. I think my absolute favorite thing about them were the Program Jockeys or PJs. They would have these little segments in between shows talking about stuff and the upcoming show. The ones who appeared on YTV during the time I would watch it the most were the best. PJ Phil is still the coolest guy in the world. Also puppets. Lots of puppets. I like puppets. 

You think with a opening review like that I would be discussing an underrated Canadian gem of a television show and well you'd be completely fucking wrong. I just wanted to mention some positivity because this show is really bad and I'm going to yell at it a lot. Radio Active is a Canadian sitcom made for kids. It takes place in a school radio station and the hijinks that happen within. This was a show I didn't like when it was on. Always preferred Student Bodies for my Canadian tv show comedy involving high school students.

Radio Active was based around a French comedy show called Radio Enfer. I'm assuming the original show was also terrible because as my review of The Wacky World of Tex Avery showed was that French people are never funny. White men can be funny. white women ladies too. Black people. Transgender people. Homosexuals. Iranians. I'm not going to be boring and do the thing where I post every group of human beings I can think of because there are a lot of groups of human beings and I think I've played that bit out. The point is that everyone, ever is funnier than the French. I don't hate the French but I would keep them all away from comedy as far as humanly possible.

A lot of comedy bits, especially in goofy situational comedy comes from really good acting and a whole hell of a lot of charisma. The people in this show do not have either. I could only just barely make it through one terrible episode of this show so I can't talk about the entire cast but everyone here is terrible. Another really awful thing in this show is the fact I wasn't sure about the characters archetypes. Like you know, The goofball, the jock, the wimpy kid, the angry woman, the wimpy man. Like Some of these come off as yeah I can tell that guy is a wimp. But THAT  guy was the Jock character? I haven't had a fight since I was 5 years old and I ran at the guy with my fist extended because he wouldn't give back my TMNT plush and I'm sure I could beat this guy and no he wasn't a teenager at the time I don't think. He apparently appeared in Good Will Hunting. He did not scream I AM A SPORTS LOVING JOCK. A good sitcom lets you know about the characters in every episode, this is not a good one.

FINAL VERDICT: This is just cheap junk. The goofy character just tries way too hard. The principal guy who I assume is a wimpy guy tries very little. It's very hard to watch honestly. They also spend way too long on some bits in this show. Yes I get it the goofy guy made a silly game maybe if the actor had any charisma I would care. I'm worried about how well Student Bodies holds up because I didn't even like this stupid garbage as a kid and I hate this shit now.

Movie Review #19: The Return of the Shaggy Dog (1987)

 

It's time for another review! I picked todays movie for a few reasons... it was the last movie I watched so it's still pretty fresh in the old memory. I don't want to go more than a few days without updating and I like to review different things so I didn't want to jump into another Final Episode. I like to keep some variety going, so expect maybe another review of something else before we go back to Final Episodes. I also wanted to see if I could blab on about something like The Return of the Shaggy Dog. (the answer is probably yes, I could blab on about pet rocks for way too much time if someone gave me the chance)

The Return of the Shaggy Dog has a lot of history behind it. It's one of the movies in the Shaggy Dog series of films. It even dates back to 1923 in GERMANY of all places. It was loosely based on the German novel The Hound of Florence. In 1959, the Walt Disney Company made the movie The Shaggy Dog. It was followed by a sequel in 1976. Then a remake in the 1990s, which starred Steve from Full House and Ed Begley Jr. If that isn't a great cast than I don't know what is! (Disney remade several movies for TV. Freaky Friday, The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes, Escape to Witch Mountain, and the only one I can't find a copy of The Absent Minded Professor between the years of 1987 and 1997) It was also remade AGAIN with Tim Allen. The less said about that movie is better. In fact the less said about anything Tim Allen has made that isn't Toy Story is a good idea. He's good in that but I believe he's been taking away from Tom Hank's charisma. 

The Return of the Shaggy Dog is a mid-qel. Yes, Not a sequel or a prequel but a movie that takes place between two other previously released movies. I don't even know who made up that term but I think they are a big nerd and I want to give them a wedgie. I think worrying about the continuity of a franchise like The Shaggy Dog is taking away from the fun of these movies. Anyway this movie takes place between The Shaggy Dog from 1959 and The Shaggy D.A. which was the sequel made in 1976. It has one of my favorite scenes of cheesy effects. The Shaggy Dog has to punch the King of Druida in the face and its a quick scene but it's hilarious to me. It's so cheesy and cheap that I love it. The rest of the movie is a lot of fun too but man I will never tire of seeing some guy in a Dog suit punch the dad from Eight is Enough. I'm a simple man and I have simple pleasures.

The Return of the Shaggy Dog is one of the many many MANY made for TV movies that Disney has done in the last 38 years. In October of 1983 they released some movie called Tiger Town that I don't believe anyone has seen since 1983. Don't tell me you have because I won't believe it.  It was made for the Disney Channel and that's where the majority of their made for TV movies go. The Return of the Shaggy Dog was for the people who couldn't afford the Disney Channel. It was a part of the short lived Disney Sunday Movie that was on ABC. I could have easily not mentioned Disney Channel at all but I just had to talk about Tiger Town. WHAT KIND OF MOVIE IS THAT?

The Return of the Shaggy Dog starts off with the Professor who had the ring that turned Wilby into a dog in the first place is dying. He has two shady people working for him who want to rob him of everything he has. Of course the enchanting words that turn Wilby into a dog get spoken and it's all kinds of wacky hijinx that happen. Moochie (Wilby's brother) has to get a dog for his dog food commercial and well it ends up being Wilby. His fiancé Betty thinks he is cheating because he doesn't want to tell her about his turning into a Dog sometimes thing. I can't really blame him because that's some weird shit. Of course the thieves find out how the ring works and try to turn Wilby into a dog and keep him that way to make money. Of course everything goes back to normal at the end but it does end in the way all great films should, with a zany car chase.

I uh, had no idea who anybody except for one person was in this film. Apparently the guy who played Wilby (Gary Kroeger) was on Saturday Night Live from 1982 to 1985 but 1.) I've never watched much SNL and 2.) No one watched those seasons so anyone could have been on it then. You can easily say you were on SNL at that point and no one will try to argue with you. In fact, I was a featured player in the 1984 season, which was even before I was born. Don't argue with it, you don't want to admit to having seen any of those seasons. In fact the only person from this movie who was in anything else was actually in two of the most iconic films of the 1980s, Caddyshack and Tron. She played Laci Underhill. She's very pretty. I like her. Despite the fact I haven't seen anyone except Laci ever before the cast does well. I liked the guy who played Moochie. This movie was also directed by the same guy who did Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles III and Rocket Man. I just want people to remember Rocket Man.

FINAL VERDICT: This was a fun entertaining movie. The comedy works well, the cast works well. It's just a likeable silly movie that you can enjoy watching. I'm in a big likeable silly movie kinda mood right now so this fit in really well. Probably not even the best movie in The Shaggy Dog franchise but did anyone who's reading this even realize it was a franchise?? I bet not, it also proved that I really can blather on about anything. I think that's pretty cool!

The Final Episode #22: Batman: The Animated Series (1992 - 1995)

 

It's time to talk about Batman again! An always great topic that no one every disagrees on. Except weirdos who want to call Batman fascist instead of just silly super heroics. People take everything too seriously. Or people who are angry that DC is making 32,000 Batman comics instead of comics involving less popular characters. Maybe not fair but I can't deny them doing the Capitalist's thing in a capitalist's system. If I weren't so lazy I would throw this entire opening paragraph into the shithole, but I am so you have to take this.

Anyway today's final episode is Batman: The Animated Series, or at this point The Adventures of Batman and Robin, had I known it changed it's name I would have triple dipped on this series. I mean I'm already technically going to double dip because this isn't the complete end of Batman in this animated style. In 1997 they brought it back as The New Batman Adventures. I'm counting it because 1.) it was a year or two later after this episode (this is why I'm going to be talking about Sunbow GI Joe AND DiC GI Joe) , they changed the designs of just about every character. I think that's enough to consider that a new show. At least I am. I like talking about Batman and it makes me feel good.  I also know that this episode was only last in production order, which is iffy, but A Different World technically put its last episode in the middle of the last season. If I can I will be going by the production order or what was INTENDED to be the last episode. Port will probably be a penis about this. He usually is.

So Batman the Animated Series just might be the BEST version of Batman and there's like 92,000 versions of Batman. This show put everything great about Batman in one amazing package. They did the same with Superman and the Justice League. I don't think any Batman or Superman or JLA cartoon will ever topple the greatness of Bruce Timm and Paul Dini and everyone who worked on these shows. I also love the design of Gotham in this series. It's a weird art deco futuristic from the past kinda thing. I don't even know if I'm explaining myself well (probably not) and it also has tons of Zeppelins. Zeppelins are cool.

The Final Episode is called Batgirl Returns, as you can see above in that image. EVERY episode had a cool image like that. How can you not say they put so much effort into this show. This episode came out on September 15th, 1995. It involves the Return of Batgirl (duh) who is voiced by Melissa Gilbert. Yes, the little girl from the Little House on the Prairie (the last episode of this show is apparently crazy and I need to see it) and she's not the first of weird celebrity voice casting (which also works really well) for this show. The episode first starts up with Batman fighting Two Face, The Penguin and The Joker when Batgirl comes by and beats their asses. Batgirl and Batman are about to kiss (ooo Babs has a crush!!!) when she's waken up by that rascal Dick Grayson, the original Robin who wants her to relax but she can't because she has to work at College shit.

Batgirl then sees a newspaper and finds out that the JADE CAT has been stolen so she goes to check out the museum and finds Catwoman there! Catwoman convinces her that she didn't steal it because someone used acid to burn away the lock and Catwoman is all about finesse as she says. Robin shows up and Catwoman runs off. The next day Batgirl finds a note from Catwoman on some kind of board where you post stuff on. I don't know what they are called. They team up to find out who did this.

The first place they go is to a seedy bar called Stacked Deck and they beat some ASS. I would not fuck with Catwoman (who I forgot to mention was voiced by Andrea Barbeau from such films as Cannonball Run and the Fog. SEE I TOLD YOU THE VOICE CASTING RULES). They find a guy called the Chemist who knows about all kinds of well chemicals. They end up finding where to go after a riot happens and they have to escape on this cool looking bike. I wish I had that bike. I would learn how to drive a motorcycle to get that one. They find the cat at a old building owned by Roland Daggett, I think he was just a random gangster created for this show but I'm sure someone will go "AHEM DON'T YOU REMEMBER HIS ONE AND ONLY APPEARANCE IN BATMAN SPECTACULAR IN 1976 YOU TURD" and I'm like I don't even know what Batman comics I own anymore I got that many.

They get into trouble and Robin comes in and helps them out. They fight the thugs while Catwoman tries to kill Daggett for getting her sick in an earlier episode. She lets him go after Batgirl goes "NO IF YOU DO THAT YOU'LL BE AS BAD AS HIM" and she's like "pfft Grow up" and lets the chain with him on it go and fall into the acid. Batgirl saves him and then takes off after Catwoman who took the JADE CAT. She and Catwoman have this discussion on the roof and she ends up taking her in. Catwoman ends up beating up the cops while handcuffed and escapes. Episode ends.

This was a really fun episode. Weird how the last episode of a Batman show doesn't really have much Batman in it but it's still a lot of fun. They have him in the beginning in the dream and a small cameo by Bruce Wayne who is off doing something else but that's it. I liked the interactions between Catwoman and Batgirl, they were very saucy and very fun. I liked the use of Roland Daggett, not only because he was voiced by ED ASNER THE GREATEST MAN IN THE HISTORY OF CINEMA but also because I like it when Batman just fights random gangsters. I think Batman should fight more gangsters. Why doesn't Batman fight any more gangsters anymore?

FINAL VERDICT: If you like Batman and haven't seen this show see it. All of it. This Final Episode is a lot of fun but is TOTALLY not the best this show ever got, but then again I'm a weirdo who thinks the episode where Batman ends up amnesiac in a weird Cool Hand Luke-like prison episode was great.  and people do not like that episode but still Watch this episode and then every other episode.

Movie Review #18: 2012 (2009)

 

I love disaster movies. The ones from the 1970s like The Poseidon Adventure. The ones from the 1990s like Dante's Peak, Volcano and Twister. I even like a ton of low budget TV disaster movies. I also love spoofs of the disaster movies, with Airplane and Airplane II: The Sequel as two of the best spoofs of all time. One thing about disaster movies I don't love is Roland Emmerich. 

Roland Emmerich movies bore the hell out of me, except for Universal Soldier. I'll give Independence Day some credit as the scene where the White House blows up is going to go down in history as one of the most memorable scenes in film. The Day After Tomorrow is boring horse shit. The movie Stonewall is also really boring despite some pretty good acting and also weirdly homophobic. There was one whole scene where the point is HAHAH LOOK AT THIS WEIRD GAY which is weird because that's a movie about gay liberation and LBGT respect and all that. It's like making a movie about Martin Luther King Jr and having a fucking scene out of a Steppin Fetchit comedy right in the middle of it. Also Stonewall looked like he directed the film through a glass of piss. Which is really gross.

I really really did not like this movie. It's as boring as The Day After Tomorrow and honestly really really depressing. There's a scene where President Danny Glover gets up from an building falling or some shit just to see a giant wave over come him. And another where you think the random russian guy saves himself in the plane just to fall into the ground. Just the way they filmed this movie, pretending it's super serious film and not an action film just depressed me. It's been a while but the movies from the 1970s knew that they were 1970s action films. They wanted to be thrill rides and tried to be serious when they needed to be. Plus this entire movie felt 82 hours longer than it should have been. I dunno how to really explain it but man this movie just put me in a bad mood.

I liked seeing Woody Harrelson in this movie tho. It's always nice to see Woody.

FINAL VERDICT: This movie is boring and it depressed me. I'm going to have to watch something better than this next. 

The Final Episode #21: A Different World (1987 - 1993)

 

Well, this is the first spinoff that I've talked about on this blog period. Spinoffs are a very varied bunch some do not last even more than a season or two (like Joey the awful Friends spinoff) but there have been several very good and well liked spinoffs. It's not a bad idea inherently to try to make a spinoff really. It's a decent starting off point to bring one character to a new show where they will bring fresh new ideas and such. A Different World also had the star of the original series it spun off from leave in season 2, yet it lasted 6 seasons.

I think you can tell that I'm uh.. trying to put off naming the original show but I knew I would have to talk about this because I run a nostalgia blog that also has comic reviews and random rants but it's mostly about the doofy shit I loved throughout my life because that just makes me feel good. The show A Different World spun off from was The Cosby Show. Yes, It's finally time I talk about Bill Cosby and his heinous crimes. Bill Cosby if you were born from anywhere between the 1950s when he first started as a stand up and the 1990s when his career kinda ended with Cosby his third sitcom is someone you'd know. He was incredibly famous. INSANELY famous. Apparently he even helped fund things for Martin Luther King. He put on a persona of a fun likeable scamp that we all were pretty much fooled by (Except I guess people who worked with him)

Bill Cosby had been accused several times in the early 2000s of drugging and sexually assaulting someone but seemed to get off from it from the longest time. It wasn't until around 2015 or 2016 where it was brought up again by comedian Hannibal Buress. This well caused a BIG STIR. More and more women would come out about him doing this going back decades. It seemed that Bill Cosby was more than just America's Goofy Dad, he was also a fucking serial rapist shithead. He's now in prison for these crimes and won't be seen as the Goofy guy he was on his sitcoms but for being a criminal of the worst kind. He's one of the few people that have been "canceled" and one who clearly deserved it and I don't think anyone will argue about that fact. This isn't like Pepe Le Pew or some old Dr. Seuss books where I'll actually have a discussion with you about, this is someone whos a damn criminal and can get fucked.

I also believe in separation of the art and the artist. I'm a all or everything kinda guy and if I started with criminals who created things, I'd end up with guys who were just jerks to other people and I'd end up with about 4 things to watch and 3 of them would be documentaries on Yaks. Not to disparage Yaks or anything. I also don't think it's fair to everyone else who worked on things with shitty people to completely throw the thing under the bus. With that said I do understand anyone who can't watch something created by awful people. I also have to mention why Lisa Bonet was forced off this show after the first season, she got pregnant and Bill Cosby thought viewers wouldn't believe her character getting pregnant. I think it would have been a really interesting way to bring the spinoff that just me. 

So yeah, some heavy shit to discuss first before even getting into the show. I also must say that I don't think I even knew it was a Spinoff of the Cosby Show when I would watch episodes of this on TBS (I would like to know when these shows came on just to add them to this. It would be interesting.) I don't believe I watched any of this first run but I remember watching a bit of this show on TBS. I really liked Dwayne Wayne, he was a fun fella. This show took place around a black college known as Hillman and the stories were about the students and faculty within the college.

The Final Episode of A Different World was put out on May 8, 1993 and was called ""When One Door Closes..."". (This episode was actually aired out of order and was meant to be the final episode. I'm still reviewing it as the final episode so eat me portnoyd) It was about well Whitley and Dwayne who were finally married and with a child on the way. Apparently in an earlier episode Dwayne got a job in Japan, which is where they are moving. He apparently stole one of the ideas that got him the job from his friend Ron, who is furious about it. He has a fight with his girlfriend Cree Summer (yes THAT Cree Summer, voice actress from Inspector Gadget and Tiny Toon Adventures.) 

I enjoyed this last episode. It was pretty funny and it was neat to see Cree Summer in this show. I felt the scenes were well acted and made you feel good. Yeah it was messed up for Dwayne to steal the idea but you know it's a sitcom, everyone's gonna get back together at the end, but it just feels good because the acting by everyone is stellar. I also didn't remember that Jada Pinkett (before she married that rascal Willard Smith) was in this show. What a ride!

FINAL VERDICT: I enjoyed this episode and I can't wait to dig in to A Different World further, and maybe even talk about it again if possible!

Movie Review #17: Mr. Wrong (1996)

 

I know a week or two back I praised Touchstone Pictures for making fun enjoyable comedy movies. I still stand by that, the majority of those movies are charming and fun, I did however mention that a few of them were not that great. Mr. Wrong from 1996 can join the list of not very good Touchstone Pictures. I'm also not alone in thinking that because said movie was a Box Office Bomb and critics and audiences were not very fond of it. This is coming from someone who likes Cutthroat Island and Hudson Hawk a whole hell of a lot. This might also be the worst movie to come out in February of 1996, the month which gave us Muppet Treasure Island and Broads Have More Guns, both of which I promise to review for you. If I don't forget, or get lazy.

Also I first must mention who directed this film, a man by the name of Nick Castle. If you are a fan of horror movies you know who this is. If you aren't you probably don't. I will let you know by telling you he was the first man to don the mask of Michael Myers. That's wild right? He went on to direct several films, most notable The Last Starfighter and the 1990s movie version of Dennis the Menace. I remember enjoying both of those movies. Not every movie someone makes is a winner, I'm sure even Orson Welles fucked up once or twice, but I'm someone who's excited to watch a movie called Broads Have More Guns, I'm clearly not an expert on Mr. Welles.

The movies plot is really simple and I can sum it up in like one sentence: Ellen Degeneres finds what she thinks is the man of her dreams in Bill Pullman but it turns out HE'S CR-AZY!!! The does movie fails because I didn't find it funny and I kinda find Ellen Degeneres to be annoying and all that. I watched this for Mr. Bill Pullman who starred in the greatest film of the 1980s, Spaceballs. I also thought that the direction was weird because this is clearly a dark comedy that's being played like Major Payne, a wacky goof ball comedy (oddly enough also directed by Nick Castle). I also thought they could have made Bill Pullman a bit crazier, he just comes off as half assed. I dunno, not the best script by Chris Matheson either. (He helped co-write the Bill and Ted films and A Goofy Movie. clearly this is not his best work)

Uh, for a few positives I did like seeing Dean Stockwell and Joan Cusack in the movie, and it's always fun to see Bill Pullman. I just wish it was a more enjoyable motion picture is all.

FINAL VERDICT: There's not much else to say about this movie, I just wanted people to know about the existence of Broads Have More Guns clearly the best movie of the 1990s.

The Final Episode #20: Bewitched (1964 - 1972)

 

It's time for I think the first show from the 1960s that I've talked about. I could go back and look but I'm way too lazy for that. Anyway sitcoms from the 1960s were the goofiest things ever. Every single one of them was goofy as hell, and thus very entertaining. Get Smart, Hogan's Heroes, and today's show Bewitched. The actors were always up for the goofiest stuff the writers could come up with and I am at least grateful for that.

Bewitched was a sitcom created by Sol Saks (lol) that ran from 1964 to 1972 for eight whole seasons and two hundred and fifty four episodes. That's another thing about sitcoms from the 1960s is that they made an incredible amount of episodes so if you like one of them you get a whole hell of it to watch. Bewitched was about a witch named Samantha (played by Elizabeth Montgomery) who married a mortal man (played by Dick York for five seasons and Dick Sargent for the last three). It wasn't even the only show about a magical person causing problems for someone so that we could all laugh. I Dream of Jeannie and My Favorite Martian were both on the air at the same time.

I would also be remiss if I did not mention that Bewitched was the gayest sitcom of the 1960s. This show's whole plot was pretty much about how you had to hide who you were because people would be fearful of you. Also most of the cast were also gay. Dick Sargent was gay. The guy who played Samantha's dad was gay. Her mother was gay. Her uncle was also gay. What I'm saying is witches clearly respect the LGBT community. This YouTube video points this out in a better way than I do.

My memories of this show come from TBS in the morning. I think it was around the time we actually got TBS as a part of our cable package in I want to say 1995. That makes sense because I feel I would watch this after Sailor Moon. I'm pretty sure Bewitched inspired the first magical girl series in Japan, called Sally the Witch. Bewitched inspired everyone! I remember enjoying the hell out of this show and I also enjoyed the several episodes I rewatched recently.

Despite that I wasn't huge on the Final Episode of Bewitched. Dick Sargent the second Darrin is a very boring actor. He just seems to not even want to be apart of this show. Weirdly enough he was supposed to be part of the original cast. Dick York was a lot more fun to watch. Maybe it's not completely fair to say this because I'm only seen this one episode of his but man it's not the best. The second reason is well the show repeated this plot (you'd have to to make 254 episodes to be fair) and well I'm sure the first time was done better. Bewitched clearly deserved to go out on a plot that was more original.

The plot of the Final Episode which was entitled "The Truth, Nothing But the Truth So Help Me Sam" which involves Endora, Samantha's mother putting a truth spell on the unicorn necklace that Darrin bought her and at this point it seems everyone not just Dick Sargent is going through the motions. All I know is that I only had a few laughs in this episode and they came from the couple of old people that the advertising place Darrin works with wanting them to work with them but everyone has to tell the truth and chaos happens! 

FINAL VERDICT: Yeah this show ended on a low note at least in my mind. I wish both Dick York never had any of those back problems that caused him to leave and that they got something that wasn't already done earlier in the series. Oh, and Dick Sargent's birth name was Richard Cox so he was literally Dick Cox. Yes, that's how I plan to end this column. It's my blog and I can do what I want!

Comic Review #17: Children of the Atom #1 (2021)

 

Yes, It's only been 3 whole days since I talked about the overall Jonathan Hickman run on X-Men which involves like 372 books within it coming out each month and most are pretty stellar, at least to the point that I don't want to drop any. I wasn't able to actually get any new comics for like a month because we had a covid breakout around where I live and unlike some places we take that seriously and not like "welp sorry if you get it but I gotta not wear a mask because it's clearly a plot by the government to take away my FREEDOM and not me just being a SELFISH FUCKER". Also this book was also postponed because of Covid, it was supposed to come out in 2020. Covid did a lot of shit to people and postpoing a comic book is the least bad thing it did.

This book was also yelled and screamed at because of dishonest fuckers on the internet known as comicsgate. Yeah, I'm sorry but I'm probably going to mention those shitty shits every time I review a comic from 2016 to whenever the hell they finally piss off, which knowing my luck will be about 22 minutes before I die. Wonderful. I know Port will be like GET OFFA DA FACESBOOKS AND TWEETER but well I want to stay on Facebook just for some friends I like to interact with. I don't know why I stay on twitter even though there are some people I like talking to on it. It's just bad and should be shot repeatedly in the face.

Anyway the honest respectable people clearly made 400 YouTube videos wherein they said these new characters are clearly replacing the X-Men, despite the fact it says SIDEKICKS in every single fucking thing put out by Marvel. These are kids who are fans of several X-Men and create new identities based around theres. You don't have to like Legacy characters and all that but they've been a part of comic books since 1956 with Barry Allen. Oh, I forgot Barry Allen's a white dude so no need to get your panties in a wad over it.

The new kids are Cherub, Cyclops-Lass, Marvel Guy, Daycrawler, and Gimmick. I've got to be honest and say I only like two of those names. I don't know who they were fighting in the first few pages of this book, that would have been nice to see. It was nice to see Magma and Maggott, because I love the New Mutants and despite not being a fan of either Scott Lobdell or 90's X-Men I gotta admit I have a weird love of Maggott. Dude's weird and all over the place. Really neat stuff. 

I loved some of the character moments like Buddy (Cyclops-Lass) yelling at conspiracy theorists who think the X-Men are building a mutant army to kill everyone and the drugs they give people are gonna kill them. They haven't been completely perfect during the Krakoa era, you know working with Mr. Sinister and guys like that but I know they don't want to kill anyone. Buddy and Carmen also talk about how Carmen created all the costumes and how Buddy works on the Archive, which I assume is information about every X-Men character, which Carmen jokes they only use it to make Fan-Fiction. I like learning minor things about characters like this.

I'm also interested in the mystery of why they can't go on Krakoa. Is one of them a human? Are they all human? Is it because of Buddy's dad? I assume more stuff will be addressed in newer issues. I'm interested enough to keep reading. I must say the last few pages were confusing, I think because of the art were they completely refused by Krakoa, or just to afraid to actually go inside the gate? I think that could have been clearer. It looked like they weren't allowed in but wouldn't that end up alerting the X-Men? 

I had some minor issues but I'm with this story. No I don't think is the best book being put out of the X-Offices these days. It's not even the best comic done by Vita Ayala, which would be the New Mutants. I'm much more interested in seeing what the Shadow King is up too then Children of the Atom, but the main point is I'm still willing to buy the next issues of Children of the Atom and I think you guys should give it a shot. Portnoyd will probably be a penis about this comic.

Transparency and CANCEL CULTURE!!!

 

See I picked the Invisible Man there because he's transparent! I'm very funny and clever! Anyway since I have a bug up my ass about dumb shit in the news and I have a blog viewed by tens of people I decided let's talk about how the news discusses things like "Cancel Culture". Won't that be fun. That's not a topic that people get angry about. No sir!

So you know about Mr. Potato Head right? Like you totally realize what went on because you read a headline saying he's cancelled and you can never buy a new one or anything. No numb nuts you don't the entire thing is WOAH kinda blown the fuck out of proportions. Mr Potato Head still exists, but the BRAND is now just called Potato Head. I assume they are going to make a Potato Head character and give it male and female pieces. That's just good capitalism. I thought right wingers were all about capitalism.

Now you're all about to say "THEY CLEARLY BANNED EVERY SINGLE SOLITARY DR. SEUSS THING IN EXISTANCE, WHAT NEXT LIBS WHAT NEXT" No, they didn't ban anything you gosh darn rascal. 6 Dr. Seuss books, one of which I THINK I may have heard off before they were mentioned all over the place. The Mulberry Street one. I do admittedly hope that they keep copies of these archived because they are still pieces of Dr. Seuss and children's book history and even something as obscure as The Cat's Quizzer (seriously you didn't even know this other Cat in the Hat book ever existed did you) should be saved. I also think that if the books were YOU KNOW ACTUALLY POPULAR they could have put a disclaimer at the front of the book saying "Hey yo, this shit was written in 1937 and we had shitty ideas about things back then, talk to mom and dad about this imagery yo" but in well less of an attempted comedic manner, but the thing is they aren't popular and they aren't being produced because of that. There's no recall on these books and I'm sure libraries will have copies if you really need to see them. They are just going out of print, you know what else goes out of print. A fucking whole hell of a lot of books. I wanted to get What-A-Mess books for my nieces but not only are they out of print it seems they never made it out of Britain (yet ABC and DIC had a cartoon which I remember enjoying a lot). I don't see anyone yelling about What A Mess being cancelled.

Remember back when The Muppets were totally cancelled and Jim Henson was pulled out of his grave and thrown into space? I do. It was the saddest day of my life. I will forever miss Kermit but NONE OF THIS HAPPENED. Some stuff had to be cut from the Disney Plus release because WOW Musical licenses Disney does not want to pay because despite having more money than humanly possible they don't want to spend any of it. Oh and one episode featuring some guy no one had ever given a shit about got banned because a Squeaky Clean Company like Disney (I mean they want you to think they are squeaky clean but they aren't...) wouldn't let an episode starring a guy who was later found with sexual imagery of children on his computer. Yeah, that's not getting on Disney Plus no matter how much you wish it was complete.

Now I guess I'll sit here and reiterate my feelings on Cancel Culture (I did a piece on this shit before but don't go looking for it. It's terrible) People like Gina Carano getting fired after Disney telling her to not get into shit on twitter REPEATELY is not Cancel Culture. I'm sure there are literal pear pickers out there who have been fired because they said something that their bosses did not like. That's called having a damn job and keeping your mouth shut. THE ENTIRE DAMN WORLD DOES THIS. 

Now people trying to dig up the history of James Gunn. yeah that's shitty (would it surprise you that the people yelling about cancel culture the most also said this was a good thing?). The people yelling at Kathy Griffin (and I don't want to be the person sticking up for her. She's no good!) for some dumb Donald Trump shit and saying how she shouldn't have a job anymore. Oddly enough ALSO from the people who mostly complain about Cancel Culture.

I guess my main point is you don't have to like any of the stuff these companies did. Think it's a terrible fucking crime for all you want. It's fine, just GET THE ENTIRE PICTURE. GET THE ENTIRE STORY BEFORE BLOWING YOUR ASSHOLE OUT please for the love of God do that so I don't lose my fucking sanity. 

The Final Episode #19: Jem and the Holograms (1985 - 1988)

 

Jem and the Holograms was a great 80s cartoon based around a set of toys for little girls. I never cared about that junk! I watched Sailor Moon and Care Bears with great glee! Gender roles meant nothing to me as a child and they mean even less to me as an adult. I'll do what I want! This cartoon was created by Sunbow Productions which was the Animation wing of Hasbro. They worked with Marvel Productions on pretty much every series. I'm sure that's why Marvel Comics had G.I. Joe and Transformers comics. I'm still pissed that there are no Jem and the Holograms old school 1980s Marvel Comics! The IDW series was really good but I still feel like we missed out! Jem and the Holograms should have been a Star Comic! Like the Care Bears!

Jem and the Holograms ran from October 6th, 1985 to May 2nd, 1988. It was created by Christy Marx, a pretty cool lady who also worked on comic books and stuff! The show was about a rock band called Jem and the Holograms. Jem was also Jerrica Benton who had to keep her identity as Jem a secret. They would end up going on wild adventures and have to stop the Misfits (who songs really are better, just saying) and the Misfit's manager Eric Raymond, who might be the sleaziest and shittiest cartoon character of all time.

The Final Episode of Jem and the Holograms, entitled "A Father Should Be..." which was the 12 episode of the 3rd season and the 65th overall was written by Christy Marx herself. I wonder if she's like the Great-great-great-great granddaughter of Karl Marx. Probably not. That was a dumb joke. I'm sure the big reason you come to this blog is the dumb jokes though so I won't delete it.

A Father Should Be starts with Jem and two Starlight Girls (The Starlight Girls were foster girls who lived with Jem and the Holograms), Ba Nee and uh... I don't remember the other girls name at a event for artistic children. Ba Nee gets sad because she sees all the other kids have parents and her mother is dead and her father is missing. This was a running thing throughout the series trying to find Ba Nee's father.  After realizing that Ba Nee really needs to find her father even after she says she doesn't want to be alive if she can't find her dad. Now that's some dark shit for a damn cartoon meant to sell dolls to 6 year olds. 

Anyway Jem goes to Riot, a member of the Stingers, a third band that was made for the 3rd season because they needed new dolls to get money from the parents of little girls (and probably some boys. I would have wanted some Jem dolls if I were older than 3 in 1988) and they started off as big jerks as rivals to both Jem AND The Misfits. They grew as characters over the third season. I really think 1980s cartoons get a bad rap. Yeah they were made to sell toys but people still told fun and heartfelt stories with them. Anyway weirdly put in ranting done. She gets Riot to talk to his dad who works for the military and his dad finds 3 people with the first and last name Martin, Ba Nee's mom had told her that her fathers name was Martin. 

The Holograms break off into groups to find the men. One is disabled and tells them that he isn't her father. The second is a creepy jerk who realizes he can try to con Jem out of money using this girl, the last one is an amnesiac and ends up actually being her father. It's just that he gets to the mansion to late and the creep has now kidnapped Ba Nee. This guy in just one episode makes Eric Raymond and the Misfits look like the greatest heroes. It's pretty amazing. Anyway he has taken her to the old abandoned Zoo and is trying to get 1 million dollars from Jem.

Her actual dad and Jem go to the Zoo to find Ba Nee and him. Jem gets accosted by the BIG JERK KIDNAPPING SHITBAG and uses her powers of creating actual holograms to scare the shit out of him with Gorillas. Meanwhile, Ba Nee's dad is having PTSD flashbacks which finally show him that he's her father. He ends up finding Ba Nee in some weird rock pit. Probably for Tigers or some shit. He then puts the BIG KIDNAPPING SHITBAG in his place, in one of the cells for the animals. The big jerk is going to go to prison and not the prison rich people go to.

There is then a party to send off Ba Nee, she and her dad are moving on. They are even met up with the Misfits and the Stingers. Everyones here. Except Eric Raymond. Anyway Jem feels bad that Ba Nee has said nothing about Jerrica not being there until the last second when Ba Nee realizes that she hasn't said goodbye to Jerrica and there's a nice goodbye and a great way to end the series.

This was a great little last episode. A nice little bow to end the series. Everyone seems to end off at a good place. It wraps up a story that was on going for quite some time. Even had some nice moments between the Holograms and the Misfits, who call a truce. I'm sure that truce ended pretty quickly after the party. It made me feel good. Jem was a good cartoon. The 1980s made good cartoons. Haters can get out of here.

I don't know where else to post this but drag queens need to dress up as Jem and the Holograms AND the Misfits. I would go to see that drag show.

The Final Episode #18: X-Men (1992 - 1997)

 

Yes, It's the return of what I think might be my favorite column of mine on my silly little blog. The Final Episode hasn't seen a post about it since the middle of February. Talking about Friends took way too much out of me so I had to take a few weeks off, and I'm only half joking there. I was wondering what stuff to talk about  but I couldn't find something appropriate. However, I've finally found a few to discuss so we will see how the end of several tv shows worked out in the next few days! Excitement!

As you can see that I have no gotten bored about talking about the X-Men, seeing as the Final Episode of the cartoon series that ran on Fox Kids from October 31st, 1992 to September 20th, 1997 for 5 seasons and 76 episodes. Like a lot of shows it feels like this one had way more episodes because all kinds of crazy shit happened in this show. Anyway, This show was a Canadian/American co-production and a lot of the voice actors are from Canada... Jubliee was voiced by Alyson Court who also voiced  Lydia in the Beetlejuice cartoon and played Loonette the Clown in the Big Comfy Couch, a show for pre-Kindergarten kids that was so entertaining you'd see me watching it at the age of 13. I ain't ashamed. Fuck you.

This show was a big part of what got me into comic books. I don't know if I got to see it on Fox Kids becuase I don't think we had that channel in 1992, BUT YTV showed the hell out of this show and the Spider-Man cartoon, both of which were so fucking cool. I just had to buy the comics after seeing this. PJ Phresh Phil told me this would be cool and he was right! (He was a host of several YTV blocks where they would talk about the tv show or something else before it started! He is still one of the coolest guys alive! I wish I knew Snit!)

So, like a lot of cartoon series that I've discussed on this little column here, it changed the theme of the cartoon. So far it's been this, Garfield and Captain Planet. I don't know why the hell you'd change from a great thing to an absolutely terrible horse shit thing but they did. Here's a link to the season 5 remix. It is clearly not as good as the original and it's shorter! The theme song is what got you pumped the fuck up to watch Wolverine wreck shit! Another problem is that they had a smaller budget and the animation looks cheap. Like this is coming from someone who still enjoys Hanna Barbera and Filmation and this shit was just hard to watch. They also changed some of the character designs around and they suck too. Don't mess with shit that already works people. It's pretty dingle dang simple you know!

Anyway this episode is uh pretty lopsided and kinda weak. I like the main concept of it, with Professor X being hurt and almost dying because of HENRY PETER GYRICH (I do not remember if he appeared on this show or not, but he is one of my favorite comic book characters EVER. He's just this grumpy asshole government employee who in this episode is shown to be bigoted against mutants. I don't remember if he has any bigotry towards them in the comics but it wouldn't surprise me. This episode gets winning points just for having him in it, despite him not having his red hair) Professor X being hurt on live tv with a crazy man who wants congress to make it harder for mutants to live well pisses the fuck outta lot of mutants who think that humanity would never accept them so they go to Magneto and well all hell breaks loose. It was neat seeing Sunfire of all characters in this episode. I like asshole characters like him a lot.

It's up to the X-Men to find Magneto because he's the only one who can help Professor X's brain connect with Lillandria of the Shi'ar. I didn't know I'd be talking about those bird people rascals in TWO posts within the SAME day. I like the Shi'ar. I like the romance between Lilliandra and Professor X. Magneto goes with them to help Professor X in a heroic moment as he believes that Professor X is his greatest enemy and maybe only friend. It's a weirdly great little moment in a less than amazing episode.  This episode ends without even fixing the problem with Magneto's mutants wanting war. It doesn't even feel like a cliffhanger thing just "oh shit we gotta get this out the door right now" kinda thing. Apparently they didn't think this was the last season and I guess they were told it was too late to fix anything.

FINAL VERDICT:  A sad way for one of the best cartoons of the 1990s to end with a weird maybe cliffhanger thing. Still the majority of this show was really good stuff, with that said I don't think I ever saw any of these episodes first run because I guess YTV didn't show them.

Comic Review #16: Jonathan Hickman's X-Men is cool and good.

 

Yes, That's right I'm breaking the cardinal rule of comic book fans. Which is to praise something new over something old, but people who get angry over new stuff are silly. I used to be like that but I'll save my entire story of how I became a non-shitty comic book fan for when I review something else. I'll just say that Facebook helped. Joining groups of people who seemed to jump over each other to go NO MARVEL COMICS STOPPED BEING GOOD IN 1991, NO WAY DICKHEAD IT WAS 1984. FUCK YOU IT WAS 1977. HA YOU LOSERS I STOPPED BUYING MARVEL COMICS IN 1961 WHEN THEY STOPPED MAKING MONSTER COMICS! What I'm saying is these people annoy me now. I don't like them. I don't like that I was like that. There are cool and good comic books from any and every era.

I like the ideas that people are playing with in the Jonathan Hickman run. The fact that they can be resurrected brings up so many questions which I think Leah Williams on X-Factor is doing a terrific job of discussing. I like the weird mystical adventures of Excalibur. I enjoy that Kitty Pryde finally gets to come out as bisexual (and even Chris Claremont wanted this, but to be fair I think he wanted every mutant to be bisexual.) and it's fun to see her be a badass pirate in Marauders. I think the Wolverine comic is really neat. I just think the Krakoa era of X-Men has a lot of cool shit coming down the road. I Also enjoy a lot of character moments that these books seem to offer. One thing I will say positive about 1990s X-Men is that I liked the Gambit and Rouge romance that they had going until they did that shitty thing where Gambit helped the Marauders (the original Mr. Sinister gang) kill the Morlocks in Mutant Massacre. I don't like that retcon (did you know theres some goofy dude on twitter whos apart of comicsgate whos angry at EVERY retcon. It's hilarious honestly)

I also enjoy the New Mutants because I love that gang of rascals. Cannonball and Sunspot are the best bros. Hellions may be my favorite because it's a group of mostly jerks and weirdos (like fucking Nanny. Who the hell decided to bring back NANNY). There was even a pretty great Fantastic Four/X-men crossover that Dan Slott decided to poop on by afterwards making it so that Franklin was never a mutant. That's another dumb retcon but that's because Dan Slott is at best an OK writer. The only book I didn't like was Fallen Angels which was just weird to bring that title back. I also like Teenage Cable way more than grumpy old man Cable and hope they never bring him back to that.

This might not be the most indepth review of these comics but I'm sure I'll end up doing that sooner or later. I just felt like doing a little overall discussion of Johnny Boy's X-Men era.

Comic Review #15: Why I don't really like 90s X-Men.

 

The 1990s in comic books is a very discussed decade. The quality is all over the place. They made great comics in the 1990s, from indie stuff like Bone to DC telling fun stories like Knightfall (which is still pretty good despite some faults at least I remember it being good. I guess we will have to put it on the list of stuff I shall have to discuss again) The 1990s also had way too much Rob Liefeld and I do not like him. Not a single bit. One of the things that are much ballyhooed about from the 1990s is Marvel's X-Men. So many people consider this a great era for the X-Men and I'm like "What are you hooligans smoking?". I figured it's finally time for me to blab about this for way too long because I'm a boring turd like that.

First off I have no real nostalgia for this era of X-Men. For the most part I would buy back issues from the 1970s and 1980s at The Second Page Bookstore. Which is still the greatest used book store of ALL time. I miss it fondly. I think I had a handful of actual 90s X-men comics as a kid. I guess it was a trip to the grocery store and I KNEW I had to get something. I'm surprised I didn't try to get a movie rental instead. I guess that was a part of the trip plan anyway. So yeah I had some random issues where they fight in space with the Shi'ar or against the Shi'ar. Those bird people are always hard to peg down. I would end up clearly reading the 80s issues I had wayyyy more because some of them are falling apart, and I don't even own those 90s issues anymore.

I also have to say a few things, when I say 90s X-Men, I do not mean the first two years of the 1990s (1990 and 1991) the last years of the Chris Claremont era, while definetly not the best stuff that man ever wrote it's still pretty good and worth owning. Two, I'm not talking about X-Force, X-Factor, X-Man, X-Fuckers, XXX-Men, I am just talking about X-Men and Uncanny X-Men. So now on to the complaining, a thing we comic book fans do incredibly well. (I will also say that Excalibur was a good series, well when Chris Claremont or Alan Davis were doing it)

I have to say they came up some pretty good ideas in this era. Like the Legacy Virus, which is a disease that kills mutants. Or Greydon Creed becoming a senator (or maybe president). They just waste these ideas so badly. Legacy Virus goes on so long that by the end no one gave a shit. It was OH SHIT WE GOTTA FIND A CURE. then OH SHIT WE MIGHT HAVE A CURE. then they forget about it for a while. Then OH SHIT WE FOUND A CURE. I don't know what I'd have done with this idea but I'm sure it would have been better than what Scott "Shitty Fucker" Lobdell comes too.  The Greydon Creed stuff would have been so much more interesting if he actually got to be a senator instead of being killed by I think Mystique?

The other stories were just not great rehashes of Chris Claremont stuff. Why read that when I have like all of those issues which were much better. I dunno what else to say other than that. 

I also do not like the art of Joe Mad. It looks awkward and ugly. I do not care to ever see it again.

Movie Reivew #16: Speed (1994) (Rewatch #4)

 

My greatest shame is that on one of my old websites that no longer exist (and thank god) I sassed Keanu Reeves. Said he was stupid and terrible. I also sassed Avengers comics. This was back when all the comedy I would do would come from being angry and negative. Now all the comedy I do just comes from saying I will slap someones bottom or yell at portnoyd. Honestly I enjoy the bottom slapping comedy more than the negative ARGH THIS IS POOP SOUP ARGH shit. I was trying ot be Seanbaby or Maddox and I was not good at it. Let's never speak of these websites again and hope that sweet beautiful Keanu Reeves will forgive me.

I put this as Rewatch #4 because I'm sure I had seen this movie in like 1994 when it was released. Probably after it had came to VHS. We didn't get to go to the movies much and I don't think they would have let 9 year old me in to see it. I did get to see the Santa Clause and Space Jam in the theatre though....wait neither of those actual beat out Speed. And I didn't even see all of the Santa Clause because of the movie messing up, I think we got a free ticket and used that to see the movie Heavyweights. I only mentioned this because I wanted to tell that story. So you get a nice boring story of my childhood! I uh, didn't remember a single thing about this movie which is one of the main reasons I really should do more re-watches. I figure after not seeing something over 27 years would give you a good reason to revisit. That is if I even saw it in the first place, I'm really just guessing if I did or not.

Anyway, Speed holds up incredibly well. It's a fast paced, frantic, and even sometimes funny action film. I enjoyed Keanu Reeves as the cop who is known for doing crazy stunts. Jeff Daniels, a man who needs just as much love and respect as Keanu Reeves gets these days plays his partner. The only real problem I had with this movie is that a smart guy like he was played as gets taken out like a chump. The character should have realized the bomb happy villain would have set a bomb up at his own house. Speaking of the villain the BEST part of this movie is Dennis Hopper. The man who could single handedly save any movie just by being in it. Even if his part was just a few minutes. Hell he's pretty much reason #1 why the Super Mario Brothers Movie is a great film. Yes it is, piss off. Oh and Cameron from Ferris Bueller is here and he delivers some pretty funny lines. It's always nice to see him pop up in a movie. Sandra Bullock does okay here too, Never been a big fan of her really but she does good here.

I also liked how all the cops seemed to care for one another, way nicer than OH IM A CRAZY OFF THE WALL COP WHO DOES IT BY THE RULES AND I HATE EVERYONE!!!! and IM A STUFFY CHIEF COP WHOS ANGRY AT EVERYONE!!! that you've seen in movies since the fuckin days of Humphrey Bogart. I also enjoyed the banter between Keanu and Bullock, Keanu and Daniels, Keanu and Hopper. Everyone works well off each other.  The direction is tense and thrilling. Shit blows up! It's everything you want in an action movie!

FINAL VERDICT:  Go watch or rewatch Speed. Also Speed 2 is not as bad as you think. It's got Willem Dafoe as the villain and really that's all a movie needs.

Comic Review #14: Marvel Music: Billy Ray Cyrus (1995)

 

So where to start on this comic book. I mean for a Billy Ray Cyrus comic there's surprisingly a lot to unpack. I guess that best place to start would be to talk about a short lived imprint of Marvel Comics called Marvel Music, which seems pretty simple, take popular artists and make comic books about them. They got some pretty big names like the Rolling Stones, Bob Marley and Alice Cooper. They also got some people I've never heard of like Marty Stuart, Onyx and KRS-One. I'm sure someone will tell me something about them. Probably portnoyd. Anyway the 1990s were not great for Marvel and this imprint had to be closed in just one year because well bankruptcy issues. It's a shame because this comic is actually a whole hell of a lot of fun.

This comic was written as you can see on the cover by Paul S. Newman, a guy who should not be confused with the actor, Paul Newman. You see he has an S in his name. Don't confuse the two men. Uh, anyway Paul wrote for just about every single company you could think of. Charlton, DC, Marvel (when they were Atlas AND Marvel), Dell and Western. I think Dell and Western and Gold Key were all the same company. Not sure though. He co-created Doctor Solar for Gold Key and I think the man deserves his credit. Not many people can write 36,000 pages of comic books. So let's hear it for the King of Comic Books! Sadly Paul passed away in 1999. 

I also really like the art by Dan Barry, an artist who started in the Golden Age of Comics, drew Flash Gordon after Alex Raymond for like 39 years between 1951 and 1990. He was asked to take a pay cut and told them to stuff Flash Gordon up their ass. Or I assume he did. We don't treat hard working people very well and I'm certain the man worked hard on this art. It's very detailed but in the old school way of very detailed art not the Evan Van Scriver lets put lines everywhere kinda detailed. I like the old school way, I don't like the Evan Van Scriver way. You get to see all of Billy Ray Cyrus' beautiful mullet.

The two stories within this book are fun. One involves Two kids going camping at a old timey fort that is taken over by native americans. They all realize everything in the end. This one really really feels like an old Dell comic where a popular figure or character like Smokey the Bear would have a wild adventure. There's not much really to say about it other than I enjoyed the art and some of the goofy jokes. It was weird to see Paleface in a comic made in 1995 though.

The second of the stories is much better because it's a time traveling story! That's right. He and another two children (who stowaway) go back to the time of King Edward the First (I'm surprised it wasn't King Arthur) and they do all the usual knight stuff. They joust, they fight a dragon (actually just a lot of smoke coming from a cave that Billy Ray gets rid of with a fire exinqustior). They fight off some other knights. I don't want to trash Paul or Dan but it feels to me that this is the story they had more fun with. After they slay the dragon and take pictures the King forces them to stay and Billy Ray has to be his Court Magician. They get out of this by making the King believe Billy Ray has the power to bring the stars down because a fancy watch one of the kids had told them there was gonna be a meteor shower. A neat little way to end a story.

This is a silly comic but sometimes I want silly. It has some really good art and I enjoyed reading it. I can't really say more than that. I don't think this deserves to be on silly internet lists of "DUR DA WORST MARVELY COMICS EVER" and if it were up to me I'd put 90s X-Men, mostly written by Scott "Shitty Fucker" Lobdell on a Worst Marvely Comics Ever list, but I don't get to because Buzzfeed doesn't want to annoy anyone and my opinion that 90s X-Men smelled of dick and ass annoys people. Mostly portnoyd, whom I do enjoy annoying but still. Anyway, uh yeah I liked the Billy Ray Cyrus comic. Eat me.

Movie Review #15: Let's Scare Julie (2020)

 

Holy hot hell this is a bad movie. This might not be as long as my usual reviews because I just had to talk about Let's Scare Julie by some guy named Jud. This is a horror movie that apparently was done in one take? Is it even possible to do a movie in one take? I don't think so. At least not a 83 minute movie. I guess that person on letterboxd was wrong. Anyway, I'd hate for this to be like the first movie to be done in one take because it's very bad and no one should ever watch it.

So What is Let's Scare Julie about? This movie is about some shitty obnoxious assholes who constantly prank this one girl who happens to be the cousin of the shitty jerk from that other shitty movie I reviewed Run Hide Fight. This movie might be slightly better than that one just because it didn't annoy me as badly. These girls are obnoxious. Like incredibly obnoxious, they talk over each other. They talk about dumb irritating shit. They annoyed the bloody piss out of me. Well, no I didn't exactly pee red because of how annoying they were but it was close!!!

These Girls then decide to talk about the HAUNTED HOUSE across the street that was once owned by some lady named Ms. Dure? I think that was here name I don't know or care. Ms. Dure is now gone and its owned by some dude and his daughter Julie. Julie has to wear some weird scarf around (it's because she's a burn victim)! They decide to scare her because literally playing pranks and scaring people is the only thing they enjoy in life. They are literally right out of a damn Goosebumps book for crying out loud!  They even blackmail Emma the girl they love to prank until they found out about Julie.

Well it doesn't go very well. One girl just up and leaves to go pick up her mom from the airport despite the fact I don't think that was mentioned before hand. One girl comes back and is scared shitless. Another just disappears from the movie. Like they never say what happened to her. I guess the really scary old lady ghost got her, and by really scary I mean really awful looking. One girl comes back just not realizing what happened, kisses a girl who I thought said some weird racist thing about muslims. I guess racist lesbians can exist. This just feels like it was put in to tidalite some dudes because the movie is also pretty boring. It's weird to see what looks like a lesbian kiss put in a movie to tidalite some dudes in 2021. 

Uh oh yeah then Emma finds out her sister is over at the other house and has to go get her. They find out they killed Julie! Oh shit! I wonder why the hell the ghost of Ms. Dure cares? God what a stupid garbage movie. Anyway she gets a call from Taylor her shitty Run Hide Fight cousin. They mention I believe for the first time some girl who killed herself named Shannon. Emma said she found a picture of Shannon at the SCARY HOUSE! I think something was edited out because I'm also sure this is the first time Shannon gets mentioned. She runs around and the ghost ends up eating her or some shit because the movie just ends abruptly.

FINAL VERDICT: This movie is ballsack shit. I want to make a Haunted House movie called the Haunted House That Just Annoyed People. It would be better than this. 

Movie Review #14: Father HOOD (1993)

 

I gotta talk about how great Touchstone Pictures was, they started in 1984 and have been dormant since 2016. It became a defunct label in 2018. I didn't even know they lasted that long. Or that they had 236 movies put out under that label. It was a label owned by Disney, because well Disney owns everyone and everything. There heyday was from around 1984 to the mid to late 90s. You've seen the logo before I know you have. 

 They also dabbled in more genres then I thought. I mostly remember them from classic comedy films like Splash, Adventures in Babysitting, 3 Ninjas (shut up you know it's still great), and the first four Ernest movies (Goes to Camp, Saves Christmas, Goes to Jail and Scared Stupid) and Lisa Kudrow's greatest work Romy and Michelle's High School Reunion (she's seriously better in just this one movie than the entire 43 year run of Friends) Of the 73 Touchstone Pictures I've seen according to my letterboxd account I think I've only disliked four or five of them. The majority of them are very well done films that are worth a watch. The great ones are amazing.

The best part is that Touchstone Pictures would pick great actors to star in these movies. I don't think this movie would have been as enjoyable if the actors weren't all great. Even the kid actors, but I gotta give it to Patrick Swayze, whom I will not make a joke about looking like Kurt Russell because both of them are wonderful and amazing and deserve your utmost respect and no dumb jokes made about them. This movie also has Michael Ironside in it, playing a crazy person. You know one of the two roles Hollywood lets him play. A military man or a crazy person. He does it very well as always. It's not a big part but I will always be happy to see Michael Ironside.

The movies plot is pretty simple. Patrick Swayze is a deadbeat dad hoping to score big with Michael Ironside. They plan to steal money from some guy in New Orleans. His daughter escapes from Bigelow, a place for foster kids. It's not being ran very well. I think the only problem is that they didn't say if that place was going to be looked into. I know that Patrick Swayze and the jerk who runs the place have a moment but I'd still like to have seen him in jail or something very conclusive. It's like damn man these place has people who do terrible shit to foster kids and you don't end up showing them shut down. That's not how you end a charming movie!

He ends up kidnapping his kids from the foster care place and they go on a road trip. He ends up getting in contact with a reporter who did a piece on well the fact he kidnapped his kids and she gets him to help get stuff out about Bigelow. The reporter is played by early 90s Halle Berry which I think is the superior Halle Berry. Throughout the adventure they have he goes from Big Douche to Loveable Scamp. He realizes his kids are the most important thing and it's not about the money. Poor crazy old Michael Ironside just gets shot a lot, that dude ends up dead in a lot of things.

FINAL VERDICT: I enjoyed this movie. It was thrilling and had several great laughs. I enjoyed watching these characters interact with one another and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys a fun movie. Portnoyd will yell about it probably.

Movie Review #13: Angel (1984)

 

Starring:  Cliff Gorman, Susan Tyrrell, Dick Shawn, Rory Calhoun, Donna Wilkes and John Diehl

The Review: Ah, this brings me back to the day when my mom went into a weird kinda grocery story (they would sell groceries to other grocery stories but would also sell groceries to the public.) and I decided to wander on over to Nintendo World. Yes, they called themselves that and No, they did not have the okay from Nintendo. Nintendo World was a bastion of VHS tapes, and when I collected them boy howdy they had hundreds. I think the tapes were around 3.99, 6.99 and 9.99. This was like 2000 when you probably still could get that for a VHS tape. Now it's 50 cents if your lucky. Unless you own some weirdo rare horror movie like Tales from the Quadead Zone. I don't know if I bought this on my first or second or third or even fifty fifth visit to the store. I just know that any time we went around this area this was a place we'd go. I even got Ghoulies III: Ghoulies go to College and C.H.U.D. II there. If that doesn't make a store great than I don't know what ever could. I believe the copy of this movie that I had was a Starmaker tape which had to be one of the cheapest VHS tapes I had, but I didn't care because this movie was great!

Now here comes the rewatch. I actually probably like this movie more now than I did then and I thought it was pretty damn cool that I had to go find the sequels as soon as possible. All 4 movies were in my possession at one point or another. This movie follows Angel aka Molly, who as the clever tagline tells you is a high school student by day, Hollywood Hooker by night. Yes, this movie is about teen prostitution and the main character is 15 (but played by a 26 year old woman if I recall correctly). Her mother and father have left her and she doesn't want to end up in a foster home and all that. She's a prostitute to make money to go to school so she can end up in college. There's also creepy assholes at her school who won't leave her alone. A police officer who wants her off the streets but can't get her off the streets. And a found family of street performers. Oh, and a murderer who enjoys necrophilia. All in this New World Pictures classic. New World Pictures was one hell of a film studio man. Started by Roger Corman in 1970 and sold around 1985 to another group of people who would make movies like Hellraiser. The second group of owners would also end up owning Marvel Comics, which I've mentioned before. This clearly has to be one of the last movies Roger Corman made because this movie has approximately 67,000 breasts in it. Roger Corman was all about the boobage.

This is still a movie that's a lot of fun to watch. Some really tense thriller scenes, like when the killer has one of the prostitutes and theres two others really close to them but she cant scream to them. There's also a lot of great actors in this flick. I'm not really sure who my favorite is. Everyone does a fine job with there characters and you end up feeling sorry for the ones who end up dying, especially Mae a transvestite who loves Molly more than her own mother ever did (Mae's words not mine) I'm not even sure transvestite or prostitute are even P.C. terms anymore. I guess I'll find out. Cliff Gorman is pretty good as the hard nosed cop who doesn't even know how to console someone. I really should talk about the movie The Night of the Juggler on this blog. Rory Calhoun MIGHT be my favorite as an old timey western star who busks for money on the Hollywood strip, but then again Susan Tyrrell and Dick Shawn have great chemistry together too. It's weird how a movie about teen prostitution and mentions of necrophilia can be weirdly wholesome. I love how all the street people watch out for each other. It's great stuff.

Final Verdict: If you enjoy 80s thriller movies about prostitution like Vice Squad with Wings Hauser (the guy who wrote this wrote that too) or Fear City, you will definitely enjoy this movie. The only problem with this movie is I wanted Rick and his asshole friends to get a comeuppance. The fuckers ruined it for Molly.

Next Time: This movie had a sequel, Avenging Angel, so let's do that one!

Movie Review #12: Warlock: Armageddon (1993)

 

Well since Warlock (1989) was the first Re-Watch-A-Thon  movie I decided what better way to follow it up then discussing the sequel Warlock: The Armageddon and I figured why not, I remember enjoying this follow up to Warlock (1989) which I must have ran out and rented the following weekend, which is what I would do when I found out a movie I liked had a sequel. I liked being able to watch the entire series as close together as possible. I don't remember if I rented it from Jumbo Video but I'm going to say I did because well I want to complain about those stupid rental cases again. You had to hold the fuckers in the right place to get the movie to come out. It wasn't like anyone was going to steal the damn movie because it was in behind where the clerks were so why not use a better damn rental case!! I am clearly mad about the important things in life.

Anyway Warlock: The Armageddon comes from director Anthony Hickox (who did Waxwork and Waxwork II: Lost in Time, which I loved way back when... and Sundown the Vampire in Retreat which for some reason I've never seen) and he does a stellar job with this movie. Julian Sands is back (which is something the third movie forgets to do!) and he's still as fun to watch as ever. I would have watched a thousand Warlock movies with that man in the title role! The other main characters are honestly a pretty likable couple of teenagers who find out they are Druid warriors (one of the teens is a comics fan and even has a Tintin shirt! Now that's cool!) and I should have realized this movie was related the Waxwork because Zach Galligan makes a small cameo role! and so does George 'Buck' Flower!

The plot is kinda similar to the first one, in which the Warlock is searching for something that will help him bring Satan into the limelight. The likable teens find out that their parents are Druids tasked with stopping Satan and that THEY are Druid warriors with magic powers! The plots good enough to get us sucked in. The acting by most everyone is honestly pretty good but the standout is as mentioned Mr. Julian Sands who I wish would return to making horror films, or at least films I'm interested in watching. The effects in this movie are pretty damn amazing, I mean at least the practical ones. the maybe CGI effects (I dunno) are laughably terrible and horribly dated but the practical ones make you go "DAMN THATS FUCKIN COOL" and every horror fan enjoys doing that!

Final Verdict: I would definitely recommend this movie to fans of fantasy horror or horror in general. Hell even if you don't enjoy horror movies you might enjoy this one. Julian Sands is a badass and I would give him a hug if I could.

Up Next: I'm not doing Warlock: The End of Innocence because well this is a fun little project to rewatch movies I remember enjoying or even ones I think I could have enjoyed more or whatever. Life is too short to watch a movie as terribly bland and unenjoyable as Warlock: The End of Innocence ONCE, let alone twice. So up next is the start of a series of movies that only my sister and I care about. She's a high school student by day! Hollywood Hooker by night! That's right Angel (1984) is our next movie!