The Comic Review #112: Spitfire and the Troubleshooters #1 (1986)

I know I said it would be DC Heavy for a little while but I figured alternating through the rest of the New Universe Stuff would work better. I want to widdle down that giant list I made at least somewhat this year. So we have already reviewed two new universe titles from our friends at Marvel Comics. Star Brand, and Mark Hazzard: Merc. Both of which I enjoyed reading. I guess you will have to keep reading to find out! After this one we will have five more to talk about. That works pretty well because I have five DC heroes I want to alternate with! Hooray for things working out and everyone out there being happy! I like being happy! I also like unnecessary additions to a paragraph to make it look longer and therefore make it look like I put more time into this review! Isn't that sneaky!?? It would be if I didn't call attention to it!

So a quick rundown on what the new universe was. It was something for the 25th Anniversary of Marvel Comics. It was created by Jim Shooter and several others. It was to create new heroes that were more down to earth and all that. It did not really last very long as the entire thing was over in three years, ending in 1989. Mark Gruenwald would bring back some of the characters in his Quasar run and maybe we will take a look at those stories after we have done finishing up discussing these stories. Eliot R Brown who created these characters with Jack Morelli was born in 1954 and found himself a job at Marvel Comics being an assistant to Tom DeFalco. He worked behind the scenes mostly it seems. He is credited for the idea and plot but Gerry Conway wrote the script to this issue. Gerry Conway is a legend of Marvel Comics and DC Comics creating Vixen, Power Girl, The Punisher, Firestorm and a bunch of others with a bunch of artists. One DC Comics writer who did only one thing for Marvel wrote later issues of this comic but we are talking about issue #1 here. Not issue #6.

 So this comic starts off with Karl Swensen being murdered by a man in a robotic suit. He was looking for something within his lab, as he takes a safe out of his desk. Then we go to see the Troubleshooters a multi racial group INCLUDING white guys which is the most 1980s/1990s kinda of multi racial group. There's a black lady, an Asian dude and three white dudes.  They are doing a wacky 1980s prank and it doesn't include sexual assault! Now that's progressive! They are building a tractor in Dean Dibbles office! They are also working at M.I.T. I know a SAUCY MAN who works there. HE IS MY FRIEND AND I LOVE HIM. Ashley Swensen comes in and well despite being a teacher agrees to help bim becuase really who the fuck would respect a man with the last name Dibble. That's the name of the police officer from Top Cat and Top Cat never gave that man a break. So fuck this Dibble too! GIVE HIM HELL TROUBLESHOOTERS.

So she goes outside his office and sees him and two police officers. This admittedly was good for the Troubleshooters because they got to pull off their prank and get out of there but the police officers are there to talk to her about her father's death. She does not take the news well (and neither do the Troubleshooters who are listening in on the ledge!) We then get a smash cut to her funeral where KROZE tells her she has until 10:00 to remove anything that her dad owned from his property or it's his forever! She goes to her fathers house and lab which was on his property, she checks his computer and finds an message from her dad, it says not to trust KROZE and it's 10:00 so she couldn't read any more. The security guy shows her the door. Tells her she has to talk to Kroze to read more. However the son of a bitch is in Europe. 

She then realizes she HAS to read the message and like any responsible teacher she decides to talk to her students about it. She then says they can't help her and it was wrong of her to help them. However these RAPSCALLIONS decide to help her anyway.  She gets into her dad's house without being seen because a bomb was placed somewhere else. It was placed by the Troubleshooters! Now they are really doing 1980s pranks! They are trying to get into a safe but Ashley Swensen tells them to leave! they argue and she realizes they can't leave so they literally turn her dad's labratory into......three trucks. the kind truckers use to haul things. I don't know what they are called. Oh and she shows them a robot like Iron Man only shitty. 

They drive the LAB TRUCKS away and they don't drive out of town or anything just to some canyon place. Ashley gets into the MAX ROBOT PROTOTYPE #2 and starts smashing the canyon to create a base for them. Of course the bad guys lead by KROZE (not his actual name apparently but I don't care enough to figure out what his name was) and this leads to a fight between the PROTOTYPE #1 owned by KROZE and PROTOTYPE #2 with ASHLEY. The fight in the air, the ground and even in the sea. You can tell I'm not in love with this comic book because I want to get this review over with. What can I say, I either get really angry at things I don't like or just want them over with. This is one of those I want it over with. They stop KROZE and move on. They drive away out of town this time to get a good place to set the TRUCK LAB up in. I am just glad I am done with this.

I did not really enjoy this comic book. I did not really get any kind of a feel for any of the characters. They were honestly quite boring characters. the art and everything is really good, just I do not care about the characters and that is the worst thing in any story. I also felt that the LAB TRUCKS were some kind of weird ass pull to get the Lab out of where it was put. Gerry Conway wrote 15452068209420 comic books over his career and really the ranked from quite excellent to uh, not excellent. The original plot from Eliot R Brown and Jim Morelli didn't really help.  I did not hate this comic book as you don't really see me getting mad about it but it is clearly the worst new universe title I have read right now. You are really better off reading any Iron Man comic being published in 1986 over this.

FINAL THOUGHTS: I hope the rest of the new universe titles are better than this one. Read Iron Man instead. Or watch the Transformers.  

The Comic Review #111: Batman #433-435 "The Many Deaths of the Batman" (1989)

 

It's going to be DC Heavy with the Comic Review for a little while. I have never discussed any Superman titles, or Wonder Woman or Green Lantern on my little blog here. I have to finish other things I said I would review that were DC related. I have some Annuals to do that I said I would do in like 2021. I have talked about Batman before but I figured I would do so again for two reasons to ease BIG DC HATER PORT J. NOYD into DC TIME for the next several Comic Reviews because he likes Batman and I was reminded of this story and it was one I haven't read in near on twenty years now. Buying it as a back issue sometime in the 2000s. The fact the 2000s are twenty years ago makes me feel like I'm going to explode into dust so I better hurry because everyone on the internet is excited for my take on this 37 year old Batman comic! So let's get to it!

 1989 was one hell of a year for Batman. That was when the first Tim Burton Batman movie had come out. It had a LOT of buzz towards it. So many people talking about it. Probably even more than you'd get later on because well THIS WAS BATMAN and it was like his first real movie. It was a pretty big hit and I personally still enjoy it a lot. This caused the Batman comic books sales to go up for a little while. I don't really have sales data or anything, I'm just going on what was said by people who were there at the time.They even gave Batman his third ongoing, the first new Batman series since 1940. It was called Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight. A series that I will get up on to discuss sometime soon. 

This comic was written by John Byrne who has said a lot of controversial things and made enemies inside the comic industry and outside it in the fandom. However he is also MASSIVELY beloved by people too. He helped Chris Claremont create some of the BEST X-Men (and Superhero) comics ever in The Uncanny X-Men. He did a great job with Fantastic Four and She-Hulk. Revamped Superman in the 1980s for DC. However he also did some not very good Spider-Man comics and other stuff. Not a perfect creator but he definitely has  an incredible amount of laurels to rest upon. This comic was drawn by Jim Aparo who drew an amazing Batman and worked on the character from 1972 to the early 2000s. Jim Aparo sadly passed away in 2005 at the age of 72. He  pretty much drew every DC character.

 The first issue is pretty neat. You see in GI Joe #21, Larry Hama drew an entire issue where there was no dialogue. It involved Snake Eyes. This is John Byrne and Jim Aparo doing the same, however there is just one problem. John Byrne had Commissioner Gordon say "Get out" He did it because he did not know who was going to draw the issue and wanted to make sure that people would know what he was thinking, but it kinda ruins the flow of an almost all silent issue. (He would later would go on to say that if he knew Jim Aparo was going to be drawing these issues he would have not put those words in). Despite that this issue is a pretty great set up to this story. You see a man dressed up as Batman tied up to a fence in a dirty alleyway. Then he is brought to the hospital, my favorite part of the whole episode is some guy trying to get a peak at who Batman is and another Doctor is like NO WAY FUCKFACE. HE SAVED THE CITY AND THE WORLD AND MAYBE EVEN THE DAMN UNIVERSE TOO MANY TIMES FOR ME TO LET YOU DO THAT! The man dies and then a news reporter finds out from a doctor and its sold to a news paper and you see reactions form the Penguin and Two Face and even Robin. Then Alfred and finally Gordon. The issue then ends with ANOTHER guy dressed up as Batman getting blown the hell up. I don't know about you but this is one hell of a way to start a story.

 The second issue involves Batman just randomly running after some person who ends up being a woman. She's in some kind of red and white cloak thing and we don't know who she is or ever learn who she is. She's just here to get Batman out of Gotham. He is in France now. We go back to Gordon and the Assistant Coroner who is a saucy lady. I wish she had stayed a part of this comics supporting cast. She and Gordon talk about the crimes. it starts out with FOUR dead men in Batman costumes who were the best at what they did (like being a body builder or a demolitionist or whatever). Another man who seems to be some kind of gymnast is killed by a crossbow and yes he's in a Batman outfit. They learn that the Crossbow Champion at the Olympics is in town. They find out before he dies (again in a Batman outfit for some reason) that BRUCE WAYNE had sent him a letter. Oh shit, Bruce Wayne is on the list of people this loony bastard wants to kill. They rush over to STATELY WAYNE MANOR to find Alfred there who is not even sure if Bruce Wayne is there, however he as made aware by the French police that he was considered dead so he went back to Gotham. He was given a Batman suit that would have combusted into acid after fiddling with the Utility Belt. We then go to a fat man trying to get some sexy times with a prostitute and yes he's dressed at Batman AND A SNAKE IS GOING TO KILL HIM. It seems we will have to read part three to find out what happens!

We open part three with the police in the prostitute's apartment. She's dead and she had jammed her finger into her carpet and made a BATMAN SYMBOL this will be important later!! We then go to Batman and Alfred talking. Did you know that DC did a stupid thing and KILLED ALFRED and so far HAS NOT BROUGHT HIM BACK. Alfred is like BATMANS SURROGATE DAD. YOU DON'T KILL HIM. Okay back to this story. He is telling Alfred that without these men there may have not been a Batman. Yes, the men who have been murdered are men who helped teach Bruce Wayne things he would need to know to become Batman.. Gordon and the Assistant Coroner talk about the death of one of the men, Stone. She tells him that he has been dead for days before he was blown to shit. Gordon is off to tell the cop whos trying ot solve that part of the crime to look up everything about Stone. He's the one the killer really wanted, everything else was to throw the police off the track!

 We then go to Stone himself and well he's getting ready to marry some woman and he goes JUST LIKE I PLANNED. Oh shit, Stone killed everyone!! Watch out Sally!! We then return to Bruce Wayne and Alfred and Bruce Wayne literally says that he doesn't care if the police find out he's Batman he has to get out there to help people. Alfred says he has a plan to get the police off his back. His plan is to COOK A LAMB ROAST IN THE MICROWAVE which he hates doing. I love that little bit. He ends up feeding the DESTROYED Lamb Roast (his words not mine!) to the police. Batman now down in the Batcave is looking at flight records becuase he knows that none of these men were Gotham natives and the man killing them had to lure them here too. He knows the next man on the list who is Boch. He remembers about how he met Boch and his wife and how he taught him all about Toxicology. The study of poisons. I must also say that I love how Jim Aparo draws Batman. So serious. So stern. STERN FOR JUSTICE.

 Batman meets up with Gordon and the LADY DOCTOR after finding out that Boch was already killed and tells them he knows who these men are and that half way through the deaths a pattern emerges, around when the gymnast was killed with a crossbow, they were killed with the next person in line's manner of expertise. Batman has a plan to lure out the killer and he also knows who he is going to go to next, so Batman dresses up as him and Stone comes there and is like IM BATMAN IM A MASTER OF DISGUISE and then later on the REAL Batman says the same thing when found out. Stone says not you or any of your enemies are going to ruin the new life I created for us. Which intrigues Batman. We see a scene of Alfred tending to Batman's wounds from the fight with Stone. He says he has to go after Stone because he knows who he is now. Stone is freaking out at his wife and tells her all about what happened mostly. Let's her know that he figured out that the Batman learned exlopsives from him and how he's worried that Joker and Two Face might find that out. She's confused because she knew him as a florist and even says that and his response is "yeah a florist with WEEDS TO KILL" Stone you wild man.

Stone just puts on a random mask and goes to the next guy, a man who knows about random tribes of people all over the world. I don't know what thats called because I'm stupid. He gets him to put on the suit to let Batman's enemies know why he's killing people. Personally I think if Stone had just gotten some mental health help we would not be in this situation. This is where the actual Batman comes in and he's freaking out about how he couldn't have found the new identity he created but Batman tells him about the prostitute Mary McGinnis (see I told you she would be important!) She had traces of a chemical fertilizer on her. A very rare chemical fertilzer used to help grow Snow Orchids. Only three guys in Gotham sell those flowers and well his dumb ass was one of them. The Police and Gordon show up (I guess some other hotel guest claled them or maybe Batman called them and it took them a while to get there. Who knows?) and he says you won't have much evidence to tie him to the Bat-killings but you cna tie him to Mary McGinnis' murder. Should have changed your shirt STONE you CRAZY FUCK. He then says he has to give some bad news to Sally. Just imagine BATMAN popping out of the shadows to tell you bad news! Probably the best way to find out bad news because you still got to meet Batman!

FINAL THOUGHTS: I had fun re-reading this story. The art is excellent and the story even if the trying to force everyone into a Batman outfit is a little forced is still a lot of fun to read. I enjoyed the bits with Alfred microwave cooking and hating having to do so. It all makes sense in a comic booky way really. I would consider this a story worth picking up if you like Batman. I don't know if it's been collected but the back issues really shouldn't cost you that much money. Probably could get all 3 of them for under $5 if you look in the right place. Can't buy much with $5 but you can buy some Batman comics with ADVENTURES OF BAYOU BILLY and HYDLIDE ads in them and I dunno about you but I think that's worth $5.

The Final Episode #145: Gadget and the Gadgetini's (2002 - 2003)

 

So I need to stop saying things like I won't talk about this thing for a decade. Even as a joke. A few months ago I did a redo for The Final Episode of Inspector Gadget. I mentioned in the bottom paragraph how I would not talk about Inspector Gadget for a decade. Then my brain was like "NO MICHAEL YOU MUST TALK ABOUT GADGET AND THE GADGETINIS" I mean yeah I did talk about it before in my not very good YouTube videos. I figured I would do this because I guess it feels right to do this sequel series and discuss it in more depth than I did in my very bad YouTube video on Inspector Gadget which even less people watched than people who read this blog. I know there is also Gadget Boy but I don't really want to talk about that series but I probably will one day. Anyway let's get into some discussion on Gadget and the Gadgetinis.

So we come back to DiC, something we've discussed a lot on this blog and will continue to do so because I like them. I don't think we will do every cartoon but I know you all need my thoughts on Hammerman and ProStars. Bo Jackson teaming up with Michael Jordan and Wayne Gretzky to fight crime! SIGN ME THE HELL UP SON! So I've mentioned the DiC story before. They started in 1971 and this was 2001 or 2002 or whatever. I don't know. This was their fourth and last decade in production. They are now owned by Wild Brain a Canadian company that has bought up like every other Canadian company that had anything to do with making cartoons or children's programs. I do not like the name Wild Brain.

This was a pretty sad decade for DiC which you can see in what shows they were making. This is the decade of Super Duper Sumos and Dinotopia. Also  a cartoon based on the comedy movie Evolution (which I remember liking). The animation was somehow cheaper than decades past (Shit I love Super Mario Brothers Super Show but it was cheap as fucking hell) and just kinda not a lot of fun to watch. I mean from what very little of this era of DiC that I have seen. Gadget and the Gadgetinis was something I only watched two episodes of and well you will find out how I feel about the show soon enough. At least after one or two more paragraphs of set up.

So this series brought back all of the original creators of Inspector Gadget. Andy Heyward, Jean Chalopin and Bruno Bianci. Bruno would create the redesigns and man I don't really like them. I can only think of one redesign I've liked and that was of the chipmunks from the 1980s. Both of those redesigns are really great. Most of the time I really do always like the original style of something than most redesigns. I can't say I hate these designs but I don't really like them. Especially Penny because she was NOW COOL AND 2002. I'd show a picture of her but I don't care enough. Go google that shit yourself you lazy fuck. They worked with a French animation company that was apparently owned by HAIM SABAN. THE POWER RANGERS MAN. The only things they made that I know about are What's With Andy, W.I.T.C.H. and this show. I never really watched any of them and really do not care enough to do so.

So this show came out in 2002 and yeah that's after my cut off date but I gotta admit there are a few shows I want to do that ended in the 2000s and even 2010s so I'll count them and this sequel series of Inspector Gadget but really do not expect many post-2000 shows to ever show up here. Anyway I never saw this series when it came out and I have no idea when I learned of this show. I was too busy watching movies from the 1980s and around there and collecting and playing NES games and talking about those things on the internet. I would get back into comics around the year 2003 after finding out about comic stores our city had. I never saw this show on the Family Channel was where the show showed up on Canada. Yeah this has a Canadian voice cast but man I only know of like two of them. One voiced Vegeta in the Dragon Ball Z dub and one I am sure I've seen act in something live action. He's this very friendly looking black man named Alvin. I like that name.

 This show changed a good amount of stuff. Brain left, Chief Quimby left, they do not mention Corporal Capeman AT ALL. So I hope he's like dead in a ditch somewhere. Gadget works for some fancy criminal organization ran by a guy called Colonel Nozzhair. Like Nosehair. He is not very good or memorable as a character. Penny created two robots called Gadgetinis who now help Inspector Gadget not die due to his complete stupidity. This show also changed the humour a bit. Everyone is comedic now, instead of Inspector Gadget being the dumb idiot with super powers in a cartoon full of straight men. They gave Dr. Claw a brother called Dr. Thaw and his mother is even a character. Just got too goofy. I mean I only watched two episodes of the show but it just felt like it was wrong somehow. I dunno. Oh, and this show also got a PS2 game made for european countries. I have never played it but it looks like a pretty bland 3D sidescroller. I'll stick with REAL Inspector Gadget games like the one made for the SNES.

The Final Episode of this show was entitled "The Comet, The Unicorn and the Bad Gadgetinis" and was written by Mister Jean Chalopin himself. He wrote or co-wrote every episode of this show. Pretty neat. You already know his history with DiC and even his other animation company Jetlag but did you know he became a banker and is like probably super ultra rich now. He is 75 years old and is still at it! This episode aired on November 29, 2003. I don't know what I was doing then so we will say I was playing Kirby's Adventure for the Nintendo Entertainment System. Oh and did you know that despite being co-produced by the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA the show never aired there. Oh, and LIEUTENANT Gadget's parents show up in this show. 

 So we start with a news reporter telling us about a comet that is returning after seven hundred and seventy seven years. They must have been a fan of Allan's Video's Seven Dollars and Seventy Seven cents special. The Comet is called the Unicorn and the last time it showed up was the last time anyone saw an actual Unicorn. I must say that wow this cartoon looks cheap as hell. I didn't think DiC could get cheaper but they showed me! The other news reporter says that it might interfer with robotic shit. Oh no! The Gadgetinis!!! We then go to a dirty man who is trying to do a William Shatner impersonation but it is very bad. He is not good at it. He works for Dr. Claw and is telling him it's all going according to plan. Oh no! 

Before I go on man Brian Cummings you did a great job as Vegeta but man you uh do not work as well as Dr. Claw. You can tell he's trying but it just does not feel right. The Doctor Henchman Guy tells Dr. Claw that the Unicorn's fur makes it invisible because it reflects light or some shit. I dunno. The Comet will mess with that and they will be able to see the unicorns that are apparently all around the place but we never bump into them. I guess they know where the Unicorns secret hiding place is but they can't find them. This episode is already stupid as hell.  We then go to the new Chief Colonel Nozzhair. He sucks. They do some really really really forced slapstick. It's not well done. He gets his assignment and leaves.

 

This is Penny's redesign and it's not one I like. They just seemed to try to make her cooler. I wish I could have gotten Gadget in there too because they removed the trenchcoat and he just wears a black thing. They look like some kind of pyjamas. Anyway Penny realizes the Comet is really bad for the robots just in case you forgot somehow. She goes to check on Inspector Gadget who is flying around with his helicopter thing and also has a umbrella out to test two gadgets at once. However the Gadgetinis have become BAD, of course they only became BAD after Gadget hit them. Maybe they finally had enough of his horse shit and decided it was time to kill him and are using the Comet as a excuse. Who knows? Anyway the Gadgetinis want to get paid and have vacation time and also medical. Full medical coverage. Penny says no and leaves for school. This gets them ANGRY and they decide to kill Gadget.

Dr. Claw somehow hacked into Gadget's house phone and the Gadgetini's talk to him and join up with M.A.D. All of this feels so try hard and corny that even if this show came out in like I dunno 1995 I probably wouldn't have watched it. I'm pretty sure I would have considered this the "dumb Gadget cartoon" and went of to watch something else. Oh and I guess Gadget didn't get an assignment this time. The Gadgetini's are just bringing him to Antarctica. They blow up a hole in a ice cave and shove him in there. They get back into their weirdly designed plane and shoot ice and snow down covering up the hole. Gadget is stuck in a cave which he can easily get out of with his gadgets. Like this really shouldn't be a problem even for a character as stupid as he is. Gadget of course thinks this is some kind of spa and some penguins come by and he thinks they work for him. The penguins freak out and run around and then Gadget decides to run around.  This is trying way too hard.

So we return to the Doctor Henchman Guy and his weird attempt at doing William Shatner and he has found Unicorn Island. He's going down to look for the Unicorn that will apparently help then take over the world. He fails and crashes the plane he was in. Now he will have to go on foot to get the Unicorn. Or maybe Dr. Claw could get the Gadgetini's to do it. Oh, he actually does do that. It's nice to know someone does something intelligent in this show. So the Unicorn destroys the random blue Gadgetini and the orange one literally catches it easily.  We go back to Gadget and he goes swimming with Penguins. the water is too cold and the joke of character gets turned into an ice cube is used for approximately the 9 millionth time. This time it does not make me laugh however. 

Penny then talks about how the Unicorn can do what it can do and man this really feels like it's talking down to kids. Yeah kids can be silly and stupid and maybe not even pay full attention to something but you don't have to keep repeating something within a 20 minute time frame. This is not a hard plot to follow at any age. She does at least give some new information which is that the Unicorn's milk makes anyone who bathes in it super strong.  Gadget in the ice cube calls Penny on his GADGET CELL PHONE and she tells him about what he's got to do. He gets a rocket out of nowhere and puts it on.  He's going to Unicorn Island!

 He flies into space and sees the Comet and now the Comet messes with him and he turns around and becomes a fireball ready to hit the earth. Penny freaks out and uses her computer to get gadget incased in a spaces ship??? This really feels like someone was writing it on the toilet fifteen minutes before it was needed to be shipped off to the animators. She tries this ass-pull shit on the Gadgetinis and well they literally just changed their passwords. This is very lazy.  We go to the Gadgetinis and they are bitching about something or other. I frankly stopped caring so don't expect my A+ material any more. I just want to get this over with. Lol, Penny just guesses the password and uploads the shit that turns them good again. That just feels like such an ass-pull and most of the time in the original series Gadget would win by knocking out the bad guy accidentally. IT STILL FELT MORE OF A WIN THAN THIS.. I should also mention that Penny is at HOME and not anywhere near this so she's not in any danger either!

The Gadgetinis and Gadget just show up to the DOCTOR HENCHMAN GUY and Dr. Claw tries to get them to do something and they are like LOL ITS 5:02 NOW WE ARE OFF THE JOB and Gadget just grabs the unicorn milk from the doctor henchman guy and you can tell I stopped caring because I'm not even putting that name in all caps for some weird comedic reason. He of course fucks up and gets the milk on him. Blah blah blah. the henchman guy gets some milk and gets knocked off the planet and on to the Comet. He is powerful enough to stand on the Comet but I guess the Unicorn's is stronger?  I dunno. When you have to ask questions like that you either have autism or the joke doesn't work. Or maybe both. I don't know. 

Some more horse shit happens with COL. NOZZHAIR but I don't care enough. Sorry. I'm done for now.

FINAL THOUGHTS: I said this show was okay when I watched it for my shitty Youtube Video but I think I said that because compared to the live action movies, the CGI animated Gadget movie (which is one of the worst things I've ever seen and no I will not rewatch it so I can review it, fuck you), Gadget Boy and that weird Field Trip show this is okay. Compared to like anything else it's not. The original show worked because it played within it's own rules and this show seems to have no rules set in stone. Just do whatever you can and get the story over with. I dunno. Another problem is that this show makes Gadget really 100 times dumber than he was before hand. Writing a stupid character is hard because there is a point where people will go "No, not even they would do something that stupid" and this show does that all over the place. I did not enjoy my time with this show and will not watch any more of it. I will probably talk about Gadget Boy but not for a very long time. 

NES Game Reviews #67: Marvel's X-Men meet Mega Man while inside Mario's Time Machine. Maxi 15 is a loser who no one likes and Mechanized Attack kisses Master Chu and the Drunkard Hu.

 

Well this is a very interesting set of games. We have the start of one the best video game series' of all time. We have a color dreams game that isn't complete fart shit and one of the WORST NES games ever. And three other games that WILL BE A SURPRISE until YOU READ THE ARTICLE! I won't ruin everything for you jerks! I mean unless you read the wordy not very funny title of the article then you know all six games. I like this Mario's Time Machine ad. I think it's for the SNES version but I don't care. Eat shit. It's got a fuckin Dinosaur in it so I was totally going to use it.

 So we finish off the MARIO EDUTAINMENT GAMES. What did I think of Mario's Time Machine as a child? Seeing that I loved the SNES version of Mario is Missing as a child. I hated it. I remember renting the game once and just not knowing what the Jesus Christ fuck I was supposed to do. You had to drive across some water and get into the right COOL SNES MODE 7 WATER THING. That's what I remember I did not check it out because I do not care about Mario's Time Machine. The fact the NES version does NOT do that weird shit makes it a better game. It is still pretty shitty. Yes I know that I gave Sesame Street and Fisher Price a pass but they worked for 3-4 year olds. I get the feeling that they would enjoy it. However Mario's Time Machine is clearly made for kids in grade school so they can do better in History. This game has the same problem Mario Is Missing has which is that it is dreadfully boring. Just a really dull mess of a game. I get the feeling if Nintendo actually made these games they might have been better but we will never know as we cannot access that alternative universe. I really have nothing else to say about Mario's Time Machine. 

 

I do not know where to start with this game so I guess I will discuss the first time I got it. My mom finally relented and found someone who gave her a NES and some games for free. I don't know if she somehow knew the games this person had were so fucking terrible they would cause someone to quit before really getting into collecting. I have no idea why she let me collect games then but man I wish she would have let me get my old games back from BULLY SHITHEAD. Anyway the games these people had were like 6 fucking copies of SMB 1, Super Mario Brothers 3 (just one copy), Snow Brothers (yes I got a RARITY for FREE but back then we discussed how the games were ENJOYABLE or NOT. Personally I like this game but I might be a bit more biased because it was one of the better games I got from these people), Ghostbusters and X-Men (two licenses that children who liked the NES wish were better. Just imagine a Konami or Capcom game made from those licenses!)  I remember being exicted because I don't think I had played either game through emulation and holy shit I was so mad at both of those games that at one point through complete boredom one day I just smashed the shit out of those two games with a hammer. Just getting some anger out of my system. I would end up buying copies of them again when I decided to go for a full set of games which I never did because the games became too expensive. So why is this game so bad? First off, the graphics are the ugliest shit I've ever seen. Yes I know it's the NES and none of the graphics are that amazing in 2026 but holy shit they did not try here. Secondly the levels are just a shitty mish mash where you have to get to a boss and then get a key. I fought Boomerang (why the fuck is he in a X-Men game?) and somehow got passed him and the game then let me go back and win the day. The music is terrible. Half of the X-Men characters you get are completely pointless and incredibly hard to use. Seriously you need an X-Men with a long range attack to get anywhere. All the enemies want to fuck you in the ass like no tomorrow. The most amazing thing about this is that I am one of the few people who stick up for LJN and say they had some good games but man this game just sucks all around. Such a painfully awful game that I do not enjoy playing in the least but I somehow beat it once. You have to slightly reset the game to get to the last level which is really annoying and stupid. Fuck this game in the ass. I will dream of a good NES X-Men game.

 Wow, this game is a rarity. This is a semi-okay Color Dreams game. One of their best in fact. I mean for their entire thing of Color Dreams-Bunch Games-Wisdom Tree. All three companies and you get like four games. This one is not great or even amazing. It's very much the most simple platformer of all time but I cannot hate any platformer that gives me what I want, which is to shoot weird enemies in the face and then go to a different stage. You have to pick up like eight YIN/YANG symbols and they take you to a boss. You do this enough times and you have beaten this game. I think I beat this game on emulation a very long time ago. I have nothing else to really say about this game except why does the name Joy Van seem so familiar. I don't think they made any other games but they apparently made this game and Color Dreams bought it. Were they connected to Sachen? PORT WHAT DID JOY VAN DO???

 This game is weird and I don't know if I'm going to review it, mostly for one simple reason. There are fifteen games on this thing and all fifteen games were released earlier on the NES. It was a game I never got and I do like the fact it has a cool case and all. Is this even the American version or the Australian version? Did that get a cool case? This was done by American Video and it was mostly their games and Color Dreams' Menace Beach. So I will just mention this game and review the games when they come up. Yeah, it was a neat idea to put all your games in one cart and try to sell it as a bargain thing but it's also an even better idea to make those games good. I think there's one whole game on that cartridge that doesn't make me puke out of my asshole. Which sounds really painful. 

 This is a zapper game that was also a arcade game. This game was a pretty good zapper game. There were about five levels and they play well. You shoot things and yeah, there's really not a lot to say about Zapper games to be honest. Not that they are bad (well im sure some are). it's just you will probably wear out your hand trying to play most of these games now at the ripe old age of OLD PERSON. Which happens when you become 40 so I am a OLD PERSON and my hands are OLD AND HURTY. It's just neat that the NES had some first person shooters and this game is well done and all that. It's a worthwhile Zapper game, but I can only think of like one Zapper game that I don't like at all. I am clearly trying to make this paragraph bigger so I will stop insulting the both of us and just move on.

 We finally got to Mega Man. The next post may take a while because I want to do good reviews for each and every Mega Man game. I also want to tell you a MEGA MAN MEMORY because Mega Man was a game series I LOVED as a child. Loved it. It and Mega Man X got so much play. First off I gotta mention the box art. Yes I know everyone says it's shit but I personally kinda love it. It looks like Barack Obama put on a weird costume and then got stuck in a depressing 1970s Sci Fi film. It's wonderfully cheesy. Just so weird. Anyway I had this game as a kid with my name written on the back in black marker. It was given away after my first NES broke to a kid named Evan. Evan was the son of my dad's friend. He was a good kid. I remember going to his house upstairs to his room and trying to beat this game for what felt like forever. We would talk at school about it, although I had to go look for him at Recess because he was younger than me. One day he just gave up on the game which was a real sad day. I think we did get to the first Wily stage. This game is kinda janky in some places. Like you have to make a PERFECT jump or you will just fall off things (and the way Mega Man hits the ground so FAST AND FIERCELY is funny as hell to me). This game is still a lot of fun, all of the weapons are fun to use and it's also fun to beat the game without using the weapons. I also love how the first two games in this series have this melancholic feel to them. Like you really had this sad lonely journey to go on TO FIGHT FOR EVERLASTING PEACE. I dunno if anyone felt like that while playing this game. Still it's MEGA MAN and is worth owning. I mean not for the 846204290 dollars people want for it but if you keep a look out for this game you will find it. I will try not to do the VIDEO GAME COLLECTING RANT for any of these Mega Man games but I probably will end up doing it for one because really fuck VIDEO GAME COLLECTING these days.

 GOOD GAMES: 180

BAD GAMES:  141

OKAY GAMES: 60

GAMES IMPATIENT: 7

HAVEN'T PLAYED ENOUGH: 3

GAMES OVERALL:  391

NES Game Reviews #66: the Mario Bros. Go Missing in Mappyland while Marble Madness plays Major League Baseball in the Maniac Mansion.

 

We haven't had a post since April 13th when I yelled at some people who will never see said post. Anyway, I just felt like not talking about things and I figure it's never good to force ones self to make a post. Just let the thousands of words fly out of your fingers naturally. If you gotta force it, just take a break from writing. I think I learned that from a Charles Bukowski poem. The things I know is amazing and will terrify someone one day. We also haven't had a post about NES games in almost a month! It's amazing how time flies when you are an adult. Even an adult who does nothing. Life is passing through my fingers rapidly and I decide to talk about Mappyland. Also said Mappyland ad is awesome and I'm glad I picked it. So let's get to the next six games, baby!

 

 We start with a fucking DOOZY of a game. Yes it's another sports game but it is without a doubt THE WORST FUCKING SPORTS GAME FOR THE NES THAT I HAVE PLAYED. At least in the top five. It's hard for me to really review sports games because I am no good at any of them. I at least can tell effort was put in there. This game really fails because of one thing in my mind. The characters move so fucking slow that whoever you are up against can literally get like a shitload of home runs. That ruins this ENTIRE fucking MESS of a video game. I can't get that mad at this game because I really don't care about Baseball (they might have gotten the REAL players names but I would probably only recognize like two of them). This game reminds me of a NES scener named Sappy who hated it so much. He was a douchebag and literally might be the only person who would look for my blog just to call me names because he doesn't like me, but I don't really think he likes any human being. Anyway I wish I was watching the movie Major League instead of talking about this game. I still need to see Major League 2 or Major League Back to the Minors. Yes, they made three of those movies. Isn't that wild?

 I just found out that someone on amazon is trying to sell this game for $75. I remember when I got my copy from some girl selling games at the flea market. She sold this game for $10 because it was a "name" game as it was a name people would recognize and not like "Phantom Fighter". $10 was fair honestly around that time (I guess this was like late 2000s?) and place. $5 was the usual price for a NES game at my local flea market here in Newfoundland, an extra five for this game was really no problem. This is the famous LucasGames or LucasFilm games or whatever point and click game and I think this might be the best point and click game for the NES. I think this is a really good port but then again I have not played the original game because I don't really want to try to get it to work. DOS confuses me and even very simple New DOS scares me. Sorry. This is a WILDLY fun little game. Great characters, great vibe, all kinds of endings, all kinds of stuff to enjoy in this little game. I still have not beaten it because I am complete ass at point and click games and I'd like to try to beat this game without a guide. I think it deserves that. I like that at least in some versions of this game you could blow up a hamster like some kind of psychopathic crazy man (hi Bratwurst). This game is funny and creative and is a lot of fun to play. There's not much else to say about it.

 

Mappyland is a game I remember from my childhood. I remember it being at the video store. Or maybe I owned it. I don't know but I do remember seeing this game. I'm sure I played it because it's a cute colorful game box that would have drawn in five year old claw in 1990.  I cannot tell you what I thought of the game as a child but I can say that I think this game is a pretty good "points" game that you can play until you get a game over or you get tired. I like "points" games because I played a lot of them as a kid. They are simple little games that get harder and the good ones just work. I would say that Mappyland is one of the good ones. Honestly I only have two problems with this game. One is the jungle level of this game. I hate hate HATE this level so much. So so bad. I also do not like how you lose the ablitiy to see in some levels once you die once. Still there's really not a lot to say about this game that's bad. It's a nice simple "points based game" that I will be putting in the GOOD section of games. I like the dancing cat with a beard on the train. Just having a good time dancing and waiting for a chance to eat Mappy. Mappy is a dumb name.

 

 

Going through all of the NES games made me realize how many GREAT NES games are just very simple games and also arcade ports. I think I might have taken them for granted beforehand but man they made some very good Arcade ports for the NES. Marble Madness. Marble Madness is a great game to pick when you need to kill 15 minutes but want to have a fun time. There's really only like six levels in this game and you can beat this game in like fifteen minutes. This game is really pretty great, the graphics are nice, the music is pretty wonderful and its fast and frenetic and gets you wanting to beat your time and trying to finish the game quicker.  I wish I really could say more because this game deserves it but it's a very simple little game BUT one I think just about anyone could get into. It's a game that is probably still $5 because IT WAS EVERYWHERE EVER and if anyone tries to make it a cent more then I will personally go insane and destroy every game convention ever. You cannot make Marble Madness more $5. I will not let it happen.

 

 

You ever see the commercial for this game for the Atari version? It's the funniest thing in the world. So poorly acted and over the top. I love that commercial. I have never played the Atari version of this game and I really see no reason to do so. Mario Bros. is the original first Mario Bros game. Donkey Kong was the first Mario game but at one point he was called Jumpman. Man the Mario lore is confusing and weird. I still have not seen the second Mario animated movie that they put out recently. I don't really care enough to do so even if I did like the first one. This is a fun game. I remember playing it on the Super Mario Brothers All Stars for the SNES. You could play it in SMB3. I don't know if you could do that in the SMB3 NES game. I forget how you even do to play it. It was a fun two player game. I remember playing this for the NES bounty and I think port and I were trying to beat it and I do believe I was the one who beat it first. and by beat I mean get past level 16 when it just starts to repeat. You can keep on playing after that and I think I did and got into the 20s which is as far as I ever got. I'm sure someone was good enough to get to level 99 and I could never do that. I am not good enough. Still regardless of how good you are at this game it is a worthy addition to any collection and is a fun game to play.

 

I was a weird child. Yes I know that's a shocking statement. A man who blathers on about The Smoggies and Blue Devil comics was a weird child.  I really really really liked Mario is Missing for the Super Nintendo. Just figuring out stuff to get a new level was something I was really into. I did not beat the game as a child but I did beat it as an adult and I do not get why I wasted a rental for that game EVERY WEEK. Yes in the 1990s I would rent several games and movies from a video store called Allan's Video. EVERY WEEK for I do not know how long Mario is Missing would be one of those rentals. It was really weird because it's kind of a dull game but it had LIL' CLAW in its grasp. Anyway I will say this much, the SNES version is much better than the NES version but both games are dull. Just lifeless. You go from one area to another bringing stuff back to these information booths and answering questions about them. Then you go to a different place in the world and do that again. It's just not very exciting. Somehow I beat this game twice and I will never understand how I could do it. Not because they were hard but because they were BORING AS HELL. I do love this games cover of Luigi being a dumbass and not realizing that Bowser is literally kidnapping Mario behind him. Great stuff. 

 GOOD GAMES: 178

BAD GAMES: 138

OKAY GAMES: 59

GAMES IMPATIENT: 7

HAVENT PLAYED ENOUGH: 3

GAMES OVERALL: 385

 

 

A Pointless Open Letter to Comicsgate, Friday Night Tights, The Gatekeepers Alliance and RANDOM LEFT WINGERS all of which will never read this.

 

To Whom It May Concern:

Entitled within is a long, rambling messy letter addressed to people who will probably never read it. Mostly because they argue on YouTube or Twitter and I think Internet 1.0 is either something they never knew or are scared of returning too. I think so many people just use the internet to argue over pointless shit. I know because I did too. This is a mostly detailed post about how I feel about the random people mentioned within. It will be sloppily written because just about everything I write is sloppily written. It will be full of yelling and screaming and probably calling everyone mentioned in the title STUPID DICKHOLES at least once. Don't worry I'll end up calling myself a STUPID DICKHOLE too so we will all feel even and also sad because no one likes to be called a STUPID DICKHOLE. I do not even know if I will post this but I feel I need to get it down on paper, even internet paper if I am ever to stop watching THESE STUPID VIDEOS THAT PISS ME OFF and go back to talking about Jughead being a punk or Designing Women or Tennessee Tuxedo. I think I need to exorcise myself of these dumb thoughts before I can spend several thousands of words talking about those Friday the 13th books where the Hockey Mask takes over people. or the comic strip Foxtrot. I don't know if this will even stop my hate watching but I hope it finally will. We will go through each group mentioned in the title of this post and talk about how I hate them or am annoyed by them, which is mostly the last group. Hopefully I will get to finally get away from this horse shit and get to do anything else.

Comicsgate:

 I can't remember when I first heard of Comicsgate. It was around when Comics and Diversity was making his brain dead reviews where he'd call Mags Vissagio a tranny and other writers pedos and just kept insulting them. Then it became a whole thing of COMIC PROS VS THE FANS. I don't care who or what you are a fan of, if you are being a GOD DAMNED ASSHOLE and CALLING PEOPLE SHIT LIKE HE DID you get to tell that fan or fans to go fuck a goat. You don't get to OWN someone because you like Empty Nest or C.O.P.S. or Faces of Death or what he fuck ever. You don't get to call Tad Stones a SHITBAG DICKFACE and then go HEY YOU'RE BEING MEAN TO BE NOW IM GOING TO TELL THE INTERNET THE DARKWING DUCK GUY WAS MEAN TO ME A FAN. I AM THE MOST IMPORTANT THING BECAUSE I AM A FAN. I AM A FAN. I AM THE MOST IMPORTANT PERSON HERE THE FANNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!  I don't care what you thought of the Marvel/DC comics of 2016 to onwards you are a dildo faced dirt eater if you are trashing the writer by calling them names. I don't even care if you call them a childish stupid insult like dirt eater you are in the fucking wrong. I would argue in the comments section of Renfamous (I bet EVS would love for her to come back so he could argue with a new person and maybe get responses back. Yeah, he's spending his time fighting Eric July another person I do not like because I think he was a stupid asshole causing people to get outraged over shit but I do think it's very, very funny that Eric July does not respond to any of these guys. It's really funny that Eric Vin Skyman shows his entire ass and no one responds. It's incredibly funny becuase Eric Van Skyman is one of the least likable people I have ever encountered on the Internet. He would literally throw any human being under the bus as long as it would give him a bit more internet fame. I do not know how any human being would trust him ever.

Friday Night Tights:

Can you stop pretending like Star Trek and things like it were ever considered masculine? You know as well as I do that they were the things you got called a BIG GAYBO over and then shoved into a locker. Or ignored. You could like them for a certain amount of time as a kid but even then you couldn't like them TOO much or you were shunned. It's very annoying. 

I would probably have more but I find you all so obnoxious that watching your little internet program literally makes me sick and gives me a headache. 

The Gatekeepers Alliance:

 First off, you cannot Gatekeep anyone from enjoying things like Star Wars. You can literally try to keep them out of your little group of sad angry nerds but it is fucking Star Wars and these people will find someone to nerd out with about Star Wars that they enjoy being around. You cannot stop that. It is a pointless thing to attempt. 

Random Left Wingers:

 This is actually mostly too Organized Chaos and Actual Fandom and all of those guys. It's mostly just two points which I will get too. The first point was every single time you called Nerdrotic or any of those dumb idiots a White Nationalist or a Facsist I would cringe. Not to say I didn't believe they were sexist or racist but when I think of White Nationalism I think of people who want literally every black person (and probably every other non-white race) to be thrown out of america on their asses. I think Nerdrotic is just a dumb ass grifter bitch who would use race and gender and being anti-identity politics to get asses in seats. I think he plays the role of a stupid asshole to make money. I do not believe he believes most of what he says at all. I don't think he even really cares.  You guys would come up with genuinely salient points about these guys and then literally piss all over that salient point with the whole OMG THEY ARE FASCISTS. No, not every dumb ass idiot on the internet is a fascist. Fucking hell.

Second point unless I find more, is uh, early on you wanted to get Movie Bob on your channel and he never did show up. GOOD. Do not try to get Moviebob on your channel because he's popular and has some left wing opinions. MovieBob is the most unpleasant human being that I will mention in this article. He is an unhappy angry man who would never let any conservative anywhere have a win. I remember him talking positively about ThunderCats and then some Conservatives or just random people he might have thought were Conservatives shit all over ThunderCats Roar (which let's be honest looked terrible. the people making it didn't deserve internet hate over it but it did not look good). To stick it to CONSERVATIVES Thundercats was now DUMB BABY HORSESHIT FOR MORONS. I might be misremembering but he gave the much hated Ghostbusters remake a positive review and I'm sure it felt like he wanted to just piss all over the original stuff TO STICK IT TO THE CONSERVATIVES. I am not a conservative. I do not get conservativism for the most part, however there are times when I agree with them. I don't think I trust anyone who doesn't at least agree with one thing the OTHER SIDE agrees with. I don't even care what it is anyone who is ALL IN 100% with a political party is untrusthworthy because of UNPLEASANT UNHAPPY PEOPLE LIKE MOVIEBOB. Oh and there's a game called DID A NAZI SAY THIS OR MOVIEBOB. I don't care what your politics are you should STAY AWAY FROM A PERSON WHO HAS A GAME LIKE THAT. IT'S ONLY A GOOD IDEA YOU GOOBERS.

My ending thoughts:

 Thank you all for literally creating this unending CULTURE WAR where everyone starts yelling at each other. It's really done a lot of good for the internet. I am ashamed I spent time involving my self on twitter about any of this and even more ashamed it took me this long to realize it was a pointless waste of my precious God given time on this planet. I think I will do something better with my time instead like anything else. 

Get bent and go fuck yourself.

More Live Action Disney Remake Shit Part 4 of whatever fuck shit why did I do this?

 

I didn't want to pick any images actually related to the Live Action Remakes so I picked an image of DISNEY from a BETTER TIME. A time of RESCUE RANGERS. A TIME OF BRONSON PINCHOT. A time when love was free. A TIME WHEN WE WERE ALL JOYOUS AND HAPPY. So of course I picked this copy of DISNEY ADVENTURES. I would like to collect DISNEY ADVENTURES because they were so cool. So many of the early issues had such great covers to pick from. Anyway, it's time for us to talk about the final four (at least for now, and I mean for like AT LEAST months) movies on the list. So let's DO THE DANCE OF JOY and talk about SOME HOT GARBAGE.

 So, a few years ago. I think two and a half years ago now IMAGE COMICS created a offshoot called SKYBOUND so they could publish TRANSFORMERS. I was at least somewhat excited because hey I like Transformers! Then I saw Starscream murdering someone violently. I found it distasteful, not because of the murder because I've seen that in who knows how many stories. I just found it distasteful because it's trying to make something that was for children into something for adults in the most uncreative way. I feel the same way about the Starscream becoming a MUDERFORMER that I do about most of these movies. No there is no murder in any of these films but they try to make them SERIOUS AND FOR ADULTS. It's like you couldn't think of a single creative way to make a whimsical film that adults might enjoy? NOPE. SERIOUS TIME. ITS FOR ADULTS SO SERIOUS TIME. I just found this whole affair to be dreadful. All the same problems I had with every other one of these, how the original voice actors were better, or how THEY SUCK ALL OF THE GOD DAMN COLOR OUT OF A MOVIE THAT WAS ORIGINALLY A BRIGHT COLORFUL THING AND GIVE YOU THIS DRAB FUCKING HORSE SHIT.  I could seriously xerox the rest of the reviews because I doubt the rest of these movies will be any good. This was done by the guy who did Pete's Dragon, which was one of the few of these movies I've seen people praise and I am now not really looking forward to seeing that. Also what's really weird is that sometimes this movie just randomly decides to actually be fun and whimiscal and it ENDS UP FEELING OUT OF PLACE. This movie sucks ass and I hate it.

 

 There have been a good number of female led action films made in the last few years. I mean they've been doing it since the B-MOVIE DAYS OF ROGER CORMAN but these days they have big budgets and conservative youtube dickholes like Nerdrotic yell about how a woman can't beat up a man or something. I don't care about that for the most part becuase well, I love old action flicks with STEVEN SEAGULL and CHUCK NORRIS in them and they were able to do all kinds of shit a normal dude couldn't. I see no reason why LADIES can't have some GOOFY POWER FANTASY BULLSHIT to enjoy if they want too. Stuff like Captain Marvel or Atomic Blonde. The problem with this movie is that while CHUCK NORRIS and STEVEN SEAGULL and all of the lady characters did crazy shit they also got knocked down a couple of times. They were put into danger. Mulan is literally the strongest character ever filmed in this movie. She gets knocked down ONCE and it's only literally because they needed her to meet the BORING NEW BAD GUY LADY who ends up giving her life up for Mulan in the WORST REDEMPTION STORY EVER. Seriously I have not seen a movie blow so much smoke up a characters asshole EVER. Mulan cannot be stopped and is PERFECT AT EVERYTHING. There's also the fact that this is a movie full of THE PEOPLE OF CHINA and they don't get JAMES HONG in there somewhere. SERIOUSLY how the FUCK could you NOT have that happen? It feels incomplete when a ASIAN MOVIE has NO JAMES HONG. I feel disgusting having watched this. Oh and all of the same complaints I had from every other review of these TERRIBLE SHIT MOVIES is here too. Even if this movie was perfection it would still have a INSANE BLACK MARK on it. See parts of this movie were uh, filmed at A CONCENTRATION CAMP. That' just blows the SHIT out of my mind. Like what the fuck were you thinking? Build a god damn set somewhere in China or America and film those fucking scenes there. Jesus fucking CHRIST Disney! Anyway this movie is dreadful and depressing and I feel sad about that because the animated Mulan was pretty awesome and very enjoyable. Oh well.

 Man the Tim Burton of the 20th Century would be very disappointed in the Tim Burton of the 21st Century. I still don't believe he directed this. Anyone could have directed this. It has none of what ANY of the other of his movies have. All of these movies literally feel like they were directed by a robot that was given no personality. You know directors do things they like to see in movies and none of that comes out in about any of these movies. It's kind of amazing actually. So I think you can already tell that I do not like this movie. It's mostly pretty bad and lacks all of the charm and personality the original movie had, regardless of some elements that people may have dated the movie (I mean it was 1941 when it was made and you gotta realize that was not yesterday and that so many things we do today would have caused a person from 1941 to think of us as a witch or warlock of some kind). I really don't remember the 1941 movie very well but I am sure as shit that I did see it sometime as a child. I'm sure its a better film than this. This has BORED TO BE ACTING Colin Ferrell in it and his daughter who is a child but might be the worst child actor I've seen maybe ever. This movie gets a higher grade than the rest of them (sans Jungle Book and Cruella) at a ONE WHOLE STAR because of Danny DeVito and Michael Keaton. I will always be happy to see them show up in a movie. Danny DeVito plays the guy who runs a circus no one wants to see and by chance finds DUMBO when he buys his mom. Michael Keaton plays the bad guy who wants to use Dumbo just to make SO MUCH MONEY and then probably cut him up into ELEPHANT STEAKS or whatever fucking CRAZY MILLIONAIRE ASSHOLES want him to do. Also this apparently takes place in 1919 but really does not feel like that. It's a shame too that could have lead to interesting things to see in a movie but CAN'T HAVE THAT WITH THESE LIVE ACTION SERIOUS DISNEY MOVIES. Another thing is that Michael Keaton starts as a nice enough guy and turns literally into a monstrous hobgoblin in like 3 scenes. I get the feeling stuff was cut that made that transition easier. One thing I found hilarious was Alan Arkin. His scenes have this weird feeling to them. It's like Alan Arkin just popped into the set one day and refused to leave and he plays his BANK MANAGER character like that. I like to think that's what he did near the end of his life. Just messing with people because he was a HOLLYWOOD LEGEND at that point. Just being like no im in this movie now. tell everyone. I will fart around and act really weird and old. It's kind of amazing. Also I loved how they messed up what I like to call GETTING THE GANG TOGETHER scene. Colin Ferrel is like WHO WANTS TO HELP ME SAVE DUMBO AND HIS MOM and everyone just smirks a bit. Like you want to see everyone excited as shit in a scene like that. It's kind of amazing. Anyway this movie is terrible, but if you are really bored you could watch like a youtube cut of all the scenes that Danny DeVito or Michael Keaton had. I would recommend watching that cut.

 You know I kinda wished I had liked this more. It has BRYCE DALLAS HOWARD who I think is very pretty and it's always fun to see ROBERT REDFORD do his thing. The biggest problem is that this feels like a first draft of a script. It has ideas and characters but it just doesn't feel like it comes to a whole movie you know. It's a shame too. the character of Pete is weird. He should be feral because he' was out in the wild for six years, left after his parents had a car crash when he was like four or five but he can speak pretty well and everything. They also try to make him come off as stupid by not knowing what balloons or sandwiches are and if you can remember how to speak you'd remember that stuff too. Also the bad guy of the picture is very underdeveloped too. It's a shame really because there's some actual genuine heart and even some sincerity with the story. It's just needed another go or two when it came to the script. Even though I'm not going to give it a passing grade I was still with this movie for the most part. It's like effort was made but I wish there was more effort put into it. You could have had something really great here. They had a new plot and everything. It wasn't the original movied chewed up and spit right into your face. It's just I felt there were too many problems to give it any more than two stars. Which I feel is the right amount for a movie where you could tell effort was put into it but you didn't really like it. Oh well, I still have the original, which I am one of like five people who like it. 

 

I am done with these movies now. There are a few more left but I just do not want to talk about them for at least a few months. Maybe even more. Maybe I won't even talk about them becuase I'm off doing something better, who knows. All I know is that I probably won't talk about DISNEY for a little while as the majority of these movies were depressing and dreadful. 

ClawX Vs. Live Action Disney Remakes Part III

 

Alrighty, so you know the deal. I talk about four Live Action Disney remakes and then portnoyd comments and we discuss it together in the comments for whatever reason. Then I do it again (although the next part will be the last part for a very long time thankfully). So yeah. Let's get this shit show over with and get on to discussing other things.

 I am sure I watched it a decent amount and I'm sure we owned it on VHS but I do not really remember the Lion King very well. I remember the spinoff tv series Timon and Pumbaa Fuck Around and Do Shit more than I remember the actual movie. It makes sense as they were my favorite part. They were always very amusing. So was this movie any good? No. It was horse shit. Just completely worthless like just about all of these movies are. The same reasons as before, the length of the movie completely throwing off the flow of the story, the voice actors being better in the original, the CGI Lions having no real personality to them and everything. Seriously I am pretty sure by the time I get to the last movie the review will just be movie bad. I will give this movie one thing, it showed me that even at like 87 or 88 years old James Earl Jones literally could still out voice everyone else in a movie. That was pretty impressive and I respect the hell outta that guy. He was the only thing in this movie that I liked. I don't remember if they wrote any new shitty songs for this movie or just ruined the original songs. Oh and Timon and Pumbaa were much better in the original. I even like Seth Rogan and he was not good as Pumbaa. Sorry, Seth! I know you read this blog every day on set! 

 

 I have said before that I do not really like the Jungle Book. I mean the original animated movie. Sure the animation is great and the songs are pretty good but the movie is as close to having no plot as a movie can. You get to see Shere Khan the villain of the piece for the first five minutes and like the last ten. the other fifty or sixty minutes were just Baloo and Mowgili fucking around and dancing with King Louie. This movie pretty much is a better film than the animated one. Yeah, did not expect to hear that but here we are! This movie has some really great voice acting. Ben Kingsley and Idris Elba as the Bagheera and Shere Khan really work well (to be fair the voice acting was also pretty good in the original movie too) but Bill Murray as Baloo is one of the bad parts of this movie. He just feels bored to be there. He is a very talented man but man when he does not care about the material and wants the paycheck he will give a blah performance when you know he can do so much better. Plus I just don't think his voice works for Baloo. PHIL HARRIS 4 LYFE BOYS! The other problem is that the kid who played Mowgili did a better job. It's a shame that he didn't becuase this could have been REALLY good instead of just good. Still you get to hear CHRISTOPHER WALKEN sing I WANNA BE LIKE YOU. Who could say no to that? Not even portnoyd. I wonder if I will actually like any more of these films.

 This movie was kinda doomed from the start. When they announced it Peter Dinklage came in and was like NO THIS MOVIE IS OFFENSIVE TO ME AND THEREFORE ALL DWARVES EVER. I AM THE KING OF THE DWARVES. This caused a bit of a stir. I think some dwarf wrestler called Peter Dinklage a doofus. Here's a hint to any movie company. Do not listen to the people on twitter. Regardless of them being conservative or liberal. They will argue with each other and whatever controversy will be forgotten in 5 days to a month,  People literally get angry over like 4 592 perceived controversies a week. It's kind of amazing honestly. Anyway this movie got conservatives angry about it because Snow White wasn't literally the whitest woman in the world and played by some lady who had the gall to talk politics! Oh no! She also did some not very good interviews and they WENT OFF TO THE RACES! Except sad and depressing and not amusing like the Marx Brothers. So how was the actual movie mr. controversy reviewer. It was a piece of crap. Rachel Zegler, Snow White tries a little bit but everyone else seemed to be bored to tears. It made me want to watch Charles Nelson Reiley be a goofball or something. That would have been much better. They had a chance to make a good film here but it really wasn't. The dwarves are weird creatures that are NEVER called dwarves and they also have a real life dwarf in the movie. I hope Peter Dinklage approved of the man's choices becauise you don't want to bother THE ALMIGHTY KING OF THE DWARVES. Gal Godot's song is worse than Akwafina's song from the Little Mermaid. It is now the worst song ever. I have nothing else to say about this movie except that really they could have beefed up and changed some things in the Snow White and actually do a good job with them not just MASH UP Snow White and ROBIN HOOD.  Yes the new prince guy who Snow White is in love with is some shitty Robin Hood ripoff. I hope these movies stop getting made because I am tired of this shit.

 

Movie bad.

 

That's it folks! See you again when I feel like hurting myself over another four shitty shitty movies. Or maybe I'll review a different group of movies. Who knows!?!?  

ClawX Vs the Live Action Disney Remakes Part II

 

So, expect a bunch of these in a row because I want them out of the way. I think I will start each post with a Disney character in animation. So this is the introduction paragraph and you can already tell by the title that I am reviewing the not very well liked Disney Live Action Remakes. Four of them at a time, so let's get to these four.

 I do not remember 1991 Beauty and the Beast very well. Again, I have not seen it in 30+ years. I don't even remember watching it as much as say Aladdin or The Little Mermaid. However it HAS to be better than this. This was such a huge load of shit masquerading as a motion picture. First off it has Josh Gad in it. JOSH GAD IS BAD. The fact that he's going to be in Spaceballs 2 is something that is crushing my soul a little bit. Do you know how badly I wanted a Spaceballs 2 as a child. Very, very, very badly and now we get it next year, but with TERRIBLY UNFUNNY JOSH GAD in it. Secondly all the old songs are done not very well and all the new songs are HOT HORSE SHIT. I do not even remember them and I just watched this hunk of shit. The voice acting is terrible, everyone seems to just not caring all that much. The worst part of it all is that the shove another 30 minutes onto this story that was told in 80 minutes. That's unnecessary as hell. That shit just ruins the flow of the movie and everything new about this movie was COMPLETELY UNNECESSARY AND WASN'T DONE VERY WELL.  This movie is incredibly boring and just not worth watching in any way. I hope the rest of these are not as bad as this one. Jesus fuckin' Christ.

 If Beauty and the Beast was a soggy shit sandwich, this is a less soggy shit sandwich. I did not enjoy this movie but it did not make me angry like the Beauty and the Beast did. This one had some WILD controversy because a black girl played a mermaid. She does fine enough. I guess. I just don't care because the core of the concept is just hollow. You do realize that they are doing all of these remakes because of streaming. Back in the VHS days and even back further they would re-release movies and you'd be like OH MY GOD PINOCCHIO IS BACK IN THEATRE. GET THE KIDS. GET GRANDMA. GET GRANDPA AND EVEN BRING OUR DOG MILLY. EVEYONES SEEING PINOCCHIO AGAIN KIDS. It was even like that when they would release and RE-realese the movies on VHS. GET THIS MOVIE BEFORE IT GOES BACK INSIDE MICKEY MOUSE'S ASSHOLE AND THEN THATS SHOVED INSIDE THE DISNEY VAULT. DO NOT MISS OUT. THAT OLD COPY OF IT THAT YOU HAVE ISN'T GOOD ENOUGH ANYMORE. GET THIS NEW FRESH COPY WITH NO REAL CHANGES. and it worked. They cannot do that anymore in the days of Streaming so they just came up with the sadly brilliant idea of remaking the movies and making them live action because I guess it's a little cheaper? or maybe to get people who don't like animation?? I don't know. I just know that this movie was more of the same. The songs were better done by the original people and the new songs were shitty. The story took 8230 years to tell whereas the original movie told it very well in like 84 minutes. Oh and the song sung by Awkwafina is THE worst song ever sung. Every song is a beautiful joy compared to that shit.

 

This movie is leagues better than the other two. I will even be nice enough to NOT consider it a SHIT SANDWICH. This is still not a very good movie. You just take all of the problems I had with the other movies and put them here. It just feels like the original movie with it's heart taken out of it. I was mostly bored by this film. One thing before we go on is that my niece called this movie REAL LIFE LILO AND STITCH which I think is unbearably cute. I do believe they saw and liked this movie and I think that's who these movies are for. Especially this one. They added some new stuff but I didn't really think it was all that interesting. I also did not like Zach Galafrackalskcishniski in the role of the alien. I thought the older guys did it better. I dunno. This didn't anger me or bore me enough to go to sleep. I really have nothing else to say than you probably shouldn't watch this one but I don't think it's the worst. I will probably rate this a 1.5 out of 5 on letterboxd. So it's not like I liked this one. Enough rambling before I start yelling about Mickey Mouse shoving VHS tapes up his asshole again. No one wants that.

 Aladdin the original animated movie is my favorite Disney movie. I watched that one so many times that I don't know how we did not wear out the VHS tape. You know the one Disney kept away from people for like two or three years before they would put it out again and everyone would shit their pants and run off. Aladdin was a funny movie with great animation and fun characters and a great overall adventure. So, how is the remake? It's a piece of shit! Were you surprised? The movie is really quite terrible overall. The old songs were done better in the original animated movie and the new songs are hot dog shit covered in piss. Jafar and Iago were a great team but in SERIOUS ALADDIN we can't have a parrot who can speak and talk back! THIS IS THE SERIOUS LIVE ACTION ALADDIN. So no comedy from either of them. Jafar is also played by an actor who just seems bored to be in a movie. I'd love to have the acting talent that would get me into fucking Z-grade movies and this guy is like OH HUM ACTING SUCKS AND I HATE IT WHY DID THEY CAST ME IN THIS. That's bad for the MAIN ANTAGONIST. The other actors try at least a little but I still liked the animated characters and the voice actors who brought them to live better. SORRY IF THAT MEANS I AM NOW THE GRAND DRAGON OF THE KKK BECAUSE I SAID STEVE FROM FULL HOUSE DID A BETTER JOB THAN THIS ARAB DUDE but it's true. He did. The other black eye this movie has is WILLARD SMIFF. I like him in a lot of things. I think he comes off as a charismatic fun guy that I would probably enjoy hanging out with. I even picked up for WILD WILD WEST people. He is not good as the Genie. In fact he's trying to fit shoes that are not his and trying to top Robin Williams in that performance is insane and he does it in the most annoying way possible. I really did not like this movie and honestly I might have disliked it more than Beauty and the Beast. Fuck this movie go watch the original one.

I know I said I wanted to get this done quickly, well expect some posts about something else. ANYTHING ELSE before I get back to this shit. I need a few days before I watch any more of these GARBAGE PILES OF SHIT.