Quick Review: Man Of Steel

This is a not-so-quick read, actually.

If you've read this blog in the past, back when I used to post a lot more (and yes, I'm going to keep making the point that my lack of posts has been an abysmal failure of mine), you know that I am wayyyyyy into Superman. The comic books, the animated films and series, the TV series and, of course, the movies. The comic books, lately, I've put aside. My disdain for the changes foisted upon Superman's character by DC Comics when they rebooted their entire universe caused me to pretty much stop buying the books. That's not to say I haven't bought any comic books; there are the Simpsons and Futurama titles, and other things I've dabbled in, including some other DC titles. (I'll have to summarize all of that somewhere. There's over a year's worth of purchases so I won't really summarize them as I used to.) But as for the main Super-titles, I haven't purchased them.

Still, I am all for Superman, when done right. So geeked was I for Man of Steel, the latest big-screen attempt to cash in on Kal-El's popularity, that I not only purchased a ticket in advance (which I never do), but I spent the extra cash for IMAX (well, the faux-IMAX that they have at the AMC at Franklin Mills Mall).

There's another reason I mention the whole DC Comics reboot. As with every iteration, the individual creators tend to make changes to suit their needs. (And at times those changes get into the comic books. The 1940s cartoons had Superman fly for the first time, instead of leaping from place to place; Kryptonite was introduced in the radio serials in 1943; the list goes on.)

Quick Review: This Is The End

And now back to our regularly scheduled movie review programming. (I hope.) I expected a lot from the trailer for This Is The End and, unlike a lot of movies recently, this one mostly lived up to my expectations. A comedy in which the Apocalypse takes place is one thing. When it focuses on how this event affects Hollywood celebrities, that's another story. And when those celebrities -- James Franco, Seth Rogen, Craig Robinson, Jonah Hill, Jay Baruchel and Danny McBride are the stars, with many other cameos, from Rihanna to Michael Cera to Channing Tatum -- are playing exaggerated versions of themselves, it goes to the next level. Lots of raunch, but also lots of laughs and some meta commentary about the celebs themselves, their importance (or lack thereof), how they're perceived by the public and media, etc., and a little stab at religious beliefs (after all, the Apocalypse is happening). Had me laughing almost from the start to the finish. My grade: A-minus.

Quick Reviews Catch-Up Part 2: Summer Flicks

Continuing my rally to get to the land of semi-timeliness...and now we get to the movie industry's prime time.

Star Trek Into Darkness: A couple of the nods to the TV series were actually a bit much for me. I don't think it was good as the previous film. My grade: B+

Now You See Me: At times fun, stupid, mystifying, ridiculous...I had an idea of who was behind everything but was only half-right. I can't explain more without spoilers. My grade: B

The Internship: Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson reunited. No "Wedding Crashers" - not as raunchy nor as funny - somewhat predictable, at times charming but too stupid too often. My grade: C+

The Great Gatsby: Visually spectacular. I say this despite the fact that I got a 3D upgrade for free because the theater loaded up the 3D version by mistake for a 2D showing, so they had to give everyone the glasses. I'm not a 3D fan. Anyway, visually spectacular. Some of the music from the touted soundtrack fit well, some of it was jarring. Acting, though, was not good. If I never hear Leonardo DiCaprio call someone "old sport" again it'll be too soon. My grade: C+

Iron Man 3: Robert Downey Jr. is fantastic in this role, as usual, but the plot was lacking. Not as bad as Iron Man 2 but not as good as the first (and nowhere near "The Avengers"). My grade: C+

The Purge: The premise that for one night a year all crime is legal is provocative, but I was unsurprised at almost everything that happened. Not many sympathetic characters in this. My grade: C-

After Earth: Who comes up with a script that has Will Smith play a cold military dad and Jaden Smith play his son, a sour, whiny military cadet, in a future where the earth is a very bad place and humans live elsewhere, and the plot keeps Will in one place doing nothing most of the time? Will's talent and charisma (and whatever talent and charisma Jaden has) are totally wasted. My grade: D.

Quick Reviews Catch-Up Part 1: Pre-Summer

Yeah, so remember how I used to write little reviews of movies I saw in theaters? Obviously I haven't done it in a while because of...well, a lot of reasons. But that doesn't mean I haven't been seeing them. So it's time to get started again. In order to get through this quickly I'm not going to say a whole lot about these, as most of them are already out of the theaters. (Some are out on DVD and Blu-ray already, though.)

I've broken them down into two posts. This one deals with everything released prior to the summer blockbuster season (which actually started in early May with "Iron Man 3"), with the rest to follow.

42: Well-acted, but kind of a standard biopic. My grade:  B+

21 and Over: College students get drunk and party. Again, kind of standard but well-executed. My grade:  B+

Oblivion: It held my interest. I saw this long after it opened and already learned of a key plot twist, so the element of surprise was gone. My grade: B

Oz the Great and Powerful: James Franco as the about-to-become-the-Wizard of Oz? A little bit meh. Which witch was going to turn green was pretty obvious. Speaking of, when are we getting a film version of "Wicked," by the way? My grade: B

The Call: Ridiculous and over-the-top but in a good way. My grade: B

The Croods: Unfortunately it's no "Flintstones" (TV series). Fortunately it's no "Flintstones" (live-action films). My grade: B

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone: Underrated. Starts off rather horrendously but somewhere along the way it hooked me in. Magic? My grade: B-

Mama: Saved from a worse grade by Jessica Chastain and by a twist at the end that I rather appreciated. My grade: B-

Admission: Considering it starred Tina Fey and the adorable Paul Rudd, a big disappointment. My grade: C+

Escape from Planet Earth: Wasn't expecting a whole lot. Got what I expected. My grade: C+

Pain and Gain: Biggest problems: implausible plot (despite being based on a true story) and unlikable characters. My grade: D+

Scary Movie 5: Serious lack of funny jokes is a bad thing in this spoof genre. My grade: D

Spring Breakers: Garbage featuring the worst James Franco performance I've seen. At one point he performs fellatio on a gun. That's not what we want to see him fellate, trust me. My grade: F

My Summer Playlist "Update"

...and by "update" I mean, here's the whole damn list from my iTunes library. Instead of repeating links to the prior posts and their bits and pieces, I decided to just copy and paste it all here. This means a number of songs I put on the list in the last year or so haven't been mentioned before.

I guess I'll repeat all my disclaimers as well: the songs on my list fall into at least one of the following categories (other than the obvious, that they're in my iTunes and I like them):

• To at least some extent they're about summer or the sun or warmth or heat
• They were released during/became hits during the summer
• I either discovered/fell in love with them during the summer or associate them with summer for some reason or they just felt to me like they had a summery sound or vibe -- so this part is very subjective and your mileage may vary

Feel free to go back to my old posts and see some of the things I wrote about the songs when I first posted the list, and in some cases listen to them via YouTube links. And so, after the jump...174 songs of my summers, past and present:

More OKStupid Follies

Presented without comment, other than that I keep saying I'm going to blog more and then I don't, for various reasons, but I'm saying it once again...

Okay, a slight comment. I actually replied to this one with: "Pics, profile completed, an explanation of why someone whose profile says 'straight' and 'seeing someone' is sending a message to another guy...I'd say all of that is needed."