Superhero musings (Punisher and Catwoman)
CHECK OUT THIS COLUMN
"The Punisher" movie isn't going to be newsworthy for much longer, so I'd like to take this on-topic opportunity to direct all readers to a wonderful little weekly web column that ought to be on the required weekly reading list for conossieurs of Geek Culture.
Scott Tipton, writing for the ever-surprising Moviepoopshoot.com, pens the column "Comics 101" which each week takes a different subject either of or related-to comic book lore and offers up an "everything you need to know about..." rundown thereof. Nevermind if you already know (or THINK you already know) everything he has to "teach," this is a damn fine read and is (when applicable) often tied in with the debut of films/TV series connected to that week's subject.
This week, Tipton offers a fine primer on, what else? "The Punisher," covering all the necessary ground from the character's origins as a guest-vigilante in "Spider-Man" and "Daredevil" adventures to the still-technically-happened-no-matter-how-much-we'd-like-to-forget-it late-90s "Punisher-as-Crow-knockoff" run, right up through the "Welcome Back, Frank" series that serves as the (loose) template for the current film:
http://www.moviepoopshoot.com/comics101/index.html
Well done, Mr. Tipton.
REVIEW RETHINKING:
I stand by my original review of "Punisher." I still think, even having had several more days to mull over it's various parts and discuss it at length with fellow Film Geeks, that it's a solid-if-unremarkable B-action flick with a certain 80s-throwback nostalgia appeal. However, as with a lot of imperfect actioners, the more time I think about the parts that didn't work the more I'm inclined to elaborate on them:
First, and most notably, the attempt to combine the base-outline of "Welcome Back, Frank" (re-emerged Punisher hides out with misfits in tenament, wages strategic war on local crime family) with a re-imagined origin story just doesn't work. Punisher having to track and kill the SPECIFIC guys responsible for wiping out his family while at the same time finding surrogate-family redemption is, aside from being kinda sloppily written in this case, at odds with the film's desire to get him going on a journey of crime-busting sequels: With his revenge secure and his "soul" saved, what reason does The Punisher have to keep on PUNISHING?
Curiously, the film refuses to go "all-the-way" when it comes to the hero's dubious grasp of sanity, which would've given them at least something resembling an "out" in this case. At the conclusion of this, it seems as though The Punisher is heading out to right wrongs for no better reason than, y'know, thats what guys with symbols on their shirts DO.
Bottom line: It's not BAD, it's just not a great film. Take away the Marvel tie-in, and it probably would've been an above-average direct-to-video release rather than a just-about-average theatrical release. (Coincidentally, this is the first Marvel movie to NOT open in the #1 spot.)
WARNERS TO FANS: "PLEASE STOP HATING US!"
Pity the feature film division at Warner Bros. For years (since about 1997 to be precise) the web movie-gossip community has painted them (not unfairly) as a place where potentially-great projects go to die. In RECENT years, much of that web movie-gossip has begun to regularly filter into the mainstream film press. The closest Warners has been to a critics/boxoffice/merchandise/awards home run has been being tied to "Lord of The Rings" even though they didn't make it (WB's independently-run "sidekick" New Line Cinema did the honors.)
Pity them more still: The talk-of-the-town in Hollywood is the sudden "DUUUUHHHHH!" realization by the suits that there are deep, rich veins of great movie material and boxoffice profit to be mined from the world of comic book literature. Marvel, which owns the rights to roughly 50% of marketable comic characters, can seemingly throw solid-waste (or the Ben Affleck "Daredevil" movie) in the direction of any production house and have a smash hit. Warner Bros. DC owns the OTHER 50% of upper-echelon characters (like, oh, I dunno.. SUPERMAN, BATMAN, getting the picture?) DC is owned by Warner Bros., but Warner Bros can't seem to get a good comic book adaptation off the ground to save their life.
For the sake of illustration: DC's proposed new updating of "SUPERMAN," the most recognizable superhero character on the face of the earth, one of the most well-known icons of the 20th AND 21st century, possibly posessed of the most self-contained free-publicity of any multimedia franchise that exist or that ever WILL EXIST.. is languishing in development hell, plagued by a revoling-door of directors, screenwriters and the issue that every actor approached for the role has TURNED DOWN THE PROJECT. Meanwhile, Marvel's new movie of "MAN-THING," a so-obscure-as-to-be-almost-totally-forgotten 70s swamp-monster character, is now nearly completed with it's shooting and heading for a theatrical release this year. Anyone who doesn't see "what ain't right" in the above scenario is reading the wrong Blog.
Ahem. To their probable credit, WB seems to be getting it's act together with Chris Nolan's upcoming "Batman" flick. but BEFORE THAT, they'll be releasing the new "Catwoman" reimagining which, to put it mildly, is the possibly the purified "nightmare-come-to-life" movie for all comic book fans: Complete retooling of the character with only the name remaining? Check. God-awful costume described as "very hip, very street" by the publicity? Check. No connection to the continuity of the comic or prior film incarnations? Check. Designation as a (shudder) "romantic action-comedy?" Check. "Name" hip-for-the-moment star completely wrong for the lead but cast to bring in the legend "non-fan demographic"? Check.
The best reporting and report-relaying on this project has, of course, been being conducted by the good souls at Superherohype.com's "Catwoman" section:
http://www.superherohype.com/catwoman/
WB knew, expected and prepared for the Geekdom to loathe the very idea of this flick from the get go. They were ready and, really, didn't care. Remember: The cast-in-stone studio view of fandom-sects is, was and ever-shall-be that they are "just guys living in their mom's basement" who's negative opinion "doesn't matter because they'll see it and provide ticket money either way." Warner Bros. DOES NOT CARE what comic fans and their Film Geek brethern think, they care what "E! News" and "Entertainment Tonight" veiwers think.
Forgive me for being so, well, GIDDY at Warner Bros. having found themselves in the predicament that the film is looking like SUCH a joke-waiting-to-happen at this point that even the "who cares about you're moving, who are you WEARING!!??" crowd is starting to smell it coming. Thus far, what little press the film has gotten has centered on troubles with the first-time director and, yes, negative fan reactions to the whole shebang. It's spin-control time:
I direct your attention to a lil' report filed by comic artist Jim Lee on Newsarama.com today. Jim, it seems was recently flown by the producers of "Catwoman" from his current home in Italy to the Vancouver set to do some live-model sketches of Berry in her costume to be used on the obligatory movie-adaptation comic.
Lee reports back on his experience, which indeed sounds like quite a fun business trip for an especially hard-working artist:
http://newsarama.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11988
Hm. A fan-favorite comic artist suddenly being associated with a fan-despised comic adaptation in dire need of a publicity-overhaul starting from the ground (web fandom) up? An artist currently in high-profile employment with the company that is both making the film AND owns the publisher of the comic? Hm.
Understand, I'm not implicating Lee (or anyone, for that matter) in anything untoward here. Lee is a hugely talented artist, one who's renderings of Berry in this film will undoubtedly look better than anything that winds up onscreen. Just positing, as a matter of admitted pure speculation, that perhaps WB is going for a sly bit of damage control with this confluence of events?
Not only is Lee a "good guy" name to a solid bloc of fans, he's in the process of a high-profile run on "Superman" thats going to get a lot of press and just finished a high-profile run on a year-long "Batman" arc that prominently featured Catwoman as a character. Could WB have been thinking, as they wrote the check to send Lee from Italy to Canada and back, that perhaps some of the "fanboy"-love currently surrounding Lee in connection with the DC arcana might rub-off on their troubled and in need of ANY love production?
Eh, it's up for interpretation of events, I suppose. Judge for yourself. I do, however, feel the need to speak in Mr. Lee's general direction at this point:
Jim, you're one heck of an artist. I'm sure I'm not the first comic/movie geek to tell you how much your ability to render voluptuous Amazonian-proportioned women in colorful spandex suggestively pawing at one-another meant to my life as an adolescent and continue to mean to my life today. As to your statement in the report that the early still of Halle-cat "don't do her justice," well... Man, I hope you're right on this one. We ALL, I'm thinking, hope you're right on this one.
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