The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

If you haven't seen this movie yet, don't read this post.  I'm going to assume that if you are reading this post, you have seen the movie and that I won't be spoiling it for you.

I have to say that this movie was not nearly as good as the second movie, which is not in any way surprising.  However, it is certainly much better than many third installments to trilogies and it is in no way a bad movie.  My main issues with this movie were the pacing and the predictability.  The beginning of the movie, especially, seemed to move very slow.  But it was interesting in that it felt like it was paced the way a comic book would be paced, which is kind of neat.  And the plot was incredibly predictable.  That didn't necessarily make it less satisfying as an end to the trilogy, but it made it a little less interesting.  The plot of this movie really went back to Batman Begins, and I had the exact same problems with that movie. 

Here's the problem.  Ra's Al Ghul has always been my favorite Batman villain.  So when I watched Batman Begins I knew immediately that Liam Neeson was Ra's Al Ghul, which apparently was supposed to be a surprise.  I'm sure that I'm not the only person who knew it, but I think that the other people who knew were similarly non-plussed by the "reveal" toward the end of the movie.  However, knowing that he was Ra's Al Ghul throughout the movie didn't make it any less enjoyable.  Then, of course, The Dark Knight happened and Heath Ledger changed comic book villains as we know them.  How can you possibly top that?  You can't.  Plus, Christopher Nolan chose not to even mention the Joker in this film, a decision which I can completely respect. 

And then we get to this final movie.  Now, one of my favorite storylines with Ra's Al Ghul (and, one of the best ever episodes of Batman the Animated Series, if you watched that) is that Bruce Wayne/Batman falls in love with Talia Al Ghul.  Well, this movie starts talking about the League of Shadows and Ra's Al Ghul and here's Bruce Wayne sleeping with some woman.  I mean, of course she's Talia Al Ghul.  How can you not see that?  It was just so predictable, and I was really frustrated with Bruce Wayne's gullibility on that.  It didn't ruin the movie for me or anything, but I just wish there had been a slightly better villain.  Talia Al Ghul + Bane are clearly not as interesting as Joker/Two-Face, but they're not even as interesting as Ra's Al Ghul/Scarecrow.  So, boo on that.

A related problem I had was that the foreshadowing in this movie was terrible.  Alfred tells the story about the restaurant in Italy, well, there's your ending.  The little quips about the autopilot on the "Bat", I mean, come on.  All the stuff with Selina Kyle and her fresh start and all of that stuff.  The ending was just too obvious. 

Having said all of that, I still thought the movie was fun.  I liked watching it.  I think it's a decent end to the trilogy.  The two best parts of the movie were definitely Joseph Gordon-Levitt and (as much as people might disagree) Anne Hathaway.  Gordon-Levitt's character was well written, interesting, and he makes a great future... I'm going to go with Nightwing.  And Anne Hathaway's Catwoman was very well done.  I thought she really understood the character and inhabited her well. It felt like a somewhat fresh take on Catwoman that made sense in the universe this Batman trilogy created, and it felt like a good ending for Bruce Wayne.

At the end of the day, the entire trilogy was great, it changed comic book movies, I can't wait for the new Superman movie next year.   But as for this summer, the Spider-man movie was better and the Avengers was probably the best of the comic book movies.  Now we wait until next summer and the next crop of superhero movies.

The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)

Went to see the new Spiderman movie last night and I thought it was awesome!  Mike didn't love it as much as I did, but I think I know why that is.  First, some background... Mike and I are both  big comic book nerds.  Mike loves X-Men, but also reads many other books, like Batman, Walking Dead, Star Wars, and Watchmen.  I, on the other hand, am a huge Spiderman fan.  I have read all the early books and, while my Spiderman collection does not rival Mike's X-Men collection, it's still pretty impressive.  I, of course, also read Batman, Superman, Watchmen, and others.  But I loves me some Spiderman.  Especially early Spiderman.  It's one of the first comic books I really got into, after, of course, my childhood love of Archie comics.  So I was super excited that this movie went back to the beginning.  Whereas Mike doesn't have that love of early Spiderman comics.

Mike's major complaint was about pacing, he thought it was too rushed.  I completely disagree and think the pacing was great.  Mike enjoyed the characters, but he really wanted them to spend more time on Peter exploring his powers.  I, on the other hand, have always thought that was the most boring part.  So, this movie was made for me!  But not so much for Mike.

So here's what I loved.  I love that it was Gwen Stacy instead of Mary Jane.  She was Peter's first love, after all.  And it really leaves a lot open for the sequel.  Will they kill her off?  Certainly seems that Green Goblin is coming up soon.  And speaking of the Green Goblin.  I love that the villain was the Lizard.  He's one of the earliest villains that Spiderman goes up against and I always liked him.  It doesn't hurt that Rhys Ifans played the part so well.  I also love that they kind of combined events a little bit, so that we can skip Dr. Octopus, who killed Captain Stacy in the comics.  I'm not a huge fan of Doc Oc, and I hope they leave him out of this reboot.  What else do I love... Martin Sheen.  Also, Andrew Garfield's and Emma Stone's acting ability.  And the scene at the end with the eggs, how sweet was that.  I loved that they included Flash instead of just having random bullies, and that they tried to capture the relationship that Peter and Flash had in the comics.  Flash isn't so bad, he's just a big, dumb jock, who needs friends to teach him how to be a person instead of a jerk.  And I feel like they went with that instead of just making him a bully.  Which, I guess, is part of why I really loved the movie so much.  The script, mixed with the acting ability of all the actors gave us a comic book movie with fully realized characters, none of whom was wholly good or  bad.  And that is my favorite kind of movie.  And now I will stop writing, but I will probably read a few Spider-man comics to relive some of the best moments.

Rock of Ages (2012)

I have been looking forward to Rock of Ages.  I saw the musical when it was on tour, with Constantine Maroulis, of course. I'm not ashamed to say that I loved him on American Idol and was very excited to see him on stage.  I was also looking forward to the movie because it was directed by the beautiful and wonderful Adam Shankman.  And choreographed by Mia Michaels!  How can that not be great.  Mike, however, was not super excited, he was just kind of there because he'll go see anything in the theater with me.  And there was nothing else coming out today. 

It started out a little slow for me, and it was clear pretty early on that they were throwing half the musical out the window, which is fine, but they did cut my favorite subplot.  Anyway, Tom Cruise was pretty great as Stacee Jaxx.  He really gave the character depth and made him interesting and sympathetic.  They should have just thrown the rest of the musical out the window, based the movie on it and made the whole thing about Stacee Jaxx.  Because Julianne Hough and Diego Boneta were okay, but Tom Cruise is the reason I would watch the movie again.  There was also a great scene towards the end with a bunch of 80s hair band rockers (and Debbie Gibson, of course) singing "We Built This City", which was clever.  There was also a Constantine Maroulis cameo, which was nice.  But the real magic was brought by Tom Cruise. 

Now, I make it no secret that I love Tom Cruise.  I don't care if he's a scientologist, or if he's secretly gay, or whatever it is that is going around.  He's good at acting.  He's also incredibly good looking and he keeps his body in fantastic shape.  So, I always enjoy watching him in movies.  And this was no different.  I hope he gets nominated for something.  He won't get an Oscar nod for it, it wasn't that great.  But maybe a golden globe nod in the comedy category.  I could see that.  Definitely some sort of MVP award, because without him, this movie would have been terrible.  Also, Malin Ackerman was pretty special.  She definitely pulled her weight. 

This has been an incredibly terrible post.  And I would love to write something more coherent and readable, but the pizza's here, I'm hungry, and nobody reads my blog anyway, so whatever.  If you didn't see the musical, or you hate 80s hair bands, or you can't stand Tom Cruise, don't see this movie.