Tag: Batman

Screening Room: ‘America, We Have a Batman Problem’

On By chrisbarsantiIn Comics-Graphic Novels, Film - NewLeave a comment

How many Batman movies is too many? It seems like we are finding out.

My article, ‘America, We Have a Batman Problem’ is at Eyes Wide Open:

Batman’s appeal to artists and audiences is understandable. His immense wealth, traumatized childhood, and schizophrenic relationship with the villains he hunts provides a buffet of dramatic possibilities. Batman’s need (trauma) and ability (wealth) to act is as bottomless as his inability to avoid questioning his actions. Still, isn’t it time to give the man a rest?

Screening Room: ‘The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part’

On By chrisbarsantiIn Film - NewLeave a comment

For anybody who is keeping track, The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part opens wide next week.

My review is at Slant:

Instead of the inside-out lampooning of the type of monomaniacal industrialized chirpiness epitomized by the first film’s earwig theme song “Everything Is Awesome,” the mood is now mock-dystopian, with Bricksburg now known as Apocalypseburg. There’s good fun to be had at the expense of Mad Max: Fury Road and its grim-faced ilk. Similarly, the series continues to poke fun at adolescent “dark” genre material with its deep seam of Batman gags. But, unfortunately, there’s also a plot and that’s where The Lego Movie 2 goes wrong …

Here’s the trailer:

Screening Room: ‘The Lego Batman Movie’

On By chrisbarsantiIn Comics-Graphic Novels, Film - NewLeave a comment

legobatmanmovie-posterartSo, now that Christopher Nolan has left Batman in the Affleck’s hands, we’re left with no new movies about the Caped Crusader. Oh wait, they would never let a franchise like that lie moribund for more than a year.

So, The Lego Batman Movie is finally upon us. My review is at PopMatters:

A sugar high of self-conscious product placement and satirical mock-epic, The LEGO Batman Movie strip mines Batman’s mythology for all its comic potential. Voiced by Will Arnett (reprising his role in The LEGO Movie), this Batman is part Christian Bale’s Dark Knight and part reality-show star, a showboater who loves saving the day but won’t let anybody steal his light or get close to him. Yes, there is a lesson here. But after three Christopher Nolan efforts and lord knows how many Zack Snyder bores, Batman could use a little therapy that doesn’t involve punching people…

Here’s the trailer:

Screening Room: ‘Batman v Superman’

On By chrisbarsantiIn Film - NewLeave a comment

batmanvsuperman2

Since it had been a few weeks since we had the opportunity to see a movie about guys in tights throwing punches at each other, now we have Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

“The New Batman and Superman are Terrible Superheroes” was published at Eyes Wide Open:

For Zack Snyder’s latest CGI cage-match, combat isn’t just a way of resolving disagreements and kicking along the plot, it’s a way of life. As self-important as it is tedious, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice features one of the great tropes of the comic book universe — getting two big heroes to fight each other — but treats it with such seriousness that the filmmakers don’t seem to realize that they’re stooping to one of the genre’s most tired tropes. It ranks right up there with having an alien power menace Metropolis (wait, that happened in Man of Steel), or randomly creating a well-nigh unkillable supermonster who multiple superheroes must come together to fight (wait, they do that in this one, too)…

New on DVD: ‘Batman: The Complete Series’

On By chrisbarsantiIn DVD - TelevisionLeave a comment

Batman-DVD setFrom 1966 to 1968, ABC showed one of the greatest series ever to grace the American TV screen. The original Batman TV show was different from pretty much everything that came before. Full of bright Pop Art colors and tongue-in-cheek satire, it both celebrated and mocked the superhero genre in a way that kids could take straight and adults could enjoy as comedy.

Finally, after years of legal wrangling, all 120 episodes are finally available for your viewing pleasure on DVD and Blu-ray. My review of Batman: The Complete Series is at PopMatters.

Also, here’s The Jam performing the unassailably cool theme to Batman:

Small Screens: ‘Batman’ Returns!

On By chrisbarsantiIn Omnicultural, TelevisionLeave a comment

 

Once upon a time you could safely rely on being able to find a couple things somewhere on TV, if you just flipped around long enough: The Three Stooges and the old Batman series. Running in seemingly near-constant syndication long after its too-brief run (120 episodes over 3 seasons from 1966–68), its Pop Art-mad cheeky humor was the way that most people growing up in the 1970s was introduced to the Caped Crusader. Once Frank Miller and Tim Burton started going all gothic on Bruce Wayne in the ’80s, it was always characterized as a reaction to the camp factor of an Adam West Batman and villains like Liberace, Tallulah Bankhead, and Milton Berle.

But the show has been increasingly hard to find outside of YouTube and black-market dubs, due to a long-running rights dispute. That may soon be over, as it was reported yesterday that the entire run of the series will be released in a box set of DVDs and Blu-ray sometime later this year. The news was broken by … Conan O’Brien. Big fan?

Comics Corner: Hippies Hate Superman!

On By chrisbarsantiIn Graphic Novels, OmniculturalLeave a comment

hippieolsen2

As one of the longest-surviving comics publishers in the business, DC Comics did so (like everyone else who made it) through a combination of quick turnaround, constant reinvention, and relentlessly squeezing every last penny out of their comics. In one of their less-inspired moves, in the 1950s, DC created a spinoff to their tentpole property Superman that came with the highly prosaic title Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen.

hippieolsen1So far, so bad. However, in one of those granular moments of surreality that comes when publishers chase every cultural trend and damn the logic, that series produced one bona fide classic. We give you: 1969’s fabulous freakout Hippie Olsen’s Hate-In!

Firstly, there’s the issue that Jimmy Olsen looks here more like a bearded dandy from the Edwardian era than hippie (details). Then there’s Jimmy’s tendency throughout the entire series to want to kill Superman. Blog into Mystery notes:

…You don’t have to be Freud or Jung or whoever to see that he has some issues with the most important people in his life. He has no problem with dreaming about punching them, tripping them, or KILLING THEM, without a whole lot — let’s be honest – of provocation for any of those deeds.

This strikes me as a problem.

It seems that Superman has always had this problem. Unlike some superheros—Batman, Spider-man—whose enemies have wanted to do away with them for interfering with their dastardly plans, Superman’s very existence appears to be the driving force behind the hatred, from friend and foe. The very indestructibility that makes him so powerful a force for good and (unfortunately) so uninteresting as a character also engender some very mixed feelings in the all-too-weak people (villains and not) who surround him.

Must make for a lonely life.