Movies & TV

Review – Movie – Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse

Sony is kind of in a weird place with it’s Spider-Man license. They are working on their third reboot of the series, which is not tied to the MCU which they don’t really own any stake in. So they have a pretty decent and successful Spider-Man series going now, but it’s technically part of a universe they can’t fully touch. Take the recent Venom movie, for example. Venom is pretty tied to Spider-Man, but this new movie itn’t part of the MCU, so that gets a little tricky.

Maybe they don’t really care a lot about continuity.

Maybe they also have just made a bold move that let’s the nor really care about continuity, with Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse.

Into the Spider-Verse is a fantastically animated color fest that does a pretty good job of giving us an Origin story, while also giving us a developed world that lets everything sort of speed along without being yet another slow burn Spider-Man origin. In fact the movie repeatedly pokes fun at the idea of yet another Origin Story, and how everyone already knows the origin on Spider-Man. It’s an enjoyable film and I look forward to the eventual sequel and likely spin-offs.

Spoiler Free Thoughts

So, I had an idea of what to expect going into this movie, but I wasn’t super sure it would be that great. I honestly kind of skip most of the animated comics based stuff these days, more for lack of time than anything. I kind of worried this was joust going to feel like something that should have been a TV Special or straight to Blu-Ray sort of deal. Considering how few films I actually see in a theater, that I went at all says something I suppose.

The basic plot follows the origin story of Miles Morales becoming Spider-Man. It’s not quite the same as his comics origins but it shares some similarities. So, you might be wondering why there is a Black Spider-man named Miles, he is not new to the Marvel Universe for this film at all. This isn’t meant to be a detailed run down, but to sort of give you an idea.

Back in the early 2000s, Marvel created the Ultimate Universe. This was essentially a new Marvel continuity where everything was darker and grittier and the Avengers were known as The Ultimates. In 2011, Miles Morales was introduced as a new character who was also bitten by a radioactive spider. Shortly afterwards, Peter Parker of the Ultimate universe was killed and Miles Morales too up the Spider-Man mantel in the Ultimate Universe. Cut to more recent times, during Marvel’s Secret Wars event. Basically, Marvel wanted to combine all of it’s various continuities into one continuity to trim the fat off things a bit and simplify everything. So Secret Wars saw the Ultimate Universe crossing over with the main Earth-616 Continuity. They used this plot to kill off some versions of heroes, and revive others by replacing them with their dimensional counterparts and just in general slim things down. Miles Morales Spider-Man however, had become pretty popular, so he was spared and became part of the main Marvel continuity.

There is a lot more to it of course but I’m not really here to give a full history of Marvel Comics. The real fun of the movie comes from “The Spider-Verse”, and the overall fairly tongue in cheek way it handles itself. Early in the film, the plot is revealed involving Kingpin trying to open a gateway to other dimensions. This rift causes several other Spider-folks to cross over into Miles’ world. Miles being new to the job, gets some help and grief from these other Spider-people and of course, learns to be his own brand of Spider-Man. We also get a brief history of each of the various other Spideys through little cut away story sequences, though for the most part, three of them are a pretty throw away part of the story.

So, the three throw away Spideys consist of: Spider-Man Noir, a Spider-Man from a 30s world who is a detective and lives in a black and white world; Spider-Ham, a Looney Tunes style anthropomorphic pig complete with Subspace hammers and random anvils; and SP//DR, a futuristic Anime girl who pilots a Spider-Man sort of robot. These three pretty much exist as comic relief characters once they arrive. Of the 6 main Spiders, they are probably the most one off anyway.

Most of the story revolves around Miles Morales, Peter Parker, and Gwen Stacey, and mostly Miles Morales and Peter Parker, as Peter shows Miles the ropes of being Spider-Man. This particular Peter is a little washed up though, so Gwen gives a lot of later pointers and help to both. I should add, this isn’t really like some training montage of teaching, it’s much more of a trial by fire sort of deal, as Peter and Gwen must work to get control of the dimensional gateway to get back to their own respective universes.

There are a ton of references to all sort of Spidey things outside the actual Spideys. Nods to things like the Tobey Maguire movies, several Spider-Man Memes from the old 60s cartoon, the comics themselves make an several appearances as part of the plot. The whole thing feels very aware of itself while never really acknowledging itself. It makes for a lot of great jokes and moments.

It’s also really visually interesting. It feels like a comic in motion. Everything is very bright and colorful, and everything looks nice and smooth. It’s a really great effect that would have never worked in a live action film. I also like how the different Spideys are different styles as a not to their different universes. SP//DR looks like an anime cartoon, Spider-Ham looks like a Looney Tunes cartoon, even a brief shot of Spider-Woman in her own world has a differently styled background that more matches what the Spider-Gwen comic looks like.

Spoilery Thoughts

So moving on to a little more actual detail. I have to say, I really enjoyed the villains. Granted, they were fairly throw away in the case of Scorpion and Tombstone and Goblin, Prowler and Doc Ock were both pretty cool. I don’t know if lady Octavius appears in any comics, though I suspect she does, it was a twist I didn’t see coming since I wasn’t familiar with the source material. While we’re on the subject of twists, I also didn’t know about the Prowler thing, though when it was being set up, it felt really obvious. Prowler overall really shines and feels pretty menacing. I really liked all of his moments and it’s a shame he didn’t get more screen time.

Then there’s Kingpin. I, kind of hated Kingpin. I have just come off of wrapping up Daredevil on Netflix, I definitely never expected Kingpin to be Vincent D’Onofrio’s Kingpin, but this Kingpin was so outlandishly cartoonish, I found him a little hard to take seriously. Don’t get me wrong, every character in this is highly stylized, but Kingpin’s microscopic head and massive body is outlandish even by the stylization of this universe. His design felt more out of place than Penny Parker, who was literally designed like a 2D anime girl.

I also really enjoyed the contrasting Peter Parkers. Peter from Miles’ universe is basically peak Spider-Man. Getting to see him in action was also great, because he’s just full on Spider-Man. No dark angst or worry and conflict, just Spidey being Spidey. Then we get to meet Midlife Crisis Spider-Man, commonly called Fat Spider-Man. There is so much nuance going on here that work so well. He’s out of shape and doesn’t really care, but when it counts, he still just does what he does. He’s been in the game long enough that everything is second nature, but he also has been doing it long enough he’s kind of become jaded and apathetic.

Then there’s Spider-Woman who sort of contrasts between Miles and Peter (Fat Peter, amazing Peter dies early on). She is still kind of a rookie at being Spider-Woman, but she is driven and confident in her abilities. I also particularly liked how both Peter and Gwen basically just accepted everything, because they have already been through plenty.

This does bring up some bits that almost felt like they should have been addressed. Maybe a director’s cut could add them, and maybe they got dropped because the writer’s didn’t want to complicate things. Maybe it wasn’t addressed because it would be kind of creepy since Fat Peter is like 40 and Gwen Stacy is something like 15 or 16. Basically, Peter and Gwen never really acknowledge their relationships with their alternate selves. There is a sub plot involving Fat Spider-Man and the alternate Mary-Jane Watson too, so it’s not completely off the table. Gwen mentions that she couldn’t save her friend, spoiler, Spider Gwen basically killed her Peter while he was The Lizard, but doesn’t really seem weirded out by meeting an older version of her dead friend. Meanwhile we get no history from Peter and any Gwen Stacy he may have known. Gwen Stacy dying is kind of a big moment for some versions of Spider-Man.

Otherwise, I really have no real complaints about the movie. It does a great job of just rolling with everything and assuming we either already know or can figure it out. The crossover mix nature of the plot is great too because it keeps the origin story of Miles Morales from being being, because we get several experienced and capable Spideys to watch instead. I almost wish they would do a Spider-Gwen movie now, because I really enjoy that book and enjoyed her presence in the movie. There is a post credits scene that sets up more cross universe shenanigans so I’m sure the sequel will bring her back. Hopefully it will give us more Midlife Crisis Spider-Man too.

Review – MCU – Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Nov 9th, 2018

by Ramen Junkie.

No comments yet

Captain America – The Winter Soldier (2014)

Chris Evans
Samuel L Jackson
Scarlett Johansson
Robert Redford
Sebastian Stan
Anthony Mackie
Cobie Smoulders
Frank Grillo

Spoiler Free thoughts and Notes

The second entry in the Captain America series comes in right on the heels of The Avengers, or “Phase 2” of the Marvel Cinematic universe. I want to take a moment here to comment on how the continuity of these movies have been handled up to this point, since this is the first “post crossover” movie. This applies to pretty much all of the Phase 2 movies, though it seems to be disregarded some starting in Phase 3 (Post Age of Ultron). For the most part, the major movie franchises that have been brought together for the Avengers, Captain America, Thor, and Iron Man, work with or without the crossover film.

What I mean is, if you wanted to watch “Captain America” you could watch Cap 1 and Cap 2, and skip the avengers, and not really miss anything major in Captain America’s story. This applies to the two Thor movies as well and, for the most part, to the two Iron Man movies, though there is some reference to Tony Stark’s PTSD from his actions in The Avengers during Iron Man 3. It’s a plot point that could be written off as being related to other events however, if you were just coming in and watching the three Iron Man movies. It’s a pretty clever story telling trick that I really liked in Phase 2 as a whole that seems to have been disregarded in a post Age of Ultron world. Civil War is a direct product of the events in AoE, and it sounds like Thor 3 will have some relation to both AoE and Dr Strange.

It’s just a little side note I wanted to throw in, and something I kind of miss about the older MCU movies. On to Captain America 2: The Winter Solder.

The Winter Soldier is considered by many to be, the best movie so far in the MCU. As a whole, the Captain America movies tend to be the better films of the individual franchises, and The Winter Soldier is definitely the best of the three Cap movies. I feel like what makes Captain America work so well is that he’s a super hero, but he’s not really a SUPER hero. What I mean is, he doesn’t fly, he’s not invulnerable and gets worn out frequently. He isn’t using some mystical magic or lasers and missiles. His villains tend to be a bit more grounded and “real world”, he fights Nazis in the first movie and Hydra in the second movie. That isn’t to say that the other heroes don’t work, Cap is just a lot more relatable as a whole. Kind of a follow up to my remarks above, it’s something that felt lost a bit in his Phase 3 movie.

Synopsis and Spoiler Filled Thoughts

The movie opens with Steve Rodgers, Captain America infiltrating a hijacked ship and battling off a small group of hijackers. It’s a really great cold open event for the film, it gives Captain America a chance to show off how he operates in combat and his various skills at infiltration. We get reintroduced a bit to Natasha Romanoff, aka, Black Widow as well, who was previously introduced in Iron Man 2 and The Avengers. The whole sequence feels very throw away at first as well, though becomes relevant to the plot later on as things evolve. Basically, it works pretty well as a sort of showcase of “A day in the life of a SHIELD agent, something we haven to gotten to see a lot of out of these two since most of their action involved fighting Chitari aliens in The Avengers.

On a side note, at the time of this movie’s release, there has been plenty of opportunity to see regular SHIELD operations in the series Agents of SHIELD, which was early in it’s first season. Agents of SHIELD suffered a bit initially with a slow start as the first 7 or 8 episodes were basically filler waiting for the events of The Winter Soldier film to happen. After this movie, the show really picks up speed since the fall of SHIELD would certainly have heavy repercussions in a TV show entirely about SHIELD.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

During the mission Cap finds Widow doing some questionable secondary operations with the ships computer. Eventually Cap faces off against the leader of the Hijackers, a mercenary named Batroc. Another element of the MCU that really is fun is seeing these sort of 3rd tier characters show up and how they get “reimagined” to be more realistic. Batroc in the comics wears a suit that makes him look a lot like a Purple Wolverine, in the movie, he’s just a skilled soldier. Sure, it’s more boring, but grounding things more in reality like this is one of the more interesting aspects of the MCU in my opinion.

Cap questions the actions of Agent Romanoff to Nick Fury, Director of SHIELD and how he doesn’t care for the extra operations going on behind his back. We get some other scenes of Steve doing various activities around Washington DC where we get introduced to Sam Wilson, a retired soldier who becomes a friend to Steve.

Meanwhile Nick Fury gets attacked on the streets of DC by several men masquerading as police officers. This starts our second big action sequence of the film. We get a lot of cool action and car chasing in Fury’s tricked out SHIELD SUV before he ends up ambushed and wrecked by a mysterious masked mercenary, the one known as The Winter Soldier.

Fury escapes and ends up at Captain America’s apartment where he tells Steve that SHIELD is compromised before being shot by a sniper. Steve gives chase and discovered it’s the same mysterious soldier who has returned to finish the job of assassinating Nick Fury. The Winter Soldier escape and Cap meets up with Romanoff and Agent Hill (Fury’s 2nd for all real purposes of the MCU) at the hospital where Fury dies.

Steve confronts Alexander Pierce, a government figure who worked with fury at the top of SHIELD. Piece explains how the operation earlier in the movie involving the Hijackers on the ship had been orchestrated by Fury in order to steal SHIELD secrets. Cap is of course suspicious of everything going on around him after Fury’s warning, with good reason. Eventually on his way out of the building Cap is attacked in an elevator by a dozen or so SHIELD soldiers including Brock Rumlow, aka Crossbones, a reoccurring foil of this film.

It’s a pretty spectacular fight and escape sequence and really exemplifies why this film is so loved. The fight and action scenes are all very well done. Like I mentioned before, it helps that Captain America is a more down to Earth hero, he doesn’t come off as someone who is just going to “win” every time, and often barely makes it out of the situations he lands in.

Cap escapes and meets up with Romanoff again, they decode the data swiped earlier in the film which leads them to an underground bunker in Steve’s old army camp from WW2. They are greeted by Arman Zola, henchman to the Red Scull, who has managed to live on as a computer AI. He gives a plot dump of how Hydra has been part of SHIELD since the start and controls everything inside and how Hydra plans to launch some Heli-carriers soon to wipe out anyone believed to be a threat. The pair escapes a missile attack on the base and head back to the city to deal with the Hydra threat. Along the way they recruit Sam Wilson and his winged jetpack as The Falcon.

During their drive they get ambushed again by The Winter Soldier and some grunts. Once again, we get another pretty great street level fight between our three heroes and the villains. Eventually Cap ends up unmasking the mysterious Winter Soldier to discover that he is in fact Bucky, Steve’s old friend from back in the World War 2 days. The Winter Soldier escapes again and the heroes all end up taken into custody by Crossbones and is crew.

This brings up my one real complaint with this entire movie. Bucky’s deal is sort of explained… but not really. This is notable to some extent because it comes up again in the 3rd Captain America film but it’s never quite really explained super clearly. Basically, after Bucky “died” during WW2, Hydra collected him up, gave him a metal arm, trained him, probably super soldier syrum-ed him like Cap, and made him an agent of Hydra. His longevity and Winter Soldier name, comes because he gets his mind wiped and put in Cryo-stasis between operations.

So getting out of stasis on this review, Cap and crew get rescued by Maria Hill who takes them to a secret bunker where it’s revealed that Nick Fury is still alive and had faked his death. He’s still pretty beat up and down for the count but he’s alive. They regroup and make their final assault on SHIELD headquarters. The elaborate plan is to insert these hard drives into each of the three Heli-carriers, reprogramming them to fire at each other. Because you know, that’s how elaborate computer systems work. All of this amazing technology at SHIELD’s disposal and swapping a few drives out in a massive flying aircraft carrier is enough to confuse the targeting systems? Seems like it would be easier to recruit Iron Man and drop some C4 into each of the giant external engines but what do I know. I mean sure they are pressed for time but Tony is pretty fast.

Anyway, we get another massive action sequence against various Hydra soldiers, Cap faces off against Bucky and Falcon against Crossbones. Fury and Widow confront and deal with Alexander Pierce. In the end the Heli-carriers are destroyed and SHIELD with it. Bucky ends up turning good a bit, but not completely and runs off on his own after rescuing Cap.

It’s All Connected

The obvious connections here are to the first Captain America movie with Bucky and Captain America himself. There aren’t a whole ton of references to Thor or Iron Man going on, or even The Avengers movie that immediately precedes it. I didn’t mention Agent 13 at all. She is never referenced in this movie by name but she is Agent Carter’s niece, the same Agent Carter who was Captain America’s girlfriend in the first movie who shows up briefly in this movie as a now old woman.

What’s Next

The movie leaves off with a set up for Steve hunting down Bucky and redeeming him. SHIELD is “gone”, though that doesn’t seem to stick very well considering the continuing Agents of SHEILD show and the fact that Fury and SHIELD still show up in Age of Ultron and the later Civil War movie. There isn’t a whole lot here to set up any of the larger MCU. There isn’t any Infinity Stone or anything major for future plots or anything. It’s actually a fairly contained experience, which is another good plus for the movie, as much as I like the connected aspects of it all.

The Final Verdict

Captain America: The Winter Soldier has a well deserved reputation as one of if not the best movie in the MCU. It’s definitely a solid entry, though Doctor Strange and Ant-Man may give it a run for the money for best.

Review – Movie – Monster Trucks

Oct 27th, 2017

by Ramen Junkie.

No comments yet

So, I’m kind of a stupid sucker for this sort of thing. Kind of dumb movies based on dumb concepts. Monster Trucks really feels like one of those, in a meeting, guy says “What about, trucks, possessed by MONSTERS. And we could call it…. MONSTER TRUCKS. This is a Nickelodeon film and rated PG, so it’s pretty sanitary in it’s story and presentation. You’re not going to get much more than what you might expect. There’s quite a few faces that you’ll recognize in here as well, though the stars are Lucas Till, from MacGuyver as “Handsome outcast loser kid” and Jane Levy as “Nerdy Girl Love Interest”.

Some spoilerish thoughts and then a less spoilery wrap up beyond that.

Plot Summary

The film starts off with an oil company discovering an underground water source during a drilling operation. After penetrating the tunnels, a mysterious creature escapes from the well (several actually). They capture at least one creature and another hides inside a company truck that was crushed during the explosion.

A few notable characters are introduced, there’s a couple of Oil company people, a corporate jerk and a couple of science folks and there is this animal tracker/exterminator/tough dude hired by the Oil company. Honestly, their names aren’t super important, they are all pretty much just the characters you’d think of in these rolls existing. It’s clear they all basically exist to serve as plot foils for our hero in various ways.

Enter our hero, Tripp (MacGuyver). We get a brief introduction sequence, he seems to be kind of the loner stereotype though he doesn’t really look it, his mom and dad are divorced (the dad was working at the oil field) and his mom seems to be dating the town Sheriff. He also works at the local junk yard with Danny Glover in a wheelchair. The junked Oil company truck is dropped off and Tripp is rather excited by the prospect of taking the engine from it for his junker old timey project truck.

He soon discovers there is more to their truck after finding some missing oil, and later luring out the giant tentacled monster who has been drinking said oil. Around this time the Oil Company enforcer dude shows up with some goons. The monster sneaks off and hides inside Tripp’s Junker truck, where he remains for most of the movie. This also crates our first… Monster Truck. Tripp tells the goons to go ahead and search around while he pushes the truck and the monster out of the garage, where he runs into Jane Levy, who was coming by to help him out with some studying.

The monster starts acting up and she discovers the monster. With the goons quickly approaching they jump in the truck and the monster drives it off. They arrive at Meredith’s place (Jane Levy), where Tripp fixes up the truck so the monster and drive it better.

They take the Monster Truck out for a spin around town and to feed on some gasoline, only to discover gasoline kind of makes the Monster go kind of nutty. After some hi-jinks in the streets they end up ad Tripp’s dad’s place to get some more input on what happened with the Oil Field accident. His dad however rats them out to the Oil Company Goons. After a dramatic chase escape between the Truck, the Goons and the Sheriff, they end up at another place run by Meredith’s family, a cabin out in the woods.

You see kids, this is how we know she likes him, because she keeps hanging out with him and his crazy truck, despite all of the peril they keep getting involved with.

Through this whole crazy escapade, we’ve gotten a few glimpses at the Oil company scientist guy. It seems that he has two additional monsters help in captivity. After some testing, he finds that the monsters are smart and able to communicate telepathically with each other. He also greatly objects to the Oil Exec dude’s plan to kill the creatures so they can get on with drilling up Oil.

So the next morning Tripp and Meredith wake up to find that the monster as left. Fortunately, Meredith’s affections for Tripp are apparently creepier than they have been coming off because she has an app on her phone that is able to track Tripp’s phone, which is in the truck. Creepy much? Tripp doesn’t bat an eye at the fact that she has apparently been secretly stalking him using her cell phone. I mean tracking apps usually need special permissions, which would suggest at some point she snuck this app on her phone.

They track the monster to a facility owned by the Oil Execs and discover the other two creatures. Unfortunately, it was a trap and they are all ambushed and taken prisoner by the Oil Company guys. While being escorted off the premises, Meredith and Tripp are picked up by the Scientist guy, who wants to help the monsters escape so they don’t get killed. The scientists suggests they need to get the monsters back to the vent in the oil field so they can return home. But they need some way to move them fast.

Which brings us to… more… Monster Trucks.

Specifically, they essentially steal a couple of other trucks, rip out the engines and modify them using more stolen parts from a car dealer. But it’s for a good cause, or something.

Our heroes hijack the semi transporting the monsters and meet up with their newly hollowed out trucks. We get an action packed cross country race through the woods and up a mountain to the dig site, and some unexpected help from the Sheriff and our family of monsters is safely returned home. Everyone gets a nice feel good ending.

Thoughts

Ok, so yeah, this movie is definitely designed for a younger audience and it’s a Nick film. Most of the characters are all as a result pretty much cookie cutter stereotypes. The basic plot is… honestly pretty solid, as well as it’s execution. This is accepting the idea of tentacle monsters that like to control trucks is a thing. The real flaw of this film is that it’s a story that’s been done before, Kid (ok, the heroes are like 18 or something but you get the idea), kid finds alien/creature/sea animal and befriends it, corporate/government goons want to stop/kill said creature/alien, usually for “reasons” that amount to “they are the bad guys”. This movie doesn’t break any new ground. It’s still a pretty fun movie, and the special effects are pretty good as are the goofy stunts.

It’s not going to win any awards, but there are worse movies to watch and younger kids will get a kick out of the whole thing for sure.

Review – MCU – The Incredible Hulk (2008)

Sep 29th, 2017

by Ramen Junkie.

No comments yet

Spoiler Free Thoughts and Review

The Incredible Hulk seems to be a really hard hero to get right for movies. He’s had a few of them and even a live action TV series in the 80s. The Incredible Hulk is sort of the redheaded stepchild of the MCU. It came out just after Iron Man. It’s technically sort of part of the MCU, but no one really remembers or cares that it’s part of the MCU. Part of this confusion is the change in actors from the movie and his next appearance in The Avengers. They traded out Edward Norton for Mark Ruffalo. This particular movie also exists in a weird space since it’s technically a sequel to the 2003 Ang Lee film simply called Hulk. The rumors and stories I’ve read are that Norton was kind of a bear to work with on the whole thing and had a hand in altering a lot of the script until it was much less of a sequel and more of a reboot. It doesn’t really directly contradict Ang Lee’s Hulk, but it doesn’t reference it either. This is also part of why they dropped Norton for Ruffalo.

A lot of the problem with Hulk is that the exciting part, IE the big green monster, is boring and hard from a story perspective. He’s not really a hero, he doesn’t really go around saving people really, he just gets mad and rages, and hopefully he’s raging against someone more evil than he is. The part that works for the story, Bruce Banner, is kind of boring from a movie perspective. It’s not super easy to depict “inner turmoil” on screen, which is part of what makes the Hulk and Banner who they are.

This film also is treated by the greater MCU the same way it treats it’s Ang Lee predecessor. It’s not really acknowledge, it’s not really rejected. It does seem to be kind of a goto reference for the TV MCU though. Ironic since the TV MCU is also ignored by the movies. Daredevil and Iron Fist make references to the final battle in Harlem, Agents of SHIELD makes references to Emil Blonsky a few times.

It’s an alright film, but I kind of prefer the Ang Lee vision of Hulk and frankly, I don’t really like Edward Norton as Banner.

Synopsis and Spoilers

The plot starts off with Banner working and hiding in Mexico, working at a soda bottling plant. He’s communicating with Samuel Sterns, a scientist in the states, anonymously working to find a cure for his Hulkness. During an accident, he accidentally cuts himself and some of his blood lands in one of the sodas which ends up giving Gamma Poisoning to poor Stan Lee. This leads the military to Banner’s location. They recruit special forces agent Emil Blonsky to head in and capture Banner. After some Fitbit advertisements where Banner’s heart rate keeps increasing during his escape from the military, he finally Hulks out and battles it out with the soldiers before making his escape.

Jealous of the Hulk’s power, Blonsky gets injected with some experimental super soldier serum to help beef himself up and help him go up against the unstoppable force that is The Hulk. Banner returns to the states to meet up with his old girlfriend Betty Ross, daughter of General Ross, who is leading the military charge against him. Bruce wants to recover the data from the original experiment that transformed him into The Hulk to better help Dr. Sterns find a cure. Unfortunately for Banner, the Military has been alerted to his presence. Hulk rears his raging face again and makes short work of the military forces, including Blonsky, despite his newfound strength. Hulk flees with Betty after The Hulk “kills” Blonsky.

Bruce and Betty finally meet up with Samuel Sterns, who was able to formulate a cure, but possibly a faulty cure. They administer the cure to Banner and afterwards General Ross, Blonsky and the military show up yet again and take Banner into custody. After Ross heads out with Banner, Blonsky forces Dr. Stern to inject him with Banner’s blood. The super soldier serum and the Hulk blood have a negative interaction and Blonsky is transformed into the classic Hulk nemesis, Abomination, who starts rampaging through Harlem. General Ross agrees to let Banner go because the Hulk is the only one who can stop The Abomination. After the two brutes trash out the city, prompting Wilson Fisk to leverage his power to rebuild things in his vision for control (no wait, wrong show), The Abomination is defeated and things come to a close.

Banner is later shown to be living in seclusion again and Tony Stark shows up to talk to General Ross in vague terms about the Avengers.

How it’s Connected

Aside from Robert Downy Jr’s cameo at the end, there’s not a whole lot else that comes up later. There aren’t any references to The Absorbing Man in the first movie, there aren’t any Infinity Stones or much SHIELD even. The events that take place in Harlem are mentioned in the Netflix Defenders shows some, primarily because those shows mostly take place in and around Harlem. Though I find it kind of odd that the major event everyone talks about is Hulk and not, you know, the literal alien invasion and Avengers. The Super Soldier serum theme is here, that of course relates to Captain America, Agent Carter, and a few bits in Agents of SHIELD.

Thoughts on What’s Next

There hasn’t been a straight followup for The Hulk, he shows up again in the later Avengers films and the upcoming Thor Ragnarok, but nothing new in terms of a solo film. There is/was clearly some plan though, during the scene when Samuel Sterns turns Blonsky into the Abomination, he too gets infected by the Hulk Blood and his head starts mutating. In the comics, Samuel Sterns is a smart dude with a big head villain named Leader. Someone was pushing for this angle, though at this point it’s clearly gone nowhere.

Final Notes

The Incredible Hulk is an ok though pretty forgettable part of the greater MCU. It’s not an awful movie, it just sort of, is. Hulk is just sort of a hard guy to really do justice in film.

Review – Movie – Warcraft (2016)

May 19th, 2017

by Ramen Junkie.

No comments yet

I have to say, I was pretty excited to see the Warcraft movie. I don’t currently play World of Warcraft but I got pretty deep into the game in recent years. I played all of the original Warcraft games back in the day as well, especially Warcraft 2. I also enjoy films such as The Lord of the Rings, which kind of felt like the same idea, a large sweeping epic.

Ultimately, I ended up really let down by this movie. I’m not sure that it’s really a bad movie, it’s just not particularly amazing, despite the pretty impressive visuals. The entire film, something just felt really off. I worry a bit that my experience with the video game series was part of the reason for the sense of distraction I felt throughout the movie. Warcraft isn’t a straight retelling of the Warcraft story, it’s simply, heavily influence by the lore.

It’s also important to know that the movie Warcraft is intended to be based more on the video game Warcraft, that old RTS game, and not World of Warcraft or the books. This feels like it shouldn’t be notable, but it is, because World of Warcraft has expanded and mildly retconned things to make them work for it’s story. It’s also worth pointing out because the original Warcraft didn’t exactly have an amazing, deep story. Orcs come through the Dark Portal, Orca and Humans battle it out in a series of medieval battles.

All of the proper players are present on both sides, Gul’dan, Doomhammer, Blackhand, King Wrynn, Lothar, Medivh, Khadgar are all characters who would have had some hand in the events of this time period of the Lore. The movie shows the Orcs baely leaving the area around the Dark Portal, though the game was a large war across several regions and Stormwind was eventually raided by Orcs. I mostly wanted to mention this because the movie presents a really odd mix of set up for sequels while not quite explaining things that really could be important later in sequels.

The main set up element is Durotan’s Orc baby, who makes several appearances in the film though doesn’t do much, since he is a baby. This baby orc, in the Lore will grow up to be Thrall, aka Green Jesus, who is the first leader and founder of the modern Horde. The real missed opportunities though come from what feels like the complete omission of anything before the orcs enter the portal at the start of the movie.

I really feel like even a narrated montage of events leading up to why the Orcs are entering the portal would have really helped. There isn’t any mention of Sargeras or the Burning Legion that I recall, though Fel Energy is a large part of the plot. There also isn’t any mention of Grom Hellscream. Grom isn’t part of the “First War” featured in this film, but he was the first Orc to be corrupted by the Blood of Mannoroth which lead to the downfall and corruption of the Orcs. He later becomes friends with Thrall and in general is a very pivotal character in many later plot elements. He is also the father of Garrosh Hellscream, though it would take a dozen movies to get to the events that make Garrosh Hellscream important. Maybe the plan is to tell his story with flashbacks in a later film.

Like I said, the little things like this kept coming up as distractions, which may have tainted my enjoyment of the film, though there’s definitely more to it. It’s easy to compare this movie to The Lord of the Rings, both are grand tales of high fantasy with a large following of fans. Visually the effects, especially the orcs look great, but there’s also this odd factor where everything just feels extremely clean, TOO clean. You never really get the feel for the grittiness of the war, it just feels, much like the original game, like an excuse to have some Orcs and Humans fight each other.

The other major problem is the schizoid all over the place plot. This is also part of where a bit more fleshing out of the back story would have really helped a lot. Giving us some better glimpses as to the corruption that seduced Gul’Dan and Medivh would have gone a long way to show the motivation behind these two. A montage sequence at the opening of the power of Sargeras (effectively, the devil), and the Burning Legion, and their quest for power and how it led to the fall of the once peaceful and noble Orcs would have done a lot to make characters like Durotan and Garona, who question the actions of their people, more sympathetic. Instead the movie just opens on a giant portal and Gul’dan sucking the life from a bunch of blue people to power said portal. No real premise provided.

Ultimately, while I did find this film disappointing, I accept that the early Lore of the Warcraft universe is in fact, kind of bland. There’s set up in this movie to eventually to run through Thrall’s story, which could easily have interweaving bits setting up the story of Arthas. Both of these events are really good plot lines and would make incredible movies. I just hope that the poor performance of this film doesn’t hurt the chances for sequels, because I’d love to see Thrall’s time as a gladiator and his eventual creation of the Horde on the big screen. I’d definitely love to see the fall of Arthas as well, as his story is such a tragic tale that would work well as a movie. While Warcraft kind of falls flat as a film, I’m holding out hope that things can get better in some sequels. It’s just so bad this weak initial story pretty much has to be told first, since it’s the foundation of everything else