Dr. Strange (1978)

At the tail end of the '70s, Marvel Comics teamed up with CBS to translate some of their superheroes from the printed page to the world of television. But while the Bill Bixby/Lou Ferrigno-led The Incredible Hulk proved to be a big hit and became a memorable part of that era's pop culture, other efforts weren't so fruitful. A Spider-Man TV show lasted only a handful of episodes that aired sporadically between 1977 and 1979, while there were two incredibly hokey Captain America movies that ultimately never led to a series.

And then there's the case of Dr. Strange. Despite the success of the title character's comic books, he's so unlike Spider-Man, the Hulk, and Captain America that I'm actually surprised that they decided to give him a shot at TV stardom. I'm guessing that it wasn't much of a success, considering that it never made it past a pilot episode that aired on CBS on September 6, 1978. But there's nothing wrong with trying, is there? So as the Sorcerer Supreme makes his big-budget theatrical debut today as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I figured I might as well look back nearly forty years and see if Doctor Strange could have had as much success on the small screen as I'm sure he will on the big screen.

Beyond our world lies a realm of such mystic wonder that only a select few can truly comprehend it. This realm is host to a constant war between good and evil with our plane of existence hanging in the balance. Defending us in this battle is Thomas Lindmer (John Mills), a powerful wizard who holds the title of "Sorcerer Supreme." With him out of the way, the vile beasts opposing him would be able to invade and conquer Earth.

But the battle is taking its toll on a weakening Lindmer, who must soon pass the Sorcerer Supreme mantle to a successor before all is lost. Realizing that this will be their best time to strike, evil sorceress Morgan Le Fay (Jessica Walter) is sent by her dark masters to eliminate their foe before his successor can be found.

To do this, she arrives in New York City and possesses a young woman named Clea Lake (Eddie Benton), who she uses to push Lindmer off a bridge. He survives unharmed, but the possession leaves Clea so mentally scarred that she is taken to the nearest hospital's psychiatric ward and left in the care of brilliant psychiatrist Dr. Stephen Strange (Peter Hooten). Lindmer and his assistant Wong (Clyde Kusatsu) follow her to Dr. Strange, discovering that the fates have aligned to make him the next Sorcerer Supreme.

Despite his initial skepticism, Strange becomes intrigued by what Lindmer is trying to sell him and follows him down the rabbit hole into a world of magic and mysticism. And it's a good thing too, because if Le Fay is to be defeated and the world saved, Strange will have to fully tap into his potential and embrace his new role as the Sorcerer Supreme.

Thanks to a combination of low ratings and poor reviews at the time, CBS chose not to pick up Dr. Strange as a series. And honestly, I can see why. While this pilot really picks up during the second half, the first act is so lifeless and dull that by the time something interested happened, I'd begun to mentally check out by that point. It wasn't until the last thirty minutes of the movie that it really re-captured my attention. But it isn't bad, either; it actually shows some promise. The cast is good, and the effects aren't bad for a made-for-TV movie produced at the tail end of the '70s. And had it gone to series, I could've seen it finding something of a cult following similar to Kolchak: The Night Stalker. But it's not perfect, so let's get into why.

This pilot was written and directed by Philip DeGuere, who was no stranger to television. At the time he made Dr. Strange, he'd most notably written episodes of Baretta and The Bionic Woman among others, and would go on to create the long-running show Simon & Simon just a few years after this. But I can't say I was particularly enthusiastic about DeGuere's work here. As far as his script goes, there's not a lot here to justify its 90-minute length. A lot of scenes feel like padding or don't really add much to the story otherwise, but my guess is that these scenes were here to add threats that would be followed if the pilot got picked up as a series or in any potential sequel movies. But all it does here is make the movie feel like it had 45 minutes of story stretched out to an hour and a half.

The story also suffers from having a tremendously weak villain. The depiction of Morgan Le Fay here is a shallow, one-dimensional character who does practically nothing except for giving people the stink-eye for the majority of the movie. The ending implies a change for the charactor's methods, but considering that there was never any follow-up, we're just stick with this boring, uninteresting villain.

DeGuere's direction is a bit better than his writing, though I wasn't really too impressed with it either. I know I should probably judge a 1970s TV production differently than a theatrically released movie, but there's isn't a lot worth talking about here. At least not until the movie is almost over, anyway. Thanks to all the meandering around that it does in the first half, the movie is almost a chore to watch for quite a bit of time. DeGuere does spice things up in the second half by picking up the pace and giving us some action and the occasional trippy visual, but it's almost too little, too late. By the time things really get interesting, it's almost over.

At least the cast, for the most part, is what really elevates the movie. The exception is Jessica Walter, who you'll most likely recognize from her roles on Arrested Development and Archer, isn't really given much to work with here. She's not awful, but Walter is wasted playing a flat character with nothing really going for it.

I could very nearly say the same for Eddie Benton, who would be credited as "Anne-Marie Martin" for much of her later career (which includes 251 episodes of Days of Our Lives during the first half of the '80s, as well as co-writing the script for Twister). Benton doesn't have a lot demanded of her here, and I get the feeling that the character would have developed more over the course of a series. But Benton does what she can with the role, and puts forth a watchable performance at the very least.

On the other hand, I really liked John Mills, whose earnestness in the role made him feel very much akin to Alec Guinness' performance as Obi-Wan Kenobi. He contributes possibly the best performance in the whole thing, with Peter Hooten coming in a close second. I thought Hooten started off a bit on the dull side at first, but really began to win me over as the movie progressed. He's got a unique charm to him that really makes me wish for some kind of follow-up to the movie, be it a series or a sequel, because I'd enjoy seeing Hooten play the character as the fully fleshed-out Sorcerer Supreme that we saw in the closing moments here.

If this review feels like it's all over the place, I'll take part of the blame for that. It's not often that I watch or write about failed television pilots from the '70s. But to be fair, the movie is kinda all over the place itself. Its imperfections are boldly on display for anyone and everyone to see. Could Dr. Strange have worked as a TV series? Sure, I believe so. I saw some real potential deep down here. And I did leave wanting to see where they could have gone next creatively. But when it's said and done, Dr. Strange is just sorta... okay, I guess. But at least that's better than bad, right?

Final Rating: **

Captain America: Civil War (2016)

It was in the summer of 2006 that Marvel Comics published Civil War, a massive company-wide storyline built around a seven-issue series by writer Mark Millar and artist Steve McNiven. Civil War had a huge (albeit somewhat temporary) effect on the Marvel universe, shaking up the status quo in a number of ways, most notably with the public revelation of Spider-Man's secret identity and the assassination of Captain America.

And despite the mixed reaction it got from readers and critics during its original run, it still remains one of Marvel's most talked-about stories even a decade later. Elements of it appeared in the Avengers cartoons on Disney XD, it inspired the story for Activision's Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2 video game in 2009, and now, ten years later, it has crept into the live-action Marvel Cinematic Universe with the release of Captain America: Civil War.

Much like the comic that inspired it, the movie seeks to shake up the status quo by pitting the Avengers against not a god, not alien invaders, not an army of killer robots, but one another. And in a summer that already gave us one horrible attempt at pitting hero against hero, it's nice to see someone take that idea and make a good movie out of it.

We begin in Lagos, as the Avengers have arrived to stop members of Hydra from acquiring a deadly biological weapon. They are successful in stopping Hydra, but an attempt by Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) to thwart a suicide bomber accidentally causes a number of civilian casualties. With public opinion of the Avengers already drastically declining following the incident with Ultron, this only adds fuel to the fire and leads to the United Nations to pass what it calls "the Sokovia Accords." These accords would establish a committee to oversee the Avengers, essentially putting them at the UN's beck and call.

The Sokovia Accords split the Avengers right down the middle, with Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) on one side, believing that forfeiting the team's autonomy would make them political pawns instead of protectors. On the other side, however, is Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), whose guilt over his role in Ultron's rampage has convinced him that the Avengers need to be governed by outside sources who would hold them accountable for their actions.

But things get really shaken up when it comes time for the Accords to be ratified in Vienna. Ten people — among them, the king of the African nation of Wakanda — are killed when the UN conference building is bombed, with all evidence pointing to Steve's old friend Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan). Already an international fugitive because of his past actions as the Winter Soldier, he immediately shoots to Public Enemy #1 across the globe despite his protests of innocence.

Not only does this mean that every law enforcement agency in Europe is looking for Bucky, but so are the Avengers that have agreed to sign the Accords. Also on the hunt is Prince T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman) of Wakanda, who has vowed to kill him and avenge his father's death. Steve is steadfast in his defense of Bucky, however, further ruining the strained relationship between he and Tony and forcing the Avengers to pick sides as the tensions rapidly reach a boiling point.

DC Comics just can't catch a break. It's bad enough that Batman v Superman was met with terrible reviews and awful word of mouth, but Civil War is pretty stiff evidence that Marvel Studios can make what is essentially the same movie and do it a hell of a lot better. Civil War is everything that Batman v Superman is not: fun, exciting, serious but never dour, and willing to let its heroes actually be heroic even in spite of their personal flaws and their quarrels with one another. And even when the movie is at its weakest, Civil War is still proof that the Marvel Cinematic Universe is firmly standing at the top of the superhero movie mountain.

Returning to direct the continuing adventures of Captain America are Joe and Anthony Russo, who once again do a fantastic job behind the camera. The movie itself is essentially Avengers 3 in all but name, but considering that the Avengers are actually fighting one another instead of some giant alien threat or an army of killer robots, it has a different feel than Joss Whedon's two movies. It feels more personal, more intimate. By putting the focus entirely on the Avengers themselves rather than their battles with some new supervillain, the Russo brothers add a level of drama you don't really see in movies like these. We the audience have spent the better part of the last decade watching these characters develop on the big screen, seeing their universe blossom and grow as they fought alongside one another. And to see them come to blows really makes the movie feel a lot more drawn in, if that makes sense. Things look differently when you're fighting your friends instead of your enemies.

But that's not to say the Russos don't cut loose and give us the spectacle we've come to expect. Oh, there's plenty of that. While I'd say the airport battle royale pitting Captain America's Avengers against Iron Man's Avengers is most certainly the movie's biggest draw and quite a bit of focus is put on it, the Russos make sure that each action sequence is the right blend of exciting, tense, and emotional. And as I said before, that feeling of intimacy makes the action feel different. The stakes feel higher since the Avengers are their own opponents for a change.

While the Russos direction is solid, the script penned by Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely isn't always perfect. I doubt Mackie and McFeely wanted to write another political thriller in the same vein as The Winter Soldier, but I actually would've liked seeing that. The Sokovia Accords don't really seem that important in the scope of things, as the movie becomes more about the Winter Soldier being the wedge driven between Captain America and Iron Man rather than the Accords. The fact that this seemingly important plot device doesn't really seem that important at all makes me wonder why they even bothered. I mean, I'm sure future Avengers movies will show us that it's changed the MCU's status quo much like Millar and McNiven's comic book did, but for now, it feels a little pointless.

Speaking of pointless, I really don't see why the movie needed appearances from Ant-Man and Spider-Man. Outside of showing off that Marvel Studios had reached a deal with Sony that allowed Spidey to join the greater Marvel Cinematic Universe, I just don't get why either he or Ant-Man really needed to be in the movie. But I will admit, however, that their presence here is still quite welcomed at the very least.

I'm also surprised by just how little the movie's actual villain appears in the movie. The vast majority of the movie's plot is set into motion by Helmut Zemo (played by Daniel Brühl), who is barely in the movie at all. I'd honestly be surprised if the total sum of his screen time surpassed twenty minutes. Did they just not come up with anything for Brühl to do? Did they prefer a villain who was working in the background so as not to distract from the whole "Steve vs. Tony" dynamic? It's probably more the latter than the former, but it still sometimes gives the impression that Zemo is a non-factor. Maybe I'm just used to seeing the villains being put on something even remotely resembling equal footing with the protagonists in these movies as far as screen presence goes, I don't know.

But let's move along to the cast, pretty much all of whom hand in strong performances. It seems like that's par for the course with the MCU, but it's still worth saying. Tom Holland and Chadwick Boseman are great as Spider-Man and Black Panther respectively, and I really liked what Elizabeth Olsen brought to the table as Scarlet Witch. I wish she'd been able to do this in a smaller movie more focused on her character rather than playing a secondary role among an ensemble cast, because I'd love to see how Olsen would play Wanda when the spotlight is shining on her alone. Olsen playing Wanda as being scared of her powers accidentally hurting people and being unsure of herself make for a fascinating bit of character study had the character's arc not been one of a whole bunch of different things going on in the movie.

The movie also boasts some great moments from Sebastian Stan and Paul Bettany (who returns as Vision), and the aforementioned Daniel Brühl makes the most of his limited screen time. But the stars of the show are very obviously Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. Both of them once again step up to the plate and knock it out of the park as Captain America and Iron Man. Their performances are exactly whet this movie needed; both characters are justified in their beliefs, and Evans and Downey play their parts in a way that a viewer leaning one way or the other as to whose side they'd chose to be on is totally reasonable.

While I personally think Civil War is the weakest of the Captain America trilogy, it's only because The First Avenger and The Winter Soldier are just that damn good. Civil War is still a very entertaining, very exciting way to spend two and a half hours at the movies. And that's a hell of a lot more than I can say for that absolute mess Zack Snyder and DC Comics made with Batman and Superman.

Final Rating: ***½

Deadpool (2016)

Every so often, a TV show's minor character will get so popular that they graduate from a small supporting role to being one of the primary stars of the show. Characters like Fonzie from Happy Days, Steve Urkel from Family Matters, and Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer are all huge examples of this. And this can apply to other forms of storytelling beyond TV shows. I mean, that's how characters like Tigger, Jay and Silent Bob, and the Minions got their starts.

It's also quite prevalent in comic books as well. Stan Lee and Steve Ditko didn't plan on having Mary Jane Watson stick around for long after her debut in 1966, but she's become just as important to the Spider-Man mythos as Peter Parker himself. Wolverine got his start as someone for the Hulk to fight in 1974's Incredible Hulk #181, but became one of Marvel's most popular characters not long after he was brought into the X-Men fold.

I bring all this up because we can't talk about breakout characters in comic books without mentioning the one and only Deadpool. Making his initial appearance in Marvel's New Mutants #98 in 1991, creators Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld will be the first people to tell you that Deadpool began as just a ripoff of Deathstroke from DC's Teen Titans comic. But as the years rolled on, Deadpool would evolve from a villain into a goofy, wisecracking motormouth antihero. And as he evolved, his popularity with readers grew exponentially, so much so that he's become one of their top-tier characters, almost on the same level as Spider-Man and Wolverine.

With that popularity, Hollywood was sure to come knocking on Deadpool's door. But alas, so did a little thing called "developmental hell." A movie starring everyone's favorite "Merc with a Mouth" was first conceived all the way back in the summer of 2000 by the now-defunct Artisan Entertainment, but nothing came of it and the film rights ended up with New Line Cinema in 2004. But they eventually scrapped the project, at which point 20th Century Fox picked up the character and gave him a brief role in X-Men Origins: Wolverine that they managed to completely bungle in the process.

The Deadpool in that movie had "Murphy's Law" written all over him; if they could screw something up with him, they would (and did). By the end of X-Men Origins, Deadpool's mouth had been sewn shut, and he was shooting lasers from his eyes and waving blades that grew from his forearms like he was Baraka from Mortal Kombat.

But a spin-off was in the works, with word around the campfire that one day, someone would correct the mistakes made by Wolverine & Co. and create a proper Deadpool movie. And it only took them a decade or so (give or take a few years), but that day has finally arrived. Deadpool has his own, proper movie, and I don't know if I could possibly be any more excited to see it. So let's dig right in, shall we?

Once upon a time, there was a man named Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds). Dishonorably discharged from the Canadian military, the cocky Wade puts his special-ops training to work as a mercenary, a soldier of fortune helping people in need. He's also madly in love with his girlfriend Vanessa (Morena Baccarin), but their relationship hits a serious rough patch when Wade is diagnosed with late-stage, terminal cancer. As he begins to resign himself to his eventual death, Wade is contacted by a shadowy organization claiming they can cure him while making him a superhero in the process. Seemingly out of options, Wade sneaks away from Vanessa in the middle of the night and signs up for their program.

He arrives at their facility to discover that human experimentation is the name of the game. Under the supervision of the lead scientist, a rather sociopathic gentleman calling himself "Ajax" (Ed Skrein), participants in the program are pumped full of a specialized serum to grant them mutant abilities before being subjected to increasingly extreme conditions to fully trigger said mutations. Wade is put through the ringer for weeks, finally being locked in an airtight chamber and deprived of oxygen after Ajax grows tired of him being such a smartass all the time.

The experience does activate his mutant ability — a healing factor so potent that it not only stops the spread of his cancer, but renders him practically immortal in the process — but it also has the pretty side effect of covering his face and body in hideous burn-like scars. Enraged over this, along with the revelation that Ajax has secret, sinister motives for he and his fellow test subjects, Wade attempts to stage a fiery escape only to be beaten and ultimately left for dead by Ajax.

He survives, but is so humiliated by his extensive scarring that he's convinced it would be in Vanessa's best interests if he never returned home. It is shortly thereafter that, while out drowning his sorrows with his best friend Weasel (T.J. Miller), he gets the idea to put his newfound abilities to good use as a masked vigilante. He adopts the name "Deadpool" and begins cutting a bloody swath through the criminal underworld as he follows a trail of breadcrumbs that will hopefully lead him directly to Ajax and a potential cure for his disfigurement.

But while X-Men members Colossus (the voice of Stefan Kapičić) and Negasonic Teenage Warhead (Brianna Hildebrand) follow him and try convincing him to join their little team of mutants and become a more conventional superhero, Wade is more concerned about finding Ajax. But when he catches wind that he's effectively led Ajax and his brawny sidekick Angel Dust (Gina Carano) to his own front door and put Vanessa in danger, the "cure for disfigurement" idea goes out the window and Wade just wants some good old-fashioned vengeance.

The thing about Deadpool is that it is so unlike every other superhero movie out there that going in expecting it to be more of the same is the wrong way to approach it. Granted, the plot is a bit of a paint-by-numbers origin story when you break it down, but outside of maybe Kick-Ass and its sequel, Deadpool is practically in a class of its own. It's violent, vulgar, immature, and hilarious. And when it's all said and done, Deadpool is such a unique entity among its superheroic brethren that I can't help but absolutely love it.

The movie marks the directorial debut of Tim Miller, who does a fantastic job telling the story and giving it an anarchic spirit. He crafts the movie in such a way that it feels very unique and stands out among all the other superhero movies out there. It stays energetic throughout, and the fights scenes... oh boy. They're ridiculously violent, practically outdoing the Blade trilogy and the Punisher movies combined. But they have the same infectious vibe as the rest of the movie.

And if it didn't earn its R rating through the violence alone, it definitely would via its script. Written by Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick of Zombieland fame, the script's sense of humor is about as blue as you can get. But it stays really, really funny all the way through. Sure, quite a few of the really good jokes have been given away by the trailers and TV advertisements, that doesn't stop the movie from having plenty of fantastic, fun, hilarious moments.

The narrative hopping around back and forth between flashbacks and the present day for the first two acts adds a little style to set it apart, while the frequent asides and breaks of the fourth wall add a lot to the movie's already irreverent sense of humor. Take, for example, a scene where Colossus tries dragging Deadpool away to meet Professor Xavier of the X-Men. Deadpool's response: "McAvoy or Stewart? These timelines are so confusing." It's things like that that keep the character true to his roots for the most part. I say "for the most part" because while the movie version of Deadpool is well aware that he has an audience watching him like his comics counterpart, we don't see him talking to his own inner monologue like he does in the comics. He's also way more of a potty mouth here than he was in the source material, the same kind of feeling is still there and bring a subversive silliness that makes the movie more engaging.

And then there's the cast, all of whom do a fine job in their roles. Morena Baccarin and T.J. Miller are quite likable, and Leslie Uggams is entertaining in her small role as Deadpool's elderly, wisecracking roommate, Blind Al. Ed Skrein, meanwhile, is perfectly sleazy as our villain. I also greatly enjoyed Brianna Hildebrand and Stefan Kapičić as the movie's resident X-Men, but the movie wholly belongs to Ryan Reynolds.

This is one of those movies that would live or die based on the performance of whomever plays the title role. Reynolds absolutely nails it, elevating the movie from "good" to "great" through sheer force of will alone. I'd heard that Reynolds fought hard to get this movie made after how much everybody hated Deadpool's appearance in X-Men Origins, and his affection for the character is obvious. He's turned all the way up to eleven here, playing Deadpool with a madcap intensity that makes him feel like a demented Looney Tunes character. The movie is that much better for it, and I couldn't imagine anybody but Ryan Reynolds playing Deadpool. 

Deadpool is not going to be for everyone. The violence and occasionally vulgar comedy won't suit everyone's sensibilities. That being said, it's still a wonderfully crazy movie. It's a genuinely fun, entertaining flick that I can't recommend enough, a refreshing change of pace from the formulaic fair we usually get in this genre. So if an R-rated superhero movie that makes jokes about itself and other superhero movies sounds up your alley, definitely check out Deadpool. They don't come much crazier than this. 

Final Rating: ****

Fantastic Four (2015)

I guess I've been spoiled by the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but I'm so used to seeing Marvel Comics movies that you absolutely have to go see or you'll be missing out on something fun. They're so good that sometimes I actually forget that there's the occasional misstep with the movies based on Marvel's properties. Every so often we get a Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, or an X-Men Origins: Wolverine, or a Spider-Man 3. But the characters that I think have suffered the most are the Fantastic Four. Of the three times in the past that the Fantastic Four have been adapted into cinematic form, one was never released, and the other two disappointed critics and were only modest successes at the box office.

It's been nearly a decade since they last appeared on the big screen. And say what you will about the movie produced by Roger Corman, the 2005 one, or Rise of the Silver Surfer, but they're all far, far better than the newly-released reboot of the franchise. That nine-year wait was not worth it at all, as this attempt to revitalize the franchise is off to a terrible, terrible start.

Ever since childhood, Reed Richards (Miles Teller) has been attempting to build a machine capable of teleporting matter from one point to another. And while the prototype he and best friend Ben Grimm (Jamie Bell) have developed isn't perfect, it draws the attention of renowned scientist Dr. Franklin Storm (Reg E. Caffrey), who invites Reed to join his team of scientists in building a similar, more advanced version. Also brought onto the project are Storm's children Sue (Kate Mara) and Johnny (Michael B. Jordan), along with Franklin's brilliant yet cocky former protégé Victor Von Doom (Toby Kebbell). Their initial experiments upon finishing the teleporter's construction is successful, as they're able to transport a chimpanzee into an alternate dimension, a strange wasteland they've dubbed "Planet Zero," before bringing it back.

The bad news, however, is that their higher-ups want to take the project from them and give it to NASA for further development. A drunken Reed decides that they should be the first ones to travel to Planet Zero instead of a bunch of astronauts. Convincing Ben that he should tag along, they, Johnny, and Victor remotely activate the device and make the trip to this strange new world. But their trip proves to be a huge mistake, as the green lava-like energy that covers much of the area's surface begins to erupt. Victor is swallowed up by the collapsing ground, and an explosion destroys the device just as Sue arrives and pulls the other three and their shuttle back to Earth.

Reed, Ben, Johnny, and Sue (who herself was caught up in the aftermath of that little misadventure) are whisked away to a secret military base, where they find that the energy from the explosion has altered them significantly. Reed can stretch his limbs, Ben has been transformed into a giant rock creature, Johnny turns himself into a flying human fireball at will, and Sue is able to render herself invisible and create force fields. Reed quickly realizes that the government has no intention of curing them, choosing rather to study the use of their powers as it pertains to military application. He escapes and becomes an international fugitive as he tries to find a way to reverse the process that gave them these abilities.

Reed is recaptured in Central America a year later, asked to rejoin the teleportation project as the scientists who overtook it plan to return to Planet Zero. The explorers discover that not only has its entire landscape changed, but that Victor is still alive. Having fused with his environmental protection suit, Victor has himself developed a multitude of superpowers with which he intends to wipe out humanity and rebuild Earth in the image of Planet Zero. Although they have never quite been on the same page, Reed, Ben, Johnny, and Sue must come together and use their own abilities to save the world.

I went back and read my reviews of the previous three Fantastic Four movies before seeing this new one. I wasn't particularly kind to them (especially the Corman one), but I would gladly watch any of them before going back and watching this new one again. Everything about it is cold, ugly, unappealing. Its depressingly bleak tone undercuts any sort of adventure or heroics the titular quartet may engage in onscreen. I'm not opposed to the idea of dark superhero movies, but unless you're going for parody, it only really works for characters that are dark themselves, like Batman or the Punisher. Who asked for a grim and gritty reboot of the Fantastic Four?

The movie is the second directorial effort from Josh Trank, who'd previously helmed the found footage movie Chronicle in 2012. But while Chronicle was a solid, entertaining movie, Fantastic Four makes his successful debut look like a total fluke. Trank's direction here is subpar to say the least. The pacing is all over the place, the CGI is overdone and barely adequate at best (the Thing looks particularly weak), and it feels like the movie was edited with a chainsaw. The cinematography just plain sucks, with the only decent bit of it ― a tracking shot near the end of the movie that follows behind Doctor Doom as he marches down a hallway, effortlessly murdering everyone in his path ― being better suited for a horror movie than a superhero flick.

I read somewhere that Trank was inspired by the week of David Cronenberg when prepping production, and I believe him because the movie isn't exactly subtle about it. Elements of Scanners and The Fly are blatantly apparent, which only adds to the movie's bleak tone. The idea of a Cronenberg-style superhero movie does sound intriguing, don't get me wrong. But not only does Trank approach it weakly, it doesn't feel like this is the proper opportunity to do it either. Had Trank been making a movie based on Warren Ellis's Ruins, I could understand it. But doing dark versions of characters just because you can, being edgy for the sake of it, seems silly to me.

I'm not saying that comic book adaptations can't be dark and have to be completely, 100% accurate to the source material. Tim Burton's Batman killed people and those two movies were really good. But sometimes you'll end up on the opposite end of that spectrum with movies like Man of Steel or Fantastic Four. But at least Man of Steel is a well-made movie, which is a hell of a lot more than I can say for Fantastic Four.

That's partly due not only to Trank's lousy direction, but the script as well. Credited to Trank, Jeremy Slater, and Simon Kinberg, the script just how little anyone cared about making a Fantastic Four movie that was worth a damn. There's no real loyalty to the source material in any serious effort, especially when it comes to the characterization of Doctor Doom. The three core parts of Doom's personality have always been his insufferably enormous ego, his overwhelming hatred of Reed Richards, and his genuine belief that the world would be a better place if he were its supreme ruler. We do see evidence of the first two when, in the character's first scene, Doom immediately accuses Reed of stealing his work despite the two having never even heard of one another previously and acting independently to develop their systems.

The catch here, though, is that this version of Doom does not want to conquer the world, but destroy it. Doom is an incredibly complex character when handled well, but the movie depicts him as a stereotypical omnicidal villain with no depth or any sort of motivation. He actually even completely disappears from the movie for the entire second act and is barely mentioned subsequently, only reappearing with his new superpowers to raise hell during the last twenty minutes of the movie. It's an absolutely pathetic waste of a great villain, one that makes the rather lackluster depiction of him played by Julian McMahon in 2005 and 2007 look a lot better in retrospect.

The other characters don't fare much better, as they're chock full of an almost unbearable amount of angst because of their superpowers. I get that might happen, and it's expected in regards to Ben Grimm, but it's almost too much angst. I don't want to watch a superhero movie where the heroes are self-loathing sad sacks that are resentful of each other.

But the script has more problems than just that. Judging by how the movie plays out, the story must have been put together at random because it feels disjointed and haphazardly put together. I don't know if that's how it was written or if there was a lot of executive meddling (judging by the producers ordering rewrites, the studio doing reshoots behind Trank's back months after production ended, the terrible editing, and Trank's since-deleted tweets, I'm guessing the latter more so than the former), but the narrative skips and stutters like there was some heavy duty editing going on with no consideration of how the final product would flow. The movie never feels like it's going anywhere because as soon as it starts building some momentum, it comes to a screeching halt to go in a completely different direction.

I also got the impression that the cast would have preferred being anywhere else on the face of the planet than on the set. They came across like they're putting forth the absolute bare minimum amount of effort, but then again, they could have hired Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep and it still would have ended up being rough to watch.

Miles Teller and Jamie Bell aren't totally awful, I'll give them that, but Tony Kebbell is given practically nothing to do, which makes me wonder why they even bothered including Doctor Doom in the movie at all. Kate Mara seemed like she was phoning it in (assuming said phone was a tin can on a string), but factoring in the rumors that Trank supposedly treated her poorly due to his anger with Fox ordering him to hire her, I can't admit to being all that surprised.

The only real standout among the entire cast is Michael B. Jordan, who was a controversial choice to play Johnny Storm simply because of his race. Much like Michael Clarke Duncan playing Kingpin in Daredevil, hiring a black actor to play a character that has traditionally been depicted as white (especially considering the actress playing his sister is also white) rubbed a lot of the hardcore comic book nerds the wrong way. But Jordan isn't bad at all as Johnny. He's not the first person I'd have thought of when casting the role, but he's charismatic enough that he becomes the one bright spot in the darkness that is the movie.

Based on the word of mouth, I entered Fantastic Four expecting the worst. It's not as aggressively terrible as I'd anticipated, but the movie was still a waste of my time and money. The only worthwhile part of the whole thing was seeing the green-band trailer for Deadpool before it started. Fantastic Four is proof of how much a lack of respect for the source material and a director and studio that have no clue what they're doing can hurt a movie. I just hope that the rights will revert back to Marvel sooner rather than later, because if they could redeem Howard the Duck with one ten-second cameo, they can redeem these characters too. The Fantastic Four deserve so much better than this.

Final Rating: *½

Ant-Man (2015)

I wrote in my review of Guardians of the Galaxy that Marvel Studios has been so unbelievably successful that they can make practically whatever movie they want at this point. They made a movie starring a gun-toting talking raccoon, for crying out loud! And it was a huge hit! It's probably this line of thinking that brings us here to take a look at their newest effort, Ant-Man. It may not be as risky a venture as the off-kilter space opera that was Guardians, but considering the Ant-Man character's relative obscurity among mainstream audiences, it seemed like it might have been a hard sell to some. But while Ant-Man may not be widely known among those who aren't comic book geeks, his movie is still a ton of fun.

The focus of our story is Scott Lang (Paul Rudd), a talented cat burglar who, as we're introduced to him, is being released from a stint in prison after robbing his employers and posting evidence of their corporate malfeasance online in the process. His attempts to return to civilian life are wrought with failure; his ex-wife won't let Scott see his daughter Cassie (Abby Ryder Fortson) until he can start making his child support payments, but he can't hold down a job because most businesses won't hire a convicted felon.

Stuck in a serious Catch-22, Scott agrees to take a job breaking into a safe in a retired businessman's basement. He's able to get into the safe with very little effort, but the only thing inside it is what he initially believes to be a motorcycle suit and a odd-looking helmet. Scott, not wanting to leave empty-handed, takes the suit home and figures he'll try it on. But he's startled when he hits a trigger sewn into one of the suit's gloves and is shrunk to the size of an insect. The disorienting experience terrifies Scott so much that he immediately tries returning the suit to its rightful owner, only to be caught by the cops and arrested while trying to break back in.

Fortune soon smiles upon him, however, when he's visited in jail by Dr. Hank Pym (Michael Douglas). Pym reveals that he's not only the owner of that suit, but set everything up so Scott could steal the suit in the first place because he wanted him to have it. And since Pym has greater plans for him, he smuggles the suit into into Scott's cell so he can escape.

Hiding out from the police at Pym's house, Scott learns that his new benefactor had invented the suit during the Cold War, operating as an agent of SHIELD codenamed "Ant-Man." After forcing Pym out of the technology company he founded, Darren Cross (Corey Stoll) ― Pym's former protégé and the current CEO of PymTech ― is now on the verge of replicating the chemical that Pym developed to allow the Ant-Man costume to shrink. Doing so would allow him to manufacture what he calls "the Yellowjacket," a flying suit of armor that could be used to create miniature armies. And to make matters worse, he fully intends to sell the prototype to everyone's favorite terrorist organization, Hydra.

Disturbed by Cross's growing insanity and refusing to allow his creation to be weaponized, Pym and his estranged daughter Hope (Evangeline Lilly) have conspired to sabotage Cross's plans before he can bring them to fruition. That's why Pym sought Scott out, because his history with burglary and corporate espionage makes him the perfect person for the job. Scott will need to break into PymTech in order to accomplish this, but he'll have to learn to properly use the Ant-Man suit and a built-in device that would allow him mental control over ants. And that'll be far, far harder than it looks.

A lot of people, myself included, thought Ant-Man might be kind of a hard sell to some people. The character doesn't have quite the notoriety of an Iron Man or a Captain America, and his powers (the ability to shrink and use mind-control on ants) admittedly sounds like a weird joke. And then there was the initially troubled development that saw delay after delay between its initial announcement in 2006 and the beginning of principal photography early last summer. The good news, however, is that while Ant-Man isn't one of the best chapters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it's still a funny, entertaining movie that is definitely worth checking out.

The movie was helmed by Peyton Reed, a last-minute replacement for Edgar Wright, who had originally been pegged to write and direct the movie. While I would have liked to have seen what Wright could have done with the movie, I thought Reed still made a movie that was better than I'd anticipated. His direction is tight, fluid, and makes the movie an engaging watch. The quick transitions from big to small as Ant-Man changes his size can be dizzying, especially if you see it in 3D on a large-format screen like I did, but other than that, Reed does a satisfying job building the movie.

I do wonder, though, how the movie would have turned out had Wright actually stuck around and directed the movie. Similarly, I'm also curious what would have happened had the script by Wright and Joe Cornish not been rewritten by Adam McKay and Paul Rudd. While Wright and Cornish are given co-writer and "story by" credits, I don't know quite exactly how much of their work survived the rewrites. The final result is something of a mixed bag. There are elements that are strong and well put-together, and the story ― a superhero-themed heist movie ― is simple enough to suit the movie's needs and make it stand out from the rest of the MCU franchise. I also liked how the characters of Hank Pym and Scott Lang were set up to mirror each other as two sides of the same coin. Scott is trying to rebuild his relationship with a daughter who never sees him yet adores him all the same, while Hank tries the same with a daughter who resents him for being too controlling. It's an intriguing dichotomy that isn't really dwelt upon for too long but still adds a bit of depth to the movie.

But there are also parts that that don't really click either. The relationship between Scott and Cassie is painfully underdeveloped, and ends up taking a back seat to Scott's training to become Ant-Man. The sort-of romance between Scott and Hope feels unnecessary and doesn't add much to the movie. And the movie ultimately feels like the first Iron Man movie was just retooled to suit the Ant-Man character and reflect where the franchise has gone in the wake of the two Avengers movies.

But at least the weaknesses are counterbalanced by its positives, among them its cast. Corey Stoll plays his character solidly, but much like Obadiah Stane in Iron Man, his character is a rather generic villain. Stoll still does a fine job with it and makes the role his own. Evangeline Lilly is capable and strong despite not having a lot to do other than react to everyone else in the movie, and I really enjoyed Michael Peña as the movie's token comic relief. But Ant-Man is really bolstered by the performances of Paul Rudd and Michael Douglas. I thought Douglas was appealing as Hank Pym, bringing a lot of depth and pathos to the role. Rudd, meanwhile, is charismatic and very likable as Scott Lang, but a bit more low-key than you might expect from Rudd's past roles. He plays the role in the way that makes the characters feel like he's realized he's in way over his head but knows this is the best chance to do something good. I know Rudd doesn't seem like he'd be the first choice to play any superhero, but he still plays it to the bets of his ability and the movie is better for it.

Ant-Man feels like it might be the least of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, with its smaller scale and lesser-known characters. But after the bloated mess that was Avengers: Age of Ultron, some low-key superheroics were a nice change of pace. It'll never be accused of being the best entry in the franchise, but Ant-Man is still an amusing ride that I thought was most certainly worth the price of admission. But I'll tell the truth: I still want to see how the director of Shaun of the Dead and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World would have made Ant-Man instead of the director of Yes Man and The Break-Up. I can always wonder, right?

Final Rating: ***½

Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)

It's weird thinking that what started in 2009 with a movie based on the Marvel Comics superhero Iron Man has blossomed into a mega-franchise that has grossed over seven billion dollars worldwide and shows absolutely no signs of stopping. Some people thought that the franchise's final endgame would have been The Avengers in 2012, but here we are three years and five movies later talking about an Avengers sequel. The hype machine is in full gear and the anticipation is high, but Avengers: Age of Ultron isn't quite as good as I'd hoped it would have been. But you know what? It's still pretty fun.

The movie takes us immediately into the action, as the Avengers launch a raid on a secluded Eastern European laboratory where Hydra scientists have been using the mystical powers of Loki's scepter for human experimentation and creating super-soldiers for Hydra. Despite the interference of Pietro (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) and Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen), twin siblings granted superpowers through Hydra's experiments, the Avengers' raid is successful. The bad guys are apprehended and Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) claims Loki's scepter for himself so that he can study it further.

His research proves fruitful, as Stark discovers that the gem within the sceptre contains a hyper-advanced artificial intelligence that Stark and Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo) believe could be the key to perfecting "Ultron," Stark's unfinished global defense system. But upon its activation, Ultron (voiced by James Spader) proves to be not only sentient, but also very, very angry. It downloads itself into Stark's mechanical peacekeeping drones and attacks the Avengers before escaping with the sceptre.

Using it in tandem with the now-abandoned Hydra lab's leftover resources, Ultron builds himself a new, more powerful body and a personal army of robots. He recruits Pietro and Wanda to help him in his fight against the Avengers so that they might settle an old grudge with Stark, but what the Maximoffs don't know is that he has more than just killing a group of superheroes on his mind. In truth, his final goal is far more sinister: human extinction.

I entered Age of Ultron excited to see it, but afraid that it wouldn't live up to the hype or that it wouldn't be as good as the first Avengers movie. And while I did think Age of Ultron was a tremendously fun, exciting ride, I simply didn't think it was as strong as the first one. It's a solid movie, don't get me wrong, but I felt a little... I don't know, perhaps "underwhelmed" is the word I'm looking for.

Returning to the Avengers saga is writer/director Joss Whedon, who, from the looks of it, adopted an "if it isn't broken, don't fix it" approach to making the movie. I saw a double feature of both Avengers movies at my local theater, and in watching them back to back, I couldn't help but notice so many similarities that it's like they're practically the same movie. There are differences, sure, but Whedon hits so many of the same notes that he hit back in 2012 that it feels like he isn't interested in bringing a lot of new to the table. Perhaps it was a case of burnout or being exhausted creatively, or maybe Whedon was being hassled by Marvel and Disney executives to deliver a certain kind of movie. I wasn't on the set, so I don't know for certain.

And maybe it's me, but the film's pacing seems to stutter and stumble every so often almost as if it was being put together from scraps. And truth is, Whedon's original version of the movie is supposedly over three hours long, but word on the street is that he had to do a bunch of haphazard editing due to Marvel executives being unhappy with some of the material he was producing along with wanting to keep the movie under two and a half hours.

But what I thought was the movie's real problem was its script. The plot is typical paint-by-numbers superhero stuff, and the returning characters are written pretty much the same way they were before. That's not what bugged me, though. What got me was the addition of some unexpected subplots that don't really go anywhere or add anything to the movie. Case in point: the Hulk/Black Widow quasi-romance felt awkward and forcibly tacked on. I didn't think it was really all that necessary to the story (or even well put-together, really), and all it did was make me wonder what the heck ever happened to Betty Ross? Did Liv Tyler not want to return, and Marvel Studios didn't want to replace her? Or could they be distancing themselves from The Incredible Hulk due to its relative lack of success compared to the rest of the franchise?

There were some things I did enjoy, though, like the additions of Quicksilver, Scarlet Witch, and The Vision to the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I though each of them added something very cool to the movie, like there's more to the world of the Avengers than just good guys fighting bad guys. And I know a few people who were curious to see how this version of Quicksilver would compare to the one that appeared in X-Men: Days of Future Past last year. They're so completely different, though, that it's almost not worth comparing them. X-Men's Quicksilver was barely in the movie but contributed the movie's best, most memorable scene, while Age of Ultron's is an important character and appears throughout, which means he might not make as huge an impact as the one from Days of Future Past but still plays a continually important part of the story. Apples and oranges, the two Quicksilvers are.

The movie might have its share of weaknesses, but it also has its strengths as well, the greatest of which is its cast. Many of the returning actors have played their characters so many times that they could probably do it in their sleep, and although they're not given any material to shake things up, the cast is still top notch. Mark Ruffalo and Jeremy Renner get to do a bit more dramatic heavy lifting, with their characters being the only ones to experience any kind of growth or evolution. Both Ruffalo and Renner are great, showing why both of them were great choices for their roles. And despite the contractual hangups regarding it, I still want to see Ruffalo get his own solo Incredible Hulk movie.

But of the actors returning to the franchise, I thought Paul Bettany really stood out in particular. Having only appeared previously as the voice of Iron Man's snarky digital assistant Jarvis, Bettany gets to stretch his legs as the android superhero The Vision. While Vision doesn't appear until the third act of the movie, Bettany still gets to make a heck of an impression. He's really likable in the role, and it left me wanting to see more of the character.

Among the franchise's newcomers, we get some really great performances from Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Elizabeth Olsen, and James Spader. Taylor-Johnson still plays his role in a way that's fun to watch, but he ends up being overshadowed by Olsen. Olsen is a very talented actress, and she brings a lot of depth and a sympathetic nature to Scarlet Witch. And like with Bettany as The Vision, I'm genuinely excited to see Olsen turn up in future movies in the franchise.

The real star of the show, though, is James Spader. One could make the argument that the Ultron we see here is kinda boring and underdeveloped (could his "kill all humans" supervillain plan be any more clichéd?), but Spader's charismatic voicework makes the character captivating to watch. He's essentially playing a dark, twisted version of Tony Stark, believing his intentions are noble but in truth causing more harm than good yet with a more intimidating, angry, evil tone to it all. Ultron takes Stark's egotism and "know it all" nature and cranks them up to a million, and Spader plays it up for all it's worth. He absolutely steals the entire movie, and despite Age of Ultron's flaws, Ultron himself makes the movie worth seeing.

I know that for a lot of this review, I've been kinda down on the movie. And personally, after how good Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Guardians of the Galaxy were, Age of Ultron is a bit of a letdown. But I really couldn't imagine a better way to open 2015's summer blockbuster season. Even if it's nothing we haven't seen a million times before, I can't ague that the movie isn't a totally fun way to spend two and a half hours. I enjoyed the hell out of it, but then I'm totally a sucker for this kind of stuff. And there's nothing wrong with that, is there?

Final Rating: ***

Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)

No one could have possibly foreseen just how big the Marvel Cinematic Universe would get when it began with Iron Man in 2008. After six years and nine movies, it's second only to the Harry Potter movies as one of the biggest movie franchises of all time. And when your movies make billions of dollars at the box office, with one of them making one and a half billion alone, you can get away with having a little bravery in future installments. So for their tenth movie, Marvel Studios chose to step away from the Avengers characters audiences have come to know and love so much and give us something different. Based on a team of characters that could be accurately described as obscure D-listers from outer space, Guardians of the Galaxy is a gamble that paid off in spades because it's one of the most entertaining movies I've seen in a while.

We're quickly introduced to Peter Quill (Chris Pratt), who was abducted by aliens as a child in 1988. Raised by a band of intergalactic pirates known as the Ravagers, the adult Quill has become one of their ranks, fancying himself an outlaw with the self-bestowed moniker of "Star-Lord." When we meet him, Quill has arrived on a desolate planet to retrieve a mysterious orb he's heard will fetch him a hefty chunk of money. His attempt to abscond with it is interrupted by Korath (Djimon Hounsou), a subordinate of the notorious terrorist Ronan the Accuser (Lee Pace), but he manages to escape with both the orb and his life. He also comes away with a bounty for his capture thanks to Ravager leader Yondu (Michael Rooker), who was angered by the knowledge that Quill would dare disrespect him by stealing and selling the orb without cutting him in on the deal.

But before he can fence his new possession, however, he is ambushed by Gamora (Zoe Saldana), an assassin sent by Ronan to acquire the orb after Korath's failure. Quill's attempt to fight back draws the attention of two bounty hunters ― the genetically modified anthropomorphic raccoon Rocket (the voice of Bradley Cooper) and tree-like Groot (the voice of Vin Diesel) ― looking to cash in on Yondu's ransom. The resulting brawl ends with all four being arrested and sent to a massive mega-prison called the Kyln.

Gamora is given a particularly hostile welcome upon their arrival by the brutish warrior Drax (Dave Bautista), whose family was killed by Ronan years earlier. But his attempt at having a modicum of revenge by killing her is halted when she reveals that she had planned to betray Ronan and prevent him from getting the orb. Upon mentioning that she had lined up a buyer offering a fortune for it, Quill, Rocket, and Groot immediately volunteer to help stage a jailbreak.

With Drax tagging along in the hopes that he will eventually encounter and duel with Ronan, the group heads to the buyer's outpost on the edge of the universe. However, not only are Yondu and the Ravagers following closely behind them, but so are Ronan and his armada. While the Ravagers merely wish to steal the orb for their own financial gain, Ronan has much more sinister plans for it and the immeasurable power it contains.

Making Guardians of the Galaxy was a brave experiment on Marvel's part. The characters don't have a built-in audience like Iron Man, Thor, and Captain America do, their lack of mainstream notoriety potentially serving as a stumbling block for some audience members. And the fact that it's not a typical superhero movie, instead being more of a space opera akin to Star Wars or Flash Gordon. This is not the kind of movie one would expect Marvel Studios to make. But they've defied all expectations with Guardians of the Galaxy. They've gone above and beyond the call of duty when it comes to showing the audience a good time, making a movie that is more fun and more entertaining than I ever imagined it could have been.

Part of what makes the movie so good is the direction courtesy of James Gunn. Hiring Gunn was another gamble by Marvel, as his prior work is comprised solely of low-budget, low-tech indie affairs that all failed to strike gold at the box office. Handing the guy that made Slither the reigns of a multimillion-dollar summer blockbuster seems kinda off at first, doesn't it? But Gunn's off-beat, mischievous, and ultimately irreverent sense of humor is perfect for this movie. It allows Gunn to build something that is lively and never takes itself too seriously. He's crafted a deep, rich world that effortlessly balances excitement, drama, and a feeling of wide-eyed awe. It never ceases to feel like an adventure, and when the credits roll, you'll wish it could have kept going.

And for all his low-budget work in the past, Gunn shows he can definitely handle the huge studio movies as well. I was impressed by how cool the visuals, represented mostly via CGI and motion capture work with practical effects mixed in, looked. They're seamlessly integrated into the movie, with Rocket and Groot looking especially awesome. It honestly looks and feels like they're really there. And I'll also give a big thumbs-up to the movie's 3D efforts. It was shot flat, but you'd never know it from how good the post-production conversion looks. Gunn supposedly filmed the movie in such a way that would benefit the added depth, and personally oversaw the conversion himself. His effort shows, and while I'm sure the movie looks just as good in 2D, seeing the movie in 3D just adds to the on-screen spectacle.

I also really liked the script, written by Gunn and Nicole Perlman. They must have worried about the obscurity of the property as well, because they've developed it in such a way that it is surprisingly accessible even for those who've never so much as touched a comic book. The story never gets muddled or over-complicated, the characters all have their own distinct personalities and motivations, and every scene and every line of dialogue (even the snappy comedic banter) builds toward something. Everything matters here. It's either moving the plot forward, developing the characters, or bringing us deeper into the movie's universe. There are a few hiccups along the way, mostly in the form of dangling plot threads that will surely be resolved in the inevitable sequel (which is currently set for release in 2017). But Gunn and Perlman have still put together something great.

The same can be said for the cast, all of whom are all great in their own ways. Among the supporting cast, I really liked Benicio del Toro, Michael Rooker, and John C. Reilly in their minor roles, while Lee Pace isn't bad as Ronan the Accuser. I wasn't totally impressed with Pace at first, since I honestly wanted to see more of Josh Brolin as Thanos (especially since we probably won't be seeing much of Thanos for a few years). But after seeing the movie a second time, I thought Pace did a fine job.

The primary cast, meanwhile, is the movie's main drawing point, and they're all strong and likable. Chris Pratt plays Star-Lord as if Luke Skywalker were desperately trying to be Han Solo; he's a cocky, swaggering wannabe outlaw with a blossoming sense of heroism. Pratt is very fun to watch in the role, putting forth a fantastic performance. Zoe Saldana, similarly, brings a confidence to Gamora, along with a certain vulnerability as well. She is more subdued than the rest of her castmates, something I felt worked in her favor. It makes her more intriguing to watch, because she's not as wacky or over-the-top as the others.

And I must admit that I was surprised by former WWE star Dave Bautista. Most pro wrestlers aren't very successful in translating from the ring to the big screen, with the only real exception I can think of being Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. But Bautista is excellent here. He's hilarious, complex and nuanced, and actually really impressive.

But as funny as Bautista's Drax is, the movie is almost completely stolen by the characters of Rocket and Groot, thanks in part to the voice work from Bradley Cooper and Vin Diesel. Cooper's Rocket is braggadocios yet secretly neurotic about his lot in life, and he makes it work. I've heard he based it on Joe Pesci's performance in GoodFellas, and I believe it. It really shows, and it makes Rocket more memorable.

Diesel approaches his role, on the other hand, as if it were similar to his role in The Iron Giant. His only dialogue is the oft-repeated phrase "I am Groot," a phrase that means so many different things depending on the tone and inflection, and Diesel makes it oddly believable. Watch the movie intently enough, and you'll start to see what I mean. The fact that Diesel was able to communicate so much through just saying three words over and over is a real testament to how impressive he can be when he really wants to be. (And the fact that he apparently recorded the line a thousand times in multiple languages for the movie's international releases gets him a ton of respect from me.)

Long story short, Guardians of the Galaxy is an all-around awesome movie. It's everything one could hope for from a movie like this. Blending an unbridled sense of adventure with silly humor, enjoyable characters, and an awesome soundtrack of '60s and '70s hits, the movie is some of the most fun I've had in a theater in a long time. And it's a shame I'll have to wait until 2017 to see the characters again, because the Guardians of the Galaxy are a great change of pace from the Avengers.

Final Rating: ****

X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)

The Marvel Comics mutant super-team known as the X-Men have had hundreds of adventures since Stan Lee and Jack Kirby created them in 1963. But few of these adventures are quite as famous as the 1980 story "Days of Future Past." Part of Chris Clairmont and John Byrne's legendary run on the Uncanny X-Men comic during the '70s and '80s, "Days of Future Past" has earned notoriety over the years as not only one of the X-Men's greatest tales, but perhaps one of the best stories Marvel has ever published.

Once 20th Century Fox began producing movies based on the X-Men, most fans assumed it was only a matter of time before the story would have some influence on the franchise. Fourteen years have passed since the release of the first X-Men movie, and now its director has returned to the franchise to finally translate "Days of Future Past" into cinematic form. The wait was worth it, too.

By the year 2023, the world will have become a dystopian wasteland. Mutants have been hunted to the brink of extinction. Those that remain, along with their supporters and sympathizers, have either been shuffled off into concentration camps or are killed on sight. The few that remain free have become refugees, constantly on the run from the unstoppable Sentinels, massive robots designed solely for mutant extermination.

With the revelation that Kitty Pride (Ellen Page) has developed the ability to project someone's consciousness back in time into their younger bodies, Professor Xavier (Patrick Stewart) formulates a plan to swing things back to mutantkind's favor. That plan: to send Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) back fifty years to prevent Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) from killing Dr. Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage). An anti-mutant government scientist who engineered the Sentinels in response to the events of First Class, Trask's murder would lead to widespread support of the Sentinel project. Mystique, meanwhile, would be taken into custody after killing Trask and experimented on while in captivity, her shapeshifting ability allowing Trask's colleagues to develop Sentinels able to mimic and adapt to any and all mutations.

Upon his arrival in 1973, Wolverine finds a younger Xavier (James McAvoy) left emotionally devastated by his school's failure, the majority of the students and faculty having been drafted into the Vietnam War. He's also begun abusing a serum developed by Hank McCoy (Nicholas Hoult), one that negates both his psychic abilities and his paraplegia. Xavier wants nothing to do with Wolverine, even less so once Wolverine suggests they break Erik Lensherr (Michael Fassbender) out of his maximum security prison in a bunker beneath the Pentagon. But Wolverine ultimately talks him into it, their mission proving to be a race against time. Not only does Mystique killing Trask loom ever closer, but the X-Men in 2023 must prevent an approaching Sentinel attack from interrupting an increasingly exhausted Kitty before Wolverine is able to complete his mission.

The "Days of Future Past" story is one of the most popular in the long history of the X-Men, one that many comics devotees were eager to see translated into a movie. And while elements of the story were changed to fit the movie franchise's convoluted canon, this adaptation is still a pretty cool movie. The franchise has had its ups and downs over the last fourteen years, with missteps like The Last Stand and X-Men Origins: Wolverine seriously damaging one's perceptions of the series. But Days of Future Past holds up as one of the better entries in the saga.

As I stated earlier, the movie was directed by Bryan Singer, whose last directorial effort in the franchise was all the way back in 2002 with X2. His name in the credits alone is a welcome sight, but having him at the reins of Days of Future Past actually helps make the movie better. Singer brings an energy and tension to the movie, making it feel like everything is important and that everything matters. The movie stays intense throughout, even as Singer gives us the occasional lighthearted moment to take some of the edge off. (The sequence that sees the super-fast Quicksilver knocking out prison guards while listening to Jim Croce's "Time in a Bottle" is the movie's funniest moment and perhaps its biggest highlight.)

Singer also successfully blends the futuristic tone of his prior efforts in the franchise with the retro feel Matthew Vaughn brought to First Class, surely aiming to please fans of both. And it never feels choppy or inconsistent or jarring, the two styles coming together in a way that feels organic.

Singer makes good use of the movie's conversion into 3D as well. The movie didn't need to be in 3D (does any movie?), but Days of Future Past looks good in the format. It's honestly one of the better 2D-to-3D conversions I've seen in a while, truthfully. A number of elements ― the "Time in a Bottle" sequence, Blink's usage of her portal-generating power against the Sentinels, Magneto picking up a baseball stadium and dropping it over the White House ― look particularly cool. I haven't seen the 2D version and I'm sure it's still visually stunning that way, but I definitely enjoyed the 3D experience for sure.

While Singer's direction puts the movie on solid footing, Simon Kinberg's screenplay is a bit shaky. The story remains faithful to the original comic while still forging its own path and conforming to the realm of the movies. Kinberg does an admirable job adapting the story, making it feel epic while also moving things along at light speed so that it never allows for anything to feel dull or boring.

But that's not to say there aren't any problems with the script. Much like the other X-Men movies, we're overloaded with characters. It seems like every movie in this franchise introduces a bunch of characters from the comics only to bolster the number of people involved in the fight scenes or have someone to kill other than the primary characters, and Days of Future Past is no different. I mean, unless you're a fan of the comics, are you going to recognize Bishop, Blink, Sunspot, or Warpath? This is their first appearance in the movies, and all they do is engage in some action scenes and that's it. I don't think they even mentioned Blink, Sunspot, or Warpath's names outside of the end credits.

I also thought the dialogue was a bit clunky at times, and there's not really a lot of character development. Instead of really building the characters, someone just gives the occasional motivational speech before we move along. Some of the characters are also wasted, especially Quicksilver. I get why they wouldn't want to keep Quicksilver around for long, since, as many other reviews I've seen have pointed out, his powers could have allowed him to solve nearly every problem in no time and the movie would have been an hour long at best. But after that awesome "Time in a Bottle" scene, I wanted to see more of him. Then again, with Marvel Studios able to insert their own take on Quicksilver into next year's Avengers: Age of Ultron thanks to a legal technicality, we won't have to wait long before he turns up again. Though whether or not their version is anything like this one remains to be seen...

But those flaws are all relatively minor in the movie's grand scheme, and could be easily overlooked depending on how into the movie you are. It helps that they've assembled a great cast, though more is asked of the stunt people than the actors. Leading the way is Hugh Jackman, who once again hands in an enthusiastic performance as Wolverine. He obviously loves playing the character no matter how good or bad the movies might be, and that affection makes him a ton of fun to watch. I can understand why people might be getting a little tired of seeing him, considering he's either been the main focus or a crucial part of six of the seven X-Men movies (and his cameo in First Class stole that one). A little Wolverine burnout is understandable. But Jackman gives it 110% here, and it's hard to really dislike him.

James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender handle the rest of the movie's heavy lifting with their strong turns on Professor Xavier and Magneto. While I still don't think they have quite the same chemistry as Patrick Stewart and Ian McKellen (whose appearances in this movie are welcomed despite their unfortunate underutilization), but both McAfoy and Fassbender bring plenty of emotion to their characters and once again make them their own.

Jennifer Lawrence, meanwhile, seems hampered by a bit of lukewarm writing. She's an immensely talented actress, but Mystique's struggle, her inner debate between being redeemed in the eyes of those who care about her or fully turning to the dark side by killing Trask, doesn't feel like it was written very strongly. It comes off a little flat, though Lawrence does her absolute best with it regardless. Also contributing his best was the actor playing Mystique's target, Peter Dinklage as Bolivar Trask. Dinklage isn't given a tremendous lot to do, but he's still very impressive. He never goes over the top or overly malicious to the point of being cartoony. Dinklage plays Trask not as a crazed mad scientist, but with a cold edge, almost detached from it all, and makes for a fine villain when it's all said and done.

Much like how Professor Xavier continues to have hope for Mystique and refuses to believe that she is too far gone to be redeemed, X-Men: Days of Future Past continues the spark lit by First Class and pushes the franchise back towards greatness. It isn't a perfect movie, but it's a satisfying one, and it leaves me looking forward to seeing where the franchise goes from here. And if the post-credits stinger, one that hints towards the next sequel, is any indication, there are bigger things ahead. As far as Days of Future Past goes, it's a big help in restoring my faith in the franchise. And assuming things go well in 2016 when X-Men: Apocalypse hits theaters, The Last Stand and X-Men Origins: Wolverine will be all but a faint memory.

Final Rating: ***½

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)

When Sony Pictures announced in 2010 that they would be rebooting their Spider-Man film franchise after a fourth movie in Sam Raimi's series just couldn't get made, the response was mixed. Fans just didn't want to see the story start over. And that reboot, titled The Amazing Spider-Man, still managed to be a big hit in spite of some lukewarm reviews. But I enjoyed the movie and anticipated where the story could go. And two years later, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 has arrived to more lukewarm reviews, and I still had to see it anyway.

Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) is having the time of his life being Spider-Man. He gets to help people, much of New York City loves him, and even the cops have began to mellow out in regards to his presence. The catch, though, is that it's started to strain his relationship with Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone). They're madly in love with one another, but Peter is troubled by the promise he made to Gwen's father as he died, a promise to stay away from her before she too incurs the wrath of Spider-Man's enemies. This causes more and more tension between them despite their affection for one another, with Gwen growing more and more frustrated by the feeling that Peter is keeping her at arm's length.

But as is the case in most superhero movies, things quickly get more complicated than the protagonists would prefer. It begins with Max Dillon (Jamie Foxx), a nerdy, socially awkward electrical engineer at Oscorp Industries. The frequently mistreated Max idolizes Spider-Man after the friendly neighborhood web-slinger saved him from being hit by a car. But Spider-Man can't save him from another accident, one that sees Max slip while repairing a damaged power line in an Oscorp laboratory and fall into a tank of genetically-altered electric eels. Now imbued with the ability to absorb, discharge, and manipulate electricity, an increasingly paranoid Max ― now answering to the name "Electro" ― now has an outlet with which to strike back against all those who have wronged him... including Spider-Man.

The arrival of Electro in Spider-Man's life is mirrored by the return of a childhood friend into Peter Parker's. With the recent death of his estranged father, Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan) has inherited the position of CEO of Oscorp. But he has also inherited the rare, strange disease that killed his father, and Harry believes that the experiments with spiders that led to Spider-Man gaining his powers could also cure him. Those spiders were thought destroyed after a number of lawsuits against Oscorp, so the only way to acquire the necessary elements to create a cure would be through Spider-Man's blood. But Spidey shoots him down, claiming that nobody's certain if that would work at all. The further bad news that Oscorp's board of directors has framed him for several acts of corporate malfeasance and voted to have him ejected from the company drives Harry over the breaking point. His anger with both Spider-Man and Oscorp lead him to seek an alliance with Electro and bring their enemies to their knees.

I'll admit to entering The Amazing Spider-Man 2 with a wee bit of trepidation. I enjoyed the first one for what it was worth, but still left the theater thinking it was okay but not great. And I fully expected the sequel to be more of the same without bothering to improve or anything like that. Basically, I thought it might get hit with a devastating case of "sequelitis." But much like its predecessor, I was actually rather surprised by how well The Amazing Spider-Man 2 turned out. It's got its fair share of flaws and imperfections that keep it from being all that it could be, but I still thought it was entertaining. And sometimes, isn't that really all you can ask for?

Returning to the franchise is director Marc Webb, who once again makes the movie feel like everything that happens is a grand adventure. He finds a nice balance between the slower, character-driven scenes and the fast-paced action sequences that allows both to have a bigger-than-life scope. Everything feels grander than it probably really is. And those action sequences, oh my goodness. They're exciting, fun, and engaging, and while the movie doesn't really match the intensity of last month's superhero epic Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Webb still hits the right notes when it comes to putting together something cool.

Webb also tries to duplicate his success from the previous movie in regards to the 3D effects, but here, the whole effort just seems pointless. There are some moments that look really cool in 3D, but it never really strikes me as something that contributes to the movie. I just came away with the feeling that the movie was only in 3D because the first one was, so they might as well keep going. Besides, every summer blockbuster nowadays has to be in 3D, right? That's how it works, isn't it?

But that's easily overcome by just watching the 2D version instead. Where the movie really starts falling apart, however, is its script. Credited to Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci, and Jeff Pinkner, the script gets bogged down because way too much is going on than needs to be. It gets exhausting after a while because there are a few too many plot threads being strung along. We've got Peter and Gwen's love story, Peter learning more about how and why his parents died, the genesis of Electro, and the downfall of Harry Osborn. All we needed was to bring back the whole subplot of Peter trying to find Uncle Ben's murderer from the first movie and we'd have been set. It never really seems focused on telling one succinct story and suffers because of it.

I also thought the introduction of Harry and his quick evolution into the Green Goblin was handled all wrong. The character feels like he was added into the movie as an afterthought, as if Kurtzman, Orci, and Pinkner were told they had to include him by the studio and/or Marvel Comics. He and Peter never really feel like they're old friends at all, and the decision to rush him into villainy so quickly rather than build any relationships with the characters outside of "good guy vs. bad guy" makers the whole thing feel like a waste. Did your movie absolutely need to have two villains? I know Sony wants to make a movie based on the "Sinister Six" gang of villains sooner rather than later so they'd want to start introducing its members as quickly as possible, but come on now.

But the movie at least benefits from some very good acting. The weakest of the cast is Dane DeHaan, who I didn't think was particularly bad, but just okay at best. I actually didn't think he had a believable chemistry with Andrew Garfield at first, but upon further reflection, that awkwardness in their scenes actually fit how the relationship between the characters was supposed to be. On second thought, DeHaan's performance might not have been as weak as I believed at first. Perhaps those weaknesses could be more easily blamed on how poor the script is and what DeHaan had to work with.

Moving along to the movie's other villain, I really liked Jamie Foxx's performance. The whole "tread-upon nerdy guy is corrupted by power" thing is kind of a cliché (DeHaan actually played a similar character in Chronicle two years ago), but Foxx still pulls it off with gusto. He's obviously having a great time playing the character, and his sympathetic portrayal of Electro both before and after he acquires his superpowers makes one want to follow his every move.

But the true highlights of the movie are Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone. Both are immensely likable and engaging, and they have a cute, believable chemistry together. Individually, they're great as well. Stone gives Gwen a bravery, strength, and intelligence that are really great to see from a love interest in a superhero movie. Gwen is no damsel in distress, and it's through Stone's performance that one could understand why Peter would love her so much.

Garfield, meanwhile, is fantastic as Spider-Man. He's very charismatic in the role, effortlessly balancing the movie's action, drama, and humor. Garfield approaches Peter in a way that makes him feel like the character's actually stepped out of the comics, always making jokes to throw his enemies off-guard and diffuse tense situations while struggling with a rocky personal life. He plays it very well, like he was born to be Spider-Man. And no matter what flaws this movie or its predecessor may have, they're both far better for having Garfield and Stone in front of the camera.

I won't lie, I did enjoy much of The Amazing Spider-Man 2. I thought it was really entertaining for the most part. But the problems I had with its script held it back from being the wondrous spectacle I thought it could have been. I guess I've been spoiled by Sam Raimi's first two Spidey movies, but it just feels like there's something lacking here. There's slick direction and some fantastic acting to be found here, but at the end of the day, I thought it was just another sequel that felt like more of the same. The movie could have been more than just "not bad." It could have been great. I can settle for not bad, but I shouldn't have to. I do look forward to seeing where the franchise goes from here, especially considering how this movie ended, but all I can do with The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is just shrug and say, "Eh, it's alright, I guess." And as much as I hate to say it, sometimes that's the best you can ask for.

Final Rating: ***