Willy's Wonderland (2021)

In my review of Five Nights at Freddy's, I mentioned that "mascot horror" almost always stays within the realm of independent video games. That's where the majority of its popularity stems from, after all. But it's occasionally branched out into movies too. For example, The Banana Splits Movie found a small fanbase thanks to the sheer absurdity of a Hanna-Barbara kids' show from the 1960s being adapted into a modern slasher movie, while also predating that recent and unfortunate trend of beloved children's characters from the past being reimagined as modern horror villains. There's also the movie I wanted to talk about right now, Willy's Wonderland.

Though the creative team behind it may or may not actually admit it, it's hard to deny that Willy's Wonderland began as an obvious ripoff of Five Nights at Freddy's. A cursory glance at their most basic concepts makes the similarities painfully obvious; Willy's Wonderland is roughly the same idea without a decade worth of lore. But unlike the the poorly made, microbudget ripoffs and cash-grabs that you expect when something that fits into the "mockbuster" label, Willy's Wonderland is one that is an absolute blast from beginning to end.

It does more than badly imitate a more well-known property's ideas, it does more than take the basic "someone is trapped in a haunted Chuck E. Cheese knockoff" idea and make something with no heart or soul. Willy's Wonderland completely embraces the inherent B-movie insanity of the whole thing to create something I found to be utterly captivating, and I cannot say enough good things about it.

The movie focuses on a silent, anonymous drifter (Nicolas Cage) who finds himself stranded on the outskirts of a small town in the middle of nowhere after a spike strip left in the road takes out all four of his car's tires. The super-sketchy local mechanic only takes cash and there are no working ATMs for miles, so a deal is struck: a sleazy local businessman will cover the repair bills if the drifter spends the night doing janitorial duty at an abandoned children's entertainment center called "Willy's Wonderland."

Sounds simple enough, right? That's where you're wrong. Just when Willy's Wonderland's new janitor begins what sounds like a mundane new job for just a night, he discovers the restaurant's eight withered animatronic mascots are alive, possessed by the spirits of a satanic cult and determined to kill anyone who walks inside. But the janitor won't let that, nor the dispensable group of teenagers that break in at some point during the movie, stand in his way as he cleans up the place as he'd been hired to do.

I first saw Willy's Wonderland not long after it was released back in 2021 and immediately fell in love. Not one single frame of the movie's entire 89-minute runtime is meant to be taken seriously. It is a batshit insane combination of every silly cheap slasher movie trope and cliché played fast and loose. I honestly don't know if I can convey just how utterly bonkers Willy's Wonderland is.

Director Kevin Lewis and writer G.O. Parsons treat the movie as if it were something made by Sam Raimi if he got his start now instead of 1981. There's a paltry budget and a cast and script that might not be all that great, but there's also an energy there that can and will keep people engaged with what's on the screen. There are parts that are sluggish, but I found myself willing to overlook those moments because the rest of the movie made up for it.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to spend the rest of this review gushing about Nicolas Cage and his performance as the silent badass credited solely as "the janitor." He is the biggest reason why this movie is so much fun. You absolutely will not give a shit about any other actor or character in this movie. I said before that the characters are disposable, and that is 100% true. They're solely there to be numbers for an episode of Dead Meat's Kill Count videos on YouTube, they're caricatures of characters you'd see in some cheap slasher movie with the actors giving performances that match. All that's asked of them is to deliver stilted dialogue and do stupid things that you've seen in a hundred other horror movies. And let's face it, you're not gonna remember or even care about the obviously evil locals that are in on the whole thing or the idiot teenagers that have shown up to burn the place down, but split up to have sex and smoke weed despite knowing the place is a death trap. You're here for Nicolas Cage.

The janitor almost doesn't belong here, with Cage himself saying in an interview on the Blu-ray's special features that it was a "Pale Rider meets Killer Klowns from Outer Space" situation. That's a fun way to describe it, because it feels like the janitor escaped from an action movie or a Western and somehow ended up in a cheesy slasher movie. It's like if someone dropped the Doom Slayer into one of those post-Scream horror flicks from around the turn of the millennium, only if the Doom Slayer were a little bit more kooky.

Much like the Doom Slayer (and "Doomguy" before him), the janitor doesn't speak one word of dialogue throughout the entirety of the movie. We only ever hear Cage's voice through the occasional grunt while he fights the merry band of monsters. A quiet hero is nothing new, his silence would make him just as menacing as the villains if this were any other movie. But this isn't any other movie. It loops around and becomes hilarious because he never responds to any character beyond a simple nod, if he even gives them that.

Dialogue, much like a backstory or even a name, would just get in his way. His sole focus is doing his job as a janitor. When one of the teenagers tries talking him into leaving, giving the janitor (and the audience) the backstory of the place, he seems like he's outright ignoring her. He doesn't respond, he doesn't look at her, he doesn't even acknowledge that she's speaking. The janitor just goes on about his business.

It's as if he's taking the janitor job so seriously that even fighting the monsters is as much a part of his duties as mopping the floors and washing the windows, and everyone else there is slowing him down. He cleans up the messes left by every fight and throws what's left of the animatronics out with the trash, makes sure his uniform is tidy, and occasionally stops by the break room to have a drink of soda and play a round of pinball. And he takes his regularly scheduled breaks seriously, going as far as to drop what he's doing and take them as a fight is about to begin, returning once his time is up so the fight can commence.

In the that interview on the Blu-ray I mentioned earlier, Cage said that he drew inspiration from Harpo Marx and Buster Keaton, along with Charles Bronson's performance in Once Upon a Time in the West, to prepare for Willy's Wonderland, and I absolutely believe him. He plays it as both a comedic and a serious role at the exact same time. Cage cleaning an abandoned building and beating monsters to death while intermittently playing pinball and chugging soda just feels right. You're probably not gonna find any memes here like you would with Vampire's Kiss or the remake of The Wicker Man, but this fits in perfectly with his more recent roles in movies like Mandy and Color Out of Space.

I've long forgotten specifically who I heard it from, but I once heard an online film critic say, "A movie doesn't have to be good to be awesome." And that's a perfect way to sum up Willy's Wonderland. It is not a perfect movie by any means, but it damn sure is a fun one. I've watched it more than once and it's still one of the most entertaining B-movies I've seen in a very long time. This movie goes all in in the silliness, which is one of the big reasons I prefer it over the Five Nights at Freddy's movie. I don't need Blumhouse playing this concept seriously while trying to shoehorn in a bunch of fanservice from video games I'll never play, I just need Nicolas Cage fighting monsters. That suits me just fine.

Final Rating: ****

8mm (1999)

I've been fascinated with urban legends since I was a kid. The whimsical and scary ones are the ones that always captured my attention, but the one that's terrified me most of all is the concept of "snuff films." The idea that someone has filmed a murder and sold the footage for profit just sends shivers up my spine. Granted, footage of actual deaths does exist. Everybody is familiar with the Zapruder film and has seen news footage of the 9/11 attacks. You can find R. Budd Dwyer's televised suicide and al-Qaeda beheading videos if you look hard enough. But for the most part, snuff films are generally classified as being as much an urban legend as Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster.

But snuff films have long been fodder for horror filmmakers. Movies like A Serbian Film and Vacancy have had characters fall prey to snuff film producers, while the infamous Faces of Death (and its various sequels and knockoffs) mixed real footage of actual atrocities in with dramatized, fictional footage. This brings us to the movie I'm reviewing now, the simply-titled 8mm. I've actually wanted to see 8mm for quite a while, mainly because I'm a fan of its star and because its concept intrigued me. But I've been putting off watching it for years, so I might as well go ahead and dive in now.

Meet Tom Welles (Nicolas Cage), a private investigator who is contacted by the widow of a recently deceased millionaire as the movie begins. While cleaning out her late husband's safe, she discovered a reel of eight-millimeter film that appears to depict the torture and murder of a teenage girl. The poor widow is rightfully horrified, and and she wants to hire Welles to determine whether the film is authentic or just a very convincing fake.

Welles's investigation is quickly fruitful, as he manages to identify the girl in the snuff film as a missing girl from Ohio. A trail of clues leads him to the seedier side of Hollywood, where he's befriended by an adult bookstore clerk calling himself Max California (Joaquin Phoenix). But as Welles and Max descend into the underground porn industry and delve deeper into the mystery surrounding the snuff film's origin, they discover a dark world from which they may not be able to emerge.

I approached 8mm knowing that it hadn't been met with very many positive reviews during its theatrical run, but with a hope that it wouldn't really be that bad. I've disagreed with a movie's Rotten Tomatoes rating on more than one occasion in the past. But all truth be told, 8mm is just a mediocre effort all the way through. Considering some of the elements it had to work with, this is a movie that could have been awesome had it been crafted properly. But the final result is a barely adequate movie that's not much more than the sum of its parts.

At the helm of this little adventure is Joel Schumacher, this being his first directorial effort following the disaster that was Batman & Robin. And while I didn't think his work on 8mm was that bad, it feels more like a generic, run-of-the-mill thriller than anything else. The score composed by Mychael Danne is actually pretty good and there's some decent noir-like camerawork from cinematographer Robert Elswit, but Schumacher never really builds any serious atmosphere or tension. He's trying, I'll give him that. You really get the feeling that he was trying to make some kind of weird amalgam of Twin Peaks (only with perverts instead of weirdos) and The Silence of the Lambs with a touch of Michael Mann's Manhunter thrown in for seasoning. But Schumacher sadly never gets above mediocrity, which is rather unfortunate.

A big part of why it's unfortunate is because the movie was written by Andrew Kevin Walker, who had previously written the thoroughly awesome Seven a few years earlier. The script features a concept and a number of moments that would have been a lot more fascinating in a better-made movie, but that's not to say that the script is devoid of flaws. The dialogue gets trite at times, the story starts feeling very formulaic, and some of the characters could have stood to be better developed.

But these flaws can't all be blamed on Walker. The story I heard goes that Walker refused to tone down the script at the studio's request, so Schumacher took it and retooled it himself. I don't know why they couldn't have simply trusted Walker, because Seven more than proved he knew what he was doing. I'm honestly not sure if the problems with the script were due to Schumacher's retooling or if it was just one of Walker's lesser efforts. But I do know that the script could have been much more intense and provocative. Instead, we're left with a movie that tries to shock yet is rarely successful in doing so. It's simply another case where something with a metric ton of potential is wasted.

I can say the same thing about the cast, too. There are some talented actors in this movie, yet none of them really knock it out of the park. Take, for example, our leading actor. Nicolas Cage has a few moments where he shines here, but for the most part, he just seems a little... I don't know, flat, I guess. It's not a particularly bad performance, but he doesn't do anything that couldn't have been done by a dozen other actors. Cage is a good actor in good movies and hilarious in bad ones, but in movies like 8mm, he's sadly forgettable.

There are some performances among the supporting cast that aren't bad, though. Catherine Keener is sympathetic in her tiny, thankless role as Cage's character's wife, while Peter Stormare plays his role, that of a producer of extreme bondage porn, with a sleazy gusto. James Gandolfini is okay but also forgettable as another porn producer, but everyone in the movie is outshined by Joaquin Phoenix. His character is a smartass who thinks he's seen it all, yet approaches everything with a sort-of wide-eyed fascination. It's a fun, charming bit of acting from Phoenix that, while it might not be on his career highlight reel, is still worth checking out.

That actually sums up the whole movie. It's not a great movie, nor is it actually really bad either. But it's worth checking out on a boring Saturday night if you're into the thriller genre. It never drags, and there are a few scenes that are certainly effective. But if you choose to avoid 8mm, you aren't missing out on anything either. It's a decent enough movie that could have been so much better with a little spit and polish. And to its credit, it's at least better than that direct-to-video sequel that came out a few years ago. So it's got that going for it, I guess.

Final Rating: **½

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2012)

For the last fourteen years, Hollywood has been cranking out movie after movie based on the superheroes that call Marvel Comics home. Some have been insanely successful blockbusters, but others were met with less-positive receptions. One of the Marvel movies that wasn't greeted very warmly was Ghost Rider, which performed well at the box office yet received a ton of negative reviews when it was released in 2007. I liked it in spite of its flaws, but the critical backlash against it seemed to be such that it took Columbia Pictures forever to greenlight a second movie starring Ghost Rider.

But as time passed and the film rights got closer to reverting back to Marvel, Columbia figured that they might as well hurry up and make that sequel so they could keep Ghost Rider under their umbrella. With Nicolas Cage reprising the role he played in 2007 and the guys behind Jason Statham's Crank movies directing it, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance was released five years to the week after its predecessor. It's cheesy, goofy, dumb, and pretty doggone fun.

It's been years since Johnny Blaze (Nicolas Cage) made his Faustian deal that cursed him to become the Ghost Rider. He's spent that time hiding out in a remote part of eastern Europe, trying to avoid letting the Ghost Rider come to the surface as he searches for a way to end the curse that's plagued him for so long. Johnny's hideout is discovered, however, by Moreau (Idris Elba), an old acquaintance who approaches him on behalf of a secret religious sect.

Moreau has sought out Johnny to tell him that the Ghost Rider's presence is needed to protect a young boy named Danny (Fergus Riordan). Danny and his mother, Nadya (Violante Placido), are being hunted by Ray Carrigan (Johnny Whitworth), a vile weasel of a man chasing them at the behest of Roarke (Ciarán Hinds), the actual devil himself. If he can get his hands on Danny, Rourke will use him to perform a ritual that would give him ultimate power on Earth. Promised that the monks Moreau represents will find a way to end his curse if he can protect Danny, Johnny must once again unleash the power of the Ghost Rider and send Rourke back to Hell.

I honestly can't say that Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is a good movie. But what I can say that I thought it was a hell of a lot of dumb, silly, utterly goofy fun. There's no way to take the movie seriously, but then it doesn't take itself seriously either, it makes it easier to get over how stupid Spirit of Vengeance is. It's the kind of stupid movie that I love, and even though I probably shouldn't, I really enjoyed it.

Spirit of Vengeance was directed by Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, who previously brought us the Crank movies and Gerard Butler's Gamer. Neveldine and Taylor are no strangers to bad movies based on comic books, having written the tremendously awful Jonah Hex a couple of years ago. Their direction is actually pretty good, with some particularly great camerawork courtesy of cinematographer Brandon Trost. Neveldine and Taylor also do a great job of keeping things moving and never letting the movie get boring. Even the scenes whose characters are just sitting around talking have an energy to them that prevents these moments from slowing the movie down.

I also thought the action scenes were actually very well done. Neveldine and Taylor bring the same frenetic excitement that fueled the Crank movies to Spirit of Vengeance's action scenes, and it makes them a lot more awesome than they probably would have been otherwise. The movie's use of 3D makes the action a lot cooler too. While the 3D doesn't add a lot of depth to some of the slower scenes, it actually punches up the action scenes. Most movies that go through a conversion from 2D to 3D in post-production don't really turn out that well, but Spirit of Vengeance's conversion wasn't bad at all.

What was bad, though, was the script. Credited to Scott Gimple, Seth Hoffman, and David S. Goyer (yes, the same David Goyer that co-wrote Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy), the script is about as weak as you can get. The dialogue is poor, the story isn't really much to speak of, and the characters aren't worth a lot. The movie is definitely more spectacle than story, but that doesn't mean that Gimple, Hoffman, and Goyer had to half-ass the whole thing.

It also seems like they couldn't decide if they wanted the movie to be a sequel or a reboot. With Nicolas Cage returning to the lead role, it makes it hard to tell if any inconsistencies between the two Ghost Rider movies are just simple retcons, continuity errors, or if Spirit of Vengeance is a full-blown reboot. It doesn't really matter in the long run, but it's one of those things one would wonder about.

The last thing left to touch on is the cast, the majority of whom is forgettable. Violante Placido isn't very impressive, especially considering her character has practically nothing to do, whole Ciarán Hinds is just boring. Johnny Whitworth and Fergus Riordan at least put forth some effort, but they don't quite stand out either. I will say, though, that I liked Idris Elba and Christopher Lambert (who has a cameo as a monk), so it isn't all bad.

But the supporting cast isn't helped by the fact that they're in a movie with Nicolas Cage, who in recent years has built up a reputation as one of Hollywood's hammiest overactors. And I'm not kidding when I say that Cage's over-the-top performance here puts to shame his notoriously silly work in the remake of The Wicker Man. The scene where he's interrogating some goon and goes of on some wild tirade about how the Ghost Rider is itching to be let loose has to be seen to be believed. Cage is screaming at the top of his lungs, thrashing his head around like he's trying to snap it off, acting like he's completely lost his damn mind. It's some of the most gloriously cheesy acting I've ever seen. I really get a kick out of Cage when he's acting like this, and he definitely doesn't let me down here. He goes beyond chewing the scenery; he swallows it whole.

I can't say I really had very high expectations going into the movie, but it definitely left an impression. The phrase "so bad, it's good" doesn't quite apply; it's more like "so bad, it's freaking awesome." I know that the reviews for the movie have been really bad, but I can an honestly say that I enjoyed it a lot. And although the movie probably doesn't quite deserve it, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance gets three stars from me. I do kinda wish, though, that the Ghost Rider film rights had reverted back to Marvel, just to see if they would have tried squeezing him into the "Marvel Cinematic Universe" they've created. He doesn't have to be in The Avengers or anything, but still, it could have been cool to see.

Final Rating: ***

Drive Angry (2011)

The Academy Awards were this past Sunday, and just like it is every other year, it was four boring hours of Hollywood slapping itself on the back for creating a bunch of artsy-fartsy movies that are made solely to win Oscars in the first place. But my motto when it comes to watching movies is "screw art, let's party." I'm not rushing out to see King George VI overcome his stutter or a bunch of ballerinas trying out for Swan Lake, and I'm certainly not interested in a movie about how Facebook was created. I'm not saying I'll never see those movies, but I'd much rather go see movies that are a ton of fun instead.

And that's just what Drive Angry is. It hasn't gotten many good reviews and it hasn't been doing too hot at the box office, but the movie is all kinds of entertaining. It's a ludicrous movie, with nonsensical writing, over-the-top acting, and a feeling that it doesn't aspire to be anything more than it already is. But that's what's so awesome about it. It's basically a grindhouse movie with an A-list star and a $45,000,000 budget. But let's dig in and see what makes Drive Angry just so damn cool.

Meet John Milton (Nicolas Cage), a long-dead criminal who has quite literally broken out of Hell. His mission: to kill Jonah King (Billy Burke), a cult leader who murdered Milton's daughter and kidnapped his infant granddaughter. Jonah and his cult plan to sacrifice the baby in a satanic ritual that they believe will unleash Hell on Earth.

Milton quickly finds support in Piper (Amber Heard), a young waitress who teams up with him after he kicks the crap out of her abusive boyfriend. But hot on their tail is "The Accountant" (William Fichtner), an operative of Satan's that is entrusted with making sure all of Hell's escapees are returned. And though he doesn't have a problem with Milton trying to kill Jonah, it's just bad for business if people escape from Hell.

Drive Angry is, beyond a shadow of a doubt, one of the most badass movies I have ever seen theatrically. I don't care what the reviews or the box office grosses say; Drive Angry is awesome. There honestly aren't enough good things I can say about it. It's a movie that puts fun and amusement at the forefront, all logic be damned. There's no story to tell here. There's no greater purpose or higher meaning to Drive Angry. It simply is what it is, and I love it for that.

The movie was directed by Patrick Lussier, his first film following his underrated remake of My Bloody Valentine. This marks his second 3D movie, and even if Drive Angry were in 2D, it'd still be cool. The movie looks fantastic, with slick cinematography and awesome effects. Lussier never lets the movie slow down either, making sure there's always a car chase or a gunfight or a brawl happening before the audience can lose interest. Two moments in particular stand out: the scene where The Accountant plows through a police roadblock in a hydrogen truck and the bit where Milton opens fire on a dozen of Jonah's cult members while having sex with some floozy he picked up at a bar. These two scenes are simply unbelievable, both in their concepts and their executions. I'm actually surprised, even now, that these scenes exist and by how well Lussier pulled them off.

I also thought the 3D effects turned out really well, too. Drive Angry was shot using 3D cameras, rather than the usual "make it in 2D and do a 3D conversion in post-production" routine that most movies go through. Since it's "real" 3D and not that after-the-fact stuff, the movie immediately looks a lot better than other 3D movies. Despite some filmmakers saying that 3D could be a serious tool in cinematic storytelling, Lussier sees the truth: that it's just a gimmick that only really pays off if you treat it as such. And he goes all-out with it, pulling off as many cheesy "throw whatever's available at the audience" tricks as he can. That might sound silly to some, but considering the kind of movie this is, that sort of thing is to be expected. If you're going to see Drive Angry, you must see it in 3D. It's definitely worth the extra $2.50 premium.

Moving along, let's talk a little about the script. Written by Lussier and Todd Farmer, who previously collaborated on the My Bloody Valentine remake, the script is rife with goofy moments, ludicrous dialogue and one-liners, and a plot so threadbare that you could struggle to say there's even a plot at all. But that's the great thing about it. Lussier and Farmer know that they're writing an exploitation movie, so they go at it with everything they've got. And really, the movie is a million times more fun for it.

And this brings us to the movie's cast, whom are all awesome in their own ways. Nicolas Cage is our lead actor here, and he plays the character as the most unbelievably grizzled badass imaginable. It's like they somehow managed to fuse Charles Bronson and Rambo and stuck the end result in an exploitation movie. Say what you will about Cage's acting ability, but he's perfect for Drive Angry. I couldn't imagine anyone doing a better job in the role. Every line he says, every move he makes, it's all awesome. Not a second of his screen time is wasted; all of it is dedicated to making Cage look like the roughest, toughest antihero possible. And Cage is fantastic, to say the least.

Playing Cage's sidekick is Amber Heard, who does the whole "action heroine" thing with aplomb. She gets to kick a lot of ass in the movie, and Heard jumps into it headfirst. Though not a lot is demanded from her as far as actual acting goes, Heard still has a strong onscreen presence. She plays Piper as a strong-willed young woman who has no qualms with kicking the crap out of someone if she has to. Her lively attitude is a great balance to Cage's gruffness, which is much better when you factor in that her character is not once considered as a potential love interest to Cage's.

As the target of Milton's vengeance is Billy Burke, who only work I'd seen prior to this in the Twilight movies. And if anything, his character in Drive Angry is a million miles away from his character in Twilight. I wasn't even for sure it was the same guy until I read it on the Internet. Burke plays Jonah King as sleazy as he can get, coming off as more snake than man at times. He's effectively creepy, giving Jonah a kind of "Jim Jones meets Charles Manson" kind of vibe. You know, the kind of cult leader that could kill dozens of people and convince his followers to drink cyanide-flavored Kool-Aid at the same time. Burke makes a great villain, one that the movie needed.

But really, if all truth be told, the entire movie belongs to William Fichtner. The guy is so awesome that he steals scenes he's not even in. Fichtner's Accountant is the epitome of cool and composed throughout the movie. He never raises his voice or acts out of sorts, casually delivering insults and killing people as if it were his standard routine. (And since the character's from Hell, it probably is.) Fichtner's straight-laced performance in the midst of all this insanity makes for funnier moments than I've seen in some comedies. I know there will probably never be a Drive Angry 2, but if there is, I'm hoping the whole thing follows Fichtner, because he was pretty much the best part of the movie.

Drive Angry is 104 minutes of pure old-school exploitation. It has no shame at all, fully embracing its own trashy nature. And I couldn't love it more. It's a movie that won't be up everyone's alley, but those who do enjoy this style of flick will love it. I'm not kidding when I say that the movie really is one of the most entertaining rides I've been on in forever. The fact that the movie bombed is disappointing, because the movie is one that has to be seen to be believed. So I'm asking if you like silly action movies with gimmicky 3D, go check out Drive Angry before it gets pulled from theaters. I'm going to give it four stars on the scale, and a huge recommendation to check it out. I know I said it'll probably never happen, but I'm still hoping for a sequel. I'd see Drive Angry 2 a million times.

Final Rating: ****

Kick-Ass (2010)

I've only been reading comic books for about two years now, but I'd loved superheroes long before then. Even as a kid, I was enthralled with the idea of having incredible abilities and using them to save the day. I'd tie a blanket around my neck and run around my house, pretending I was Batman or Superman. And I know I wasn't the only kid like that, either.

But it's been a long time since I was a kid, and in that time, superheroes have become a lot more mainstream. With superheroes having tons of success in movie theaters and on TV this past decade, it's become cool to be a fan. It's even reached the point where people are putting on their own colored costumes and performing citizen's arrests of muggers and drug dealers.

However, the idea of these real-life superheroes didn't really make any sort of real impact on the comic book industry until 2008, when writer Mark Millar and artist John Romita Jr. created the book Kick-Ass. Published by Icon Comics, an imprint of Marvel Comics dedicated to creator-owned books, Kick-Ass tells the tale of a comic book fan who chooses to follow in the footsteps of his favorite characters and become the first real-life superhero. It's a fun read, and when it was eventually translated into a movie, that element of fun was carried over to the adaptation as well.

Dave Lizewski (Aaron Johnson) is your average high school student. He doesn't fit in with any of the usual cliques or teenage stereotypes, and is invisible to practically everyone outside of his small circle of friends. While perusing the shelves of the local comic book shop, he begins wondering why nobody's ever tried becoming a superhero before. You don't absolutely need superpowers to help people, right? His friends have a good laugh at the idea, but Dave can't let it go. He ultimately chooses to take a little initiative and become a hero himself.

Donning an ugly green wetsuit and mask he bought online, Dave hits the streets looking for a crime to stop. His first outing, though, is a miserable failure. He is badly beaten, stabbed, and hit by a car. Dave spends weeks in the hospital being pieced back together, but emerges undeterred in continuing his new life as a masked vigilante.

His next time out, he succeeds in saving a man from a gang's attack. A video of Dave battling the gang ends up on YouTube, quickly becoming an Internet sensation and making Dave a folk hero known as Kick-Ass. The popularity of the YouTube video prompts others to become superheroes as well. Among them are Big Daddy (Nicolas Cage) and Hit-Girl (Chloë Grace Moretz), a lethal father/daughter duo systematically killing anyone and everyone involved with the drug ring overseen by mob boss Frank D'Amico (Mark Strong).

Blaming Kick-Ass for the attacks on his operations, D'Amico tasks his thugs with killing the green-suited hero. However, his son Chris (Christopher Mintz-Plasse) has a different idea. Adopting the superhero persona of "Red Mist," Chris sends Dave a message about forming a partnership in order to lure him out. Big Daddy and Hit-Girl soon become involved as well, leading to a series of events that culminate in a bloody war where asses will most definitely be kicked.

I will confess that I hadn't heard of the Kick-Ass comic book prior to the announcement that the movie's production had begun. I quickly hunted down the comic and loved it, and between it and the movie's trailers, I was super-excited to see some live-action Kick-Ass. I was a bit worried, though, that it might follow in the footsteps of Wanted, another movie based on a Mark Millar comic. Wanted was a joyless, mean-spirited disappointment of a movie, so I was hoping that Kick-Ass wouldn't end up being more of the same.

However, I'm proud to say that I was wrong. Kick-Ass definitely does kick ass. It is a tremendously fun movie that I can't say enough good things about. It's everything I could have wanted out of a movie based on that particular comic. It's funny, violent, exciting, and treats superhero conventions with both respect and irreverence. While fuddy-duddies like Roger Ebert are getting on their high horses and calling Kick-Ass a morally reprehensible piece of crap, the movie actually is an over-the-top dream for fanboys, geeks, and lovers of action and dark comedy.

Helming Kick-Ass is Matthew Vaughn, who I felt did a fantastic job in bringing the comic book to life. He gives the movie an energy than never lets up once it gets rolling. The movie's brisk pace doesn't allow it to become boring, and with the efforts of cinematographer Ben Davis and the rest of the production crew, the movie is a treat to watch.

The music is equally awesome too. Vaughn puts a rocking soundtrack and cues from movies like For a Few Dollars More, 28 Days Later, and Stardust to excellent use, and also gets a fabulous original score from Ilan Eshkeri. Eshkeri's music is nothing short of excellent, and really suits the movie well.

One of the trickier parts of making Kick-Ass, though, had to have been in writing it. The comic's initial run hadn't yet ended by the time the movie entered production, with its final issue not hitting store shelves until this past January. Yeah, it took them two years to release eight issues, during which time the movie had already been made. So I'm sure that writers Vaughn and Jane Goldman had a rough time actually putting it together. (Unless, that is, they had a little help from Mark Millar during the writing process.)

However, Vaughn and Goldman have knocked it out of the park. Naturally, there are some differences between the movie and the comic book, but these changes don't have any negative effect on the movie. They all fit within the tone and scope of the movie they were making. Even the insane moments they added to the climax make things even more exciting and just plain awesome.

The best part of the script is that Vaughn and Goldman actually put the focus on the primary characters, shining a light on who they are and not just what they do. This is most evident in the handling of Kick-Ass, Big Daddy, and Hit-Girl. Obviously, it should be Dave who gets the lion's share of the character development, since it's technically his movie. But Big Daddy and Hit-Girl are given plenty of time to shine as well, and as they develop, they become more likable and entertaining. It's not hard to enjoy them and Kick-Ass, as Big Daddy and Hit-Girl represent the excitement of superheroics, and Kick-Ass is whom many within the movie's target audience will relate to. And that just shows how well the writing works.

What also works well is another tricky part of making the movie, the casting. Each of the actors hired for the movie bring their A-game, all of them playing their roles to perfection. In the lead role of Kick-Ass is Aaron Johnson, a British actor who is a relative unknown here in the United States. He's perfect for the part, playing the role with both the courage and cluelessness that the character needs. Kick-Ass is the movie's emotional center, a regular kid who finds himself neck-deep in a situation even he knows he could have avoided. Johnson is believable, making the character's fear, exhilaration, and fake bravado look 100% natural.

Playing our villains are Christopher Mintz-Plasse and Mark Strong. While Mintz-Plasse will probably be forever recognized solely as the dorky "McLovin" from Superbad, his performance in Kick-Ass goes along way in establishing another character he could be known for. You could argue that he's basically playing McLovin if he were the son of a mob boss and pretending to be a superhero, but Mintz-Plasse is funny and entertaining in the role.

Strong is also very good, playing his second consecutive villain after coming off Sherlock Holmes this past December. Strong is vicious yet charismatic, giving the movie exactly what it needed in a bad guy. He does a fine job, even if the other characters are the movie's primary focus.

But as good as everyone else is, the movie is completely stolen by Nicolas Cage and Chloë Grace Moretz. If the entire movie had been about them and their characters, I wouldn't have minded at all. (In fact, they kinda end up becoming the focus of the movie towards the end.) Cage may be dressed as Christian Bale's Batman, but he talks like Adam West's Batman, which makes him infinitely more amusing. He's obviously having the time of his life here, and it's contagious. Cage is tremendously funny when he has to deliver dialogue, and totally badass when he has to get down to business, which is why I'd call him one of the best parts of the movie.

If anyone can top Cage, though, it's Moretz. Only twelve years old when the movie was filmed, Moretz is tasked with playing a foul-mouthed tyke who racks up a rather impressive body count. Her fight scenes are some of the most memorable parts of the movie, and her dialogue is some of the funniest. I don't know what's so funny about a 12-year-old girl in a bright purple wig swearing like a sailor, but I laughed my head off nearly every time Moretz said a word. She is wonderful as Hit-Girl, giving a performance that is charming and straight-up cool.

The party poopers can say what they want about it, but I'm here to tell you the truth: Kick-Ass kicks ass. It serves notice to the entire superhero genre: you don't have to be lame like Hancock, and you don't have to be bleak and depressing like The Dark Knight or Watchmen. It's a movie that any adult who calls themselves a fan of the genre should see. On my patent-pending Five-Star Sutton Scale, I'll gladly give Kick-Ass four stars and my proud seal of approval. And if anyone wants to make a spinoff starring Hit-Girl, I wouldn't argue with that.

Final Rating: ****

Ghost Rider (2007)

When you hear the word "superhero," images of people decked out in capes and spandex tights probably come to mind. However, one superhero stands out as being cut from a completely different cloth than other comic book superheroes: Ghost Rider. While the name was originally used by two separate cowboy titles by two separate publishers, it is a name most recognizably associated with a supernatural stunt biker named Johnny Blaze.

Created by writer Gary Friedrich and artist Mike Ploog, Blaze made his first appearance in the pages of Marvel Spotlight #5 in 1972, and got his own monthly series from Marvel Comics shortly thereafter. Though the series came to an end in 1983 and a new Ghost Rider was eventually introduced, it was Johnny Blaze that got the nod when it came time for the Rider to join other Marvel characters with his own cinematic adaptation.

But getting the movie into theaters, however, would be a long hard road out of developmental hell. Scheduling conflicts with the cast and crew, script issues, and studio changes ended up delaying production until early 2005. Columbia Pictures even changed the movie's expected August 2006 release date on two occasions, eventually deciding to release it this past February, where it was met with overwhelmingly negative reviews from professional critics. But screw those guys, I enjoyed it a lot and I'll tell you why.

As the movie begins, we're introduced to Johnny Blaze (Matt Long), a teenager who teams with his father Barton (Brett Cullen) as a duo of death-defying stunt bikers for a traveling carnival. After he discovers that his father is dying of an untreatable lung cancer, Johnny is approached by the demonic Mephistopheles (Peter Fonda), who offers to cure Barton's cancer if Johnny will trade his soul. The young man is understandably leery at first, but ends up inadvertently accepting the deal when he accidentally pricks his finger and lets a single drop of his blood drip onto the contract Mephistopheles had presented him. That's a cheap way to do business, but nobody ever accused the devil of playing fair.

Johnny awakens the next morning, believing he's simply had a really bizarre dream. But it's no dream; his father's fit as a fiddle. At least he is for a little while, because it isn't long before a freak accident during their show leads to Barton's tragic and untimely demise. Ah, irony; how I hate you, how I love you. Johnny starts making all kinds of wild accusations about who's at fault for the accident, but Mephistopheles retorts that he only agreed to cure Barton's cancer and not keep him alive. And it's not like it matters either way, since he still owns Johnny's soul and he'll be coming to collect one day.

Years later, the adult Johnny Blaze (Nicolas Cage) has become immensely famous. Take Evel Knieval's fame and multiply it by a million, and you've got Johnny Blaze. Although he has achieved this recognition through unbelievably dangerous stunts, he is equally renowned for walking away from horrific crashes that would kill normal people. His manager and best friend Mack (Donal Logue) suggests that he has a guardian angel on his side, but Johnny thinks it's something else. And deep down, he knows it.

He's spent his life regretting the decision he'd made, looking for a sign that he's getting closer to a second chance at the happy life he'd had before his deal with Mephistopheles was struck. And as he prepares for his next big stunt, he gets that sign in the form of Roxanne Simpson (Eva Mendes). The two had been madly in love with one another and even planned to elope, but after his father's death, Johnny fell into a pit of self-loathing and left her behind without a word. Roxanne became a television reporter in the years since, and her station has sent her to interview Johnny before his next stunt.

The pair hit it off and slowly begin to rekindle their relationship, but a scary, demonic wrench gets thrown into the gears. Shortly before a big date with Roxanne, Johnny is finally called upon by Mephistopheles, who needs Johnny to remedy a problem for him. Blackheart (Wes Bentley), the son of Mephistopheles, has arrived on Earth with the intention of locating and procuring a long-hidden contract that will give him access to a thousand wicked souls and enough power to overthrow both Hell and Earth.

Mephistopheles just can't have that. So he cashes in Johnny's half of their bargain, enlisting him to serve as the latest in a line of fiery skull-faced bounty hunters that carry the name "Ghost Rider." He charges his new Rider with eliminating Blackheart and his three minions, sweetening the pot by offering to return his soul if he is successful. With a little help from a mysterious cemetery caretaker (Sam Elliott), Johnny learns the basics of his newfound power as he searches for a way to stop Blackheart from reaching the contract while reclaiming his own soul.

I don't believe I'm being controversial when I say that Ghost Rider is a solidly B-list character. So I think it only makes sense for him to be translated into a wild B-movie. While I will admit that the movie has a preposterous story and some hammy acting, it's all handled in such a way that makes it entertaining and just plain fun to watch. Sure, there's a few moments that will probably make you roll your eyes. Sure, there's a few moments that are corny and don't really work. But no matter, because the movie tries with all its might to be entertaining, and I think it's a success.

Writer/director Mark Steven Johnson is no stranger to the world of comic book superheroes, having previously helmed Daredevil in 2003. And just like Daredevil, Ghost Rider might not be built on the strongest of foundations, but it has its moments. Johnson's screenplay is a mixed bag. Among the bad are its fair share of clichés, predictable spots, and groan-worthy bits of dialogue (the only time the line "you're going down" has worked was when Bruce Campbell said it to a decapitated head in Evil Dead 2), while I felt the villains were lame. A superhero movie is only as strong as its villains, and Blackheart and his three henchmen were totally weak. And I also got the impression that the henchmen — played by Daniel Frederiksen, Mathew Wilkinson, and Laurence Breuls — were only included in order to boost the number of action scenes. It didn't help anything that the three were disposed of relatively quickly, either. Why even include them at all if they're only going to get one scene a piece? That time could have been used to make Blackheart seem like more of a threat, but what do I know.

However, Johnson balances the negatives with some positives. He gets the comedic bits right, and he includes a fun twist on a typical superhero movie cliché. You know how in most of these movies, conflict is created by the superhero trying to keep his girlfriend from finding out that he's the superhero? Batman, Superman, Spider-Man; they're all guilty of it. So what does Johnson do? He has Johnny come right out and confess to Roxanne that he's the Ghost Rider, and Roxanne treats him like he's out of his mind. It's the little moments like that that help save the script from complete mediocrity.

Johnson also helps to mask the script's inadequacies with his energetic direction. He and cinematographer Russell Boyd give us some fantastic camerawork that, when combined with the spectacular CGI effects, makes for a movie that is visually astounding. Johnson also makes sure to keep things going at a rapid pace, only really slowing down when we need to get the plot out of the way. This works in the movie's favor, since it is a movie driven by action sequences and exciting visuals, and slowing down would take away from that.

And I have to compliment Johnson's idea to change the color of Ghost Rider's fire depending on his mood. There's the usual orange when he's all about business, then a soft blue to represent sadness and worry, then a rare transition to black for pain. It's pulled off nicely, and I think it was a great idea since it's not like skulls can emote or anything. Johnson's direction is bolstered by not only the CGI, but by Christopher Young's great score as well. Containing elements of both the western and horror genres, Young's music is quite effective in setting the mood and establishing the movie's atmosphere. A couple of classic rock songs are put to good use as well, so I'm not complaining about the music at all.

Last but not least is our cast. Nicolas Cage is supposedly a big fan of the Ghost Rider comics, and his devotion to the character shows. I don't know if he's the first guy I'd have thought of to hire to play Johnny Blaze, but Cage is quite effective. He plays the role with an Elvis-like rock star flair, and the eccentricities he gives the character — sipping jelly beans from a martini glass, laughing his head off at videos of monkeys practicing karate, listening to the Carpenters to prepare himself for stunts — make the character likeable and engaging.

He also handles the dramatic scenes well, and his transformation scenes evidence a real knowledge of the character. In the scenes in which Johnny initially transforms into Ghost Rider, Cage exhibits tremendous agony that gives way to maniacal laughter as his flesh burns away. It shows that while the transition from man to monster causes Johnny pain, it gives the Rider pleasure; it's an interesting dichotomy that gives the character a certain subtle depth.

Eva Mendes is great as well, though I got the impression that her role was only there to serve two purposes: to be the token love interest, and to show off as much cleavage as possible so the 14-year-old boys in the audience will have something to watch between action sequences. But she's a lot of fun to watch, and Mendes and Cage have an amiable chemistry together that really makes their scenes work. Meanwhile, the character of Blackheart isn't all that great of a villain, but Bentley makes a good go at it. He at least tries, which I can respect. Our primary supporting actors, Peter Fonda and Sam Elliott, are both fantastic, but you wouldn't expect anything less from them.

Put it all together, and you've got a movie that, while not an all-time classic, is most certainly an entertaining way to spend two hours. I really don't get all the criticism against Ghost Rider; have people become so jaded by the artsy-fartsy pretentious crap that gets all the Oscar nominations every year that they just can't let themselves enjoy the simpler movies anymore? No, I wouldn't say that Ghost Rider is as good as Batman Begins or the first two Spider-Man movies, but it's still worth a watch. I mean, how many movies can say they have a stuntman forced to become a demon-fighting skeleton after getting the raw end of a Faustian deal he'd made years prior? What's not to like about that? So I'm going to give Ghost Rider three and a half stars, heavily leaning towards four, and a big thumbs-up. So go check it out, won't you?

Final Rating: ***½