The idea started simply enough: I would watch 24 hours straight of "bad" super-hero/comic book related films, documenting the entire thing with notes and hopefully not going completely bat-shite insane along the way. I pitched my idea to my boy
Goddard whom I often bounce column topics off of and was completely amazed how excited he got by the concept. In fact, he wanted to join me in this obviously daft endeavor. We made a list of potential movies and figured out what we could get and what we wouldn't be able to find and last Saturday at 10:34am - it began. While I am sitting here alive and well enough to tell the tale, one might question my sanity now that I have consumed such drivel in one 24 hour period. Kittlings, it was a difficult task that left me worn down but I am here to relay the details to you for your reading pleasure.
(While we did find 12 movies that can be considered "bad" or "awful" in some sense of the word, we randomly
mixed them up and put them in no particular order. I think this made for a much more scientific presentation of the facts.)
MOVIE #1 - THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMAN, or LXG10:34am IT BEGINS.
Jacob brewed a pot of Trader Joe's 5 Country Espresso Blend while I stuck with my ever present beverage of choice these days, Diet Pepsi. LXG was a comic book put out by
Alan Moore's ABC imprint, a division of
Wildstorm, a division of
DC Comics.
Goddard and I are both fans of the comic book series which ran 6 issues (there have been 2 subsequent mini-series following the original series but the movie was based on the 1st series alone).
James Robinson wrote the screenplay for the film - he is a well respected comic book writer known for his
Starman series. So this would potentially lead to a good movie right? So. So. wrong.
I had seen the movie before and knew what I was getting into.
Goddard had not seen it but was still able to discern the end of the movie not even halfway through the film. Now you would think this would be easy considering he had read the series but characters were added and the plot was rearranged to add certain elements that the producers deemed "essential" for American audiences. Like adding
Tom Sawyer (how are them dum Americans going go be able to follow around a team of foreigners?) and the rather
Johnny Depp-ish looking
Stuart Townsend as
Dorian Gray.
Mina Harker (from
Bram Stoker's
Dracula) was the leader of the League in the comics, but no way was a girl gonna lead the
LXG! Nah,
Sean Connery as
Quartermain is the obvious leader of the group. After all, he is old enough to be every one's great grandfather. But
Mina needs to be sexy guys! So let's make her a vampire! Hilarity ensues. This movie was more annoying than anything else for
Goddard and myself as we felt the book was bloody great and the movie was just plain stupid. I know I shouldn't blame
Mr. Moore for the outcome of other people adapting his comic book work to films...but dammit!
Tom Sawyer doesn't even fit into the time period! I hate the misconception that it needs to be violent, bloody and American for the US to understand or like something.
MOVIE #2 FANTASTIC FOUR 2 : THE RISE OF THE SILVER SURFER12:26pm. It now being lunch time,
Goddard and I order Dominoes pizza and get to watching the sequel to
FANTASTIC FOUR, which was actually a movie I liked. What can I say?
Johnny Storm is hot and the film was fun. I have always said that the
Fantastic Four are the lamest Super-hero team ever - just a bunch of nerdy scientists and a guy that says "Flame on"? Utter silliness. But nevertheless I was a fan of the 1st film and was actually looking forward to the sequel.
The fun first part, where the
Silver Surfer is cruising around ze earth, wreaking havoc and messing with
Mr. Storm's powers is like watching a sitcom. A pretty funny one too. Then it has to get all serious and the Fantasticar has to show up. Why doesn't
Victor Von Doom have an accent? Isn't Latveria a foreign country? The biggest disappointment of this film is
Galactus whom I've grown to have an increasing fondness for over the past year. If you know anything about
Galactus, then you know he is this HUGE bloke with a silly purple helmet that devours planets.
Silver Surfer is his "herald" that prepares the planets for
Galactus' ravenous appetite.
The Fantastic Four need to stop the planet from being eaten, and as
Galactus approaches Earth, there is a shadow of his helmet on Saturn as he inches closer to our world. But then he arrives...and he's JUST A STUPID CLOUD!!!! WTF?? Things get serious,
Silver Surfer loses his illustrious shine and helps the nerdy 4 save the day simply because
Invisible Girl is hot and kinda reminds him of his gal back home. Awww....how terribly cute. I swear to god if I hear "It Clobberin' Time" ever again (even if darling
Johnny Storm says it!) then I might just lose it.
NOTE : 1st appearance of blind character,
Ben Grimm's girlfriend. Also 1st appearance of
Stan Lee, who may be dressed in a tuxedo but still is stumbling drunk and couldn't put his toupee on straight.
MOVIE # 3 - DAREDEVIL -- aka
DD (or as I like to call it "my own personal Hell")
2:09pm Oh how I regret not starting to drink during this film. At least I could've laughed a little bit at the absolute absurdity put before me in the shape of a movie. I have never read
Daredevil before and after seeing this movie, I will run screaming at the thought of
Ben Affleck in tight red leather. This movie wins for number of name drops alone.
Quesada, Miller, Mack, Bendis, Romita, Lee, Kirby. But nobody really wins with a mo
vie like this. There is only pain.
So
Ben Affleck is blinded by some hazardous chemicals (2nd occurrence of blindness) and hones his other senses with the help of a montage (you gotta have a montage!) so much that he actually saves
Stan Lee (2nd occurrence of Stan) because Lee is too drunk to realize he's walking into oncoming traffic. And yes, Lee's toupee was still crooked.
DD is a bit bitter when it comes to criminals and uses snappy one-liners ("Half a Nice Day" before pushing a low-life named
Quesada onto subway tracks where he is cut in half) and has the foresight to write his initials in lighter fluid on the off-chance that news reporter
Ben Urich will throw his match onto it, igniting the flaming "DD" with such dramatic stupidity that I felt myself getting dizzy.
It's pretty cool when you have a pal like
Batman to build your apartment for you. I don't know how much
Daredevil paid the
Dark Knight but it was worth every penny. The best part of
DD's pad is his water isolation tank that he sleeps in to block out all the noises he can't help but hear because of his heightened senses. Funnily enough,
DD doesn't wake up as a prune-man every morning, and still takes a shower after spending the entire night in water.
And what about that snappy soundtrack? All the main characters get their own type of music.
Daredevil has that angst-ridden generic rock so popular with teenage boys these days.
Bullseye (Irish!) has
House of Pain to herald him in. The
Kingpin has
N.E.R.D. to illustrate to the viewer of his status, and
Elektra gets the sweet
Evanesence for her tunes of both anger and sadness.
Bullseye needs to get revenge on
DD because as our Irish dead-aim so eloquently puts: "He...made...me...miss." Spoken like a true
William Shatner student.
Bullseye requires one thing from the
Kingpin to accomplish this revenge kill. Why - a costume of course!
To pay homage to
Batman for tricking out
DD's apartment, bats inexplicably fly out of a huge pipe organ during one fight scene, and somehow
Bullseye makes it all the way to the end to ensure a funny "after the credits start rolling" scene. If only this film was mocking
Daredevil. Nay, they were trying to be absolutely serious. And that's what makes me ill.
MOVIE #4 - THE PUNISHER4:10pm. 
This movie wasn't nearly as bad as I had expected. Except for
John Travolta and his toupee (3rd toupee of the day kittlings!) and an inexplicable R rating. I mean, they really could've shown
Frank Castle just getting medieval on plenty of people. Instead, he's really a bit of a nice guy, but with that "revenge" thing that most all those super-hero guys have got going for them. His mastermind plot to seek vengeance? A fake fire hydrant. Brilliant? - maybe. Exciting or inherent to the character of
The Punisher? - no way. Seems the R rating was to show one pair of Bazooms and drop the F-bomb a bit. Although I gotta give big props to the 2 assassin scenes featuring the musician/killer
Harry Heck and an unnamed Russian bloke that doesn't say a damn word (moral of that story: people in glass bathrooms shouldn't throw grenades).
MOVIE #4 - GHOST RIDER6:30pm. I'm not gonna lie. I have despised
Nic Cage for a long time now. I hate the way he talks. There are 2 movies that I like that he is in (
Raising Arizona and
Leaving Las Vegas) and that's it. He bothers me. The previews for this movie bothered me. And after seeing
Daredevil, I was just horrified that the next thing I would be watching was a
Nic Cage movie. But that was how the chips fell, and I had to bite the bullet.
So
Ghost Rider signs his soul away to
Mephistopheles, or
Mephisto, or some dark demon lord played by
Peter Fonda, who made a
good motorcycle film. He trie
s to save his dad, but then that mean old devil dude kills his father anyway! How rude! Then some other demons come out (element demons, the main one played by
American Beauty weirdo
Wes Bentley) and
Ghost Rider must do away with them because he's under contract to
Mephisto. At night he becomes a demon rider and must perform
Mephisto's will. Along the way he meets grizzled old gravedigger dude played by
Sam Eliot that gives the
Ghost Rider the know-how on what he is and what he has to do.
I find it utterly laughable we are meant to believe as an audience that
Nic Cage and
Eva Longoria are the same age. I also found the "Penance Stare" more annoying than
Nic Cage himself.
Donal Logue saves this pic somewhat...but not really. The worst part this film? The video game element that
Ghost Rider must beat all the "level bosses" to make it to the "head boss." I probably would've hated this movie more but
Daredevil saved it.
MOVIE #6 - ELEKTRA8:45pm. It was during this movie that
Goddard made a SPARKS alcoholic energy drink run and we commenced watching
Elektra, the
Daredevil spin-off starring
Jennifer Garner with (thankfully) no
Ben Affleck or
DD to be found. I couldn't really place the time of this movie but I feel that it was after the
DD flick because she talks about dying and being brought back to life. This is a power that certain ninjas known as "The Hand" possess. We get some background knowledge on
Elektra's training,
Terrance Stamp plays
Stick, who trained
DD in the comic books but does not make an appearance or get a mention in the
DD film.
Apparently
Elektra has a killing problem, she's more like
The Punisher than
The Punisher is in his movie.
Ele
ktra is a paid assassin, and I guess is so high-profile that she needs an agent to handle all her jobs. In this movie
Garner's character is fleshed out more, so we get some flashbacks, we get to see her set up her bathroom which reveals her OCD.
Elektra is sent to some location to do some killing, but before she gets her assignment she makes nice with the neighbors down the street. Oh snap! Those are the peeps she has to kill. I mean, she's a stone cold assassin with a "killing problem," does dinner really make it that hard for her to finish her mission? You bet it does. She can't do it and actually ends up saving the man and daughter she was sent to murder.
Some cool team (reminded me of the villains from
Ninja Scroll) from The Hand sets out to find
Elektra and the family she is protecting...and you know, action and adventure ensues.
Oh yeah, and
Stick is blind. That's the 3rd blind character. And the 2nd grizzled old man that helps the super-hero overcome some obstacle or issue (Remember
Sam Eliot in
Ghost Rider?). This movie was silly, but still not nearly as lame as
Daredevil.
====================
End of PT 1. Stay tuned next week for PT 2!!!!
~Till Next Time Kittlings.
Michael Woods is the editor of the new Western Anthology, OUTLAW TERRITORY. I recently chatted with Mike in regards to his anthology and the business of comic book editing. Check it out!
e with a darker, grittier tone. I had no idea what that would be until I talked to an artist about illustrating a short western story I had cooked up. He asked if it was for a western anthology. "It is now." 
a lot of communication with a lot of different people who are all busy on other projects at the same time. And that's only after searching comics and the internet to find the right people. I think I got lucky that their are a lot of western fans working in comics who wanted to be a part of this. I wish their was some secret to how all these amazingly talented people decided to do this (because I'd use it all the time), but honestly...I just asked. 
es the future hold for Outlaw Territory? Another volume? What about for you personally? 
