#Deadpool feels like it's laughing at the concept of superhero media and it's a horrible boring deconstruction of it bc it doesn't get it.

[james-stark-the-writer]

the difference between the fourth wall breaks of something like the Deadpool movies compared to something like Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn and She-Hulk: Attorney At Law is that every joke in Deadpool feels masturbatory like the writers think they're so hilarious for doing a fourth wall break like that's never been done before whereas both of the other two not only feel right at home with the characters' personalities but are much more natural and much more well done compared to the jokes in Deadpool or its sequel. (do not get me started on Deadpool 2, the movie sucks ass in basically every way except for the characters of Domino and Yukio. every single joke in it was outdated before it was even written. they were making fucking dubstep jokes in 2018. it was a 2012-ass script made way too late and riding on the coattails of the first with even less effort into being actually good.)

but the difference between those properties is that Deadpool wants to be congratulated for being some insanely crazy shocking movie that's pissing off the studio system or whatever but every single joke in it was approved by those people because it makes them money like it's so antithetical to the entire point they're trying to make and it makes for a very infuriating watching experience sometimes. the cognitive dissonance is hard to swallow with that one. but the way BOPATFEOOHQ and She-Hulk do their bits feels so much more authentic and less self-congratulatory and also just like they're clearly done with so much more passion and effort and care? when I watch either of the Deadpool movies, I feel like I'm watching a bunch of executives jerking themselves off. when I watch the other two, I feel like I'm watching a passion project that the executives clearly didn't give a shit about and thus the creative team were actually allowed genuine creative freedom with not a lot of oversight. that's a little less true with She-Hulk (especially in terms of that glorious finale although even that feels more authentic and artist-driven than most things in either Deadpool movie. Kevin Feige's boring, sanitized ass does not have the range to do that finale) being a MCU property although Phase 4 was so fucking experimental and it was a joy to behold even if not everything hit but it's still true and more authentic for the most part. with Deadpool it feels like the only person who really really cared about it was Ryan and like maybe a few of the other actors who actually did do commendable work with what they were given but with the other two projects, it feels way more collaborative because every single person showed up and cared deeply about what they were making.

(this is an addition to the tags bc I ran out [apparently i forgot there was a 30 tag limit] but. anyway the point is. Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn is a phenomenal movie in basically every single way and you should watch it.)

#James talks #sorry I just wanna scream about how much I love BOPATFEOOHQ again #the first CBM since 2014's The Amazing Spider-Man 2 that felt more like the voice of artists than the voice of a studio. #I love Shazam but even that felt like it was a little studio driven instead of being a David F. Sandberg movie. #like BOPATFEOOHQ feels artist driven the same way The Batman does and the TASM movies do. #not to derail this tag rant but the TASM movies are Marc Webb movies through and through. #yes they have Sony's grubby hands on them with the product placement and shit but they are inseparable from Marc's vision #they are what Marc cares about more than what the studio cares about. the thematic interests are all Marc Webb. #anyway point is: more art like BOPATFEOOHQ bc it actually cares and less shit like Deadpool that is just pointing and laughing. #Deadpool feels like it's laughing at the concept of superhero media and it's a horrible boring deconstruction of it bc it doesn't get it. #it feels bad to the psyche the same way those meme disney show record scratches do— #like 'my life is kinda crazy' but it's 'ironic' now so it's 'funny'. #'see it's funny bc they're self-aware!' okay but what are they doing by being self aware??? #I'm not saying every piece of art has to be some profound exploration of whatever but Deadpool feels bad to watch in a way the others don't #BOPATFEOOHQ is actually fucking commenting on something using its gags! #the fucking 'they call her... the crossbow killer gag' is actually thematically relevant!! women telling their own stories!! #a subversive joke actually playing into the themes of the project!! imagine that! care ajf effort put into saying something!! #anyway Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn is phenomenal. #genuinely one of the greatest CBMs out there. also just a phenomenal time. even tho Parasite is a better movie overall #— BOPATFEOOHQ was my favorite movie of 2020. #some of the best action around with a great script with amazing pacing and phenomenal acting and a great score and soundtrack!! #literally nothing more to ask for. #one of my usual criteria for evaluating how good a piece of art is how much I'd add to it to help it do what it was trying to do. #like not cutting anything from it unless absolutely absolutely necessary. just adding like maybe 10-15 minutes to the runtime and— #helping maybe a few weaker elements shine more. with BOPATFEOOHQ the only change I'd make is to have more of the characters. #let us see more of Cassandra and Black Canary. more of their inner lives and backstories. #Christina Hodson tells us their stories with great efficiency and it's done really well but visually I'd just like to do more with them. #give them each maybe a 2-3 minute scene with what their daily routine is like. #maybe explore Canary's history with her mother more. see how it ties into the GCPD more effectively. #maybe actually see Cassandra's parents and how she deals with them daily instead of hearing about it from her hiding outside

[rielzero]

Marvel's Midnight Suns Deserved Better

I finally finished my second playthrough of this game, with all the dlc. On stream, and after a disaster dumpster fire of the game and stream obs lagging as hell, I just want to jot down all my thoughts.

Marvel's midnight suns is a perfect example of the modern gaming scene and why it's failing so many gamers.

The core concept of this game, the story, voice acting and gameplay are great and fun- but it has so many fucking problems.

From being visually buggy as hell- to optimization issues in the final fight- characters having soulless faces and textures going missing at random.. To the DLC and the price tag.

If you buy legendary edition, for 99,- (season pass, plus all the extra cosmetics) I'd say its not worth it.

The dlc add 4 characters, one of which has a bugged steam trophy- It adds extra story missions (which are fun, but they don't add much more than there was) and some more cosmetics for those characters.

Out of every dlc character, Storm felt the least developed. Storm has a similar problem to Steve in this game- in which their personalities are not really shining, and reduced to a singular character trait they have. The voice acting not being the problem- but the writing. While I can remember Venom's story, Deadpool's banter, and Morbius' emo shit making me laugh and tear up like hell- Storm really deserved better. All I can recall is saving the morlocks and doing one final mission were she happened to also be.

Steve is ''Mr leadership man''- Storm is ''hold your emotions in'' Lady.

Villains and dialogue- all the little things in the cinematics. It was great. You really care for Wanda- You worry about Hunter and their horrible family dynamics. You're concerned for Tony and the avengers when the Hulk gets caught- You mourn with the midnight suns when Wanda screams ''You will never hurt me again''

Corny superhero banter (which i love, but sometimes repetitive mid-battle lines get old.), cute evil devil doggo. Very sexy mephisto. Magik is frigging awesome. Blade x Captain marvel- Epic frigging final moves- and cool fighting animations. This game has so much going for it.

Sometimes dialogue will not match the subtitles, I assumed at first this is because you have a female / male voice actor depending on the bodytype you pick- so the dialogue must be different yes? But no- even all the other heroes have mis-matching subtitles to different dialogue lines. It's minor things usually- Like a word or sentence being said very differently than how its written.

But its essentially a cashgrab with texture bugs, deadpan doll expressions- visual glitches (enemies not disappearing after they're slain sometimes), copypasta idle animations and bodytypes- the further you go in the game, the more there seem to be of these little things. First they're funny- then it gets a little too distracting.

This game had all the building blocks of a great game, but it comes with the typical dlc problem too- and just doesn't deliver. It feels very empty promises eventually. It drops a nice typical after credits cutscene that teases Dr Doom and a potential sequel. And I wonder if there's even going to be one at all. Or an expansion instead.

I love each and every character brought into this game. (except for Steve and Storm, they just weren't done much justice.) This game made me like Captain marvel while otherwise I dislike how she is portrayed personality wise in other media.

The final mission should've felt like the most epic conclusion- and by how laggy and sparkly it is it feels like it just explodes in your face with what its been build up towards. A child and mother reunite- but they meet an open end. All after defeating the longest- laggiest- spammiest battle.

It's quirky, it's silly. It's got all the feelings. It has cool things in it and yet it feels very cheap. It should've been cheaper. But its still treated as a finished product. It did not feel finished. Even if I loved and enjoyed this game to the end.

My stream recording literally contains frozen visuals while the audio is in tact. I can't even. Sure my pc isn't the best but this is beyond absurd.

Voice acting 9/10 Majority of characters are great- everyone has a fitting voice. Some lines could've been better. Characters will banter and sometimes have unique dialogue for certain team combinations but not much.

Writing 7/10 A bit corny and predictable at times, but enjoyable nonetheless. Flawed stories tend to be easier to absorb and follow- Superhero stories follow such recipe. Wish they added pronouns- To save on voice line costs they made hunter standardly nonbinary regardless of bodytype- so Hunter only has ''they/them'' pronouns. Isn't referred to as son/daughter, only child and gender neutral terms. This is completely fine, but I personally like to be able to customize my character more. This game offers no romance- but hints that Wanda may have a crush on the player character. You can't tell her you're not interested but you can joke that you're a couple with one dialogue option.. (I tend to make my PCs gay because I am a gay dude myself.) The lore they used for this game was really intriguing. Chthon and Atum have some more appearances in the comics from what I can remember, so learning about The Blood and the Old gods mythology in particular in the game's universe did make me really like the backstory they gave the PC. Caretaker x Agatha lesbian witch moms. The hunter has three mothers canonically if you don't think too hard- but both Caretaker and Lilith are horrible people lol. Wanda is definitely the best character in this game, if not for the rest of the midnight suns- (Nico, Robbie, Blade and Magik are AWESOME) The avengers are here too, but they don't outshine the rest. Oh- and spider-man gets kind of adopted into both groups.

Gameplay Loop 6/10 Combat! It's fun and challenging sometimes but gets eventually and quickly repetitive. At some point you'll get more and more copypasta enemies with just different textures slapped on and similar animations. The DLC enemies are not worth it and don't offer much more. The dracula boss fights were the most interesting and felt a little rewarding once dealt with. Exploring the abbey with stale walking / running animation does not feel smooth. Crafting potions or items doesn't feel like it adds much sometimes. I've not used items often in my gameplay. The chests make me wonder if at some point they wanted to put more micro transactions in this game.

Pricetag 2/10 Honestly- Get it on sale. Big sale. Legendary edition is not worth it. DLC does not add much to the core gameplay unless you really want those character interactions and dialogue. The side missions are fine story wise, but they aren't attached to the main campaign. Deadpool and Eddie have the most additional dialogue during abbey time and other interactions- Morbius has unique dialogue during a very few main story quests- and Storm just has the least. They slipped in the morbin' time meme.. I just.. PFFF its time to morb everyone- 20 bucks worth at least. If not less.

TLDR Game funny, characters great, fun but very repetitive, very buggy, not worth 99 euros- 20 maybe, stop making dlc with texture swap enemies please. I love deadpool. Great design but very unpolished in places.

#midnight suns #marvel midnight suns #marvel #video game #review #my thoughts #final thoughts #its not worth the pricetag #its worth the experience #good gameplay #questionable dlc practices #get it on sale #dont bother with legendary edition the cosmetics arent worth it #finished not perfect #polish it please #yet still feels unfinished #it sequel baits but do people even know if its getting one? #funny banter and silly superheroes #theres no romance its all about friendship

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Michael in the Mainstream: The Dark Knight Trilogy & Its Negative Impact on the Superhero Genre

Superhero movies have come a very long way in the past couple of decades, cementing themselves as a genre unto themselves rather than the odd action movie here or there. Almost every year a few new ones of varying quality pop up that incite equal parts excitement and derision. It��s definitely a genre people feel very strongly about, but even people who tend to not love superhero films will admit that Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy is fantastic.

From 2005 until 2012, Nolan reinvisioned Batman in a way that grounded the character in reality. There’s no fantastical elements, there’s no insane science, there’s no superpowers… Everything in these films could happen in the real world. In a post-Batman & Robin world, this was seen as a breath of fresh air, and the critics loved it. In particular, The Dark Knight helped to usher in the modern age of superhero films, releasing the same year the MCU kicked off and widely being hailed as one of the greatest films of all time. That’s right, not even superhero films, films period. These films were impressive, groundbreaking, and… they fundamentally ruined superhero movies for quite a while.

Look, I don’t particularly hate these films. I think all of them are pretty good, in their own ways. But they have a lot of glaring issues that really hamper them a fair bit and yet, somehow, they became the blueprint that studios decided to look at for what they thought a successful superhero movie should be. Nolan’s films are serious, brooding, dark, and lack the whimsy and creative insanity that makes comics such a fun and engaging medium, and I think this right here is what has hurt comic book movies the most over the past decade. These are films that feel absolutely ashamed to be comic book movies, and they desperately want to seem like they’re “mature” and for “adults.” And, unfortunately for the rest of us, this shame translated over into a lot of other films, something we’re only just now recovering from.

Looking at the greatest strength of the trilogy shows this issue pretty well, that being the villains. Nolan’s films gave us truly iconic portrayals of characters like Bane, Joker, and Scarecrow, and you’re not gonna hear me say much bad about them. Cillian Murphy, Liam Neeson, Tom Hardy, Anne Hathaway, Aaron Eckhart, and Heath Ledger all do fantastic jobs as the insidious rogues of Batman. But the issue I have is that by grounding these characters in a realistic setting like this, it kind of misses the point. Joker isn’t using exploding cakes and laughing gas, Ra’s al Ghul isn’t an immortal warrior, Bane isn’t a drugged-up super soldier… They’re all just Guys. They’re Guys With Gimmicks, yes, but at the end of the day they aren’t what should be looked at as the be-all, end-all of the character’s portrayals.

And yet everyone acts like no one should ever play Joker again, because Heath Ledger’s Joker was just so good, guys! And he was good, but I don’t think Ledger’s Joker should be the absolute final Joker ever. Quite frankly, I prefer Phoenix’s Joker, because even if that version is also in a rather grounded film missing the overt weirdness of comics for the most part, he still dresses in a colorful costume, acts weird, tells jokes, and is in general more Jokery. Out of all of these villains, I think Bane and Scarecrow at least come within the ballpark of being close to how they should be, but Scarecrow is horribly underutilized and Bane is given a rather undignified sendoff.

Then there are the bigger issues. Batman himself is really downplayed throughout the trilogy, getting fairly little screentime compared to villains and side characters. This was a huge point of contention when The Dark Knight Rises came out, with most of the film featuring Bruce Wayne, and in hindsight it highlights how unwilling Nolan was to engage with the comic book trappings of what he was adapting. I like Christian Bale a lot, he’s a great actor, but I don’t think he really carries any of the films; in fact, it’s usually the villains carrying the movies. Bale is certainly not as bad as Val Kilmer in the role of Wayne/Batman, but he’s no Keaton, he’s no Clooney, he’s not even an Affleck. A lot of the time, he also just feels like… a Guy. And Batman should not ever, ever just be a Guy.

But perhaps the most egregious fault of the films is what it did to Gotham City itself. In Burton’s films, you really get a feel for the Gothic atmosphere of the city with how it’s designed, and this goes for Batman: The Animated Series too. And even the more cartoonish, colorful Gotham of Schumacher’s films pops and leaves an impact. But Nolan’s Gotham? It’s very much just a City. There is nothing distinct about Nolan’s Gotham, it’s literally just a generic city, and if you even have the faintest knowledge of Batman you will know that Gotham is not just a city. Gotham is pretty much a character itself, a dark, imposing landscape in which Batman does battle with his costumed foes. Every other adaptation I can think of knows to make Gotham feel unique and distinct, but this one just absolutely drops the ball. You might as well just have the city be New York if you’re going to put no effort into giving it personality.

And that all brings me to this: every reviled superhero movie of the past decade, from F4ntastic to The Amazing Spider-Man to Dawn of Justice, all have their genesis in Nolan’s trilogy. He laid the groundwork for these films to exist, and a large majority of the blame needs to be put on Nolan for sapping the fun out of comic book movies. Now, to be totally fair to Nolan, he’s not entirely responsible for what happened to the comic book film landscape; prior to him, the X-Men film series was giving all of the heroes dark costumes and being a bit more serious. But despite those films playing a bit of a part, there’s one major reason I don’t fault them nearly as much: The X-Men films never once felt ashamed to be comic book movies.

You have to understand, people loved grit and edginess in the 90s and had just violently rejected Batman & Robin a few years prior to the original X-Men film, so it’s hard to really fault it for wanting to avoid being too campy. But much like Blade, the films never tried to act like they weren’t still crazy comic book films. Scott still has eye lasers, Mystique is still blue, Nightcrawler looks like a demon, there are Sentinels and Apocalypse and even Dazzler shows up at one point! The X-Men franchise wasn’t always good, but it managed to balance between being silly and taking itself seriously pretty well for the most part. Magneto is still a Holocaust survivor, his relationship with Xavier still has impact, there are still emotional moments here and there, but then you also have Deadpool movies and the multiple comic book style retcons to the timeline that leave the continuity a mess, and something about that just feels right. And all that makes Logan less egregious despite being the sort of brooding, angsty superhero drama Nolan would make, because even if it is those things, it still centers around a dude with metal claws coming out of his hands trying to stop his best friend from wiping out everyone with psychic seizures. Nolan could never make this superhero film.

Nolan’s films, on the other hand, did. These films did not feel like they wanted to be comic book movies, they felt like they wanted to be serious crime films but Nolan was stuck with Batman so he just mashed the two together. And honestly, I’d probably be more forgiving if it weren’t for the hugely negative impact these films and their critical success had on the superhero genre even until this day. The first decade of superhero films as a major contender in cinema were colored by these films. People outright balked at silliness in superhero movies for quite some time, with a lot of criticism levied at the early phases of the MCU for being too goofy; in fact, at times it seemed as if the MCU was going a bit too far in the goofy direction without striking the proper balance, with films like Age of Ultron having most of its tension defused by constant wisecracks. And on the DC side, Nolan’s grounded approach lead to Zack Snyder’s flaccid filmmaking with dark coloration, moody atmosphere, and not a shred of joy to be found. Nolan is essentially the peak of dark, grounded superhero films, and Snyder is the nadir, but Snyder’s awful DC films wouldn’t exist if not for Nolan.

It was a slow crawl getting to what superhero movies should be. Guardians of the Galaxy and Ant-Man were films tossed out only when Marvel was certain they could take risks, because absurd concepts like those would just not have been able to survive if not for years of good will beforehand. That’s not even getting into some of the more bonkers elements of later films, such as Ego the Living Planet and basically everything about Doctor Strange. In fact, Doctor Strange, for all its issues, is still a massive step forward for a genre that outright rejected magic for a long time, instead for a time turning Thor and his costars into a cast of hyper-advanced aliens, with later films having to clarify that there is magic and zombies and so on. The recent WandaVision was able to further clarify this by making Wanda unambiguously magic and not an evil Nazi science experiment.

Superhero animation didn’t suffer quite so much, but that’s mostly because, much like comics, animation is still seen as “kid’s stuff” by way too many people. And even then, they didn’t escape the shadow of Nolan totally unscathed; one need only look into the infamous Bat Embargo, which limited Batman villains so there could only be one given incarnation of said character in media. For instance, the Scarecrow being in Batman Begins meant he could not appear in the animated series The Batman. This lead to such things as no Batman characters appearing in Justice League Unlimited. It was truly a stupidly frustrating time to be a Batman fan when some of his most iconic foes were relegated to only certain appearances because it “might confuse kids.”

Let me again clarify this: I mostly like the Nolan films. I usually like Nolan, though he has become unbearably, obnoxiously pretentious these days. I think a lot of elements of them are great, I feel like they mostly have strong villains, and I don’t disagree that The Dark Knight is a fantastic film. But the thing is these are only good as AU stories, as their own thing; they should not be the template every superhero movie should follow, or any superhero movie for that matter, because they lack the ability to engage with the things that make people love comics in the first place. People love wacky, off-the-wall concepts, superpowered aliens, magic, talking animals, evil living planets, alcoholic ducks, and all that fun stuff.

People desperately want the fun, camp, and wacky stuff back in comic book films, as the success of the goofier DC films like Aquaman, Shazam, and Birds of Prey as well as the success of shows like Doom Patrol in comparison to the critical and audience revulsion of Snyder’s films, with Shazam in particular giving us such bonkers concepts as an entire family of superpowered children and Mr. Mind, the evil alien caterpillar. Thor: Ragnarok and the Guardians of the Galaxy films have become some of the most beloved MCU movies despite being weird, wacky, and wholly embracing the joy of comics to the point the latter films feature Howard the Duck and the aforementioned Ego alongside bizarre characters like Rocket Raccoon, Groot, and Taserface. And the thing with all of these films is that they’re able to balance the weirdness and wackiness of comics without losing sight of human emotion, moving storytelling, and drama. They’re both fun and deep, goofy and yet meaningful. This is what comics are, and what they should be, and anyone who thinks comics should be grim and gritty really needs to think about why they think an entire genre needs to be colored in with only the dullest colors.

I think what I’m trying to say here is this: Make a Detective Chimp movie, you cowards.

#Michael in the Mainstream #mitm #review #movie review #the dark knight trilog #the dark knight #batman begin #the dark knight rises #superhero movie #christopher nolan #DC