Zero heroes coming to a theater near you! Captain Canuck and the Human Fly!

[adrotate banner=”1″]Lost in the shuffle of the big Comic-Con super hero movie announcements were a few announcements of smaller super hero flicks that will certainly excite someone. Maybe.

First up is everyone’s favorite maple syrup loving super hero, Captain Canuck! Yes, that’s an actual comic book character, older than me even, and now he’s heading for the big screen. In fact, the official announcement was at last year’s Comic-Con, but this year they announced that there was a writer for the film! Arne Olsen, famed scribe of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: the Movie, is doing the script. The Captain Canuck series began in 1975, where the first Captain Canuck patrolled Canada in the futuristic world of 1993, where “Canada had become the most powerful country in the world.” I’m not sure who Captain Canuck fought against, but it was probably radioactive beavers. Minds Eye Entertainment is the group bringing Captain Canuck to the screen.

Next up is a super hero who was briefly a Marvel comics character, and was sort of based on a real person! The Human Fly. You all remember him? Described as an “accident victim turned pacifist acrobat, the wildest hero of all…because he’s real!” He also smacks sharks with a cane, according to the cover of his comic book that I haven’t read. But scour those 10 for a dollar bins and you’ll be sure to find some back issues of The Human Fly. Rick Rojatt is the stunt guy he’s supposedly based on. Also a Human Fly showed up on an episode of the Simpsons, he stayed up all night dying his underwear. Such is the heroic pedigree of Human Flies! Eisenberg-Fisher Productions is independently producing this, which will hopefully cash in on all that Ant-Man money.

I hope both of these two films do well and then the heroes team up to fight Beaver Sharks! That’s a billion dollar movie idea, right there!

Captain Canuck news via QuietEarth

Human Fly news via Beyond Hollywood

Human Fly

Using a cane? We all know Dr. House is the Human Fly!


Captain Canuck

Time for hockey, eh!!!

Planet Hulk (Review)

Planet Hulk


2010
Directed by Sam Liu
Written by Greg Johnson (screenplay) and Greg Pak (comic)

Planet Hulk is a storyline from the Incredible Hulk series where our favorite giant green monster gets rocketed to another planet, where he becomes a slave, a gladiator, a rebel, and finally a king, smashing things all the while. It was very popular, for good reason, because it was freaking awesome! It spawned sequels, spin-offs, and this DTV animated film. The storyline was mainly written by Greg Pak, or Robot Stories fame. Planet Hulk brings about memories of stories such as the John Carter of Mars series, Gladiator, and Conan the Barbarian. If you have the time, I highly recommend reading the story, collected in graphic novel form. It helped get me back into reading comics for a while, which was pretty difficult to do thanks to Marvel ruining things with stupid Spider-clones and crap.

The DTV film which is the subject of this review differs from the original story in several ways. One of the main differences is the fact the Silver Surfer is nowhere to be found, instead replaced by Beta Ray Bill (which is pretty random, sort of like the Silver Surfer’s original appearance in the story!) Surfer’s non-appearance is apparently due to licensing reasons. The story is also missing the Warbound Brood character No-Name, so I guess all those Brood fans will be disappointed. As the film is not so long, the story is sped up and most of the last act is hurriedly paced, even if I hadn’t of read the original story it would have felt rushed. Along with that, many subplots die by the wayside. Finally, the tragic ending of the original storyline does not occur, probably due to them wanting to end the story on a positive note and leaving the rest for a possible sequel. Hulk may be green, but Marvel wants the other green, money!

So since I loved the original story so much, that probably means I hate this version? Not quite. Despite over-simplifying it to the point where much of the flavor is removed, the same basic story is there, and there is plenty of fighting action. There are numerous scenes with the Spikes, which show someone involved in the DTV production really liked zombie movies. Parts of it are actually creepy/scary in a way they fail to be in the comic. I didn’t hate this version, I actually liked it, but I’ll be keeping the graphic novel instead of the DVD on my bookshelf.

There are numerous cameos in the audience, including Pip the Troll, Gamora, Adam Warlock, a Skrull, Star-Lord, and some guy hiding behind the Red King who might be Grandmaster. So if you are that guy who loves Grandmaster, this is the film for you.

Hulk (Rick D. Wasserman) – Hulk smash!
Caiera (Lisa Ann Beley) – Caiera is the super-powered bodyguard of the Red King who will eventually become the Hulk’s wife. She has “Shadow Strength”, which means she can make her skin rock hard and she’s very strong.
Miek (Sam Vincent) – Miek is an unhived native with black skin so you can tell him apart from the generic insect natives there as well who will die. A loner who finally finds friends and a hive in the battle arena. Most of his story arcs in the comics are excised here, Miek doesn’t even mutate into King mode.
Korg (Kevin Michael Richardson) – A rock guy from Thor a long time ago that shows up here in Sakaar, because, rocks gotta go somewhere! By the way, my high school team was the Rocks, though no one from my high school was sucked into a vortex in space and crashed on an alien planet where they were forced to fight as gladiators. When it happened to me I had to work at Hot Dog On a Stick instead.
Hiroim (Liam O’Brien) – A castout priest who believes in the Sakaarsan so much he’s very happy when the Hulk arrives to be the Sakaarsan. Good thing for Hiroim that this movie has a different ending from the comics. And I think they killed him off later in the comics so enough of this guy.
Elloe Kaifi (Advah Soudack) – Crazy revolutionary girl who is far to revolutionary for her own good and keeps getting the team into trouble. Simmer down, girl! The way to revolt is to do it in a way where you don’t get caught.
Red King (Mark Hildreth) – The evil king of Sakaar who is evil, though the movie only shows him doing a little evil stuff and not lots and lots of evil stuff.


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Captain America battles Teabaggers, Marvel apologizes

[adrotate banner=”1″]First, let me apologize for the lateness of this post. Between ER visits, my wife’s birthday, and Valentine’s day, this kept getting delayed to the point where it became a huge story.

For those of you who had equally busy lives this week, you may not know that in a recent issue of Captain America (#602), the good Captain and his friend Falcon need to go undercover in an anti-government group. A group that has protests against the Federal Government, and carried signs identifying them as Teabaggers. Par for the course, as Captain America has regularly taken on enemies of America. But, the Teabaggers in real life were angry. They were mad at the picture stories that said they were bad, so they threw a temper tantrum and screamed until Marvel apologized.

Marvel is now owned by Disney, who the Fundies hate anyway because Mickey Mouse doesn’t stone the gays at the theme parks, so pretty much anything Marvel doesn’t isn’t going to appease crazy idiots who weren’t buying your stuff in the first place. So I say, don’t bother to apologize, because there is nothing to be ashamed of in fighting Right wing idiots bent on warping the country into their own personal Hell.

So here is the offending panels (Click for HUGE!):

And here are some typical FreeRepublic.com reactions:

These comic books are something only losers read, that’s why I’ll make a big fuss!
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The free market is obviously a sign of outside foreign influences! And good job not reading Liberality!
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Bryanw92 boycotts everything, leaving him nothing to do but to sit in the dirt. On the RIGHT side of the dirt.
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Sooooo much stupid in one tiny little post!
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Before the Internet Marvel was 100% hippies selling arms to Saigon
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Oh, Travis McGee, your racist screed will be featured here soon enough…
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Maybe if SevenofNine (don’t tell him the Federation are space socialists!) actually read comics he would be able to speak English.
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First of all: Taint. Second of all: Free market, baby!
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Rastus sure reads a lot of comics for hating comics so much. Even I don’t know that much about Seige! I did read Planet Hulk, and I recommend it to everyone.
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Yeah, make your protests even more of a giant circus! Please?
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For some perspective, besides Captain America’s own title, one of the best Captain America books was What If?, which featured various alternate outcomes of classic Marvel Comics events. Thus, Captain America showed up a lot, and many times fought against evil duplicate Captain Americas. In this particular one, a crazy, Right Wing guy has assumed the role of Captain America and proceeds to make it into what is probably a Teabagger’s wet dream:
whatifc.jpg

whatife.jpg

But then the Real Captain America returns to beat down the crazy:
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whatifd.jpg
whatifa.jpg

So What If? rules, Captain America rules, and Teabaggers don’t.

Man-Thing (Review)

Man-Thing


2005
Starring
Matthew Le Nevez as Kyle Williams
Rachel Taylor as Teri Richards
Jack Thompson as Frederic Schist
Patrick Thompson as Jake Schist

Man-Thing, you make my heart sing! Now that that’s taken care of, on with the review…

“Whatever knows Fear, Burns at the Touch of the Man-Thing.”



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