If this series is any indication of what more "crisis" crossovers would be like, I'm glad we're calling this the "final" one. After a confusing 7 issue arc, I sat down and read all 7 comics back to back to see if the story made any more sense. Not really. This is possibly the most self-indulgent comic book story I have ever read. Morrison juggles a ton of characters that are either obscure (even to a real DC fanatic like me!) or brand new without any explanation or reminder of who they are and where they came from. The only way to make sense of this series would be to get a list of every DC comic book Grant Morrison has ever read and study them so that we can know what he obviously thinks we should know about all these Z-list characters. Kalibak is a talking tiger? The Atomic Knights are riding around on giant dalmations? Freaking CAPTAIN CARROT??? With the presence of Geoff Johns, it's become cool recently to take outdat...

Two bits of dialogue jumped out at me last night while watching "Legend Of The Seeker". Since the concept of the show and books lends itself to asking "truth oriented" philosophical questions, I came up with a couple for last night's show. Kahlan: You can't ask me to change my beliefs! Richard: And you can't ask me to change mine! In the show, a baby's life hung in the balance during this conversation and the argument hit a stalemate at this point as they both surrendered themselves to this overly sensitive mentality. Why can we not ask each other to change our beliefs? I agree that we can't "demand" that someone change their beliefs. But why can we not ask someone, in light of good evidence and solid reasoning, to change their belief on an issue? I mean, I can always say "no", can't I? What's the harm in asking if the request is accompanied by good reasoning? Well, in this episode, good reasoning didn...

As I sat in the theater, preparing to watch this movie, I wasn't sure what to expect. If the trailer was any indicator, this would be the best movie I'd seen in awhile. But trailers have been bad to me recently, so I tried to go in "neutral". I own the first two Underworld movies on DVD and really enjoyed them. What started as a relatively small action film(Underworld) quickly leaped forward in the second installment (Underworld: Evolution) to an explosive vampire/werewolf action flick. But this movie lacks both Scott Speedman and Kate Beckinsale, the lead performers in the other films. It also has a new director and takes place hundreds of years before "Underworld" begins. I knew that this could go either very right or very wrong. I'm pleased to say it went very right. Despite this being director Patrick Tatopoulos' second film, with most of his career focused on special effects work, it's clear he knows how to b...

David Goyer (Co-writer of Batman Begins and director of Blade:Trinity) serves as writer and director of this movie about a girl being haunted by an evil spirit. The trailer for this film is what brought me to the theater. It's a shame that the best parts of this movie were in that trailer. Based on the previews for this film, I assumed I was heading into something akin to "The Ring". Creepy images covered the trailer from front to back. But when I sat down to watch the film, I soon realized that the majority of this film would have an entirely different feel to it, and was made for a different audience as well. The lead character, Casey, is played by Odette Yustman. From the moment she first appeared on screen, a small part of me sighed and though, "I don't think this girl was hired for her acting chops." Two underwear and one shower scene later, I was all too familiar with the kind of movie I was looking at. Performances from th...

I have nothing for or against Vin Diesel. He usually fills the role of action hero without adding or subtracting from the film. The same was true in Babylon AD. I missed seeing this movie in theaters and so rented it on DVD this week. For the first 40 minutes it looked like things were going somewhere. Sure, it had some plot points we'd seen before, particularly in "The Fifth Element", but it had enough going for it that I was more than happy to see it through. Too bad the film-makers didn't seem to feel the same way. This "pre-post-apocalyptic" movie has a few semi-cool action sequences that gave me the feeling we were building up to one or two really fantastic ones. But the coolest special effects shot of the film was the focal point of every trailer for this flick, so it was nothing new when you saw the pseudo "bullet-time" shot at the climax of the film. I should also say that I use the word "climax" very loosely. After 40 m...

Frank Miller has created some celebrated comic books that have recently been made into very successful films. Sin City and 300 both wowed audiences with their stylized visuals that captured much of the source material in a dynamic and appealing way. Miller, who co-directed Sin City, decided to make "The Spirit" his feature film debut as both writer and director. But the result is an experience lacking both textual substance and film quality. I am not a fan of The Spirit, and know very little about the character. So I judged this movie on its own merits. I went into this film not knowing what to expect. The previews looked like a Sin City knock-off and Samuel L. Jackson made me nervous from the get go. He’s either really right for his roles, or really wrong for them. I knew within 20 minutes of this film that I’d made a terrible mistake in coming to the theater. Seven dollars and two hours that I’ll never get back. Sometimes I’ll go and see a movie I might otherwis...