Superheroes!

Day Thirty One.

From Kung-fu to Superhero movies. Yeah, I know I should get a life. But what can I say, I’m a girl with many interests. But first and foremost, I’d like to thank Rokk and Frogger for their comments on some of my posts especially on the last one.

Anyway, going back to business…I went out again this morning to watch a new movie. I just needed something to take my mind off of my rabbit’s death. I just miss the little fellow so much. So, this time I watched the latest parody film from the creators of the four Scary Movie films. I know, I know…Parody films are lame and most of the time they are completely stupid and senseless. I really do know, because watching “Epic Movie” was the most excruciating movie-experience of my entire life. And as if I haven’t learned my lesson, I even watched “Date Movie” on HBO and I ended up even more traumatized. But eventhough those two movies left me scarred for life, I actually enjoyed the Scary Movie series (except for the 2nd one).

The Scary movie films are quite different from Epic Movie. First, they’re not as mindless and stupid as Date Movie and Epic Movie. Second, they always have some sort of plot and not just some random scenes thrown one after the other. And lastly, they have some pretty decent comedic actors in them. I mean, Anna Faris was really funny and who in the world doesn’t find Leslie Nielsen hilarious? Plus they have lots of unexpected cameos, like Shaq and Dr. Phil on the fourth one. And just like what the critic in movies.com said, the guys behind Scary Movie have a somewhat classier pedigree when it comes to parody films. Besides, the only way you could completely enjoy watching a parody film is when you’ve seen all of the movies they’ve copied. Well, I’ve seen all horror and blockbuster movies of recent years so it’s not so hard for me to find Scary Movie amusing. Of course, they’re far from from perfect and they have a lot of unnecessary scenes, dumb jokes and over-used ideas. But I still found them quite entertaining.

So, when their latest work, “Superhero Movie” came out, I was really eager to watch it. I’ve seen every single Superhero movie there is, after all. I’m no comicbook otaku, but I’ve been watching American cartoons like X-Men, Batman and Justice League since I was a kid. And I love watching Superhero movies as much as love watching anime and kung-fu movies.  Although only a few of them got it right (X-Men, Batman Begins, Batman Returns and Spiderman), I still love seeing comic book characters come to life on the big screen. So I knew, I’d be able to recognize all of the characters and scenes in “Superhero movie”. Well, I guess, just recognizing them was not enough. This movie turned out to be utterly disappointing.

The whole movie is almost entirely a spoof of Spiderman, except from the fact that the main character is now called “Dragonfly” and they inserted a few characters and scenes from other Superhero movies. Almost all of the scenes and characters in the first Spiderman movie were here only with different names. Well, it did have a plot, so it’s still a level higher from Date Movie and Epic Movie but aside from that it doesn’t have much to boast about. The jokes and antics have all been done before. Eveything’s just way over-used and are not as funny as they used to be.  We’ve seen the Tom Cruise impersonation before, the killing of old ladies part, the excessive farting, and all the mindless second-hand jokes. Leslie Nielsen was still hilarious as Uncle Ben (Or Uncle Albert in this movie). He gave a new twist to the very gentle and noble character from the Spiderman movie. But aside from him and the crazy doctor, played by Jeffrey Tambor, everyone’s just ordinary and dull. The lead characters Bell and Paxton, just didn’t have any comedic bone in their body. I miss the old Scary Movie cast. Some of them did cameo roles in this movie but it’s just not enough. And this movie is just not complete without Anna Faris. But, I guess, even Anna wouldn’t be able to save this movie from being a complete disaster. Everything is just wrong: the script, the gags, and the actors. Plus, it didn’t have enough Superhero movies in it. It was all about Spiderman, and only has a scene from Batman and a few characters from X-men and Fantastic 4. Where’s Superman, The Hulk, Ghost Rider, Hellboy, Catwoman and the other characters from all of those blockbuster Superhero movies? It’s just unacceptable that they left-out so many characters and scenes from well-known Superhero movies. I guess, it sucks being a movie-buff because you’d end up complaining about this sort of stuff.

Oh well, all in all, Superhero movie is not as painful to watch as Epic movie and I did have a few laughs while watching it. But if you want something original and actually funny, then I’d advise you to just ignore this one. Let’s just hope, they learn their lesson and come-up with new jokes for the next installment.

After the movie, I went to the bookshop to buy a new book. Well, you know my cheering-up routine: Movie, books, food and caffeine. This time I bought another book that I’ve already read: “Smokes and Mirrors” by Neil Gaiman. This book is probably my second favorite book next to “Veronika Decides to Die” and Gaiman is my one of my favorite authors. So eventhough I’ve read this book a million times already, I just had to buy it  for my collection. Plus it has a story of a very brave pet cat in it that I just have to re-read today.

After buying a book and eating beef teriyaki, 3 bowls of rice, a large bottle of cola and a huge bag of cheddar and sour Cream potato chips, I went home and watched a couple of episodes of  “Ashita no Kita Yoshio”. One of the reasons I started watching this drama is because of the brilliant cast. I just adore every single one of them. I love Matsuda Ryuhei because of his role in “Nana”, Kuriyama Chiaki was great in” Battle Royale” and “Azumi 2″ plus she was the ultimate bad-ass in “Kill Bill”, Kaname Jun was really cool in “Casshern” and  Namase Katsuhisa was hilarious in “Gokusen 1 and 2″. So how could I not watch this drama? Of course, that’s only one of my reasons…

Anyway, I’m really loving this series. It’s one of the most unique dramas I’ve ever seen. For starters, almost all dramas have good-looking young actors playing the lead character, but not this one. The main protagonist (Kita Yoshio) is actually a timid old man. Now that’s something you don’t see very often. But the best part of this drama is Matsuda Ryuhei. He’s just amazing here. I love his character Heita-san! He’s one of those bad-ass guys with a conscience and a good heart. And he and Chiaki looked really good together. Namase Katsuhisa was also really funny here. I really loved the scene where he said that Japanese people should speak in their native language all the time. So instead of saying “Spiderman”, Japanese people should say “kumo otoko” and “hoshi senran” instead of Star Wars. Then the guy he was talking to kept asking him to translate stuff like Die Hard, 24 and other popular American movies and show. That scene was just hilarious!

Anyway, it’s really late and I still have one more episode of “Ashita no Kita Yoshio” to watch and a few Bleach episodes to download.

Oh, by the way, the episode of Supernatural tonight, was about a rabbit’s foot that could make you really lucky once you touch it. Man, why do they have to keep reminding me of my pet rabbit!!!

End of Day Thirty one.