Film of the
Week:
Batman Vs Superman: Dawn of Justice
This is going to be my non-spoiler review. My spoiler filled
review will be not this Friday, but the Friday afterwards.
Batman Vs Superman hit cinemas across the country, generating a tsunami
of mixed reviews. Most critics hated it, yet some fans enjoyed it. And when I
mean some fans, I mean the fans that did enjoy the film, raved about Ben
Affleck’s performance as Bruce Wayne/Batman and not Henry Cavill’s performance
as Clark Kent/Superman.
This film is a sequel to the film Man of Steel. Whilst the fight
between Superman and General Zod was happening, Bruce Wayne was fighting his
way through the terrified city to get to the people he cares about, who are at
his building in the city which Zod destroys with the fire from his eyes. This
cements Bruce’s opinion on Superman and the rivalry begins. Director Zack Snyder
told Ben that Bruce is tired. He’s experienced the lot, yet there’s still so
much more he has to do. He’s Batman and Batman doesn’t stop. Ben did a superb
job doing that.
Jesse Eisenberg plays Lex Luthor. Lex Luthor has been played brilliantly
by a number of actors over the years, all catching his genius, but insane personality,
hell-bent on defeating Superman because he believes that the city will start to
rely on him and not do anything to help themselves. Jesse performed just as well
as all the others. He captured Lex’s insanity well.
Wonder Woman blended well with everyone. She helped tell the audience that this was all part of a bigger story, which involves all the members of the Justice League, including the Flash and Aquaman.
And now we get to the two main people. Clark Kent/Superman, and
Lois Lane. We are already familiar with Henry Cavill as Superman, so we didn’t
really need much of an introduction. He carried on struggling to decide whether
to be good or not. It’s understandable that the city would be scared of his
actions, considering that he is an alien with immeasurable powers that almost
obliterated the entire city during his last encounter with another one of his
kind. That confrontation happening whilst Lex goes about his plan in the background
blended together nicely, only overlapping when absolutely necessary. Lois Lane
was the same character as she has ever been in the comics and films: Strong and
independent, and doesn’t take no for an answer. The Clark and Lois’
relationship also worked well.
And say what you want about the film, you can't deny that the climatic battle at the end wasn't epic, because it was. Doomsday pushed Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman to their limit, showing us that even the most powerful of superheros struggle sometimes.
That’s pretty much all I can say about it without giving anything
away. There is one thing that I would like to address before we move on to the
next section, however, and that’s the reviews many critics have been giving the
film. They have been saying that the film is terrible, and it only has, as of
this Monday, 29% on Rotten Tomatoes. But, despite all of that, the film has
broken the record for the highest opening weekend for any Warner Bro. film,
beating the likes of Harry Potter and the Dark Knight trilogy, scoring a
staggering, as of 11 hours ago, $468 million. The fans have been swarming to
see the film, which got me thinking. The immensely epic Science Fiction
thriller, Watchmen, also scored considerably lower with the critics, than with
the fans who has labelled as the best superhero film of all time by the fans. The
also as epic film 300 was obliterated by the critics, but fans loved it. It
seems that both times, critics’ opinions have been pushed aside and ignored. The
question I’m asking here is, what’s stopping the same happening with Batman Vs
Superman?
TV Episode
of the Week:
Supergirl – Season 1 – Episode 18: Worlds Finest
It has to be noted that the production schedule for the crossover
was a bit off. Supergirl airs on Mondays, whereas the Flash airs on Tuesdays,
but the Flash sets up the crossover. Well, sort of. If you watch Supergirl,
without knowing the Flash’s story, then his appearance may be sudden a little
out of place with the main storyline of the show.
The episode of the Flash that aired on Tuesday did start to set up
the crossover, but in the crossover, he has a device that he had built from the
information he got from Eobard Thawne after travelling through time to ask him
to teach him to go faster. A whole lot of crazy happened during that episode. Barry
accidentally messed with the timeline, causing a Time Wraith to appear,
hell-bent on destroying the future Barry to set the timeline right again. It’s
a nostalgic episode because you got to see Tom Cavanagh play the evil version
of Dr Harrison Wells, who is secretly the Reverse Flash/Eobard Thawne. Without
going into the complete lore of the Flash’s continuity as this section is more
dedicated to Supergirl’s episode, Barry does manage to convince him to hand
over enough information to help him go faster. At the end of the episode, not
much has changed, and things carry on as normal. I would like to say, however,
that even though it was great to see Eddie back again, he was only there to
help Iris’s character development, and although that can be classed as an important
role, having him back, I thought he would have done something a little bit more
than just be stared at with nostalgic memories and say a few words that we may
already have known, but that’s just one element of the show. The rest of the
episode was great.
Next week on the Flash, Barry and the team at Star Labs are going
to use that information to build him a device that will help him travel from
one Universe to another so that he can stop Zoom once and for all. That device
is what we saw in Supergirl. So, the production schedule is completely out of
sync by a couple of weeks. That does and doesn’t affect the crossover.
Let me explain. Supergirl’s storyline revolves around stopping Non
and his army from destroying National City. A couple of episodes back,
Supergirl lost trust in the city, and she now has to try and win their trust
back. This episode, there are two enemies for the price of one. Livewire and
the newly introduced Silver Banshee. They both have a vendetta against Cat
Grant and Kara Danvers, and team up to take them both down. If the Flash wasn’t
there, then it would have been just another episode. The gradual character
development of the Silver Banshee was well-written, and if this crossover didn’t
happen, then Supergirl would have had to fight two enemies at once. She would have
struggled a bit, but she would have done so, and things would carry on as
normal. There were fears that Supergirl brought in the Flash just to give the show
an increase in popularity, but that simply wasn’t the case. Supergirl’s
storyline was strong enough to hold its own without any help. The fans asked
for the crossover, and so the two networks delivered.
So, let’s look at the other side of the coin. The Flash being
there did make the episode somewhat better. The Flash’s introduction to the episode
by saving Kara from falling several stories, and due to his speed boost he got
from Harrison Wells, meant that he accidentally ran a little bit too far before
stopping. Instantly, the two characters' chemistry brightened up the show massively.
Barry’s mild awkwardness yet knowing what he is talking about, complete with
Kara’s confidence and being in awe with Barry being from another universe
altogether, allowed them to bond and have a fun time throughout the episode.
Barry told Kara about his experience with the city you love turn their back on
you. All you have to do is give it time and things will slowly go back to normal.
Near the end of the episode, Kara saves a helicopter from being struck down by
Livewire’s bolt of electricity, injuring herself in the process. This gives the
people of National City the message that Kara is not their enemy, but instead
their hero, and does what they can to stop her from getting hurt further. So, because
this crossover happened, Kara was able to help the city trust her again. If it
hadn’t have happened, then she would have earned their trust slower than just
one episode.
Having a crossover of two major characters needed to have some
impact on someone’s storyline, and because the Flash was crossing over the
Supergirl, then it was her storyline that had that impact. The episode was
joyous to watch, and it did push events in the direction they needed to go. One
of the beauties with filming new episodes whilst episodes are being aired is
that you do have a plan as to where you would like the show to go, but that
plan always has some leeway. It can be changed in subtle ways, which is exactly
what happened here, and I believe it was for the better. They used the Flash as
a plot point between Kara and Jimmy Olsen. Kara wants to be with Jimmy, and
what better way to do that than to be seen communicating and getting along well
with another man. They used the crossover as a way to increase the speed of the
show (pardon the pun).
As I said before, you don’t necessarily have to be completely
caught up with the Flash’s story to understand everything that happens, as
Barry does a good job explaining how he arrived in that Universe, the theory of
the multiverse, and the most important thing of all, who he is and how he
obtained his powers. All you need is a few quick and simple sentences to
explain so much, then move on to the main plot of the show. But, it does help
in some ways if you did know the storyline, which is what I was afraid of
happening. Fans of the Flash would come over to watch Supergirl, then leave,
whereas fans of Supergirl suddenly got a new superhero in town, standing out
like a sore thumb. My opinion does originate from knowing both show’s continuity,
which is why it is hard to devise an opinion as if I didn’t, but I do believe
that they did a good job to include him in the show, and the chemistry between the
two leads covered up any unknowing information, and how it pushed the story
forwards that much further and faster than if Supergirl had to do it on its
own, then all I can say is that fans of the show have a good few episodes
coming their way.
The ending went just how I had expected. Kara kissed Jimmy. I was
also expecting some sort of cliff-hanger immediately afterwards, leaving a
questioned unanswered and setting things up for the next episode.
All in all, the episode was great. A lot of comic book Easter Eggs
for those that read the comics, and a couple, but extremely subtle references
to the Flash’s show. It was a well-constructed episode, and I hope that it has
inspired them to do more. It also sets up a major storyline that they may or
may not do: Crises on Infinite Earths, but that’s for another day.
Game of the Week:
Planet Coaster
This came comes from the minds that brought you Roller Coaster
Tycoon 3. Back in 2004, Theme Park games would never be the same again. Tycoon
3 reimagined the entire concept, bringing added realism and unlimited possibilities,
including 3D graphics. And it is still the number one Theme Park game around
today. It still sits on its podium, wearing its crown with pride. Several games
have tried to take the crown from it, but always ended up falling flat on their
face. The latest attempt was with Roller Coaster Tycoon World, which is can
technically be called the fourth instalment in the series. It has been pushed
back more times than anyone can count, and handed to many different developers,
all of which have discarded the previous developers’ workings and started from
scratch once more. It has been a disaster from the very beginning and doesn’t
deserve to be included within the main series.
That top spot may be, or may already have been, taken. Planet
Coaster has just been released, but as an alpha, meaning the full game has yet
to be released, which has been scheduled for the end of this year, but already
it has won over many gamers. And it has won me over as well. Looking further
into the game, I discovered that it was actually made by the same developers
who made Tycoon 3. If a game is worth beating, it’s worth beating yourself.
Already it has proven to be an incredible accomplishment. Tycoon 3
was known for its fantastic light engine, making the night time scene look spectacular.
Planet Coaster today’s technologies, which are vastly superior than what they
had back in 2004 to its advantage, to make the lighting engine bigger, better
and so more dazzling. You can be insanely creative with your placements of multi-coloured
lights, making your park look like a masterpiece. You can customise any ride
you want instead of only having fixed designs, allowing you to create your own
theme if you feel that you want to do something different. The possibilities really
are endless.
As much as it is such a good game, the price does let it down.
When it comes out at the end of the year, it has the potential to be worth
every penny, but being an alpha, despite the amount of stuff you can do already,
the price does need to be lowered, or the game has a few updates before it is
worth that amount of money. So far, the basic package that includes the game is
£30.00. The deluxe package is £69.99, which is a bit much, especially
considering it isn’t the full game. You can get a very decent pair of
headphones for that amount of money, and you would know that it will come
complete, instead of you having to wait for the wires to come so you can plug
them in. Despite that, however, it is a superb game and is set to be the next
best coaster game money can buy.
Video of the
Week:
The LEGO® Batman Movie Teaser – Batcave
(By Lego)
&
The Lego ® Batman Movie Teaser – Wayne Manor
(By Lego)
I don’t know if it was intentional, but having two teaser trailers
for the spin-off movie from the Lego® movie featuring the one and only Batman
in one week does seem pretty intentional to me. But who cares, right. Everybody
loved the Lego® movie, including the critics, and everyone especially loved
Batman. He had a different personality compared to the live-action films. His
subtle narcissistic personality complete with sheer awesomeness propelled him
to the top of most, if not all, of everyone’s favourite character list from the
movie, so it does seem predictable that the studio would bring out a movie
centred round him.
The first teaser showed off his awesomeness once more, by
explaining how the film had been written, directed, choreographed and painstakingly
beatboxed by him, because he’s Batman. Then he dropped the mic, right before
the clips from the film played. After seeing that video, all I can say is that
he most definitely deserves that lobster.
The second teaser shows him in his manor, talking to Alfred, who
broke the fourth wall by saying that Bruce is acting much the same as he always
has done during his previous appearances in all of his films beforehand,
including that weird time in 1966. I agree with Batman that he has aged phenomenally.
Then the clips from the film plays, cementing my want to go and see the film
when it comes out in 2017.
I know, I can’t wait that long either.
Thanks for reading
Antony Hudson
(TonyHadNouns)
My book, Sector 22: Zoey, is now available on Amazon, eBay, and SkyCat Publications' website:
Amazon:
eBay:
SkyCat Publications:
Ask me anything at:
ahudsonpresents@live.co.uk
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