News and Notes
Entertainment Weekly is reporting that despite being tied to the final season of How I Met Your Mother, Cobie Smulders will be making an appearance in the series premiere of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
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Beware the Batman – Hunted
- Title: Beware the Batman – Hunted
- tv.com: link
In my opinion any attempt to make a Batman-inspired cartoon is doomed to pale in comparison to the Batman: The Animated Series. Given the extreme liberties taken with the designs of Batman’s rogues gallery I could never get into The Batman, but I will admit a fondness for the sheer glee in which Batman: The Brave and the Bold embraced the Silver Age ridiculousness of the character (even offering us Catman riding his giant robotic cat in one episode!). Replacing Green Lantern: The Animated Series on DC Nation, the similarly CGI-animated Beware the Batman began its run this past weekend with the show’s first episode – “Hunted.”
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Shockingly, R.I.P.D. isn’t D.O.A.
- Title: R.I.P.D.
- IMDB: link
Based on the comic series by Peter M. Lenkov, R.I.P.D. stars Ryan Reynolds as a recently slain dirty cop who is drafted by the Rest In Peace Department for his unique skill set and sent back into the land of the living to catch escaped souls hiding out on Earth. To teach him the ropes, Nick (Reynolds) is paired with Roy Pulsipher (Jeff Bridges), an persnickety lawman straight out of the Old West who has hunted souls for centuries.
The comparisons to Men in Black are too obvious to ignore, but R.I.P.D. does have one thing going for it that the MIB franchise has been missing since the late 1990’s: a fresh take. As goofy and unoriginal as the concepts behind R.I.P.D. are, the movie puts its own spin on things while delivering an impressive production design as well as sense of fun missing from far too many of this summer’s movies. The weapons of the film are a mix between MIB and Hellboy while the design of R.I.P.D. headquarters, once again borrowing heavily on other films (most notably MIB), creates a nice mix of out-of-control underworld bureaucracy and an incredibly clean police station.
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Red 2
- Title: Red 2
- IMDB: link
Not every movie deserves a sequel. Based on the early 2000’s comic from Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner, Red was good dumb fun about retired spies forced to get back into the game when their past caught up with them. Not straining any brain muscles, the sequel is roughly the same premise as Frank Moses (Bruce Willis), Marvin (John Malkovich), and Frank’s girlfriend Sarah (Mary-Louise Parker) find themselves marked for death based on Frank and Marvin’s part in a secret operation more than three decades ago.
The movie begins in much the same way as another of Willis’ regrettable sequels as the former spy attempts to lay low in the suburbs with a girlfriend who wants more crazy adventures. Forced on the run, the threesome are pursued by the world’s best hitman (Byung-hun Lee) with a personal score to settle, as well as Victoria (Helen Mirren) who is ordered by MI6 to put Frank and Marvin in the ground. Brian Cox reprises his role as Ivan, and the movie also offers up Catherine Zeta-Jones as the Russian spy who has Frank wrapped around her little finger and Anthony Hopkins as a mad scientist locked away for 30 years.
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Daredevil #28
- Title: Daredevil #28
- Comic Vine: link
- Writer: Mark Waid
- Artist: Chris Samnee
When Matt Murdock is approached for help by his childhood bully, Daredevil has grave reservations about defending the person who made his childhood a living hell, and is responsible for the nickname “Daredevil,” from charges that he belonged to a terrorist organization. Beginning with Matt visiting Foggy in the hospital, the issue certainly focuses more on Matt than his horned alter-ego.
Although he originally turns down the case, Murdock’s conscience gets the better of him and he finally agrees to prep Nate Hackett to defend himself in court (which turns out to be quite entertaining). The emotions of Matt’s struggles to both sit at Foggy’s bedside and help an old enemy each work well (even if I’m not comfortable with yet another retcon of where Daredevil got his name).
The issue ends in bizarre fashion as the Sons of the Serpent make sure Hackett doesn’t give away any privileged information about their society by having the judge shoot the defendant in the middle of the courtroom. I was thrown off a little by these last few panels, but I trust that Waid knows where he’s going. Worth a look.
[Marvel, $3.99]