Okay. Let’s just get it over with… you may want to sit down. Even though the little teaser link leading here may have suggested what I’m about to do, it still may not prepare you for the shock.
(sighs)
I might have been a little harsh on the Daredevil movie last week.
Okay, okay. No need to rub it in.
I got some letters over the last week from various readers who said that they enjoyed the movie. Some of them had no familiarity with Daredevil at all and some knew the basics of the characters. In short, none of them had my geeky level of experience with Daredevil. But all of them said they liked reading the perspective of someone who was a fan who would nitpick over the little details. Well, thank you all for that.
But over the last week, as I talked with people about the movie, I came to a conclusion. I was so shocked and jarred by the idea of Daredevil killing that it colored my opinions of everything that came after that scene. So I thought… what if? What if…
(Insert Pretty Artistic Parody of “What If†Cover Graphic Here)
(What? What do you mean we don’t have an artist who could… *sighs* )
What if Matt had gone to the bathroom and missed that scene?
On reflection, if I ignore that scene, the movie did get most everything right. And reading Ben Morse’s review of the movie, I find that we both agreed on most of the points I made. Good (all the performances are good for what they are given) and bad (weak script, tries to do too much, go read the article for the rest…).
And while the man at the beginning is most assuredly not the Daredevil from the comics, he is by the end of the movie.
So all in all, let’s give it a 7 out of 10 stars now that my Fanboy Rage has calmed itself.
Now hold on to your seats a while longer folks, because it’s about to happen again.
You see, I got another letter two weeks ago from a reader who wondered why I thought Judd Winick was doing a good job on Green Lantern. Well, I explained how I thought he had brought life into the book after what was quickly becoming a stagnant run for Ron Marz. I explained how I felt he had developed Kyle Rayner into a more confident and competent hero, while fixing some of the more complicated subplots that were left unresolved when Ron Marz left the book. I also mentioned how I liked how the book was returning to the more Silver Age/Space action roots and how the Guardians and the concept of a Corps of Green Lanterns was slowly being phased into the book.
Well, this reader responded back with his own list of the problems he (a big fan of Green Lantern Kyle Rayner) had with Winick’s run on Green Lantern. And you know what? I agreed with every single complaint and every point he had about the book. I still like Winick’s writing, but I admit that his (the reader’s) complaints were valid.
Well, never one to shy away from admitting mistakes (especially if I can get a column out it) I’ve been thinking about the problems, from the view of a nitpicky fan, with some of the stories Winick has written for Green Lantern. There are so many nitpicks, in fact, that it would take a whole other column to review all of them.
Good thing I didn’t have any plans for next week’s column yet, eh?
So check in next week for The Nit-Picker’s Guide To Green Lantern..
Finally, I’d like to give a shout out to the good people at Kenzer and Company, publishers of comics and many fine role-playing games. If you’re into gaming, high fantasy comics or high fantasy comic satire, I highly recommend their entire book line which includes the officially sanctioned Dungeons and Dragons comic book as well as the acclaimed Knights of the Dinner Table books.
And I’m not doing this shameless promotion because you’ll find kindly old Unca Star’s name in the front among the names of other winners of a recent contest the company was holding in the front Knights of the Dinner Table Illustrated #19. I’m doing it because they make good comics… and because I always feel bad getting things for free, even in a contest.
Tune in next week. Same Matt time. Same Matt website.
