Posted on

Let the Crime Fit The Punisher: Analyzing the 2004 Film

Released in Spring 2004 to middling reviews, little fanfare and a lousy box office take, The Punisher is often seen as the red-headed stepchild of the Marvel films, not a good film by any measure but a distinctly vexing one, let down by a weak budget and an inexperienced director more so than being a complete fiasco. The tone, borrowed heavily from Garth Ennis’ seminal Marvel Knights run of stories, is wildly inconsistent, alternating between mean-spirited sadism and downright wacky slapstick comedy. Eventually, over-the-top ultraviolence and silliness overtake the sorry spectacle, and it’s remembered not as a high watermark in comic book film but a hiccup before Marvel Studios got their hand on the characters, and they started to actually get away from Avi Arad’s death grip. Still, there are many many things to analyze, most of which relate to the story and the choices made- some of them not good. Strap yourselves in folks, as we take a look at the very first (second I guess, if you count the Dolph Lundgren version) big screen adaptation of our favorite judge, jury and executioner rolled into one skull-faced package. Continue reading “Let the Crime Fit The Punisher: Analyzing the 2004 Film”

Posted on

Carousel: The Circular Nature of Comic Books

In the first season finale episode of Mad Men, Jon Hamm’s dapper Don Draper is trying to sell a version of Kodak’s Carousel home slide projector, which was ostensibly a product in 1960. Making a pitch while he rifles through pictures of his family and himself in better times, Don delivers a monologue so moving that even hapless Harry Crane wheezes tearfully from the room. He narrates, “In Greek, nostalgia literally means pain; the pain from an old wound. It’s a twinge, in your heart. Far more powerful than memory alone. This device isn’t a spaceship, it’s a time machine. It goes backwards, forwards. It takes us to a place, where we ache to go again. It’s not called ‘The Wheel,’ it’s called ‘The Carousel.’ It lets us travel in the way a child travels. Round and round, and then back home again. To a place where we know- we are loved.” Continue reading “Carousel: The Circular Nature of Comic Books”

Posted on

Teenage Wasteland: The Ultimate Legacy of Ultimate Spider-Man

Ultimate Spider-Man, by Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagley, ran for 160 issues from September 2000 to June 2011, of which Bagley illustrated 116 (plus change) of those issues, with a few interim artists and relaunches lumped in-between. It was a fascinating, widely beloved comic of its time that was practically the face of “Nu Marvel” and Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada under his regime, remaining well-regarded even today. Both one of the first “reboots” of a character attempted in the modern era, and not at all as much of a controversial gamble as revisionists would lead you to think, USM (as it has become known) explored Peter Parker in his formative high school years, along with his cast of friends and villains updated and refurbished for the new millennium. Extremely decompressed, the greater story spanned about two years’ comic book time over eleven real years and launched the eponymous Ultimate Universe, to become one of Marvel Comics’ preeminent series. It was a fan favorite, a top seller, and won numerous awards. And it had almost nothing in common with the youth of the day it was supposedly created to appeal to, nor has it had any real permanent legacy beyond being fondly remembered and kind of/sort of leading to Bendis’ creation of Peter’s successor, Miles Morales. That is all, of course, besides one important lasting influence that the series left on Spider-Man, one which may not have changed him for the better at all. Continue reading “Teenage Wasteland: The Ultimate Legacy of Ultimate Spider-Man”