My Thoughts On Smallville

I'm a big fan of Superman. Always have been. Some of my earliest memories involve the first Christopher Reeve movie coming out in theatres (I believed a man could fly!).

But I never really dug the Superboy stories. For some reason, Superboy just didn't do it for me the same way the grownup version did.

I think part of the problem was that, even as a teenager, I didn't like teenagers. Maybe that's part of why I'm not as in to Spiderman and some of the other heroes. I like kids and I like grown-ups. In between, doesn't do it for me so much.

But I was excited when Smallville first came out. I've been waiting for a good TV version of Superman to come back on (yes, I said back on; the old George Reeves show was great) even thought I'd hated Lois & Clark and never really watched Superboy.

So when Smallville started, I was there. I watched that show religiously for a few seasons.

And then it happened. I noticed every episode was the same. Someone in town gets powers, someone Clark loves gets in trouble, Clark stops the person with the powers. I got tired of it.

I'll be honest--the formula could have worked. "Freak of the Week" is not an inherently bad idea. Shows like CSI and Law and Order manage to get a lot of mileage out of "criminal of the week" and we keep tuning in, over and over. The problem is, those shows rely on fascinating crimes and great performances by the guest stars. Smallville could never quite take its crazy comic book kryptonite freaks seriously, and our heart never seriously went out to any of them, or any of their victims. The stakes were never really that high, so our heart was never really that in it.

But I think it was more than that. I think the other problem was that a lot of us, watching the show, were looking for an origin story. Comic book readers almost never tire of slightly different variations of their favorite character's origin stories, and as we've watched all the different iterations of Superman's origin, we were interested in seeing another one.

However, it soon became clear that the show's creators didn't see themselves as doing any such thing. They were just doing stories, not a continuous plot the way we've come to expect from shows like 24 and Lost.

And no, I don't mean Soap Opera. Soap Operas (in America, anyway) are designed to go on and on forever. You put the characters through endless rotations--now Sally is in love with Charlie and Charlie is betraying Alice, but wait! Now Sally is betraying Charlie and Charlie is in love with Alice.

What Lost and 24 started to offer was a sense that things were going somewhere, and that your loyalty to the show would pay off as little things came to light down the line.

Smallville was pretending to be a show like that, offering little hints that Jor-el had a master plan for Clark, but that it might be an evil plan, or of Kryptonian connections in history, or other teasers that there might be something solid behind everything going on.

But, it was all just blustering. Time and again, the producers have let things fizzled, set things up and let them disappear, created one impression and then let something completely different appear out of nowhere.

If you're going to watch Smallville, and enjoy it, you've got to accept a few things.

1. The show is not, and never will be, a history of any of the characters we know and understand. This version of Lois Lane will never be the Lois Lane of the movies or the comics or the Cartoon. They've created their own version of Lois for this show, and this is not an origin of the Lois we know. Ditto Jimmy. Ditto Ma and Pa Kent (Since when was Superman's mother a successful politician?). But most especially, Ditto Clark Kent and Lex Luthor.

2. This show does not have a storyline running through it. When you're wondering what Lana's marriage to Lex has to do with the overall arc of the story, you're thinking about Smallville too much. Lana's marriage to Lex has nothing more to do with the story than any of 9 million stories where Lois turned into a monkey girl or Lois ran off to space that ran in the 50's had to do with the Superman story. It's just another week, another crazy thing they threw out in a writer's meeting.

3. The stakes are never really going to be all that thrilling. I don't understand why this is true, but it is. It isn't that they don't go big on occasion. The dam exploding in the Season Finale was pretty big. The big "end of the world" riot was pretty big. But it's just not going to be exciting. and things will always, always be back to normal in an episode or two.

My Prescription

First, you need to take some of the money you're putting in to doing special effects, and put it in to getting better directors.

I'm usually hesitant to place blame on either actors or directors for poor performances, because I'm never really sure who to blame.

But there have been some moments where things absolutely worked. So I believe there are good performances to be had from these actors.

And in many cases, the writing works. Riots are good. Exploding bridges are good. The writing in the scene with Jimmy and Chloe in the elevator was good.

But the scene itself fell flat. And I blame the director. I think Smallville is consistently badly directed, and they don't coax really great performances out of actors who have had moments of brilliance, but often let tension fizzle like a limp balloon.

And on a show where the final scene is always dependant on creating an emotional moment, generally between Clark and Lana, you just can't do that. You need directors with a solid ear and eye for tone, who can tell when there's no emotion in a scene, and who are demanding enough to call for another take and coach out the performances that are needed, then edit the solid stuff into moving scenes.

Second, they need to increase the stakes by introducing suffering. Suffering doesn't just have to mean death. It can mean heartache. It can mean abandonment. It can mean powerlessness. Start showing sympathetic meteor freaks Lex is kidnapping. Start showing poor people losing their homes to LexCorp. Start showing sacrifice.

And finally, they need to introduce strong, season-long story arcs. Let real questions be raised. Then provide surprising and exciting answers. Have people slowly develop over time.

Actually, you know what--that's not finally.

The finally is, they need to make us care about all the characters again. The fact is, right now, we don't.

Lana seems completely wrapped up in herself, pursuing a vendetta against Lex that seems primarily motivated by revenge. Boring. No reason to root for her.

Lois's motivation seems to be getting ahead in her career. Which, we know will happen for her eventually, since we know the future of the story, so there's no tension there. Boring. No need to root for her--we already know she wins.

Chloe is still the best character on the show. But what's her motivation? Nothing, really. She's the Velma of the show--she's around to figure stuff out that all the other characters are too wrapped up in themselves to notice. We love her, but we can't really root for her because she doesn't really have an agenda. They've been trying to give her one by making her a meteor freak--and quite honestly, that's probably the best element of the show right now. It's certainly led to the most genuine moments. Not quite boring, but still not great.

And Clark--well, Clark seems to just want to be left alone to work on the farm. Which, if you think about it, is about the stupidest thing to assign as the motivation to Superman. Would anybody have kept buying Action Comics if it was about The adventures of a super strong farmer who just wants to be left alone?

Of course not. They buy Superman--the story about the guy who will drop everything to go save the day at the tiniest hint of trouble, no matter how big or strong or evil the bad guy is.

No reason to root for Clark, either. If he got his way he'd be on the farm and there's be no show. Boring.

How to fix everyone's motivations?

First, Lana needs to stop thinking about herself. Characters who think about themselves all the time are uninteresting. Lana needs to do a complete 180 and become focused on one thing--saving the world. Only she can't do it, only Clark can. Lana's primary motivation needs to be pushing Clark towards any sign of trouble.

This would do two things right away. First, it would get the entire audience on Lana's side--a place where not all the audience has ever been. But she'd be pushing for exactly what the audience wants--for Clark to start being more like Superman. So they'd all agree and start being won over to her side.

And second, it would make her character become a motivator of action rather than a passive participant. It would make her seem strong. Give some life back to her, rather than have her be either emotional or brooding the way they've tended to do in the past.

As for Lois, she's the one who needs to be trying to bring down Lexcorp, not Lana. She needs to be fired from the Planet, immediately, and blacklisted with every newspaper in the city, so the question of how she becomes a reporter is a source of tension again. And then, she should start putting her resources in to bringing down Luthercorp. The audience will get behind her effort far more heartily than they got behind Lana's, especially since she seems more like an underdog without the 10 million dollar help.

I hate to say this, but Chloe is the one that, if put in real danger, could add the most real tension to the show. I hesitate to say that for two reasons. First, because simply making Chloe a damsel in distress would ruin her character, and second, because if they ever really tried to kill her to raise the emotional stakes, it would kill the show.

But the fact is, Chloe needs to start dying of this kryptonite poisoning. She can't really die, but her dying needs to be the catalyst for all the other action--the attempts to bring down Luthercorp, and to find out what's being done with all the other meteor freaks.

As for Clark, he needs to start caring more about the mysteries of where he came from and what his father really wanted for him. He needs to try to figure out all the Kryptonian mysteries and connections. They need to drop the whole pretense of "It doesn't matter what my father wanted, I'm a human now, blah, blah, blah." That was all just excuses to keep from answering questions. If he's trying to find the answers to the questions the audience wants to know, the audience will start rooting for him again.

So there you go! All the problems with Smallville, along with how to fix them.

Here I come to save the day.

My Thoughts On Heroes

It was obvious that Heroes this season was broken. Even Tim Kring's admitted that. There were some problems.

Part of it, obviously, was the strike. The season wasn't supposed to end where it did. They managed to get kind of lucky that there was some resolution, what with taking care of the virus and taking care of Adam.

But I think that there are some things the creators don't understand.

First, nobody likes Sylar.

Okay, maybe that's a misstatement. An exaggeration. There are probably people out there who like Sylar.

But nobody watches Heroes for Sylar. They just don't. He's not one of those love-to-hate kind of bad guys that brings us back to the TV, like the evil President on 24 or Ben on Lost.

Sylar is just unpleasant, and I never once, this whole season, enjoyed a scene he was in.

Okay, I take that back.

This season had exactly one Sylar moment that worked. When Mohinder was getting ready to go take the virus to New Orleans to save Niki, and he got the phone call from Sylar saying she was with Molly, that was a good moment. Moral dilemmas make for good TV, and having to choose between Niki and Molly made for a good moment.

Except that the producers didn't seem to notice they'd created a moment. From then on, it was like Mohinder just forgot all about Niki or anybody else he could have called to help him out with Sylar. He just trotted off to go find Sylar by himself, in a very non-smart, way-people-only-act-in-movies-to-make-a-plot-work kind of way.

That's one of my two big problems with Heroes. My two problems are:

1. The writers don't think enough.

Take Peter, for example. The guy's got like 40 different powers, including the ability to read minds. But this entire season was based on Peter being tricked by someone he didn't know, and who had no ability to block his thoughts from Peter.

The writers need to have a geek on call that they can call up and say something like, "Hey, we've got Peter in a hallway where he's got to get into a giant safe with a virus in it. What could he do?"

And the geek would say, "He's got DL's powers, doesn't he? He just walks through the safe door."

And the writers could say, "Um, yeah. That's what we though, too. Just checking."

2. They don't understand why we love Hiro.

I was discouraged by an interview I read with Tim Kring. In it, he said he felt the problem with the part where Hiro was in the past was that it went on too long.

Quite the contrary--there were two problems with Hiro in the past, and one of them was that we weren't seeing enough of the trials. Too many of them happened off-screen. We want to see Hiro and Adam use their powers and be clever and do stuff, but instead, all the scenes were them standing around talking about how tough the trials were. Show us more, not less.

The other problem was that it wasn't the Hiro from the first season. Hiro from the first season was just so cheery and excited about things, you couldn't help but get excited about whatever he was a part of. This season was "Sad Hiro" season, and that's just not the emotion we love Hiro for.

My Prescription

So if anybody cares, here's my prescription for how to fix Heroes next season:

First, recognize that some of the best moments are when you put people in situations where their powers won't help. Niki beating up that guy without her powers was my favorite Niki moment. Put people in situations where their powers don't help, and you've got drama. And don't cheat--make it obvious why none of their powers would work.

Second, realize that people like this show for the Heroes, not the villains. I know next season is called "Villains" and the temptation is going to be to showcase the nastiest folks you can think of.

Let me tell you a secret--the out-of-control bomb guy from last season was far more interesting and compelling and menacing than Sylar. Give us villains we're almost tempted to side with, not cardboard baddies like Sylar and Adam who just randomly decided they're supposed to kill as many people as possible.

And no, the girl with the black eyes doesn't count. She wasn't interesting to anybody, and Sylar fooling her into abandoning her brother was about the most unbelievable thing I've seen on TV outside of Warner Brother's cartoons.

Third, show the action. Build up to it, but then show it. Let Peter and Hiro fight. Let Adam get ravaged as he charges up the steps to face the trials. Let Claire and Elle fight it out.

Fourth, just accept that Noah Bennet now owns the show, and let him do his thing.

New Serenity Comic

Serenity Better Days #1 Comic Book


Yup, pre-orders are starting for Joss Whedon's return to the Serenity 'verse. All those tales he was itching to tell with his Firefly TV show before Fox proved they can't see past the edge of their noses are finally being told in the small sequential boxes of the comic book pages.


But if you're not interested in waiting for those tales, check out the ones you probably missed.
Serenity - Those Left Behind
bridges the story between the end of the show and the start of the movie, including such tidbits as why Shepherd and Inara weren't on the Firefly any more.

Even More G.I.Joe Casting News

IESB.net has news that both Storm Shadow and Scarlett have been cast in the new G.I.Joe movie, and with more people I've never heard of!

Scarlett will apparently be played by Rachel Nichols, who has never been in anything I've seen, but who was in 17 episodes of Alias, which I have thought about watching some day.

Storm Shadow will be played by Byung-Hun Lee, a hot actor in Asian films I've never seen, and that you've probably never seen either.

Taking the directorial reigns will be Stephen Somers, who has directed movies I have seen, like the Mummy movies and Van Helsing. The IMDB also lists him as the director of "The Revenge of the Mummy: The Ride," which means he should be able to put in a good word for a "Battlin' Joes Stunt Spectacular" show at Universal.

Just to round out what we know, the screenplay is by written by two guys who have the tough-sounding names necessary to credit such a tough-guy movie: Stuart Beattie and Skip Woods. Actually, Stuart worked on Collateral and the first Pirates movie, and some people think Skip is a pseudonym for Quentin Tarantino, so there is some hope there. But on the other hand, Stuart also worked on Joey and the last two Pirates movies, and some people think Skip is a pseudonym for Quentin Tarantino, so we could be doomed.

G.I.Joe Movie Casting News

Just a quick update on the casting news for the new G.I.Joe movie:

Snake Eyes, everybody's favorite lovable mute ninja, will be played by everybody's favorite lovable horned almost-mute Sith, Ray Park.

And the Baroness will be played by Sierra Miller, who, apparently, I would have heard of if I read more gossip magazines.

(Yay. The G.I.Joe movies are going to be covered in the gossip magazines.)

New Dark Knight Trailer Online

Yup. The new Dark Knight trailer is posted online all over the place.

It's got lots of things going fast and things going boom, but it's not staying up anywhere for very long.

Where's it going to officially appear?

Here:

http://atasteforthetheatrical.com/

JLA movie renamed "American Heroes?" I Don't Think So.

So this is how rumors get started.

It's all over the internet that the Justice League of America movie has been renamed "American Heroes."

It all started when Ain't It Cool News reported that Christian Bale was talking about the film (and how its going to be different from Batman Begins), and instead of giving it the name we all know, he called it, "American Heroes."

Personally, I think this is the equivalent of somebody interviewing Dan Castanella about the Simpsons movie, and him calling it, "Matt Groening's big dream project," and people thinking that "Matt Groening's Big Dream Project" was the new title.

The other possibility is that American Heroes is an international title. Remember how, in Britain, they used to call G.I.Joe "Action Force?" Same thing, I think. In fact, I'll bet when the G.I.Joe movie does come out, they will call it Action Force in the UK.

So don't sweat it. Nobody's going to change the name. Justice League it was, and Justice League it will stay.

New Dark Knight Teaser Poster

The new Dark Knight teaser poster is up over at Superhero Hype, and people around the interweb are pretty happy with it.

Are we?

Oh, yeah.

In other Dark Knight news, apparently I Am Legend is now the official movie to promote Dark Knight. Not only is the movie going to have the trailer for Dark Knight in front of it, but the IMAX version of I Am Legend is going to feature the whole first seven minutes of the movie--the introduction of the Joker.

Apparently, they're filming tons of the key scenes using IMAX cameras, so they're not just blowing up 35mm stuff for the big screen.

Is there any way this movie can possibly live up to all this hype?

I hope so.

Studios Turning To Fans For Art And Promos

Now that the Joker has sent kids all over the world out to take pictures of themselves in makeup, now other projects are trying to get the fans involved.

Over at the new Terminator TV show, they're doing a contest to design a poster for the show. They've got some .zip files of .tif artwork and photos of the characters from the show for you to use in designing your masterpiece. The top ten posters will be selected by the show's staff, and those top ten will be voted on by the people who visit fox.com.

And while there doesn't seem to be any prize involved, the Iron Man Movie website is looking for fan art to post, to be rated by the folks stopping by their site.

So crank up your image editors and show what you've got.

The Jack Bauer Action Figure

Yes, they're here. Jack Bauer Action Figures.

Let's check 'em out--starting with the most expensive Jack Bauer first:


"Real Action Heroes 12"" Jack Bauer Action Figure" - $ 189.95
From: YouBuyNow.com

This one's the big dog--coming in at almost $200, this 12 inch Jack Bauer figure is the serious one, for the serious collectors who want their Jack to look nice.

As opposed to this Jack Bauer:


"24 8:00AM Jack Bauer 12"" Cloth Figure" - $ 28.50
From: YouBuyNow.com

Which is cheaper, but makes Jack look more like a Ken Doll.

I think my favorite, though, is the cheapest Jack Bauer of all of them, from McFarlane Toys:


Jack Bauer Boxed Set Action Figure - $ 21.00
From: YouBuyNow.com

You can't pose this one, but come on. Aside from shooting Barbie in the thigh to get Ken to talk, this is the pose you'd put him in anyway, isn't it?

Win Cool Swag With Your Iron Man Costume

Speaking of Wizard, they're offering cool Iron Man stuff to whoever wins their Iron Man costume contest.

You can win what they're officially describing as, "$2,020 in Iron-y goodness, including statues, busts and whatever else is in our vast Prize Closet!"

They're opening it up to any character in the Iron Man universe who's ever donned armor, including everyone's favorite armored hero, Aunt May.

Check out the rules here.

Batman Vs. Snake Eyes

Of all the mythical struggles that will never happen, this one is, perhaps, my favorite.

What if Snake Eyes fought Batman?

Wizard did it's take on it a while back, and while the art was cool, I'm not so sure about their victor.

I mean, if you think about, Batman does have three advantages. First, he practices every night, while Snake Eyes only does occasional missions. Second, while Snake Eyes is a trained ninja, Batman is a trained Ninja AND trained in whatever else he could spend money on. And, he's got a more expensive utility belt. Since Snake Eyes's gear is military issue, that means it was probably overprice and outdated.

However, I still got to give it to Snake Eyes. Not only is Bat's "Ooh, I'm wearing a creepy Bat-suit" schtick not going to phase Snake Eyes, but Snake Eyes has almost every fight he has with other ninjas. Batman fights street punks.

Plus, you have to remember that when Snake Eyes is training, he's training with folks like Jinx, Kamakura, and Scarlett. Who's Batman training with? Kids in circus outfits?

I'm going to have to go with Snake Eyes for this one.

A Good Place To Get Punisher T-Shirts

Once upon a time, I hunted all over creation trying to find a good Punisher shirt. I finally ended up at a biker kiosk at the mall. I didn't even know there were biker kiosks. To me, the image of somebody who dresses that hardcore picking up his spikes off a fake wood kiosk at the mall across from the pretzel place just seemed odd.

But there it was.

Now, there's no need for you to hunt all over your town looking in kiosks. Check out SuperHeroStuff.com for whatever kinds of T-shirts you want. You can't go wrong with a good Punisher shirt, but they've got everything from Green Lantern shirts to shirts from NBC's Heroes.

They've got other stuff, too, like Superhero statues and Superhero graphic novels, but it's the shirts that are the name of the game at this place.

Go peek around.

New Joker Image Being Revealed

Okay, so maybe it's some other crazy guy with purple pants. Like, oh, I don't know. Willy Wonka.

But a new pic of either the Joker or Willy Wonka is slowly being revealed by the folks over at Empire Online.

Details on The Watchmen Movie

Be sure and check out the Watchmen movie website.

There are some cool pics of the set, along with some interesting tidbits about the set itself.

For example, in the movie the same set had to be redone to pass for years 1938, 1945, 1953, 1957, 1964, 1974, 1975, 1977, and 1985 (And you thought doing the three time periods for Back To The Future was impressive).

As for more on the movie, here's the synopsis from the website:

A complex, multi-layered mystery adventure, Watchmen is set in an alternate 1985 America in which costumed superheroes are part of the fabric of everyday society, and the “Doomsday Clock” – which charts the USA’s tension with the Soviet Union – is permanently set at five minutes to midnight. When one of his former colleagues is murdered, the washed up but no less determined masked vigilante Rorschach sets out to uncover a plot to kill and discredit all past and present superheroes. As he reconnects with his former crime-fighting legion – a ragtag group of retired superheroes, only one of whom has true powers – Rorschach glimpses a wide-ranging and disturbing conspiracy with links to their shared past and catastrophic consequences for the future. Their mission is to watch over humanity…but who is watching the watchmen?

The film based on the graphic novel is being directed by Zack Snyder (300) and produced by Lawrence Gordon (Die Hard), Lloyd Levin (United 93) and Deborah Snyder (300), with Herbert W. Gains serving as executive producer.

Playing the film’s core group of “masks,” the masked adventurers at the center of the story, are Malin Akerman (upcoming The Heartbreak Kid) as Laurie Juspeczyk, aka Silk Spectre; Billy Crudup (The Good Shepherd) as Jon Osterman, aka Dr. Manhattan; Matthew Goode (Match Point) as Adrian Veidt, aka Ozymandias; Jackie Earle Haley (Little Children) as Walter Kovacs, aka Rorschach; Jeffrey Dean Morgan (TV’s Grey’s Anatomy) as Edward Blake, aka the Comedian; and Patrick Wilson (Little Children) as Dan Dreiberg, aka Nite Owl.

Watchmen was originally published by DC comics as a 12-comic book series between 1986 and 1987, before subsequently being collected into a trade paperback. It is the only graphic novel to win the prestigious Hugo Award or to be named among Time magazine’s “100 Best English Language Novels from 1923 to the Present.”

More Dark Knight Viral Sites Go Live

So it looks like the people who sent in pics on the last round of the Joker's viral web-commanding have got a bunch of newspapers in the mail as a reward.

The newspaper is now visible online, here: TheGothamTimes.com.

Of course, the Joker's answered that with TheHaHaTimes.com.

The paper also includes links to various Dark Knight other viral sites, including RememberingGina.org, GothamNationalBank.com, WeAretheAnswer.org, GothamCityRail.com,
and GothamPolice.com.

There's a phone number in there too, 1-866-237-6480. You can dial 1 and leave a message.

Oh, and be sure to check out WhySoSerious.com/PersonalityProfile and see how high you can light up the ol' crazy meter.

Some Iron Man Stuff

If you haven't seen it yet, there's a few new bits up over at the Iron Man movie's official website. I know the jury is sort of still out on this one, but personally, I think it looks great.

In the meantime, Orson Scott Card, award-winning sci-fi author and writer of the Ultimate Iron Man series, has given an interview to Wizard magazine about the next Ultimate Iron Man series. It apparently picks up moments after the first book ended, which makes sense when you consider the first series ended one issue shy of what it was originally slated to.

Regarding Optimus Prime

In the subheading on this blog, I mention Optimus Prime.

I want to make it clear that there is only one Optimus Prime I am referring to, and it is not the Bayified Optimus Prime that served as comic relief for the "real" (yeah-right-chortle-chortle) heroes like Shia LeBeouf in the movie.

The real Optimus Prime is the one who rolled out of the back of the big ship, transformed in mid-air, and started picking off Decepticons before he hit the ground. Not the one who knocked over flower pots because he didn't know how to hide. Even though his main attribute is camouflage.

It's the same way there's only one Megatron, and he's voiced by Frank Welker.

And Starscream can talk. And Bumblebee keeps his pants on.

Just so we've all got it straight.

The Mighty Marvel Vault

Wow. Just . . . wow.

This is some box set.

This is more than just a comic book book. They're calling it a "Museum-In-A-Book," and it comes complete with the kind of stuff you'd expect to find in a museum of Marveldom.

It's got everything from a membership certificate for the Merry Marvel Marching Society to the oft-coveted No Prize (did anybody else try for one of these things and never get one?).

Like just about everybody, I'm as big a fan of Stan Lee's wonderful flair for promotion as I am of the comic book superheroes he created, and this looks to be a celebration of both.

I can't imagine buying this as a collector's item, because it would be just too much fun to flip through, but I guess it would be possible. If you ask me, though, this will be way cooler on your coffee table than that book of famous dogs through history your crazy aunt got you for Christmas last year because it was on the discount rack at the bookstore.

Excelsior!