ACERBIC
TREATS: POP CULTURE CORNUCOPIA COLUMN OF CALAMITY.
Greatest and Worst Comic movies Ever, Iron Man
Review, and MORE .05.12.08
Welcome back to the column that keeps chugging
along, like one of those cars in the Disney cartoons that is dying
of exhaustion and requires the clutch to be pulled, only to strangle
said car. Seeing as I have shifted my focus on what I write about, I
decided an alliteration filled new title was needed, hence the above
awesomeness.
This week I thought I would continue to focus on
the NBA playoffs because what else am I going to talk about, as well
as TV and movies.
TELEVISION: THE OPIATE OF THE MASSES
The Primaries: Dominating the headlines, Hilary
Clinton refuses to just go away. There is an article on Yahoo.com
stating that Clinton is in this race partially because of her
popularity with “voters without college degrees…gun owners [and]
rural voters”. To summarize: Clinton exists only in this election
“race” because of hillbillies. Is that really who we want taking
part of the democratic process? These same hillbillies are the same
ones who won’t vote for Obama simply because he’s black. The same
article states that three out of every 4 voters exit polled, claimed
that race played a part in their voting for Hilary. So you have
stupid racist hillbillies. Forget the fact that Hilary is a closet
conservative (which is probably a good thing in their eyes) do we
really want someone running for the White House that the morons of
America chose to place in the position. I know my argument is simply
flawed because these same morons vote for the president as well, but
seriously, if your campaign stays afloat on the backs of the
democratic mooncalfs and simpletons of the world, you might as well
kill yourself. And drop out of the election. In that order.
LOST and THE OFFICE: This is how I spend my
Thursdays normally. I wake-up, masturbate, I get out of bed, go to
work, masturbate, trudge through work, eat lunch, masticate, go
home, masturbate, go to the gym, masturbate (there are some
seriously hot chicks at the gym sometimes), go home, make dinner,
watch the Office, think about how much better the show was 2 seasons
ago, watch Lost, masturbate, and think about how confused I am by
the preceding episode of Lost, go to sleep, masturbate. The Office,
while it is the funniest show on TV still, by a relative long shot,
it has lost some of its luster. The episodes have become more and
more bizarre with some characters becoming caricatures and evens
becoming asinine for the sake of just being strange (Toby hopping
the fence after touching Pam’s leg in the previous weeks episode and
then no reference of it anywhere in the following weeks). While I
still would love to have Michael Scott as a boss and work in that
office, the heart of the show as well as the realistic (that’s the
key word) and genuine humor of the show seems to me missing.
Lost on the other hand has continued to cause me
hours and hours of carnal passion due to the fantastic presentation
and constant “What the fuck just happened” reactions mixed with
understanding. This is the best season since number two, and the
giant turd that was season 3 (well 3/4 of it anyway) while terrible,
was wrapped up VERY nicely over the final few weeks of last season
making this many consecutive weeks of TV orgazmo. The episode
revolving around Sun and Jin get a special note for being fantastic,
and touching (not in the “your uncle creeping into your room” type
of touching, but sensitive touching). Lost is back on track finally
and I can’t get enough, although I still have no idea what the fuck
is going on…
The Office: B-, LOST: A-
THE SLIGHTLY LESS PRE-DETERMINED SPORTS REPORT
ROUND 2
Ok my predictions were terrible. Way off. As if I
were drunk. Or high. Or that I work for ESPN. But what the hell I’m
still here for my 2nd round predictions, and although we are already
a few games in, I will continue to provide the predictions as needed
for these series, because seriously does one game mean anything?
#1 LOS ANGELES LAKERS
vs. #4 UTAH JAZZ
One game means everything. Phil Jackson has
never, and Dr. Gonzo says NEVER, lost a series after winning game
one. He continued that trend in round one when the Lakers completely
dismantled a complacent and possibly buzzed Nuggets team, shattering
any dreams that Carmelo Anthony and his tattooed collection of
payroll wasters had of advancing past the first round. Carmelo
Anthony is the Tracy McGrady of the past few years. Except more
drunk. The Lakers look to continue Phil Jackson’s amazing feat after
beating up on the Jazz in game one. I expect game 2 to be no
different with Kobe receiving the MVP trophy and transforming into
some sort of all powerful super-being. Much like Gannondorf whenever
he is in contact with the Tri-Force. Utah does not have a prayer in
this series, but keeping that in mind, the Lakers better learn to
rebound the ball or they’ll end up at home playing with theirs.
Lakers win series 4-2
#2 NEW ORLEANS HORNETS
vs. #3 SAN ANTONIO SPURS
What a surprise that there were no upsets in the
first round. The biggest surprise took place during the regular
season when not only the Lakers the number one seed, but the Hornets
were the number two. The continued to play like it, dominating San
Antonio like an orderly at a geezer freezer. They withheld their
meds, strapped them to a bed, unplugged their dialysis machines,
took their AARP cards and then pooped on their chests.
Metaphorically of course. I was way off in predicting a Suns upset,
but the Hornets aren’t the Suns (as you can tell by the spelling of
the word Hornets). Chris Paul is an MVP in waiting, possibly next
year. Hornets win 4-3
#1 BOSTON CELTICS vs.
#4 CLEVELAND CAVALIERS
It took all of Lebron’s effort and 6 games to
beat a 43-39 team. Unless Cleveland manages to clone a Lebron army
from DNA on his sweatband, or they teach his 4 and 1 year olds how
to run the pick and roll (probably to a better result than most of
the Cavs), Boston will destroy this team. Atlanta took Boston to
task with just pure effort and thug-like ethics. They had nothing to
lose (except the series) and played like it. Like a geriatric (Tim
Duncan) after some little blue pills, I imagine Boston will
definitely be up for this series. Boston wins series 4-2
#2 DETROIT PISTONS vs.
#3 ORLANDO MAGIC
Detroit definitely was awake for game one of this
series, clubbing the Magic with snideness and indifference. You
can’t keep a superman down though and I imagine Dwight Howard will
rebound in game two quite well. But in the end, it really doesn’t
matter because the Pistons will take this series, setting up the
inevitable Celtics/Pistons borefest. Pistons 4-2
MOVIE RANT
I ran, man. I mean IRON MAN. That’s right…So Iron
makes $100 million in its opening weekend and I managed to see it
opening night. What do I think you ask yourself? You know giant
piles of shit that smell and are just covered in flies? They just
stink and you feel like vomiting not just from smelling it, but just
from looking at it too? It looks sort of green and red, that you
really hope isn’t blood, and is sort of runny too? Well Iron Man is
the exact opposite of that. This is a fan boys wet dream. It takes
everything out of the comic book and brings it to life in a
believable and awesome way. This is the closest thing to the comic
source material since the ORIGINAL Spiderman (not the shit that was
Spiderman 3). When it was first announced, I thought Robert Downey
Jr was perfect casting in just physical resemblance to Tony Stark,
and he blew me away with his performance as well. I always knew the
guy was a great actor, but I wasn’t too sre how he would take on the
roll of a b level superhero, but he actually makes Iron Man cooler
than the comic. Asshole Tony Stark in the movie was sweet, and a guy
I would actually like to hang with, not just because he is boning
Leslie Bibb, but because he just radiates cool.
The suit is sweet. The special effects are so
good you never question them. Gwyneth Paltrow was cute and
believable as Pepper Potts and Terrence Howard was sweet as the
future War Machine. “The dude” was great in all his Ironmonger
glory, except without a robe and without shades, and without long
hair. Except for that, he is JUST like Jeff Lebowski.
John Favreau loves this source material and it
shows. Solid movie, and very little to complain about. It is a very
fun movie, not really great cinema, but fun for what it is. All the
main characters are here. And keep an eye out post credits for an
AWESOME fan boy look into Iron Man 2. Seriously, probably the
greatest fan boy moment out of any comic movie. I could tell the
nerds in the theatre loved it because I popped a boner…I mean THEY
popped a boner…so I hear.
The only thing I worry about, and this is the
case with so many of these movies, is that after the initial
introduction story, comics tend to get very supernatural, and they
have been setting these so much in reality, is someone really going
to believe Mandarin or Fing Fang Foom? I mean the sequel is set up
to avoid this supernatural aspect, and hold true to one of the
greatest sequels ever, but at some point, these supernatural aspects
need to be included. How sweet would an Infinity Gauntlet series be?
That’s right, you may change your pants now.
IRON MAN: B+
To wrap this up, here are the top 5 best, and top
five worst comic book movies ever.
TOP 5
1. Batman Begins: How FUCKING sweet does part 2
look? So sweet in fact that I am applying to Hogwarts so I can go to
the Forbidden Forest and search for the resurrection stone to bring
Heath Ledger back. Every additional preview I see including the
joker makes me sad to realize that we are probably going to witness
the greatest comic to movie performance ever. All apologies to
Jessica Alba and Dolph Lundgren. Katie Holmes sucks though.
2. Spiderman 2: Everything is awesome about this
movie except the Spiderman unmasking. That was PURE gay. And Kirsten
Dunst sucks.
3. V for Vendetta: Hugo Weaving rocks. Natalie
Portman rocks. This movie rocks, except for the PC changes they made
to it. The graphic novel is better, but isn’t that always the case?
4. A History of Violence: Viggo Mortenson is the
man and Maria Bello is SUPER hot and doesn’t mind getting crazy
naked. Graphic sex and graphic violence gives me an uncomfortable
chubby.
5. Hellboy: Guillermo Del Torro is a genius at
making great looking, interesting movies. This is no different.
Hellboy was a surprise sleeper and the sequel looks great. It helps
that ron Pearlman looks just like Hellboy with no make-up on. And
Selma Blair is hot. So is Abe Sapien.
Honorable Mention goes to Superman Returns as
well as Ghost World for introducing the world to Scarlett Johansson.
To avoid further trouble, I will take the Forest Gump route and that
will be all I have to say about that.
BOTTOM 5
1. Catwoman: I was never a big Catwoman fan. I
only ever got her comics by accident. It seems as if they made
this movie on accident. This is one of 2 movies that I have seen
that made me so angry that I wanted to write the production company
to demand my time back. This movie sucked hard. At least Halle Berry
owned up to its shittiness though.
2. Fantastic 4 1&2: Both movies were terrible
with the 2nd one being a bit better if only because of the Silver
Surfer who was pretty sweet. What was not sweet, however, was
GALACTUS AS A FUCKING STORM CLOUD. WHO THOUGHT THAT WAS A GOOD IDEA?
People were telling me afterwards, “You could make out ‘parts’ of a
robot in the cloud.” FUCK THAT. I do not go to movies to take
Rorschach tests. I am nut a fucking psycho. If you want to make a
robot, make a robot and call it Galactus. If not, make a storm cloud
and call it Gay because that’s what that was. 3. Batman and Robin:
This movie sucks. Not only does it cast Arnold, and have nipples on
the bat suits, but it has Bane. Sounds cool right? Well they kill
Bane in about 15 minutes by unplugging his steroids until he shrinks
back into a 90 pound weakling. That’s right. If that isn’t a
cautionary tale for Arnold I don’t know what is. They KILL the man
who BREAKS Batman. I would threaten Joel Shumaker, but thanks to him
destroying the franchise, we wouldn’t have Batman Begins. So thanks
Shumaker, I stand at your alter, not knowing if I should worship you
or sacrifice you.
4. X-Men Franchise: Way to take arguably the
greatest comic of all time, and completely do NOTHING with it. Let’s
see: Apocalypse? Check. Sentinels hunting mutants? Check. Any
recognizable story line from the comics? Check. Not resorting to the
hackneyed Dark Phoenix storyline? Check. Not killing off everybody
at the end of the movie? Check. Yup, all those things are NOT in the
X-Men franchise making it the gayest series of all time. It is just
inexcusable how Fox fucked this up. How could they NOT have
sentinels? Or GAMBIT??? Why is Magneto infinity years old? And gay?
I love Ian McClellan but he does not scream Magneto. Casting
otherwise was ok, but the movies were terrible and had some of the
WORST ideas for characters ever. Did they run out of all the cool
characters? They just seemed to take ideas from Stan Lee’s drunken
rants (the same one who thought Stripperella was a good idea) and
create some shitty villains out of that? Where was Psylocke? Mr.
Sinister? Havoc? Puck for Christ sake??? ANYBODY?? This series is
shit and seriously needs a re-launch. How about just take the
animated series and make movies out of that?
5. Too many others to name: Comic book movies
suck in general, but have been better recently. I’ve got to be
honest and say I don’t know why the Hulk by Ang Lee was so bad? It
was boring, but it had Jennifer Connely in it. JENNIFER CONNELY you
heathens!
All right, rant over. I’ll be back
in a while to review Indiana Jones and GTA 4 as well as my updated NBA predictions. And I think Lucas owes me some money because
he may have adapted the story I wrote for an Indiana Jones movie a few years back for this very site. So if my lawsuit is successful, I’ll see
you all in hell. If not, I’ll be back here.
Doctor Gonzo is The Wrestling
Fan's resident alcoholic drug-dependent IWC superstar. As the inventor of both the Psychic Playstation 2 and the "Alcohol
intake" rating system, his various works have been
read here at The Wrestling Fan, along with 411 Mania.com
and Inside Pulse respectively. He was also declared clinically dead
two years
ago.
