Before
I start this blog, I feel that a moment needs to be taken to address
the tragedy that happened yesterday during the midnight screening
of The Dark Knight Rises. My thoughts are with the
people who simply wanted to go out and enjoy a movie with friends and
family. I haven't gone to a midnight showing in years, but it's no
different than going to a con or a concert. It's all about the
experience and having a good time with a group of like minded people.
It's just a sad day in general. So far there doesn't seem to be a lot
of finger waving or general blame games being hurled about. We
shouldn't blame the media, religion, politics, or any other standard
that goes up when events like this occur. This was the cruel act of a
very ill person and as of this moment I say we focus on the victims
and their families members. Let's focus on the healing....and
laughter is the best cure in my book so I hope that people get a
laugh or two out of this.
It's
been years since I've seen Batman and Robin and I'm starting to
remember why...because it is a bad movie. Sweet cream Jesus this
movie is bad and I don't understand why it's so bad. I remember being
really excited for this movie when it was announced since it was
going to have two of my favorite characters in it: Bat-girl and
Poison Ivy. Finally we were going to get some female leads again
other than Bruce's love interest for a change and the 12 year old
girl I was so happy. Than I went and saw the movie and I
honestly have no memory of how I felt when I walked out of the
theater. I remember being really excited and than it was like I lost
two hours of my life and than I went shopping my mother's birthday. I
just watched it last night and I can't remember what the hell
happened.
So Batman
Forever was a huge success so the heads a Warner Brothers
decided to fast track a sequel. Schumacher was quickly re-hired to
director, however Kilmer was not ask to renew his role as Batman
since Schumacher found him difficult to work with the first time
around. Schumacher also decided to pay homage to the campy Batman of
the 1960's with this film and even the actors on set found it
difficult to work under. Chris O'Donnell would later go on to say- "
It just felt like everything got a little soft the second time.
On Batman Forever, I felt
like I was making movie. The second time, I felt like I was making a
kid's toy commercial." According to John Glover who
played Dr. Jason Woodrue, Schumacher would sit on his crane and
before each take tell the actors that they were making a cartoon.
Comparing this to the Batman Animated Series is like comparing a
really expensive sport car to a rusted out school bus. I would rather
watch a cartoon than watch this again, at least the cartoon as a
plot.
People
have gone of to say some of the harsh reviews and bashing of this
movie stems from some the homoerotic innuendo in the
film, I honestly didn't see it has a twelve year old and has twenty
seven year old I really didn't care if it was there or wasn't there.
I cared that the story was lacking and the characters were boring and
I don't understand how they could be boring. Mr. Freeze is one of the
best villains in Batman's Rouge Gallery and he could have carried the
movie solo. Poison Ivy is a fun femme fatale who doesn't need a man
to do her work and let's not even get started on Bane. Bat-girl we
finally get Bat-girl and I hated her...they made my 12 year old self
hate Alica Silverstone. I was the biggest fan girl of Clueless and
they made me hate her. The actors have actually apologized for
ruining Batman this movie was that bad
Ok...so
we once again open up with no really build up, we're just thrown into
the movie with Batman and Robin getting ready and close up and butt
cheeks and cod-pieces. Not funny. God I can't even remember what
happened and I just watched it last night. So they go off to do
battle with Mr. Freeze and I guess this is their first encounter with
him, but for some unknown reason they have built in ice skates and
heat lasers and god this movie sucked. Mr. Freeze is supposed be a
tragic villain, he was trying to save his wife and was 'killed'
by his boss in a lab accident and wants revenge on his boss. Paul
Dini who wrote the Batman Animated Series episode Heart of
Ice admitted to crying when he wrote it since it was so
sad what happened to this man who just wanted to save his loved one.
This is the stuff that those Twilight fan girls eat up, this story
should make you feel sorry for this guy. Instead we get Arnold
Schwarzenegger tossing off one liners about cold and freezing. If I
had been running against Arnold for Governor all
my campaign ad's would have been clips from this movie and
asking the people if we really want this guy running our state. So
they fight Mr. Freeze and his Mighty Duck rejects and Freeze gets
away in a rocket ship....what the French Toast. I think I started
playing Triple Town at this point in time. So Mr. Freeze is going to
let his rocket ship crash and Batman says it will kill thousands if
he does, however Batman and Robin blow it up so I'm confused and than
I think there was some sky diving and surfing going on, the effects
are just really bad and not getting my attention. So they fight
and Mr. Freeze uses his freeze ray on Robin and than tells Batman how
to save him. Face-palm and I start working on a new high score.
We
than cut to South American were Dr. Pamela Isley is working on trying
to make an animal/plant cross breed so that plants can fight
back...and totally throw off the whole eco system I don't know what
is going on. She's upset that the project isn't working and she
thinks it's because her boss keeps taking her venom samples for his
own projects. She hears something from his lab and goes to see what
it is and it turns out her boss is using part of her research to
create super soldiers from South American prisoners and
sell them to evil countries. He turns one of this prisoners into
Bane. Well of course she confronts her boss, he asks her to join him,
she says no and he pushes her into her plants and chemicals thus
killing her. Ok if you find out your boss is capable of creating
super humans and working with terrorist countries than maybe pissing
him off isn't a good idea. Anyone else notice this re-occurring them
in the series. Confronting your boss or co-workers will get you
killed and sometimes give you awesome powers, but most of the time if
just leads to you dying. So when she comes back she is
transformed by the chemicals and venom and able to kill with kiss.
She burns down the lab and takes Bane with her to be her henchman.
Now
I really don't care for this version of Poison Ivy. I know the comics
based her looks off the late Bettie Page, but this is supposed
to be one of the really smart villains in Batman and she's so
annoying in this role. This lady teams up with no one and suddenly
she takes Bane has her lackey. She doesn't need them she's more than
capable of handling things and like I said we're not going to talk
about Bane, another very smart villain reduced to a very dumb role.
It was like they decided to take three of the smartest Batman
villains and make them stupid.
So
other stuff happens and we're introduced to Alfred's niece Barbara
and I don't even want to figure out the time line for her family
since Alfred is like eighty and she's only twenty at the most so how
old is her mother. I was more than a little annoyed at this change in
the story. Barbara is supposed to be Gordon's daughter and they
actually could have used this to show some relationship between
Gordon and Batman since the other three movies have forgotten that
part of the story, instead this sub plot is just shoved in for
reasons unknown.
I'm
sure other stuff happens, but I can't remember. I can normally
remember what happens in these movies even two or three days later,
but this time I'm just drawing a blank since I was so bored the whole
time. We'll just cut to one of the dumber scenes in the movie. So in
order to trap Mr. Freeze who uses diamonds to power his suit Bruce
Wayne is going to loan one of his family diamonds to a charity
auction and somehow he got Batman and Robin to attend. I'm starting
to think the people of Gotham know that Bruce Wayne is Batman, but no
one wants to hurt his feelings. Cracked.com did a rather funny video
about this so go check that out. The auction is going on and than
suddenly Poison Ivy is stripping out of a monkey suit and walking on
oily half naked guys and seducing the crowd with her magic pixie
dust. She than gets the guys bidding on her and than Batman and Robin
start bidding over her and I feel dumber just writing this...Batman
pulls out a Batman credit card. "Never leave the Cave without
it!" Really who the hell thought this was funny none of this is
funny. The 1960's Batman was funny, this is just stupid and boring
and it made my head hurt. Freeze shows up and is captured and tossed
in Arkham and I'm really sorry for H.P Lovecraft being referenced in
this movie.
More
stuff happens and we find out Alfred is dying....really where the
hell did this come from. It turns out that Alfred has the same
illness that Mr. Freeze's wife has and of course he has the cure for
the stage that Alfred has. But before they can go and talk to him,
Poison Ivy and Bane break him and and break the laws of Physics
by jumping out of the building and going at least a thousand feet
down. We're also shown a really out of nowhere scene with Bruce and
his new girlfriend. They been dating for almost a year and she still
hasn't figured out he's Batman. Normally they find out or figure it
out within a few weeks, but I guess Bruce finally got a dumb
girlfriend for a change and she asks him to marry her and he doesn't
response and why is her. We get no set up for her, no story closure
and no explanation of what happened to Chase. We couldn't even
get a one liner about what happened?
I'm
just going to skip to the end because even writing this bores me to
tears. The guys are still fighting over Poison Ivy, Barbara figures
out that the guys are Batman and Robin and despite being on his death
bed Alfred still finds time to make her not one, but two costumes
plus all the gadgets that go with it. This guy is devoted. So
they beat Poison Ivy and Bane, Mr. Freeze turns a giant telescope
into a freeze ray they beat him and than I fell asleep. I'm serious I
fell asleep with only ten minutes in the movie left. It was like my
brain shut itself down to cope with what I was watching and than I
woke up to the credits. No I did not go back and re-watch the last
ten minutes because I don't think my psyche could handle it. I think
if I could have watched this is group with a few drinks it would have
been funnier, but I was sober and my husband was playing The Secret
World and didn't want to watch the train wreck.
I
will give it some credit, had this not happened we wouldn't have the
amazing Nolan films we have today.
Next
time-Batman Begins and The Dark Knight
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