Guilty Pleasures #45 - Spider-man: Homecoming

Time to go back to Spider-man in his third iteration of the 21^st Century. I took issue with the Raimi Spider-man stories, mostly because of the dialogue which has aged terribly. I also don’t like the direction they went with the relationship between Peter and MJ (although it’s a million times better than selling their marriage to the devil)

The Amazing Spider-man movies are less cringeworthy when it comes to dialogue but have issues when it comes to storytelling and tone, with the second movie in particular being too busy setting up multiple plotlines and attempting to establish an expanded universe, rather than being a smaller self-contained story.

Sony were knocked back by the ‘poor’ performance of the Amazing Spider-man 2, dropping its sequels and I have no idea what they’re doing with Venom. They made a deal with Disney to incorporate Spider-man into the Marvel universe. My understanding of it, beyond merchandise which is another can of worms is this: Spider-man can become a part of the Marvel cinematic universe. Sony are still responsible for making (and financing) the movies, but with Kevin Feige, overseeing it as producer, as he is with all MCU movies. Sony do not have to pay Disney for any MCU characters they use, but at the same time, Sony do not get paid when Spider-man appears in any other Marvel movie. 

So, after making his debut in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, Spider-man would be in his first MCU solo movie with Spider-man: Homecoming.

The movie was well received with a 92% rating on Rotten Tomatoes (average 7.7/10) and made $880m on a modest $175m (well, modest by Marvel standards) budget. Is it deserving of all that praise? Let’s take a look

#63 - Secret Empire (part 3)

OK, I’ve had a nice rest, let’s get back to it.

#61 - Secret Empire (part 2)

OK, let’s continue our look at Secret Empire. If you want to know what happened so far, go back and read my last review you lazy f*ckers!

Too far? That’s what this comic makes me.

#60 - Secret Empire (part 1)

You may remember a while back, I covered Steve Rogers: Captain America. Written by Nick Spencer, it featured a revelation: that in bringing Cap back from being aged, the cosmic cube (Kobik) messed with reality and made him HYDRA, thinking that was for the best or something. I dropped the book after 4 issues because of its pacing, which was far too slow for my liking, but then we come to what it was all building up to, Secret Empire

Secret Empire was not a smash for Marvel sales wise with numbers dropping well below what is normal for an event comic. Why is that? Well, I’m not covering 13 issues in 1 go, especially when it’s of this sh*t, so I’ll be doing it in 3 parts making this my first and hopefully only multi-part review. Let’s take a look at Secret Empire

We’ll be looking at #0, the Free Comic Book day issue, and #1-3

Marvel Month - Mini Review - The Avengers/Avengers Assemble

Next up in Marvel Month, it’s Time for Avengers assemble

I’ve already done a review of that, and a lot of my complaints still stand is it goes into *sigh* its 4^th season, that said I have seen improvements. But this time we’re looking at the other Avengers Assemble

Known as The Avengers in the US, the title was changed to not be mistaken for the British The Avengers, the Nostalgia Critic did his review on that and I have no unique perspective to cover it as I’ve never seen it, it’s a little before my time.

But Avengers Assemble was a massive gamble for Marvel, with a hefty $220m budget, a large cast and the pressure of being that movie everything was all building up to, this movie blew everyone away, meeting their expectations and of course, for Disney, who had recently acquired Marvel, made over $1bn at the box office, $1.5bn to be more precise. This is also the first Marvel movie I ever watched, at the cinema with my soon-to-be uni housemates.

But 2012 was a way away, does it still hold up, let’s take a closer look.

Marvel Month - Mini Review: Iron Man 2

Well, Iron Man 1 was a success, so a sequel was inevitable. Iron Man 2 came out in 2010 to critical acclaim at the time, however looking back on it people’s tastes seem to have soured towards it. Still it made $623m on a $200m budget so it was successful enough for Marvel as they continued to build momentum towards the Avengers. Here’s how I see it

Marvel Month - Mini Review: Iron Man

So, it’s been a while since I did a theme month in November, but here’s one

It’s Marvel Month

So, for this month I’ll be covering all the Marvel movies in the MCU that I haven’t already covered. Iron Man 3, Age of Ultron and Civil War have already been done, so I’m not doing them again. I also won’t be doing Spider-man Homecoming since that’s still a Sony product, just in the MCU (plus I don’t have any space for it) Logan and Deadpool I’ll try and cover sometime next year. Also, because since most Marvel movies haven’t been critically slammed and I don’t dislike them personally, this will be entirely mini reviews.

So, with that said, let’s get to where it all started with Iron Man.

2008 was when Marvel struck it lucky with the beginning of their cinematic universe, with a 94% rating on Rotten Tomatoes it remains one of their most critically acclaimed movies but not their most successful, it made $585m on a $140m budget, which was a good enough starting brick for the towering behemoth the Marvel Cinematic Universe would come to be. Does it hold up nearly 10 years later? Let’s take a look. And spoilers for a 9-year old movie will follow

Guilty Pleasures #32 - Next Avengers: Heroes of Tomorrow

You may remember way back when I reviewed Ultimate Avengers 2, a not particularly well received sequel to a better, though far from perfect movie that was Ultimate Avengers. I’m not going to review that movie. But there is a movie I am going to review and it came in the same collection. Next Avengers: Heroes of Tomorrow.

I don’t have a lot to say about this one so let’s just dive in.

4 Issue Test #21 - Nova

No blank variant again and I can't be bothered to edit a new one, so here's a sh*tty-looking variant instead

Nova was a title I picked up on a whim, I was not initially intending to pick up his title (the same goes for Ant-Man and Uncanny Avengers btw) and Nova does not make the first impression since he’s the hothead of Ultimate Spider-man. But I’m willing to give everything a second chance, so let’s dig into Nova #1-4

Guilty Pleasures #6 Iron Man 3

The Iron Man franchise was the beginning of great things for Marvel as their partnership with Paramount allowed the creation of a Marvel Cinematic Universe, which eventually cumulated into the Avengers.

But Iron Man sequels themselves never quite had the popularity of the first. Iron Man 2 was criticised for particularly its lack of Iron Man himself and its ending, where Tony created an impossible to synthesise element in a matter of minutes. Still it enjoys a 73% rotten tomatoes rating and made a decent $600 million at the box office, so a 3^rd instalment was inevitable.

Also note-worthy is that this is the last movie distributed by Paramount Studios. Following Marvel Comics Acquisition by Disney, Disney themselves handled the distribution of the films that followed this.

There are loud critics for Iron Man, despite its incredible box office performance, managing $1.2 billion at the box office, and its favourable 78% rotten tomatoes. I don’t consider this movie that brilliant, it’s flawed and I’ll be spending the remainder of the review explaining it. But for all its problems, I find, like most Marvel movies, it’s fun and enjoyable. So let’s dig into Iron Man 3 and discover all that it can be.