Batman: Arkham Asylum was released for major consoles last week, and the reviews have been overwhelmingly positive. Even Yahtzee had quite a few things to say in favor of the game’s merit. I played the demo on my X-Box and enjoyed it thoroughly, and I’m sure the full game would be just as good if not better. However, these are times in which new entertainment must be balanced with things like square meals and reliable transportation, and so rather than telling my wife & cat that it’s going to be Ramen Week, I’ll keep us all happily fed and review a Batman film from Netflix’s Instant selections. It stars the voice talents of Kevin Conroy, Dana Delany, Abe Vigoda and Mark Hamill.

I’m a fan of the recent reboot to the Batman movie franchise. Batman Begins and The Dark Knight are equally brilliant and compelling films, especially in the usually hit-or-miss arena that is comic-book superhero adaptations. One of the best things about them is doing away with the camp of the 60’s TV series and the messes Joel Schumacher put on the screen. In some respects, I feel it’s a cue they took from the animated series that first premiered in 1992. It followed on with Tim Burton’s notion of an art-deco film-noir inspired Gotham City with long shadows, square-jawed gents, leggy dames and stories that were not only mature but well written.

Mask of the Phantasm is the first “theatrical” release the series produced and it showcases all of these aspects pretty well. A lot of it plays like an animated Batman Begins and while that’s not a bad thing in terms of content, storytelling or acting, it does have a bit of the “we’ve seen this before” vibe. That aside, the story about a Batman-like figure bumping off mob bosses while the Caped Crusader evades the police and a rather sleazy city councilman is decently paced and delivered with poise by the animators and voice cast. The highlight of it, for me, is when the Joker hits the scene.

Heath Ledger delivered a powerhouse performance as the deliberate, reasoned and completely psychotic Joker in the Dark Knight. He was unforgettable in his espousing of chaos and occasional dark creepiness. The Joker, as played by Mark Hamill (yes, that’s right, Luke Skywalker is the Joker) in Phantasm , doesn’t quite get that edgy but instead conceals his madness with a distinctive, almost constant laugh and a mercurial mood that is echoed beautifully by the animation. He’s no less dangerous than Ledger’s Joker, but he has more propensity for odd contraptions and lethal puns.

Kevin Conroy might be one of the best actors to play Batman to date, if not the best ever. The real Bruce Wayne, the public Bruce Wayne, and Batman himself have three different voices, and they’re not so dissimilar as to be jarring. Christian Bale should be taking notes. Batman’s voice is brooding and gritty without being distorted or ridiculous, Bruce’s public voice is light and carefree, and the real Bruce is somewhere in between. Conroy makes it sound easy, and he keeps us immersed in the experience of the story. He and Mark Hamill also lend their voices to the Arkham Asylum video game, which only increases the interest to a Batophile like myself.

At 76 minutes long and free of commercial interruption, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm gets us right into the action and doesn’t overstay its welcome. It suffers a bit from the comic book story tendency of leaving plot threads hanging at the end, but that happens so often in cinema these days it shouldn’t be a surprise. Since it’s available instantly from Netflix, you can bring it up through your web browser if you find yourself in need of lunch break entertainment and everybody else has gone out. However you watch it, if you’re a Batman fan, it’ll be time well spent.

Josh Loomis can’t always make it to the local megaplex, and thus must turn to alternative forms of cinematic entertainment. There might not be overpriced soda pop & over-buttered popcorn, and it’s unclear if this week’s film came in the mail or was delivered via the dark & mysterious tubes of the Internet. Only one thing is certain… IT CAME FROM NETFLIX.

Considering how tight money is for me at the moment, I neither bought new comics today nor the Director’s Cut of Watchmen last night. However, from the annuls of my LiveJournal, I’ve plucked the review of the film and am reposting it with a couple revisions to clear up some confusion. So, without further ado, read on.

The Dark Reign event is in full swing over at Marvel. In the wake of the brutal Skrull Invasion, Normal Osborn (aka the Green Goblin) of all people has taken hold of the planet. Tony Stark is on the run, deleting the sensitive information he collected as head of SHIELD from his brain one neuron at a time, and the Avengers are pretty pissed that killers, madmen and unstable people are running around with their good name. The X-Men, on the other hand, were largely staying out of the conflict, settling into their new expansive digs in San Francisco. With these individuals living openly comes the ignorance and bigotry of “normal people” and the combination leads to riots. Norman and his Avengers step in, and in order to control the mutant population, he turns to Emma Frost and commissions her to form her own team of X-Men.

I don’t have the entire story yet, as Uncanny X-Men #513 is probably among my father’s mail up in Allentown and the local comic book store was sold out, but here’s a breakdown of the team as I see them.

Emma Frost has quickly become one of my favorite characters in the X-Men comics. Previously her appeal to me was based mostly on her physical appearance. However, of late she has developed into a very deep and nuanced character, who manages to straddle that line between harnessing the essence of noblesse oblige and being a cunning and manipulative bitch. Once a member of the Hellfire Club and concerned solely with her own ends, the survival of mutantkind has taken the place of her former decadent desires, and so she’s been with the X-Men for quite a while, and has proven that the well-being of her fellow mutants is now what’s foremost in her mind. But a new pair of shoes never hurts. She’s the leader of these Dark X-Men due to her proximity to Norman Osborn, who invited her to be part of his secret cabal of evil leadership in this new era of the Marvel Universe. I highly doubt that she’ll let Norman dictate to her how she’ll use her team.

Namor, likewise, isn’t about to let this pencil-necked human with stupid hair tell him what to do. His relationship with Emma, however, is long and complex, and for a long time he’s denied the fact that he’s more a mutant than he is an Atlantean. Marvel’s “first mutant” and the first true antihero in comicdom is slowly moving away from Osborn’s cabal towards a higher ideal. Atlantis is in a shambles and were I in Namor’s shoes (provided he wore shoes), I would imagine that someone like Emma Frost will be better equipped in the future to secure the safety necessary for the kingdom to rebuild. There’s also the fact Osborn had the Sentry demolish an Atlantean population for political purposes, and Namor can’t be happy about that.

Daken is the son of Wolverine and is a character that puts me on the fence. I love the two aforementioned characters, and am ambivalent about some of the others, but Daken makes me want to hate him while also highlighting something very interesting about his father. You see, were it not for Logan’s developed sense of honor and strong loyalty to those who have earned his respect and trust, he would be what Daken is: a stone-cold arrogant killer. Both Daken and Logan are fully aware of their monstrous inner natures and unapologetic about the efficiency of killing those who oppose them, but Logan’s rage and ferocity are tempered with knowledge and training. Logan has chosen to be something more than just a mad animal and makes that choice every day. Daken is his father’s polar opposite and is interesting as a character study in that regard. I think I’d like him more if he wasn’t acting like such a brat and swinging his alpha male claws around as much as he is.

Mimic, along with Cloak & Dagger to a lesser extent, bring to mind days of Marvel past, not unlike the characters brought back to the forefront in the Annihilation event. Mimic in particular is a former villain who wants to make himself better, and when he is offered a spot on a legitimate team backed by the government, he jumps at the chance. I’m curious to see how he reacts when he realizes exactly who Osborn is. Cloak & Dagger have a chance to separate themselves from their pasts, which have seen them breaking the law more than once, but I find their story less compelling than Mimic’s.

Weapon Omega, to me, feels a bit tacked on. That might change.

Mystique. I don’t see her in either of the books I picked up today, but I know she’s a part of this team, and I know Osborn is keeping a very close eye on her. This isn’t going to end well, especially if she and Emma begin to work together. Hell hath no fury etc.

Dark Beast is a smug and sadistic jerk and I hope Hank recovers enough to kick his furry butt back into his home dimension.

That’s all for now. Until next week, you can continue to make mine Marvel.

The real world is a chaotic and disheartening place. Once again a steady stream of work has kept me from being able to get my thoughts out as expediently as I would like. The major flaw in establishing a schedule is the feeling one gets when falling behind. However, rather than allowing that feeling to defeat me, here’s a little something that combines Wednesday’s comic content with Thursday’s thoughts on writing.

Let’s talk about Iron Man and Batman.

It’s undeniable that there are similarities between the Armored Avenger and the Dark Knight, so allow me to get those out of the way. Both characters dress up in self-designed suits to punch out bad guys, act like your typical celebutard to rival any of the Kardashian sisters whenever anybody’s looking, and actually use their fortunes to undermine the more dastardly uses of their companies’ resources. Oh, and both maintain disturbingly large amounts of data about the other superheroes around them, just in case one of them does a face heel turn and decides that reducing the nearest city to rubble is more fun than saving the various kittens stuck in its trees.

This is where the similarities end, however, and while Batman is one of my favorite superheroes of either major universe, I’m still a Marvel True Believer at heart. The reason I prefer Iron Man to Batman has to do with the depth of Tony Stark. It’s something that’s existed for quite a while and only recently exploded into the mainstream, and it’s based on a different foundation than Batman.

Bruce as a young boy sees his parents get shot and killed, and as a result is driven to become a force of vengeance and natural justice. His wounds are internal ones, deep mental scars that border on psychosis. He’s badass, to be certain, but he’s also not quite right in the head. As the Christian Bale version says in Batman Begins, he “clearly has issues,” a funny observation coming from the same person who played Patrick Bateman.

Tony, on the other hand, grows up knowing his father and instead of being vengeful from a young age is genius-level smart. He carries on the family business of making things that blow up for the men & women who carry such things around at the behest of tax-paying conservatives, and it’s only after a brush with the dark and bloody world he helped create that he snaps himself out of a haze of booze, broads and Bentleys to do something about it. So instead of being a driven character that is motivated by the loss of family, we see a man who is struggling to change not only the world around him, but himself as well.

Batman has only ever been Batman. While this by no means makes him a shallow character, it does necessitate a certain single-mindedness in his character. His quest for justice in Gotham City may weary him at times, as he is only human, but as he doesn’t let a personal life or much of anything short of severe injury stand between him and his goals, he’s never out of action for long. There’s also the fact that according to some authors, Batman’s had ninja training, and we all know what unstoppable killing machines ninja are, even if Batman refuses to kill.

Iron Man isn’t made of iron. When he removes his suit, it’s difficult for him to be seen as heroic or even admirable. He’s an alcoholic, a womanizer, and something of an arrogant, selfish prick. And unlike Bruce Wayne’s public face, it’s less of an act and more of who he really is. He wants to be heroic, to live up to the deeds and accolades associated with Iron Man, but outside of the armor it’s all to easy for him to fall short of those high expectations. He’s a study in duality, even moreso than Batman, and that, to me, is what makes him so compelling.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the goddamn Batman. But Iron Man, to me, is a more interesting character and keeps me coming back to the Matt Fraction-penned ‘Invincible Iron Man’ title every month. There is, essentially, more to write when it comes to Tony Stark, and that’s without even mentioning his association with the Avengers or his own dark pantheon of villains.

There’s also the fact that his name is the cue for a Black Sabbath song. This is awesome.

I ended up being pretty pressed for time at work today, so instead of tackling two of my current favorite titles from Marvel, I’ll focus on just the one. Guardians of the Galaxy starts up in the wake of the Annihilation event, which introduced older characters from outside of Earth in the Marvel universe (the regular one, not any of the odd parallel ones) and made them awesome. I’m not exaggerating – the very first mini-series took Drax the Destroyer and changed him from an energy-shooting Hulk-wannabe resembling a lime green brick to a shirtless badass armed with a couple of knives and more attitude than Wolverine on a bad hair day. He doesn’t even wear a shirt when exposed to deep space. That’s pretty badass.

He’s a member of the Guardians of the Galaxy, a team of super-powered beings from all over the Milky Way brought together by a guy who has no powers whatsoever, Peter Quill (aka Star-Lord) in order to keep an eye on the goings-on in the greater universe and to keep things from going too pear-shaped. They’re kind of like interplanetary troubleshooters. Their roster is a fascinating mix of individuals, ranging from the most deadly woman in the universe (and one of the hottest) to a gun-toting wise-cracking anthropomorphic raccoon who tends to ride in the branches of a living tree whose got strength that rivals the aforementioned Drax. I’m not even making this up. Rocket Raccoon is awesome and if you disagree with that sentiment I’m going to have to ask you to step outside.

What makes the Guardians on the whole appealing to me is the way the stories, action and dialog remind me of the very best space operas of the past. Picking up the latest issue has a feeling that brings to mind the anticipation of a new episode of Star Trek: the Next Generation or reading The Cat Who Walks Through Walls for the first time. Since the Guardians are mostly adults, there’s none of the “Dawson’s Creek” feel that could occasionally creep into the Legion of Super-Heroes and the title delights in deep space swashbuckling and high adventure without descending into the camp of the 1980s Buck Rogers series, though there’s more than a little humor to be found. I mean, come on, a raccoon riding a walking tree! And did I mention the telepathic dog who used to be a Russian cosmonaut?

If you’re a fan of science fiction at all, or you like fast-paced action mixed with humor and diverse character interaction, I heartily recommend this title. And if you find yourself in desperate need of reading material dealing with sweeping cosmic events and visuals that will blow your mind – Drax’s final confrontation with Thanos for example – go to Amazon and pick up the Annihilation trade paperbacks. I hear Annihilation: Conquest is just as good but I don’t have the scratch to spare to pick those up.

If nothing else, you’ll come to understand how “I AM GROOT” can express quite a wide range of emotions.