http://megashare.info/watch-the-amazing-spider-man-online-TlRRME1nPT0
This movie is worst movie that just so happens to be the best at disguising itself as one of the most "Ok" movies of all time. And I would like the first say this: "We did NOT need a reboot of Sam Raimi's Spider-man!" Sorry, but seriously, this movie is nothing more than Sony trying to keep the money that they were getting from the first two Spider-men movies that it needed to do whatever it took, including appealing to the audiences that seemed to hate the first two movies for arbitrary reasons.
But let's get going and try to review this movie as a separate work (even though having the mere balls to make this a reboot of the greatest comic book adaptation movie there is makes it completely deserving of being compared). First, since you all know my opinions on the final verdict, I'm going to leave that and the real problems to last. Now, characters first:
Spiderman is the biggest dick in the universe. Gwen Stacey has a fetish for douche-bags who stalk her and her father disapproves of. Flash Thompson is a bully who grows and learns to accept Peter as a person and a friend. Uncle Ben is a good man and didn't deserve to die. Curt Conners has one of the biggest, out of the blue motivation changes there are. George Stacey (Gwen's father) deserved a LOT more character growth.
Now, I bet you are thinking, wow, that was the most opinionated review ever, this guy isn't professional at all. Let's go read Film Critic Hulk's stuff instead, which you should, it's really good stuff, but first, let me explain. Peter Parker does nothing in this movie that makes him look realistic, sympathetic, or heroic at all by the beginning and pretty much the entire movie. There are plenty of moments where he acts like he is learning, and growing as a person, but he never stays like that for long, instead going and doing another insensitive thing. Also, apparently Peter Parker is a wimpy, bullied nerd, but the first thing out of anything that he does, is get asked out by a very cute girl and he turns her down. Really, and I'm supposed to feel sorry for him and relate to him? And really, he stutters more than Shia LaBeouf
Then there's Gwen Stacey, who seems to think that if a guy is stalking you, he is someone you should ask to go on a date. Really? He shows up at the place you work without any explanation, then his uncle says that he has your picture on his computer, I'd get going in the other direction. And in case you want to say maybe she knows he's not really stalking her, I spent my years watching movies and tv shows glorifying stalking as a justifiable way for people to get girls to like you, so one year I tried that in middle school, no one I knew would let me live it down ever since. Girls don't like stalking, even when all you do is just stare at them during recess.
Now, to Curt Conners. Like the rest of the Spider-man movie villains, this was a good villain. He was tragic, he had motivation, UNTIL he pulls a 180 and decides to turn everyone into a lizard. They try to cover this up with having Curt leave a message confessing to his evil plans, but really? It feels 100% contrived and there could even have been ways to make this whole thing work. Maybe instead of a recorded message, you could have him try to turn another person into a lizard, and when they reject his offer he fights them and accidentally kills them. He sees this as a weakness on their part and decides to make everyone stronger, instead of this, for no reason, wanting to make all humans stronger for no reason.
And now Uncle Ben and Police Chief George Stacey. Both of these characters are actually really good characters, but the problem is that neither of them ever get any real character moments in the movie. All the Police Chief does is gripe about wanting to catch Spiderman and how Spiderman is a menace to the police and all Ben does is try to be a good parent to a bratty kid who can't seem to get his act together.
There are a few good moments in this movie, like when the mugger goes and kills Uncle Ben. It is a very different scene from the original Spider-man movie. In that one, the mugger was just a desperate guy robbing a jerk for money. In this, the jerk who gets robbed is completely justified in getting robbed, and the robber actually is nice to Peter, giving him what he was trying to buy as well. Then he drops his gun and Uncle Ben tries to be a hero and grab the gun from him and he accidentally shoots him. It's a great moment that feels very real (which is one of the only real moments in this entire film). Then there's that moment where Chief Stacey argues about how Spiderman is more of a danger to the city because he interferes with police activities.
Now, if any of you read my review of Rurouni Kenshin, then you know that I know a little about fight scene choreography and I have to say this. This movie has some of the best fight-choreography in any modern comic book movie at all. It's very good and properly demonstrates all of Spiderman's abilities, except one. Sadly, I have to say, this movie has left out one of Spiderman's most important super-powers ever, and I'm not talking about his web-shooters. I'm talking about his spider-sense. I mean, think about it, never in this movie do they really show Spiderman using his spider-sense. They have him use enhanced reflexes, but not his near-pre-cognition that was his trade-mark back in the day. In fact, he even gets tricked and sneak-attacked in the sewers, when in "reality" spiderman should have been able to easily get out of that situation by reacting with his enhanced reflexes.
Now, to what really drives home the problem with this movie, even more than how none of the characters actually grow or how none of the events in this movie make sense. It's the editing, the writing, and the camera-working. There are so many pointless scenes, whether they are too long or completely unimportant, that this movie feels like it would do so much better if the time used in this had been used to give many of the characters some more character growth.
All in all, this movie has a few good moments, but no where near enough to redeem its horrible lead characters and shitty writing. If I wanted to watch the origin story of Spiderman, I would have watched the Sam Raimi one
Sunday, October 27, 2013
Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Episode 5 - An Adaptation Review
First, I would like to tell you that I am not avoiding Amazing Spider-Man like I did with Spiderman 3, but rather, i am preparing to make this a very special review since it is the last in my Spiderman review Marathon and I won't be reviewing Adapted movies afterward for a bit. I'm doing a lot of research into the movie and seeing what other more respected reviewers have to say before I give my piece.
Now, onto this episode. This was a pretty good episode and I'm glad to see that the show hasn't dropped in quality since episode 3. It was a pretty crucial episode as well so I hope you all watched it. In this episode, information on a meta-human (a human with super-powers but no clearly defined origin story behind them) in china has been leaked to the Centipede organization and he's been kidnapped. Worse-yet, Skye has been suspected of being a traitor since the leak has been trailed back to the Rising Tide, Skye's own group of Cyber Terrorists.
There's going to be a lot of info delivered on this episode because a LOT happens, so to make sure I don't give you a synopsis instead of a review, I'm going to discuss the characters and my review first. FIRST, this was a great Skye-Coulson episode. We see the betrayal Coulson feels since he was the one who recruited Skye and we see the guilt Skye feels for betraying them.
The episode itself is very good, one of the best so far. a LOT happens in it and it feels a lot like a movie short instead of an episode with how well written it is. There isn't a lot of pointless drama, or bad writing, it's all done correctly and nothing is dragged out. The reveals are made swiftly so as to not leave us groaning or pad for time and there's actually a lot that happens. If this were a movie, this could actually be a main plot for it. Though a couple sub-plots would probably need to be included for the run-time and to make it work.
Now for the knew characters. Chan (I forget his full name since it isn't on the wiki yet and I am terrible with names) is a meta-human with pyro-kinesis. He can create, manipulate, and is immune to fire. He's a stage magician who wants to be a star, but he is forced to keep his gifts a secret because of SHIELD. Once again, just like the Gravity episode, we see SHIELD's attempts to protect the world being turned against them.
We then get the girl in the flower-dress. I forget her name but it was probably a false identity anyway. She seems to be our evil Lieutenant for the show, making many of the orders on behalf of her organization (the same centipede group as the pilot). She also has a hobby of making superhero names for people: She gave Chan the name Scorch.
This is actually lamp-shaded a couple times, both by a scientist working for her, and Coulson. The scientist herself isn't very special and since she dies at the end, there isn't much left to talk about with her.
Last is Skye's hacker boyfriend(or ex-boyfriend). He's a fellow Rising Tide cyber-terrorist, one who seems really cool at first but then appears lost and kind of pathetic (though not enough to make him detestable). He and Skye were still together during her work with SHIELD, which became a problem when he got paid one million dollars to leak SHIELD intel on Chan to the Centipede group.
The centipede group is still experimenting with the Extremis serum from the first episode, but this time it feels a lot more natural. I guess I shouldn't have been too hard on the first episode for it's molotov super-soldier cocktail, but I wasn't that harsh. In this episode, the group wants to use Chan's immunity to fire to stabilize Extremis's problem with bowing people up. It works, but it results in Chan loosing that immunity and getting burned whenever he uses his power. This leads to Chan going homicidal on the entire lab, almost even taking out Coulson and May as well.
Luckily(or rather unluckily for me), they manage to inject him with two more dosages of Extremis to make him blow up. I understand that this was natural and expected and I like how they handled it all with Skye's boyfriend helping to quell the damage, but I was really liking this Scorch guy and wanted to see him in further episodes. But oh well, it was nice knowing him.
Well, hopefully I did better than a synopsis with this review and you all are enjoying Agents of SHIELD. All in all, this was another decent chapter
Now, onto this episode. This was a pretty good episode and I'm glad to see that the show hasn't dropped in quality since episode 3. It was a pretty crucial episode as well so I hope you all watched it. In this episode, information on a meta-human (a human with super-powers but no clearly defined origin story behind them) in china has been leaked to the Centipede organization and he's been kidnapped. Worse-yet, Skye has been suspected of being a traitor since the leak has been trailed back to the Rising Tide, Skye's own group of Cyber Terrorists.
There's going to be a lot of info delivered on this episode because a LOT happens, so to make sure I don't give you a synopsis instead of a review, I'm going to discuss the characters and my review first. FIRST, this was a great Skye-Coulson episode. We see the betrayal Coulson feels since he was the one who recruited Skye and we see the guilt Skye feels for betraying them.
The episode itself is very good, one of the best so far. a LOT happens in it and it feels a lot like a movie short instead of an episode with how well written it is. There isn't a lot of pointless drama, or bad writing, it's all done correctly and nothing is dragged out. The reveals are made swiftly so as to not leave us groaning or pad for time and there's actually a lot that happens. If this were a movie, this could actually be a main plot for it. Though a couple sub-plots would probably need to be included for the run-time and to make it work.
Now for the knew characters. Chan (I forget his full name since it isn't on the wiki yet and I am terrible with names) is a meta-human with pyro-kinesis. He can create, manipulate, and is immune to fire. He's a stage magician who wants to be a star, but he is forced to keep his gifts a secret because of SHIELD. Once again, just like the Gravity episode, we see SHIELD's attempts to protect the world being turned against them.
We then get the girl in the flower-dress. I forget her name but it was probably a false identity anyway. She seems to be our evil Lieutenant for the show, making many of the orders on behalf of her organization (the same centipede group as the pilot). She also has a hobby of making superhero names for people: She gave Chan the name Scorch.
This is actually lamp-shaded a couple times, both by a scientist working for her, and Coulson. The scientist herself isn't very special and since she dies at the end, there isn't much left to talk about with her.
Last is Skye's hacker boyfriend(or ex-boyfriend). He's a fellow Rising Tide cyber-terrorist, one who seems really cool at first but then appears lost and kind of pathetic (though not enough to make him detestable). He and Skye were still together during her work with SHIELD, which became a problem when he got paid one million dollars to leak SHIELD intel on Chan to the Centipede group.
The centipede group is still experimenting with the Extremis serum from the first episode, but this time it feels a lot more natural. I guess I shouldn't have been too hard on the first episode for it's molotov super-soldier cocktail, but I wasn't that harsh. In this episode, the group wants to use Chan's immunity to fire to stabilize Extremis's problem with bowing people up. It works, but it results in Chan loosing that immunity and getting burned whenever he uses his power. This leads to Chan going homicidal on the entire lab, almost even taking out Coulson and May as well.
Luckily(or rather unluckily for me), they manage to inject him with two more dosages of Extremis to make him blow up. I understand that this was natural and expected and I like how they handled it all with Skye's boyfriend helping to quell the damage, but I was really liking this Scorch guy and wanted to see him in further episodes. But oh well, it was nice knowing him.
Well, hopefully I did better than a synopsis with this review and you all are enjoying Agents of SHIELD. All in all, this was another decent chapter
Thursday, October 17, 2013
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Episode 4 - An Adaptation Review
I am SOOOO sorry guys. I've been trying to make this review but work just kept piling up and every time I got a chance to post it, I'd immediately forget when I get to my dormitory. So, without any more hold up, he's my thoughts on this one.
This episode is pretty average. Better than the first two, not as good as the third, whatever. It's plot, An ex-agent and protege of Agent Coulson has been spotted committing impossible crimes that make her appear to have precognition. I quite like how everyone in SHIELD immediately dismisses Psychic powers, a reference I hope to the fact that all the note-worthy psychics in Marvel are owned by Fox in the X-men franchise. Instead, it seems the girl has super-advanced technolofy that's decades in the making implanted in her head that gives her an eye in the back of her head and x-ray vision. Also, she has a bomb in her robot eye with a screen that tells her what to do and where to go. And if she refuses, BOOM.
It's a nice concept, though the rogue agent herself and the guy controlling her aren't that interesting of characters. There are some cool events though and the ending leads to TWO plot reveals. 1. The guy controlling the rogue agent was also being controlled and whoever was doing that is still out there. and 2. Agent Coulson isn't himself, or rather, the agent Coulson we all know and love, isn't the same Agent Coulson from before when he was training the ex-agent.
This all brings up some great thoughts and ideas, but first let's talk about the characters. Skye got a little more character growth and her relationship with Coulson and Agent Ward has gotten a little more fleshed out, but this is surprisingly a Coulson centered episode. May got a little character growth as well, learning about teamwork and trust. Actually, rather than be a centered episode, this show is pretty much a SHIELD episode.
Now for the thoughts and ideas. Coulson has been collecting a LOT of old trinkets over the years and has an old military helmet. It doesn't look like its from Coulson's time, which brings up the idea, what if Coulson is a LOT older than we think? What if he's died on numerous occasions and has been fixed up again and again.
Not much has happened in this episode though so I'll leave it at that. I'm sorry for taking so long.
This episode is pretty average. Better than the first two, not as good as the third, whatever. It's plot, An ex-agent and protege of Agent Coulson has been spotted committing impossible crimes that make her appear to have precognition. I quite like how everyone in SHIELD immediately dismisses Psychic powers, a reference I hope to the fact that all the note-worthy psychics in Marvel are owned by Fox in the X-men franchise. Instead, it seems the girl has super-advanced technolofy that's decades in the making implanted in her head that gives her an eye in the back of her head and x-ray vision. Also, she has a bomb in her robot eye with a screen that tells her what to do and where to go. And if she refuses, BOOM.
It's a nice concept, though the rogue agent herself and the guy controlling her aren't that interesting of characters. There are some cool events though and the ending leads to TWO plot reveals. 1. The guy controlling the rogue agent was also being controlled and whoever was doing that is still out there. and 2. Agent Coulson isn't himself, or rather, the agent Coulson we all know and love, isn't the same Agent Coulson from before when he was training the ex-agent.
This all brings up some great thoughts and ideas, but first let's talk about the characters. Skye got a little more character growth and her relationship with Coulson and Agent Ward has gotten a little more fleshed out, but this is surprisingly a Coulson centered episode. May got a little character growth as well, learning about teamwork and trust. Actually, rather than be a centered episode, this show is pretty much a SHIELD episode.
Now for the thoughts and ideas. Coulson has been collecting a LOT of old trinkets over the years and has an old military helmet. It doesn't look like its from Coulson's time, which brings up the idea, what if Coulson is a LOT older than we think? What if he's died on numerous occasions and has been fixed up again and again.
Not much has happened in this episode though so I'll leave it at that. I'm sorry for taking so long.
Sunday, October 13, 2013
Spiderman 3 (2007) - An Adaptation Review
http://megashare.info/watch-spider-man-3-online-TXpFNE13PT0
Ok, remember last time when I said I was hesitant to watch this movie because it was terrible? Well, I was wrong. Yeah, this movie isn't really as bad as I or anyone else made it out to be. I mean, yeah it has its problems, but not nearly as many as say Spiderman 2. The problem is that after Spiderman 2 people were broken from the illusion and were seriously hoping for something better to win them back, but it didn't, so they hated it extremely.
Now, the movie is bad for a lot of different reasons and it actually does fix a couple writing problems that were in the last film. The problem is the moves they made to try an win back the audience (I'm looking at you emo-bangs)
First, let's talk about what this movie did right, since no one seems to want to do that. Unlike in Spiderman 2, the pacing and relationships felt a lot better, and the movie all around felt like it was its own movie, unlike Spiderman 2 which constantly tried to retread old grounds. They even made this movie funny sometimes and a good laugh is pretty hard to find in superhero flicks nowadays.
But, let's look at the new characters, Eddie Brock, Flint Marko, and Gwen Stacey, and see what was done good or bad about them. I'm not too fond of how they portrayed Flint Marko, but I was never that attached to him as a character, I never even read about him in the comics, but Gwen Stacey on the other hand, she's a huge let down in this film. Instead of being Peter Parker's lost love, they turn her into the destroyer of the legendary Parker/Watson love. She's made into some perfect version of Mary-Jane that she instantly becomes jealous of: She's a model, she's Peter's lab partner, she replaces Mary-Jane on her Broadway show.
Then we get to Eddie Brock, an up and coming photographer who seems to be trying to replace Peter at the Daily Bugle. He's young, up-and-coming, and seems better than Peter at his job.
And actually, to be honest, this actually felt alright at the beginning. From the way the story was progressing, it looked like Eddie and Gwen were supposed to be the knew power couple that were going to leave Peter and Mary-Jane with nothing and serve as the obstacle for their romance. In fact, the whole first half of the film felt great. It felt like a really well paced story with a great plot. Everything seemed to be going great. I didn't even feel that the number of enemies were too much either.
But then, emo-bangs shows up. Actually, the real problems started to show up when Harry made his second 180 during the course of the whole film. It just felt so forced. I mean, Mary-Jane kisses him, then she runs out of the house, then he starts hearing his father's ghost and remembers everything that he lost during his amnesia? Also, William Dafoe, what are you doing here? At the end of Spiderman 2 you just acted like a representation of Harry's anger and angst, but now he's saying stuff that only the Green Goblin would know to say. As if he was really a ghost and not Harry getting crazy. And that doesn't make any sense.
Then he starts making Peter emo and ruining the whole film. Peter starts doing his stupid strut through the city, he does that ridiculous number at the jazz club, and he goes all dark avenger on Harry. I get that the suit was making him act this way, but does it really need to make Peter Parker a douche? Really?
Well, the second half itself isn't entirely bad. I did like the scene where Peter reveals Eddie for the lying tool he really is, but they ruin that by making Peter act like a douche to Jonah. The scene where Peter starts a fight in Mary-Jane's club and accidentally hits her is great too, though it is overshadowed by him acting like a douche in the scene before it. The entire douche-ness is the real problem of the movie, and that, coupled with Harry's out of the blue 180 is what makes this movie bad.
They actually had a really good movie here, even the ending was good. I laughed pretty hard during the scene where Jonah gets conned by a little kid when he's trying to get some footage of the crime scene. Though I wished they followed with the beautiful art scene caps from the last movie, like they did during Spiderman 2, instead of these photo scene-cuts. It feels a lot lazier.
All in all, this movie isn't that bad. The camera work isn't nearly as good as the last two, which saddens me, but that doesn't mean there aren't some good shots. But there's a lesson that can be learned from this movie: DON"T MAKE DOUCHE-BAGS OUT OF YOUR PROTAGONISTS!
Now, next week I'll be reviewing The Amazing Spiderman, one of my least favorite Comic book movies ever. Right next to The Dark Knight Rises and X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
Ok, remember last time when I said I was hesitant to watch this movie because it was terrible? Well, I was wrong. Yeah, this movie isn't really as bad as I or anyone else made it out to be. I mean, yeah it has its problems, but not nearly as many as say Spiderman 2. The problem is that after Spiderman 2 people were broken from the illusion and were seriously hoping for something better to win them back, but it didn't, so they hated it extremely.
Now, the movie is bad for a lot of different reasons and it actually does fix a couple writing problems that were in the last film. The problem is the moves they made to try an win back the audience (I'm looking at you emo-bangs)
First, let's talk about what this movie did right, since no one seems to want to do that. Unlike in Spiderman 2, the pacing and relationships felt a lot better, and the movie all around felt like it was its own movie, unlike Spiderman 2 which constantly tried to retread old grounds. They even made this movie funny sometimes and a good laugh is pretty hard to find in superhero flicks nowadays.
But, let's look at the new characters, Eddie Brock, Flint Marko, and Gwen Stacey, and see what was done good or bad about them. I'm not too fond of how they portrayed Flint Marko, but I was never that attached to him as a character, I never even read about him in the comics, but Gwen Stacey on the other hand, she's a huge let down in this film. Instead of being Peter Parker's lost love, they turn her into the destroyer of the legendary Parker/Watson love. She's made into some perfect version of Mary-Jane that she instantly becomes jealous of: She's a model, she's Peter's lab partner, she replaces Mary-Jane on her Broadway show.
Then we get to Eddie Brock, an up and coming photographer who seems to be trying to replace Peter at the Daily Bugle. He's young, up-and-coming, and seems better than Peter at his job.
And actually, to be honest, this actually felt alright at the beginning. From the way the story was progressing, it looked like Eddie and Gwen were supposed to be the knew power couple that were going to leave Peter and Mary-Jane with nothing and serve as the obstacle for their romance. In fact, the whole first half of the film felt great. It felt like a really well paced story with a great plot. Everything seemed to be going great. I didn't even feel that the number of enemies were too much either.
But then, emo-bangs shows up. Actually, the real problems started to show up when Harry made his second 180 during the course of the whole film. It just felt so forced. I mean, Mary-Jane kisses him, then she runs out of the house, then he starts hearing his father's ghost and remembers everything that he lost during his amnesia? Also, William Dafoe, what are you doing here? At the end of Spiderman 2 you just acted like a representation of Harry's anger and angst, but now he's saying stuff that only the Green Goblin would know to say. As if he was really a ghost and not Harry getting crazy. And that doesn't make any sense.
Then he starts making Peter emo and ruining the whole film. Peter starts doing his stupid strut through the city, he does that ridiculous number at the jazz club, and he goes all dark avenger on Harry. I get that the suit was making him act this way, but does it really need to make Peter Parker a douche? Really?
Well, the second half itself isn't entirely bad. I did like the scene where Peter reveals Eddie for the lying tool he really is, but they ruin that by making Peter act like a douche to Jonah. The scene where Peter starts a fight in Mary-Jane's club and accidentally hits her is great too, though it is overshadowed by him acting like a douche in the scene before it. The entire douche-ness is the real problem of the movie, and that, coupled with Harry's out of the blue 180 is what makes this movie bad.
They actually had a really good movie here, even the ending was good. I laughed pretty hard during the scene where Jonah gets conned by a little kid when he's trying to get some footage of the crime scene. Though I wished they followed with the beautiful art scene caps from the last movie, like they did during Spiderman 2, instead of these photo scene-cuts. It feels a lot lazier.
All in all, this movie isn't that bad. The camera work isn't nearly as good as the last two, which saddens me, but that doesn't mean there aren't some good shots. But there's a lesson that can be learned from this movie: DON"T MAKE DOUCHE-BAGS OUT OF YOUR PROTAGONISTS!
Now, next week I'll be reviewing The Amazing Spiderman, one of my least favorite Comic book movies ever. Right next to The Dark Knight Rises and X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Episode 3 - An Adaptation Review
First, I greatly apologies for the late reviews. My internet has been down so I never got a chance to re-watch Spiderman 3 and yesterday my workload prevented me from putting out a review of Agents of SHIELD right away afterward like I normally do. I will get around to reviewing the Spiderman movies some more but some other time (My hesitation also stems to the fact that Spiderman 3 is just crap and I reeeeeeaaaaaally don't want to watch it. I'm hoping one of my flatmates will agree to watch it with me.)
Now onto the review.
This episode is by far the best episode so far, but with the waist that was the last one and the weak opening that was the first, you really can't expect much in the form of shocking improvement. But I still say that this episode is really good.
WARNING: Major spoilers of this episode, sorry but I already gave my grade for it so let's go on ahead. First, let's give a plot synopsis: A very talented scientist held in protection by SHIELD has been kidnaped and investigation has led them to believe that he has been taken to Malta and is outside of SHIELD's jurisdiction. So they send Skye in as a mole during a party of his and she sneaks them in to get the scientist out.
Now the two new characters. The kidnapped scientist is named Dr. Franklin Hall, played by Ian Hart, and his kidnapper, is Ian Quinn, an old college buddy of his who is played by David Conrad. Franklin is a very smart scientist who actually taught Fritz and Simmons back in their days as students. He is also quickly becoming a very close favorite of mine. I soon discovered that Hall is actually a character from the comic books who goes by the names Gravitron. He seems to be a much different character this time around though and I like the transformation here.
There isn't much to say about Ian Quinn except for him being a selfish mineral digger who hates being confided by international regulation. He takes an old research theory that Hall made when they were drunk in college and actually got a prototype working and he "rescues" Hall from SHIELD custody because he wants him to work for him.
Here's were I really start to like Hall's character. Hall accepts Quinn's proposal, but only so that he can use the machine to kill Quinn and his entire complex. The machine uses an incredibly rare element called "Gravitonium" (I might have botched the spelling but who cares really) that can manipulate gravity. Coulson gets down to the lab and tries to save Hall but is surprised when he learns Hall's plans. Fritz and Simmons tell him he needs to use a catalyst to shut down the Gravitonium and the machine. Left with no other option, Coulson sends Hall into the Gravitonium and kills him and the machine.
The episode ends with Hall's hand reaching out of the Gravitonium and signaling for the coming of the first super villain of the show.
Now for the character development. This is really a Skye centered episode more than anything. They play the whole "can-we-trust-skye" thing again, though it's the third episode so I can let it slide, especially since it's the first time it was used so majorly. She's genuinely getting to care for the team and the mission also, and her relationship with Agent Ward is getting closer. I predict that by the end of the season their feelings are going to get full circle.
I like the debate on government power in this episode also, since neither side is painted in the 100% right. SHIELD is fighting to help people but their aren't exactly doing a 100% good job at it since their attempt to create infinite clean energy caused an alien invasion, but if men like Quinn get away with this then the world would be even worse. Really it's not that SHIELD are the good guys, it's Coulson's team that are the good guys.
Now for some predictions: Coulson is loosing a lot of his "muscle memory" lately and it could be a sign that he has a new body, which works with the LMB theory that he did die in the Avengers and this is a new Coulson body. I very much like this idea because LMDs are really just a plot device as of now and it would be great to have a character who is specifically a LMD.
That's it folks, see ya later, hopefully I'll have a review of Spiderman 3 next weekend.
Now onto the review.
This episode is by far the best episode so far, but with the waist that was the last one and the weak opening that was the first, you really can't expect much in the form of shocking improvement. But I still say that this episode is really good.
WARNING: Major spoilers of this episode, sorry but I already gave my grade for it so let's go on ahead. First, let's give a plot synopsis: A very talented scientist held in protection by SHIELD has been kidnaped and investigation has led them to believe that he has been taken to Malta and is outside of SHIELD's jurisdiction. So they send Skye in as a mole during a party of his and she sneaks them in to get the scientist out.
Now the two new characters. The kidnapped scientist is named Dr. Franklin Hall, played by Ian Hart, and his kidnapper, is Ian Quinn, an old college buddy of his who is played by David Conrad. Franklin is a very smart scientist who actually taught Fritz and Simmons back in their days as students. He is also quickly becoming a very close favorite of mine. I soon discovered that Hall is actually a character from the comic books who goes by the names Gravitron. He seems to be a much different character this time around though and I like the transformation here.
There isn't much to say about Ian Quinn except for him being a selfish mineral digger who hates being confided by international regulation. He takes an old research theory that Hall made when they were drunk in college and actually got a prototype working and he "rescues" Hall from SHIELD custody because he wants him to work for him.
Here's were I really start to like Hall's character. Hall accepts Quinn's proposal, but only so that he can use the machine to kill Quinn and his entire complex. The machine uses an incredibly rare element called "Gravitonium" (I might have botched the spelling but who cares really) that can manipulate gravity. Coulson gets down to the lab and tries to save Hall but is surprised when he learns Hall's plans. Fritz and Simmons tell him he needs to use a catalyst to shut down the Gravitonium and the machine. Left with no other option, Coulson sends Hall into the Gravitonium and kills him and the machine.
The episode ends with Hall's hand reaching out of the Gravitonium and signaling for the coming of the first super villain of the show.
Now for the character development. This is really a Skye centered episode more than anything. They play the whole "can-we-trust-skye" thing again, though it's the third episode so I can let it slide, especially since it's the first time it was used so majorly. She's genuinely getting to care for the team and the mission also, and her relationship with Agent Ward is getting closer. I predict that by the end of the season their feelings are going to get full circle.
I like the debate on government power in this episode also, since neither side is painted in the 100% right. SHIELD is fighting to help people but their aren't exactly doing a 100% good job at it since their attempt to create infinite clean energy caused an alien invasion, but if men like Quinn get away with this then the world would be even worse. Really it's not that SHIELD are the good guys, it's Coulson's team that are the good guys.
Now for some predictions: Coulson is loosing a lot of his "muscle memory" lately and it could be a sign that he has a new body, which works with the LMB theory that he did die in the Avengers and this is a new Coulson body. I very much like this idea because LMDs are really just a plot device as of now and it would be great to have a character who is specifically a LMD.
That's it folks, see ya later, hopefully I'll have a review of Spiderman 3 next weekend.
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Episode 2 - An Adaptation Review
Ok, to start things off, I HATE the "How we got there" trope in television. It is so cheep and overdone and does nothing but pad time and trick the audience into trying to figure out what happened. Now, as the show was going, I was actually thinking this might work, that it was going to use time travel. Since the new artifact they discovered is some kind of machine built with technology from all over time. The first thing they say is that the artifact is millions of years older that the ancient ruins it was in (I'm probably misquoting, but it was basically saying that it was older than the place it was in.)
This made me wonder if they were dealing with some kind of nazi german time machine, but no, instead we get a super laser weapon that the peruvian government secretly built with escaped Nazi scientists back years ago. Really?
But anyway, I guess this is what I get for expecting something new out of a crime drama. It seems they are all the same. overused plot tropes. easily identifiable character tropes. Though I do like the constant inclusion of world events the show is giving us. I mean, the first episode starts by pulling Agent Ward out from somewhere in Europe (I forget where, no one was talking that much and it took only a few minutes) and now we head over to Peru, even though half the episode is actually involved in the plane.
Now let's talk about character development. Skye and Agent Ward seem to be building more of a relationship, which was obvious from the start, but what I like about this is that they seem to be arguing mostly about their own ethics and don't genuinely act like children in this episode. Ward is speaking from the side of someone who has protected the country from threats for a while and has made sure not to let anyone know and he sees Sky as dangerous because of that. Skye sees Ward as dangerous because of what he does and she tries to protect people by showing them what is the truth. There's no one great evil here, both have reasonable sides and I like how it is developing.
What I worry though is Skye's group, Rising Tide, hasn't chosen it's side though and is showing sides of being evil. Especially during her talk of what they believe in. I don't know why, but when she mentioned how Rising Tide is all about taking pieces of ideas from everyone and using it all to form a single idea, really fits with the Centipede project done by the evil organization last episode where they took technology from every movie series in this franchise and put it all together. So it is probably going to be revealed that Rising Tide is the bad guys.
I also fear that maybe Ward or Skye will just end up siding with the other's ideology and there won't be any dynamic anymore. There isn't a single right side things.
Also, Fitz and Simmons got some new character development. It seemed Simmons dragged Fitz on board this team and Fitz doesn't seem that happy about it. He seems to have a lot of signs of having strong OCD, such as in the last episode where he didn't like touching anything in the crime scene. And in this episode, where he almost cost his team their lives when he started freaking out over the order of placement for his flying drones.
We see more of Melinda May's combat experience as well, learning that they used to call her the Cavalry and she seems to be just as good as Black Widow.
It is also brought to question why Coulson put together this team with so many rookies and inexperienced officers. The antagonist of this episode even says he's having a mid-life, or as Coulson puts it, and after-life crisis. Coulson seems to see a lot of potential for them all and I'm looking forward to their progression. Some of his backstory was presented in this episode as well, showing that he used to serve alongside the antagonist and that they had a romantic relationship back in the day.
Now for a little speculation: Agent Coulson as a LMD. I'd LOVE it if this happened. It would be so cool to introduce a new addition from the original Marvel mythos to the Movie Universe. I'm hoping that maybe Fitz might improve on his flying drones and create his own combat technology, like his own Iron Man suit. and who knows, if he gets popular enough, he might make an addition to the Iron Man cast like Coulson did.
I'm really interested to see how Thor 2 is going to play with Agents of SHIELD when it happens? Is Whedon going to make the episodes before and after the showing of Thor 2 connect to it in some way?
Also, I heard that they were doing end-credit clips like in the movies, so I went to take a look and really? the only thing you could think of was just have Nick Fury start yelling at Coulson for smashing a plane? They couldn't have done anything involving plot development wise?
I'm still keeping up with the series since I love the idea of the project, but this might be my least favorite episode in the season.
This made me wonder if they were dealing with some kind of nazi german time machine, but no, instead we get a super laser weapon that the peruvian government secretly built with escaped Nazi scientists back years ago. Really?
But anyway, I guess this is what I get for expecting something new out of a crime drama. It seems they are all the same. overused plot tropes. easily identifiable character tropes. Though I do like the constant inclusion of world events the show is giving us. I mean, the first episode starts by pulling Agent Ward out from somewhere in Europe (I forget where, no one was talking that much and it took only a few minutes) and now we head over to Peru, even though half the episode is actually involved in the plane.
Now let's talk about character development. Skye and Agent Ward seem to be building more of a relationship, which was obvious from the start, but what I like about this is that they seem to be arguing mostly about their own ethics and don't genuinely act like children in this episode. Ward is speaking from the side of someone who has protected the country from threats for a while and has made sure not to let anyone know and he sees Sky as dangerous because of that. Skye sees Ward as dangerous because of what he does and she tries to protect people by showing them what is the truth. There's no one great evil here, both have reasonable sides and I like how it is developing.
What I worry though is Skye's group, Rising Tide, hasn't chosen it's side though and is showing sides of being evil. Especially during her talk of what they believe in. I don't know why, but when she mentioned how Rising Tide is all about taking pieces of ideas from everyone and using it all to form a single idea, really fits with the Centipede project done by the evil organization last episode where they took technology from every movie series in this franchise and put it all together. So it is probably going to be revealed that Rising Tide is the bad guys.
I also fear that maybe Ward or Skye will just end up siding with the other's ideology and there won't be any dynamic anymore. There isn't a single right side things.
Also, Fitz and Simmons got some new character development. It seemed Simmons dragged Fitz on board this team and Fitz doesn't seem that happy about it. He seems to have a lot of signs of having strong OCD, such as in the last episode where he didn't like touching anything in the crime scene. And in this episode, where he almost cost his team their lives when he started freaking out over the order of placement for his flying drones.
We see more of Melinda May's combat experience as well, learning that they used to call her the Cavalry and she seems to be just as good as Black Widow.
It is also brought to question why Coulson put together this team with so many rookies and inexperienced officers. The antagonist of this episode even says he's having a mid-life, or as Coulson puts it, and after-life crisis. Coulson seems to see a lot of potential for them all and I'm looking forward to their progression. Some of his backstory was presented in this episode as well, showing that he used to serve alongside the antagonist and that they had a romantic relationship back in the day.
Now for a little speculation: Agent Coulson as a LMD. I'd LOVE it if this happened. It would be so cool to introduce a new addition from the original Marvel mythos to the Movie Universe. I'm hoping that maybe Fitz might improve on his flying drones and create his own combat technology, like his own Iron Man suit. and who knows, if he gets popular enough, he might make an addition to the Iron Man cast like Coulson did.
I'm really interested to see how Thor 2 is going to play with Agents of SHIELD when it happens? Is Whedon going to make the episodes before and after the showing of Thor 2 connect to it in some way?
Also, I heard that they were doing end-credit clips like in the movies, so I went to take a look and really? the only thing you could think of was just have Nick Fury start yelling at Coulson for smashing a plane? They couldn't have done anything involving plot development wise?
I'm still keeping up with the series since I love the idea of the project, but this might be my least favorite episode in the season.
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