TheRetroCritic

I talk at length about Marvel's Jessica Jones Netflix series.

The first proper Justice League trailer finally exists! What do you guys think?

I compile 20 of the worst lines from Shaq's infamous superhero outing Steel . It's on now!

The Doctor is in...

I finally talk about DC's latest Suicide Squad . I'm known to be quite vexing, I'm just forewarning you.

Set before the Arkham Asylum video game but after Arkham Origins , Batman: Assault On Arkham is an animated feature by DC which sees the Suicide Squad attempt to retrieve The Riddler's cane from Arkham under Amanda Waller's orders. Two years before the Suicide Squad live-action movie, we got this animated adventure focusing on the dysfunctional team of villains which, this time, includes Deadshot, Harley Quinn, Captain Boomerang and new recruits Killer Frost, Black Spider and King Shark. They are assembled after Batman (voiced by Kevin Conroy) captures The Riddler who may be holding information on the Squad he's planning to release to the public. Along the way, the team encounters Batman and The Joker (Troy Baker) who has his own agenda as he is plotting to unleash a dirty bomb in the city, just to make things more difficult for everyone. This is a busy little film with a lot of main characters to keep track of but it somehow holds together better than Suicide Squad

In this second episode, the Agent Of F.I.L.M faces his darkest, most challenging case yet as he reviews low-budget superhero film Iron Hero . For the first episode in which the Agent takes on HorrorVision , click here.

Just for fun, here's a cover of Christophe Beck's excellent Ant-Man theme as I tap and scratch on an acoustic guitar maniacally.

I n this 68th episode of  The Big Rewind , we review  X-Men Apocalypse ,  talk about  Doc Savage ,  X-Men  and  Nick Fury: Agent Of SHIELD . CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE EPISODE Email us here if you have any questions, requests or contributions:  bigrewindpodcast@gmail.com Or simply comment below :) Oh and you can also find us on  iTunes ,  Stitcher ,  Soundcloud  and  Player FM  where you can subscribe to the podcast and download every episode thusfar! @TheRetroCritic #TheBigRewind #SuperheroMonth retrocriticblog.blogspot.com thebigrewind.blogspot.com youtube.com/TheRetroCritic youtube.com/Cablogula

And so it's time to list my Top 10 Best DC Movie Villains , to even things out with my Top 10 Worst compilation. I'm not counting the animated movies in this list, just so you know. 10 HECTOR HAMMOND Green Lantern Probably the most underrated part of Green Lantern was Peter Sarsgaard's solid performance as Hector Hammond. The pathetic nature of the character is portrayed really well by the actor who gives the villain a growing edge as he is consistently ignored by his father and eventually turns into a macrocephalic monster. Sarsgaard takes the character seriously, even after his freakish transformation, and you do care about Hammond since he didn't start out as a bad guy so seeing him turn into an evil super-villain is surprisingly tragic.   9 THE RIDDLER Batman Forever Here's a villain that easily could have made it into the Top 10 Worst list in that he's both so over-the-top it's distracting but, on the other hand, he's

Back when Shaquille O'Neal was in movies because... basketball (?) we got Steel , a superhero movie based on the DC comics character with good old Shaq in the lead. Willingly ignoring the whole Superman connection to the character save for a shot of Shaq's "Man Of Steel" tattoo, the film instead decides to do its own thing with Steel by packing the story with new supporting characters and giving him another, simpler origin story. Released the same year as Spawn , Steel unfortunately failed to wow critics and audiences alike and it's still seen as one of the most misguided comic-book films out there. Despite a healthy budget, Steel still managed to look cheap somehow with the hero's costume not looking metallic so much as it looked rubbery and thrown together. Shaq's performance also left a lot to be desired as his constant toothy grins and stiff demeanour didn't exactly sell Steel as a moody tough guy going around the streets of Los Angeles making

Released in 2012, Ultraman Saga was a Japanese superhero movie set in a post-apocalyptic world where cities are being invaded by Godzilla-style monsters as a team of big robot-controlling tough gals and the last remaining giant heroes try to defend what's left. Mixing CGI, colourful anime visuals and dudes in monster/Ultraman costumes, this is a modern precursor to Pacific Rim with a proudly retro look and feel. It is a sequel to Ultraman Zero: The Revenge Of Belial , released two years prior, and stars familiar faces from the series as well as members of the J-pop group AKB48 because pop stars make excellent actors, as we all know. The good thing about this one is you don't need to know anything that happened before because, fear not, the film is packed with flashbacks and exposition so it's all pretty self-explanatory. Hell, even without the subtitles I'm sure any non-Japanese speaker would easily figure out the plot: monsters bad, everyone else good. The afo

An unlikely favourite comic-book movie of mine growing up was Doc Savage: The Man Of Bronze , the 1975 big-screen adaptation of the old Lester Dent pulp magazines. I was later surprised to learn that, not only did the film receive negative reviews and failed at the box-office upon its release but the French dub inexplicably gave Ron Ely a lisp. Don't ask, I don't know... While the film tries to stay true to the character of Doc Savage and his story in the comics, it also keeps a tongue-in-cheek tone throughout, occasionally poking fun at the dated nature the pulp hero. This might have confused audiences back in the day who may have expected a more earnest action film, sort of like how Last Action Hero didn't do well with reviewers who weren't expecting a flood of in-jokes. But although Doc Savage has its cartoonish moments, it's not really a spoof and it captures the spirit of the titular hero and his adventures rather well. Doc Savage is given his own patri

I talk briefly about Captain America: Civil War , Marvel's epic new blockbuster. Assemble!

Only a month after Batman faced Superman in DC's pre- Justice League crossover movie, Marvel graces us with Captain America: Civil War , bringing to the screen a sort of mini-Avengers movie steeped in Cap lore based on a classic comic-book storyline. The film sees Captain America (Chris Evans) having to protect his friend-turned-Hydra pawn Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) who may or may not have attacked the UN. Steve Rogers believes he may have been framed but, when half of The Avengers agree to the Sokovia Accords, a list of laws which would restrict their freedom to jump into action, things get somewhat more complicated and an elaborate manhunt is soon underway. Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.), after a blunder involving The Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen) taking out villain Crossbones with a lot of collateral damage, decides that the superteam should probably be held accountable for their destructive efforts but he quickly finds that convincing Captain America of that is not s

With the help of @Silent_Consumer, Jamie and I review the Fantastic Four reboot on episode 61 of podcast The Big Rewind .

In the hope of reviving a decidedly retro superhero in the way that Warren Beatty brought back Dick Tracy in the early 90's, studios decided to make The Phantom , a film based on the comic strips from the 1930's. The Phantom was not going to be an easy sell for audiences with the old-fashioned tone, Billy Zane wearing that purple onesie and the 30's setting even though the cartoon series Phantom 2040 was still technically on television and the movie boasted a kickass poster. It's obvious from the get-go that the filmmakers wanted to somehow capitalise on the popularity of the Indiana Jones movies as we follow some clueless explorers looking to find a skull in an old temple before the superhero shows up to foil their plans. Amusingly, the Indiana Jones movies would later emulate The Phantom by making  The Kingdom Of The Crystal Skull all about skulls. Looking at the box-office numbers, it seems like audiences didn't exactly flock to this movie which flopped h

1997 was not a great year for superhero movies: not only did we get Batman & Robin but we also got Spawn and, although the latter was much more interesting and original than the former, it received some pretty rough feedback from critics and audiences alike. Based on the dark supernatural comic-books, Spawn sees special forces soldier Al Simmons (Michael Jai White) get double-crossed by Jason Wynn (Martin Sheen), the head of the agency who sent him on his latest mission. Simmons is burned alive and left for dead leaving him not only horribly disfigured but undead as a short trip down to Hell dooms him to eventually lead the Devil's army. In retrospect, attempting to tell this story on a $40M budget was somewhat over-ambitious seeing as the film was not only packed with special effects but builds up to a climax set in Hell with Spawn fighting a demon. Michael Jai White does a solid job as Spawn and it's pretty refreshing to see a film with an African-American superh

I try to find 10 cool things about Bryan Singer's Superman Returns because someone had to do it at some point, right? WROOOONG!

The idea that Marvel was not only going to be introducing a rather unique crime-fighter to its already plentiful collection of movie superheroes but also was going to give the film itself an R rating made Deadpool instantly appealing as a project. The casting of Ryan Reynolds as Wade Wilson made sense despite a shaky attempt at bringing the disfigured anti-hero to the screen in Wolverine: Origins and having starred in the hugely unpopular Green Lantern movie. A promising leaked trailer led to a legion of fans demanding to see the full movie and... here we are! The playful yet violent tone of the film is introduced right off the bat as the opening titles show a paused car crash with credits replaced by piss-take descriptions of the cast and crew. What follows is a narrated, fourth wall-breaking journey inside the mind of the mouthy, twisted superhero who is hunting down bad guy Ajax (Ed Skrein) in order to get him to fix his mutated body. Along the way, we're taken back to W