LEGO DC SUPER HEROES: JUSTICE LEAGUE-- ATTACK OF THE LEGION OF DOOM (2015)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological*

In marked contrast to the same year's BIZARRO LEAGUE Lego-flick, the Legoverse's first introduction of the Legion of Doom (as conceived by the SUPERFRIENDS cartoon of the 1970s) is a good parody of a "straight" Justice League story with several funny moments-- though at least one joke involving "the New 52" will only make sense to comics insiders.

I don't remember what if any status "Lego Cyborg" had in earlier installments, but here he's the new kid in the League, and eager to prove himself. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor, having suffered more humiliating defeats since the League came into existence, decides to forge his Legion of Doom. After a pretty funny "obstacle course" to determine which villains get to join, Luthor's lineup includes Gorilla Grodd, The Cheetah, Captain Cold, Sinestro, and Black Manta. Three Bat-foes are rejected for one reason or another-- The Joker, The Penguin and The Man-Bat. Also, a Flash-villain, The Trickster, has a separate encounter with the League, which is mainly worth mentioning because he's voiced by Mark Hamill, who portrayed a live-action version of the evildoer on the 1990 FLASH show. Trickster's main function in the script is to unleash a trick that Cyborg falls for, thus making him look bad in front of his buddies.

Luthor's first mission for the Legion is to raid a government facility, and despite their being forced to flee the League, the villains escape with an alien who was being held prisoner in the facility. (This prisoner is alluded to in BIZARRO's coda, though the actual continuity doesn't track.) Irritated by his internment, the alien decided to help the Legion, but only because Luthor claims that the Legion is devoted to justice. I don't know Luthor knew that this ET had powers that could help the Legion's next scheme-- getting the League exiled from Earth-- but I can give the writers a pass, given that this is a good intro for the Lego version of The Martian Manhunter.

There's a running gag in which Flash and Green Lantern keep trying to one-up each other, and a subplot showing that Darkseid has been funneling weapons to Luthor. After the Legion's defeat, Darkseid contacts a new potential ally, doubtlessly Brainiac, who then appears in COSMIC CLASH. To date CLASH is the last of the Lego-flicks to sport the "Justice League" banner, though technically two later movies, spotlighting the Flash and Aquaman, make considerable use of the League's presence. The fight-scenes combine a decent mix of comedy and adventure, and in the end, Cyborg gets to have his day in the sun. Thus DOOM stacks up as one of the more entertaining of the series.

LEGO DC SUPER HEROES: JUSTICE LEAGUE- vs. BIZARRO LEAGUE (2015)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological*

Given that all of the Lego versions of standard DC heroes are goofy (some would say "bizarre") takes on said characters, there's not a lot of ground to be gained by creating Bizarros of the Justice League.

The one exception to this statement is that in the opening scenes, the script does get across one psychological trope with regard to the Man of Steel. When Bizarro-Superman shows up in Metropolis and begins wreaking havoc with his blunders, Superman is embarrassed that the locals think the Moron of Steel is somehow related to him. Thus, when the hero finds a way to distract Bizarro by sending him to another planet, Superman's not doing it purely to protect humanity, but to sweep a mortifying subject under the rug.

The script then burns up a little time having the Lego League contend with four Lego-villains, giving the movie the chance to introduce its cubical versions of Guy Gardner ("alternate Green Lantern") and Plastic Man (probably not the best choice of a hero to be Lego-ized).  

Shortly thereafter, Bizarro returns to Earth and invades Luthor's laboratory, stealing his duplicator ray. When members of the League follow, Bizarro uses the duplicator ray to create Bizarro versions of Batman, Guy Gardner, Wonder Woman, and Cyborg, whom he then takes back to his newly adopted "Bizarro World." When the heroes follow, they learn that the world to which Superman exiled Bizarro is now under attack by the forces of Darkseid. After various reversals, the League repulses Darkseid, saving both Earth and Bizarro World.

There's one good fan-pleasing moment: Superman's body gets riddled by kryptonite radiation, but Bizarro, invulnerable to that influence because he's artificial, dispels the poison with his super-breath. But the rest of the film lacks the comic timing found in the better Lego-DC outings. 

There's a coda that foreshadows events of the same year's LEGION OF DOOM effort, though the coda itself doesn't blend in with the continuity of that story.

GHASTLY PRINCE ENMA, BURNING UP! (2011)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *good*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical*

*SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS*

I hadn't heard of Go Nagai's manga "Dororon Enma-kun" or any of its reboots until stumbling across this subtitled 2011 series on streaming, mostly derived from the 1973 original. Since most of the other Nagai works I'd encountered didn't seem as well-organized as GHASTLY, I read the '73 manga online, only to find that it was like a lot of other Nagai productions. tons of transgressive scenes of sex and violence, with an insubstantial plot that pooped out at the conclusion. Therefore I credit the writer-director of the anime series, Yoshitano Yonetari, with having firmed up the weaker aspects of the source material.

Nagai still deserves high marks for the inventiveness of the basic scenario. In the Hell of Japanese belief, the ruler King Enma becomes irate that certain demons have escaped his domain to wreak havoc on humanity. Caring more about his proprietary rights over his subjects than about human suffering, the monarch assigns his nephew Prince Enma to corral the escapees. To this end the king gives Enma a fire-staff weapon and three helpers. Two are just minor figures, a kappa-spirit named Kapeuru and a living hat named Chapeujie, while the third is a powerful snow-woman, Princess Yuki. Enma and Yuki have a thing for one another, though Yuki plays hard to get while Enma is an unswerving perv, always ready to peep on her or feel her up. (The Yuki of the original manga is not nearly as forceful as the one in the 2011 anime, since 2011 Enma frequently gets his ass kicked for his molestations.)

The early episodes are very "monster-of-the-week," as the four-person "Demon Squad" begins the task of tracking down various vicious demons. In the manga they get aid from a human boy, but in Yonetani their aide is a human girl, Harumi, who's frequently grossed out by the licentiousness and irresponsibility of these "good demons." Many of the fugitive demons also inflict absurd curses on humanity, like making them unable to stay on the feet, or causing a "fattitude plague" in which almost everyone on Earth becomes fat enough to roll along like a beachball. 

One structuring addition by Yonetari is that he interpolates a character from one of the ENMA reboots, one who was originally a female version of Enma named Enpi. In the manga Enpi was much like another Enma character, Kekko Kamen, who went around semi-naked most of the time. Yonetani makes Enpi a separate character, the older sister of Enma, and gives her a quixotic mission. Enpi constantly undermines the Demon Squad's efforts because she wants to make the whole world "overflow with titillation and delight."

Another added wrinkle is that 2011 Enma, unlike the 1973 version, wears a piece of metal headgear called a "Fire Crown." A number of demons want to remove the crown for whatever reason. Enma doesn't remember the crown's purpose, except that his vanished mother and father gave it to him, but of course he's willing to burn to ashes anyone who tries to take his things.

The third and last improvement is that, while the manga-version of King Enma has no big plot in mind when the series commences, Yonetani's version is working hand in glove with the denizens of Heaven. Both parties need to power their realms with "psychowatts" derived from human beings, and the easiest way to gain that power is to bring about a major cataclysm that ends most of human life. This sort of chaotic apocalypse occurs in a lot of Nagai manga, though it's only suggested at the end of "Demon Prince Enma."

Yonetani manages to tie together Enpi, the Crown and the collaboration of Heaven and Hell in a pleasing way. Enpi eventually reveals that the siblings' parents created the crown to control Enma's lusfulness, which had become so pronounced that he apparently tried to sex up his sister. It's not clear why Enpi became more oriented on promoting disorder later on. Still, she's instrumental to showing how Enma can unleash the power of lust to rebound upon both angels and demons. Instead of bringing about humanity's destruction, the denizens of Heaven and Hell become so horny that they have a mass orgy. As it happens, the orgy unleashes so much energy that Heaven and Hell no longer need to kill people to get psychowatts for their realms, and so humanity gets to live.

So Yonetani succeeds in making all of the grossness and weirdness of the series' twelve episodes work together coherently, as well as giving the viewer all of Nagai's characteristic sex and violence. (At times the two get combined: in two separate episodes, the boobs of female characters become so large that they can be used as bludgeons.) All of this wackiness is given a serious undercurrent by the end theme song, which starts off singing, "Sooner or later, everybody's gotta die," but concludes with the life-affirming "We are still alive!"

  

DEATHSTROKE KNIGHTS AND DRAGONS (2020)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological*

I could have copied for my illustration one of DEATHSTROKE's more violent scenes, but instead I chose this talking-head shot, to clarify how bland the animation style is when no one's being shot or stabbed. Possibly his blandness has something to do with the DTV's origins as a web-series prepared for a subdivision of the CW company.

I can't fault the script of Marc de Matteis in finding the most efficient way to boil down the relevant elements of the Deathstroke property so as to exclude his origins in the TEEN TITANS book. KNIGHTS contains most of the characters germane to the cosmos of Slade Wilson, a.k.a. the masked mercenary of the title: his estranged wife (and former combat-veteran) Adeline, his son Joseph, his daughter (by another mother) Rose, and his assistant Wintergreen. In the comics Deathstroke works for the criminal cabal H.I.V.E. rather than fighting against them-- at least in early narratives-- but since KNIGHTS is in effect independent of DC continuity, this change is not important. De Matteis creates a new villain (as far as I know) named the Jackal who's one of Deathstroke's opponents, and he throws in a couple of stooges who are funhouse-mirror versions of their DC-counterparts, Lady Shiva and The Bronze Tiger.

The big problem is that the film-script emulates Marv Wolfman's Deathstroke-of-the-comics far too well-- which may be a selling point for some viewers, but which was a turnoff for me. In the comics Deathstroke originated as a TITANS villain in his early-1980s appearance, though he enjoyed a starring DC series from 1991 to 1996. Conceptually the character followed closely in the footsteps of hyperviolent crusaders like Wolverine and Punisher, in being utterly unrestrained in terms of striking his enemies with unrestrained violence. This approach would not have been extraordinary if Deathstroke had remained an unregenerate evildoer. However, even in the mercenary's first appearance, Marv Wolfman sent mixed signals. Deathstroke was merciless, and yet he possessed some vague nobility. He was a mercenary who killed people for pay, but he had some code of professionalism that supposedly distinguished him from the average assassin. 

These mixed signals, Marc de Matteis produces impeccably for KNIGHTS-- but they don't make Deathstroke as compelling a character as either Wolverine or Punisher at their respective bests. Slade Wilson becomes the costumed Deathstroke as the result of a military experiment, and he uses the powers he gained from the experiment-- rapid healing, super-fast reflexes-- to become a mercenary. At the same time that he's a ruthless mercenary, he's also a family man, marrying Adeline and spawning young Joseph-- though during some foreign-based adventure, he also sleeps with another woman, who gives birth to an older female, Rose. These movie-characters have next to nothing in common with the comics-originals, for their purpose is the same as Adeline's here: to give Slade Wilson grief for his past sins. Yet the script is spongy on the subject of what those sins were, aside from sleeping around.

KNIGHTS tries to make Deathstroke sympathetic in that in one exploit, he's seen confronting one of his targets, but informs the guy that he's just killed the man who ordered the target's death and now demands that the target pay Deathstroke for the hit. This is meant to suggest that Deathstroke somehow manages to make his murders serve an altruistic purpose. Frankly, this is so phony that when The Jackal takes the contrary position in one monologue-- to the effect that there's no real meaning in violence beyond the acquisition of power-- the villain sounds more authentic than the hero ever does.

The characterizations of the supporting characters are no better; they come on stage, air their grievances, and press their attacks on long-suffering Deathstroke. There's a lot of competently executed violence, but without a protagonist whose violent obsession feels roughly justified-- again, paging the Punisher-- the violence alone is likely to make some viewers want to go watch a PUNISHER movie instead. 

  

TEEN TITANS: TROUBLE IN TOKYO (2006)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological, sociological*

This TV-film aired on Cartoon Network in the same year that the five-season TEEN TITANS teleseries concluded. That circumstance probably encouraged some reviewers to term TROUBLE IN TOKYO a "finale." But because the TV show was in the nature of a continuing soap opera-- though not as much as the comic book from which it was derived-- this stand-alone TV-movie doesn't really play into the ongoing storylines, with one exception I'll describe later. But TROUBLE does have the virtue of being an homage to the artistic sources for the popular program.

In the Titans' home of Jump City, they're inexplicably attacked by a colorful super-powered foe, Saico-Tech. The heroes defeat their attacker, who makes confused statements in Japanese, and then disappears. So all five-- Robin, Starfire, Raven, Cyborg and Beast Boy-- journey to Tokyo to see what they can learn the entity Saico-Tech claimed to be his boss: someone named Brushogun.

Once in the Japanese capital, the Titans find themselves forced to battle a Godzilla-sized reptilian monster, though it, like Saico-Tech, disappears. The American heroes then meet a special task force, the Tokyo Troopers, who under the command of Commander Daizo are responsible for quelling any monsters or villains who menace the city. This in itself may be a subtle acknowledgement that Japanese pop culture generally seems less invested in vigilante heroes and more in crusaders linked to some authority, be it Earthly or extraterrestrial. Daizo welcomes the Titans as guest heroes but tells them that "Brushogun" is just an urban legend about a man who lost his soul.

The Titans then try to relax and enjoy touring Japan, with Beast Boy being the most insistent, wanting to visit a manga publishing company. (The fact that the heroes go to the company but find it closed should trigger one's foreshadowing-senses.) During this period, we see the only continuation of a TV-show plotline, as Robin and Starfire come close to consummating their romance. However, Robin can't let the mystery go unsolved and launches a private investigation. This action seems to conjure forth another attack on the Teen Wonder by Saico-Tech. However, during the fight Saico-Tech appears to perish, and Commander Daizo arrests Robin. Further, the other Titans are attacked by brand-new villains, some of whom look like familiar figures from anime: an Astro Boy type, a cat-girl type, etc. I won't go into a lot of detail about the nature of the entity responsible for all of the strange goings-on, but yes, there is a Brushogun, Virginia, and he too seems very like an American's attempt to create a supernatural menace of the sort the Japanese are often good art producing.

The reason I call TROUBLE an homage is because, for whatever reasons, TEEN TITANS heavily invested in visual tropes used in popular anime, particularly the use of "super-deformed" versions of the stars for comical effect. And of course, having the theme song sung in two versions-- one in English, one in Japanese-- signals an appreciation of Japanese pop culture as well. This isn't to say that the TITANS show didn't have a lot of grounding in American tropes as well. Still, I like to think that the animators wanted to conclude their time with the Titans franchise by re-iterating their admiration for the influence Japanese pop art had on them.

THE HOUSE OF USHER (1989)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *uncanny*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological*

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

In my review of this film, I noted that it was one of three 1989 collaborations between producer Harry Alan Towers and director Alan Birkenshaw, and that two of those three were fake adaptations of Edgar Allan Poe stories. So I decided to look at HOUSE OF USHER, which slightly preceded Birkenshaw's MASQUE OF THE RED DEATH.

My re-watch confirmed that the 1989 USHER was as bad as I remembered, as well as a much worse take on Poe than MASQUE. Whereas Birkenshaw's direction on the later film is at least competent, the visuals for USHER are ugly and dispiriting, and the plot-action is just one lumbering grossout scene after the other.

The plot, such as it is, starts with an engaged couple, Ryan and Molly (Rufus Swart, Romy Windsor). They're driving through the English countryside, trying to find the castle of Ryan's uncle Roderick Usher (the same name as the protagonist of the titular Poe story). Two weird children appear in the road, and the driver has to crash the car to avoid hitting the kids-- who are not seen again until the film's end. Molly is largely unhurt, but Ryan suffers injuries. As it happens, though, the butler who works for Roderick happens to be in the area.

Molly passes out, and when she wakes up, she's at the Usher Castle. She meets Roderick (Oliver Reed), who tells her that Ryan was taken to an English hospital, but that Molly can't go visit him until he's better. Having no means of transportation, Molly accepts the situation, though the elder Usher and his servants all seem eccentric. Roughly like the Poe character, Roderick has unusually sharp senses, though the film mostly forgets about this element when it's convenient.

It takes this plodding movie forever to get to the heart of the matter: Roderick's got Ryan squirreled away in the castle, to use him as a threat against Molly. Because the Ushers suffer from a "blood taint," Roderick wants Molly to wed him so that he can produce a line of healthy children. I can't resist mentioning that this part resembles the plot of the original Gothic novel, THE CASTLE OF OTRANTO, though I doubt either the writer or director were aware of that book. I can only guess that the writer picked up on the arguable incest-elements of the original story, in which Roderick has his sister buried alive for some transgressive reason, and he reworked that into a "bad father" drama. So most of the film is about Molly trying to win free of Roderick's tyranny, like a lot of mainstream Gothics.

For good measure, halfway through the movie the audience learns that Roderick has a brother named Walter (Donald Pleasance), who's lived for years in the castle as a virtual prisoner. But Walter, who wears a drill-bit glove on one hand, may be crazier than Roderick. After a lot of blundering attempts at shock, there's a big fight between Ryan and the psycho brothers, and the house catches on fire as Roderick chases Molly--

And suddenly, with no explanation, or even a dream-transition, Molly and Ryan are back in their car, on the English highway, looking for Roderick's castle. But this time, Molly, guided by "women's intuition," suggests they drive back the way they came. As they do so, the same two kids from the opening are seen walking along the highway, but they merely watch as the car implicitly drives away from its encounter with the Gothic patriarch.

This ending is probably the most interesting thing about this dismal movie. Possibly Birkenshaw thought this "arty" touch would grab the horror-audience. I've discussed the idea of the "movie as premonitory dream" in my review of INVADERS FROM MARS. But that film plays fair in showing the viewpoint character having dreams that may or may not come true, and USHER utterly fails to understand how the dream-trope works when well done. Next to this massive misfire, MASQUE is refreshingly ordinary.

THE BRIDE WITH WHITE HAIR 2 (1993)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, psychological, sociological*

Although BRIDE 2 came out the same year as BRIDE 1, it still met the fate of many other sequels: not quite managing, even with the best efforts, to duplicate the first film's chemistry.

Now, BRIDE 1 was all about how clan-conflicts doomed the great love of two members of said clans: young swordsman Yihang of the WuDang Clan, and "wolf girl" Lien from WuShuang. Feelings of betrayal cause Lien to transform into a blood-hungry "white-haired witch" who can, among other things, strangle or stab people with her extensible hair-follicles. Most of the clans are decimated by their conflict as well, although WuShuang seems totally gone while WuDang has apparently reconstituted itself, to judge by the number of young people still amid its ranks. However, witchy Lien has built a new clan made up largely of other women betrayed by their male lovers, and with the aid of these women warriors she's continued to prey on all local clans. Apparently all this has remained the state of affairs for ten years since the first film, because Yihang waits ten years for the blooming of a magical flower that can cure Lien's madness.

However, the Lien-Yihang conflict can no longer drive the narrative, so the writers-- one of whom was BRIDE 1's director Ronny Yu-- focus upon a new couple. This time both romantic leads come from the WuDang Clan: Yu Qin (Joey Meng) and Feng (Sunny Chan). Feng is the nephew of Yihang, who to the best of everyone's knowledge is still brooding atop some snowy mountain, waiting for the blooming of the magic flower. The fact that Feng's uncle brought about much of WuDang's suffering doesn't seem to bother anyone, and everyone seems quite happy that Feng will become the new head of the clan once he's married. (To be sure, there's one female, Yu Hee, who has a thing for Feng, just as there was a side-character in BRIDE 1 who wanted to win Yihang's love-- but Yu Hee ends up supporting Feng's romance despite her own feelings.)

Lien, who's still pissed at WuDang, abducts Yu Qin but leaves Feng alive. Feng thus marshals six other stalwarts, including Yu Hee, to liberate the bride who doesn't have white hair. While they prepare for battle, the audience sees that again Lien has fallen prey to bad advice. Chen, one of the members belonging to Lien's clan of disaffected females, has conceived a lesbian passion for Lien and is jealous of Yihang when Lien remains distant. Chen persuades Lien to brainwash Yu Qin to believe herself betrayed by Feng. Thus, when the knights of WuDang attack, Yu Qin joins the other Amazons in routing her former friends. But on the good side, the magic flower has bloomed, and Yihang is at least ready to make amends for his past deeds.

The various dramatic arcs involving Feng and Yu Qin, or Lien and Chen, are not very involving, and the production values are a little less impressive this time out. I don't think new director David Wu is at fault, though, and all the actors certainly do their best. The doomed reunion of Lien and Yihang has all the expected sturm und drang one might desire of a splashy romance, and BRIDE 2 gets that across in a satisfactory fashion, though the script doesn't evince the more imaginative concepts seen in the first part.