Zack & Nick's Culture Cast

Continued from Part 3:

Hal learns that Parallax is coming to Earth (shit…I completely forgot about him!), so he heads to Planet X-Box for help.  However, because the Green Lantern Corps are bigots, they refuse (even though it is their job to stop stuff like this).  Hal then asks for permission to do it himself which they grant, but since he’s had the ring the entire time without anyone caring it begs the question on why he went to Oa in the first place.  The scene added nothing.  They don’t give him any help.  They don’t give him any tools to fight.  Just a “Good Luck”.

“I don’t remember saying ‘good luck’.”

Honestly, why do they not want to defend Earth?  Not only is it their job, but it gives them a strategic advantage.  They know where the bad guy is going to be!  Can’t they devise some sort of surprise attack?  Why are they completely fine with Parallax destroying all life on Earth (especially since destroying such life will make Parallax strong enough to destroy the Green Lantern Corps)?

Hal returns to Earth where Hector has kidnapped Carol and reveals that he turned to evil partially because he was jealous of Hal’s lifestyle.  Interesting message.

Hal gets Carol out of trouble just as Parallax arrives and kills Hammond for his failures (thereby making Hammond ultimately pointless in the grand scheme of things).

Parallax then starts to invade the city and, presumably kills thousands inadvertently making this movie much more horrific than the filmmakers probably intended.  The problem with all of this is that we never learn what any of the ramifications from any of this are.  Wouldn’t the government and the world population be going nuts that a giant evil cloud was vaporizing thousands.  We get nothing.  The next time we are back on Earth, all seems fine.  Granted, we’d be opening up a giant can of worms if the movie dealt with what came next.  The fact that it isn’t even mentioned seems troubling.

Ramifications? The movie has no time for such things!

Hal confronts it and eventually gets it to go off planet.  A chase ensues and, because the movie has no sense of how our solar system is arranged, Hal and Parallax make their way from Earth to the Asteroid Belt and then the sun in under two minutes.

Science!

Hal is able to get the evil cloud to fall into the sun.  Thank goodness for Kilowog’s completely forgettable line of common knowledge (which wasn’t even referenced here – Hal comes up with this idea under a completely different rationale).

Now, as an aside, I am not saying that this wasn’t challenging.  But it seemed as if Hal took down Parallax a bit too easily on his own.  I mean, afterall, all Hal did was punch Parallax into the sun.

This actually happens.

Remember how Parallax was built up earlier by killing off the “strongest Lanterns” who were acting as a team (all of whom were, presumably, Green Lanterns for more than a day).  It was also implied that Parallax was much stronger when he faced Hal than he was in that earlier battle.  Who knew punching a cloud was the key to victory?

So, Sinestro, Kilowg, and Tomar-Re arrive right after the battle finishes – nice timing guys – and bring Hal back to Oa where Hal becomes Employee of the Month.  Also Kilowg takes credit for training Hal.  What training?  You just punched him a bunch of times and reminded him about gravity.   Is that what you are taking credit for?

We are then treated to the exact same clip we saw earlier in the movie during Sinestro’s mid-movie speech.  With the exception of planet shot mirrored, the movie doesn’t even try to hide it.  Just look.  See!

Hal gets back to Earth, kisses the girl, and goes “looking for trouble”.  And that’s Green Lantern.

Oh yeah..and this:

For the sequel that will never happen.

Boy is this movie bad.  Not, awful-awful.  It’s watchable, but largely forgettable.  It is as mediocre as mediocre can be.  The plot is unfocused, the characters are bland, and they rush through some of the more high-concept stuff.  The special effects can be kind of cool at times – I particularly liked what they did with the Green Lantern suit, but some of the other visuals can be incredibly dodgy at times.

The way this movie was executed reminds me of something from the mid-90s.  Sci-Fi movies such as Supernova or Event Horizon which are not really all that good, but have become cult favorites.  Granted, it is a different type of movie from those two, but Green Lantern sort of falls into that mold.  Even the soundtrack sounds like “90s generic”. If this was made during that time period, I think people would be kinder to it.  However, it was made in 2011 in the midst of a superhero movie renaissance where the competition is much stiffer and the critical eye more cynical.

The problem really lies with the script.  The acting was pretty good.  Ryan Reynolds was fine as Hal Jordan.  I’m not one who thinks he was miscast.  He just did the best he could with the material given which is a shame because there are a lot of things you could do with this fictional world.  Peter Sarsgaard is clearly having the time of his life camping it up, and Blake Lively really turned out to be the welcomed surprise of the bunch.

In the end, the filmmakers were simply trying too hard when they didn’t need to.  The Green Lanterns are basically space cops.  Use that formula!  It works and is easily accessible for mainstream audiences.  Instead, the filmmakers felt like giving the finger to the audience by confusing the hell out of them.

It is almost as if Ryan Reynolds was trying to tell us.

Well, that’s my breakdown of Green Lantern.  Again, if you liked this movie for whatever reason –  great!  I didn’t, and I feel it is one of the reasons I won’t be seeing a Flash movie anytime soon.

I hope you enjoyed my scene-by-scene breakdown!  Do you want to see more posts like this?  Sound off below and let me know what movies you want me to look at!

~N

Green Lantern Scene-by-Scene Breakdown:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Also, check out Zack’s What Went Wrong feature on Green Lantern!

Continuing on from Part 2:

We learn that the Green Lantern Corps are not faring too well against Parallax.  My question: if Parallax was defeated before by Abin Sur, why not do what he did?  Clearly, it worked.  Wouldn’t that be the first course of action?  Or did Sur never write it down?  The fact that Sur defeated Parallax is never really referenced again nor his method of doing so.

Hal then gets trained.  And by trained, I mean thrown into the fire and sucker punched constantly.  Is this really how they train new recruits, especially ones who *just* learned of the Green Lantern Corps existence?  Seems harsh.  Kilowog, in a completely throwaway line (which shouldn’t have been) mentions how the sun has gravity.  Training complete!

Proper Training

Hal also meets Sinestro (with a name like that, I’m sure he isn’t evil) and the purple alien takes his anger out on Hal.  He’s upset that Hal is disrespecting Abin-Sur’s memory by not being the perfect Green Lantern right away.  Wouldn’t it make more sense for Sinestro, who revered Sur, would want to take Hal under his wing the way Sur did him?  No, that’s too rational (and there wouldn’t be a movie if he didn’t outright reject Hal).  Granted, it is misplaced anger, but Sinestro never acknowledges this (even after he takes a liking to Hal at the end).

“Hi. I’m racist.”

Hal agrees that he sucks and goes home.  For some reason, he is allowed to keep the ring.  Why?  Wouldn’t that be like letting a cop quit his job, but the force allowing him to keep his issued gun?  That’s stupid.  Plus, how long was Hal gone for?  A couple of days, maybe?  And no one notices him missing.  Is disappearing for days on end common for Hal?

Meanwhile, Hammond begins hearing people’s thoughts and lives out every teacher’s fantasy by slapping his students around via telekinesis.

Any teacher who claims they would never think of doing this is lying.

Later on, we are at a big party.  Apparently the US military agreed to use the automatic planes shown at the beginning.  Even though the military expressed enough disinterest in the project for Ferris Air to lay people off, we are given a nice hand-wave explanation on why this is happening.  However, this plot element is completely worthless as the military having these planes as it doesn’t have any real impact on the story.  Ah, whatever.

We also learn that Hal and Hammond know each other and clearly don’t like each other.   Why, you may ask?  Well, that is never established.  I guess you can argue that Hammond is jealous of Hal since Hammond’s father treats Hal like a son, but we don’t know what Hal’s problem with Hammond is.  They just act cold towards each other, even when Hal tries to subtly champion what Hammond does.  Then again, Hal is a bit of a jerk, so perhaps that’s just Hal being Hal.

“We don’t like each other for reasons neither of us are completely sure of.”

I guess my major problem is that we are an hour into the movie and this is the first time these characters are actually meeting.  And, even more problematic, is that the movie is trying to shove some sort of backstory between the two.  With only 40 minutes of movie left, it comes off a bit contrived.  I feel we needed some of this rivalry earlier, and then build on it, so we can have some sort of reason to care when these two eventually go at it.  I guess this is a minor point, but one that still bugs me.  Maybe they should have put it in the opening narration with everything else.

Also, why is Hammond even at this party?  Other than being the senator’s son, there is absolutely no reason for him to be there.  And since he doesn’t like his father, even if he got an invite (which, logically, Hammon probably wouldn’t), why would he come to something that celebrates the senator?  Oh, I know.  Because the plot demanded he be there.  And, I guess, to have a needless bit of him creeping on Carol.

“I’ve turned into a complete cliche!”

So, the senator leaves the party and Hammond decides he’s had enough of his father by using his new powers to get his helicopter to crash.  Of course, no one runs when they see this helicopter fall to the ground, then again, who would run from the slowest falling helicopter in the world?  And of course, when it does hit the ground, no one gets shredded into bits from the propeller (even though numerous people are close by).

No one was killed in this horrific accident.

Hal jumps into action as Green Lantern and saves the helicopter by putting it on a toy race track.  Earlier scene explained.  I guess using a giant hand to grab it would have been too easy.  Perhaps I’m being too critical.  Wait, no I’m not!

Later, Hal visits Carol, who immediately recognizes him through his mask.  I’ll give credit where credit is due.  It is a funny bit.

“I’ve known you my whole life! I’ve seen you naked! You don’t think I would recognize you because I can’t see your cheek bones?!”

Meanwhile, Hammond tweaks and gets a big head, literally, and the government nabs him.  Of course, they cannot control him and chaos ensues.  Fortunately, Hal’s ring senses it and he intervenes.

Marvel as the two guys who apparently didn’t like each other in real life just happen to both independently get superpowers!

After some fisticuffs, Hector destroys the government compound (killing his father in the process).  Of course, this goes unmentioned the rest of the movie.  You’d think the government would send some sort of man hunt on either Hammond or the strange green guy floating around since they were sighted at the location.  Then again, this is the same movie where the shadowy government agencies move at a snail’s pace.  Good consistency.

In fact, this scene just sorta ends.  Hal zaps Hammond across the room, Hammond screams in defeat (for some reason), and Hal just sits there catching his breath.  Cut to next scene with Hal in his apartment.  This is just incredibly lazy writing.

“Should I go get that guy and bring him to justice? I mean, he’s just across the room. Nah…I’ll do it later.”

Tune in tomorrow for the “thrilling” conclusion!

~N

Welcome to the second part of my scene-by-scene breakdown of 2011’s Green Lantern starring Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively.  Continuing from Part 1:

Hal goes to his nephew’s birthday party and parks like an a-hole for no reason.

Seriously…why does he park like this? Was he re-wrapping the gift?

He discovers his nephew is sad at the near-miss Hal had that day. They have a really genuine heart-to-heart that really plays well.  Renyonds and the kid have a good chemistry (and the kid isn’t that bad of a child actor).  I bet this relationship will play off later in the movie.

Bawhahahahaha!  Who am I kidding?  We never see this kid again.  Nothing of real value came from this scene other than the race car set.

Up yours, race car set!

Anyway, Hal is then abducted and brought to a crashed Abin Sur and is given Sur’s ring before the alien dies.  Tom comes by to collect him right before the government comes by to see the downed alien ship.

Question: how long has it been since Sur crashed?  The movie implies it’s been a few hours at least.  Why did it take the feds that long to mobilize?  Oh, wait.  Because the script called for it.  Silly me.

Also, is it me, or does Hal accept the fact that an alien died in front of him a bit too easily?  Well, perhaps I’m just being too nitpicky.  I should focus on the big things like Hal’s car.   It should still be at his brother’s house.  Wouldn’t his family notice—ah, who cares?  We’re never going to see Hal’s family again.

Perhaps Hal getting abducted by glowing green balls (thereby abandoning his car) is just Hal’s thing, and his family simply accepts it at this point.

Meanwhile, college professor Hector Hammond (Peter Sarsgaard) is recruited to look at the body of Abin Sur, now in the government’s custody.  We learn that he was given the chance to look at the alien because his father is Senator Tim Robbins.

The strange thing (more so than everyone acting nonchalant that there is a FREAKIN’ ALIEN BODY just laying there) is that there doesn’t seem to be any other scientists on this project.  I know there is Amanda Waller, but that seems to be it.  Oh yeah, he also gets infected with yellow power.  Gee, maybe having an assistant would have prevented that.

You would think the government would have guards or something to shoot this guy down just in case things like this would happen.

While that is going on, Hal mucks around with the lantern before going out drinking and getting into a fight.  Apparently, his earlier showboating caused Ferris Air to not get the government contract prompting massive layoffs.  Gee, his co-workers are mad at getting fired.  Imagine that.  Hal fights them off with the ring and is taken to the Green Lantern planet, Oa.

On Oa, we get an exposition dump of everything that was said during the opening narration.  So, why was that opening narration needed?  Beats me!

“I am Tomar-Re, protector of sector 2813, and I love exposition!”

The one thing they don’t delve much into is the ring.  Here is my problem with the ring.  It is never really explained how it works.  We are told that it can create anything the wearer imagines.  But does that mean it takes on the complete properties of said item?

For instance, when Hal makes a gun, it fires bullets.  Why would it do this?  Are those bullets effective since they are not “attached” to the ring?  Same with the necklace he later gives Carol.  Is there a distance factor with the ring?  Or when Hal makes the jets, they work as jets would with logical working jet engines.

How is this possible?

This is fine, but the movie doesn’t explain that, and the ring’s functionality is left incredibly hazy.  Can he make fictional items?  Like what if he made the USS Enterprise and made it go to warp speed.  Can the ring do that?  If not, why?  It can make fully functional jets.  How does the ring know real items from fictional?  One line probably would have solved this problem.

Remember when you were a kid and you played make-believe with your friends?  And you would say how you would have a power, but then your friend would counter with a power that outdid your power, so you would come up with one that outdid your friend’s?  And things would keep escalating with utter nonsense until someone throws down the “infinity” card?  That is kinda how the ring is presented in here.  And because of that, it makes the ring seem too powerful and that, willpower aside, limits the dramatic effectiveness of it.

Definitely not the One Ring.

Tomorrow: Part 3, in which Hal gets “trained” and Hammond goes crazy!

~N

Welcome to our scene by scene breakdown of Green Lantern, the 2011 superhero flick starring Ryan Reynolds.  I promised this entry well over a year ago.  Sorry it took so long.  Originally, I wanted to do a video breakdown, Nostalgic Critic style.  Unfortunately, during editing (and, subsequently, pretty far into the project), I determined that it was not working.  I simply do not have the voice or talent to pull something off as clever or interesting.  I do want to add a video component to the Culture Cast someday, but it is not going to be today.

Anyway, Green Lantern — this movie is bad.  Whatever potential it had, it completely squanders it.  The truth of the matter is that it was not one big thing that destroyed the movie, but a lot of little, smaller things that just added up.  Today, I am hoping go through the movie, scene by scene to see what just did not work.

One thing before we begin.  If you liked this movie, great!  These are just my opinions.  I did not like it, and these are my reasons why.  I do not think less of anyone who likes this movie.  That is just arrogant, and I really try not to be.  Without further ado, here is Green Lantern.

We start with an opening narration given by Tomar-Rey (who is voiced by Geoffrey Rush).  This was my first warning sign of bad things to come.  I am always leery of movies that try to cram a lot of information in some sort of opening narration or scroll.

Look at movies like Super Mario Bros. or Judge Dredd.  I realize they are trying to get the viewer up to speed with the backstory, but it rarely works out.  Especially so since they are forcing the audience to swallow these insane and goofy concepts.  Green willpower?  Yellow fear?

It’s laughable at face value.   In a movie with space aliens, giant head creatures, and evil clouds, you need to ease your audience into these concepts.  In a high concept movie such as it, you need to first ground it, and then bring on the crazy.

Abstract images of strange looking people do not help.

Look at the Star Wars movies.  They did it right.  None of the opening crawls wasted time on the history of the Jedi or Republic.  It just told us what was going on in that particular moment.  The rest was filled in as the movie went on.

I guess I would not go on about this so much considering that an hour later (when this stuff actually matters), the movie repeats everything established here.  It is even said by the same character.

Anyway, we start out on “The Lost Planet” in the “Lost Sector”, even though people know where it is.  We see some hapless aliens release Parallax, our principle villain.  He then attacks Green Lantern Abin Sur.  Sur gets away, but not before being gravely injured.

Rumor has it that Parallax and Galactus from Fantastic Four were roommates in college.

We then cut and meet our hero, Hal Jordan.  And, since it is important to show him being an irresponsible douche, we get him trying to wrap a present while driving recklessly on his way to work (of which he is already late to).

Who will be able to forget the iconic gift wrapping scene? Cinema was forever changed.

Why is he wrapping the gift then?  We see later on he has plenty of time before the party when he is standing around at work doing nothing.  What went through his head when driving to work?  “Hey, I’m late to work.  I can’t think of a better time than now to wrap a present.”

The movie is trying too hard all at once to make him irresponsible.  You can show it bit by bit.  We the audience will get it.

So, Ferris Air is giving a demonstration about some new automatic planes they are trying to sell to the government.  Hal and love-interest Carol (played by Blake Lively) are facing off against new technology to prove the new tech’s worth — I think.

“Honestly, Hal, that mysterious Gossip Girl couldn’t make heads or tails out of what we’re suppose to be doing today.”

It is never made clear what the goals and motivations are from the different people involved.  Hal and Carol seem as if they need to show up the new unmanned planes.  The higher-ups at Ferris Air want the unmanned planes to win (so they can get the lucrative government contract).  And Tom, the guy who invented the new planes, seems happy when Hal wins against them.

Why does he get this excited over Hal winning?  Especially in front of the generals, who the company hopes will buy the planes.  That’s like Bill Gates being happy in front of investors that the next version of Windows fails.

“Awesome! The thing I worked tirelessly on has completely failed the test to impress the people my bosses hope to sell it to and save the company I work for!”

So, as I mentioned, Hal wins against the new planes after a crazy maneuver.  But, of course, he causes his plane to go out of control which, in turn, triggers the memory of his father’s death.  Why is this here?  It is totally shoehorned in.   Does he get flashbacks like this often?  Was it because he was in a dangerous situation?  If so, why is he allowed to fly?  You’d think that would come up during a psych test.  Well, Hal ejects and his plane crashes.

Nice job, Ace. Next time, don’t showboat.

We then cut to a scene where Hal gets chewed out, and I am left wondering why Hal couldn’t wait to wrap his nephew’s gift.  I mean, they are all just standing around doing nothing.

“Hmm…Good thing I wrapped that gift when I did!”

Tomorrow: Part 2!

~N