20 replies to this topic

[Earwolf Admin]

We're on a superhero kick, and we have received so many requests for this one! Find out what bad summer movie we're watching next. Plus, Paul shares his tips on how to detect which movies will be bad and whether he prefers Nic Tics or Rage Cage.

[Paul Tabachneck]

Is this a public taping on Monday? Or was this taped during DCM?

[Ryan Sz]

Thank god you guys are doing this movie. This is by far one of the worst superhero movies ever made. From bat-nipples and codpieces to a Batman credit card with a "forever" expiration date, this thing missed on all fronts. The only good part was Schwarzenegger who was having fun playing his silly character. Everyone else tried to play this straightfaced while being surrounded by neon paint and Greek statues of men.

This movie was even made fun of, along with pointing out Joel Schumacher being gay, in an episode of the New Batman Adventures cartoon where kids are talking about what they think Batman looks like when the effeminate kid named Joel who stand in front of a shoemaker store talks about Batman's muscles and tight rubber armor.



Thank you HDTGM for taking this horrible movie to task.

[wyldride]

If Batman and Robin is the Superman III of the Batman movies, then Batman Forever is the Batman IV. B&R may be sillier, but BF is way, way worse, but not in a fun way. Also of note: BANE! Played by the late Jeep Swenson.

[Lukas Holmes]

Tommy is strong in a crazy homeless guy way. Wonderful! I have to disagree about Batman Forever. I love Batman Forever.

wyldride, on 31 July 2012 - 07:15 AM, said:

If Batman and Robin is the Superman III of the Batman movies, then Batman Forever is the Batman IV. B&R may be sillier, but BF is way, way worse, but not in a fun way. Also of note: BANE! Played by the late Jeep Swenson.

[Jimmy Willis]

Kill the heroes! Even the movie trailer felt like it went on for hours, you might need a two-parter on this one.

[Julia Hays]

I don't know how or why, but I have this monstrosity on VHS.

[Lukas Holmes]

Julia Hays, on 31 July 2012 - 09:15 AM, said:

I don't know how or why, but I have this monstrosity on VHS.

I think the correct answer to both is; Because you're awesome!

[PlanBFromOuterSpace]

25 million bucks equals a million dollars a minute? Whhhaaaa? That is some crazy math. I mean, you can't mean the actual runtime, and I know Arnold HAD to be in the movie for more than 25 minutes. Sure, I know it just FEELS like he was onscreen for about 6 hours of what felt like a movie that ran for 8, but this was less about Batman than any Batman movie before or since.

[Lukas Holmes]

I honestly have not be this excited for an episode of HDTGM yet. Come on next week already!!!!

[Ryan Sz]

PlanBFromOuterSpace, on 31 July 2012 - 08:49 PM, said:

25 million bucks equals a million dollars a minute? Whhhaaaa? That is some crazy math. I mean, you can't mean the actual runtime, and I know Arnold HAD to be in the movie for more than 25 minutes. Sure, I know it just FEELS like he was onscreen for about 6 hours of what felt like a movie that ran for 8, but this was less about Batman than any Batman movie before or since.

25 minutes seems about right, sort of like how Anthony Hopkins was only in Silence of the Lambs for 16 minutes and still won an Oscar for that role. The problem with this movie was that there were so many main characters and different storylines so it really limited the time for all of the characters. I think the makers of the movie were just banking on Arnold's name to bring in a huge gross at the box office, rather than a good story and characters.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace]

I would SO like to see Clooney of today given another shot at Batman, like if they ever decide to do a proper "Dark Knight Returns" a few years down the road, where an older Bruce Wayne comes out of retirement, he'd actually be perfect.

Speaking of which, how much did a lot of the stuff in "Dark Knight Rises" just NOT mean anything? It had to have one of the greatest anti-climactic beginnings of all time. Bruce went home 10 minutes after the end of "Dark Knight" and hasn't been Batman ever since? The first hour of this movie is spent trying to get him back in the suit, and when Batman DOES return, he's back for a day before Bane takes him out of commission AGAIN for another hour of the film. He beat up a guy that was using a cane to get around 5 minutes ago! How is that impressive?!?! Good thing for Gotham City that he gets back on the DAY that the bomb is going to go off and that we didn't get some time of him rallying the troops and earning the trust of the people back. Like "Batman and Robin", this movie didn't actually have a lot of Batman, but "Rises" sure had a shit ton of Bruce Wayne.

Also....

**********SPOILERS**********







Is the next Batman movie or (if by the grace of God, some miracle occurs and it actually gets rolling...) JLA going to start off by telling us that 5 minutes after finding the Batcave, JGL just decided "Fuck it, crime fighting isn't for me after all", and just spent the next 8 years sitting on his ass at home?








**********END SPOILERS**********

[twarnercool2]

PlanBFromOuterSpace, on 01 August 2012 - 08:14 AM, said:

I would SO like to see Clooney of today given another shot at Batman, like if they ever decide to do a proper "Dark Knight Returns" a few years down the road, where an older Bruce Wayne comes out of retirement, he'd actually be perfect.

Speaking of which, how much did a lot of the stuff in "Dark Knight Rises" just NOT mean anything? It had to have one of the greatest anti-climactic beginnings of all time. Bruce went home 10 minutes after the end of "Dark Knight" and hasn't been Batman ever since? The first hour of this movie is spent trying to get him back in the suit, and when Batman DOES return, he's back for a day before Bane takes him out of commission AGAIN for another hour of the film. He beat up a guy that was using a cane to get around 5 minutes ago! How is that impressive?!?! Good thing for Gotham City that he gets back on the DAY that the bomb is going to go off and that we didn't get some time of him rallying the troops and earning the trust of the people back. Like "Batman and Robin", this movie didn't actually have a lot of Batman, but "Rises" sure had a shit ton of Bruce Wayne.

Also....

**********SPOILERS**********







Is the next Batman movie or (if by the grace of God, some miracle occurs and it actually gets rolling...) JLA going to start off by telling us that 5 minutes after finding the Batcave, JGL just decided "Fuck it, crime fighting isn't for me after all", and just spent the next 8 years sitting on his ass at home?








**********END SPOILERS**********

I know. I mean really,nothing for 8 years! I expected him to fight some other villans during that time. Like the Riddler or Calender man. And the movie could have been only an hour and a half if they cut out most of the first hour and a half. The first hour was basic saying the same thing as the next hour. It was cool(if they meant it) to have Selina dress in a maid costume and act like Dorothy from the big O. The movie was ok.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace]

Really! I expected that Batman would have stayed active, but just wouldn't have had the cops on his side like before!

I've been saying to folks how, if they wanted to tell the story they were telling (which was basically two stories in one), it would have made PERFECT sense to make "Rises" a two-part finale. Hell, the second part COULD have been called "The Dark Knight Returns".

The first half of the film wanted to be "KnightFall", the story where Bane breaks everyone out of Blackgate Prison and Arkham Asylum, causing Batman to spend a week rounding them up, leaving him an exhausted wreck before Bane easily dispatches him in his own home. The first hour of part one could have been very similar to the first hour that we got in "Rises", the jailbreak could have been the mid-point, and then it would have MEANT something when Bane took out Bats in the part one cliffhanger after he spent half the movie having to fight every criminal and crazy out there.

The second half of "Rises" wanted to be "No Man's Land", where the government pretty much gave up on Gotham City after the latest in a decades-long series of disasters involving Batman and his rogues gallery. Again, part two could have picked up with Bruce in Bane's old prison (a nice callback to the beginning of "Begins") just like in "Rises", and it still could have taken him half the movie to get out while everything went to hell back home. Only here, Bruce could have made it back WITHOUT rushing right to the endgame. He could have had time to re-build his rep, gain back the trust of the people, and the support of the cops. As it stands, he shows up at EXACTLY the time he needs to show up, not a moment too soon, and we go right to the end. His return should have MEANT more.

"Dark Knight" was also crazy long, but there was so much going on, and it all seemed to mean something. "Dark Knight Rises" was really long, but seemed to rush, and not only was the main character MIA for most of it, but other important characters were out of action for long stretches (Gordon, Catwoman) or downright disappeared (Alfred) as well.

Am I wrong, or did Alfred essentially give Bruce the Ben Affleck speech from "Good Will Hunting"?

[Be Cool About Fire Safety]

One of my big problems with TDKR is that, although physically menacing, Bane just fell completely flat for me. He and Batman had no chemistry. My friends couldn't stop gushing over this movie and their response to Bane was that he was compelling because he's the only antagonist that could physically over power Batman. That doesn't really get me excited though. The Joker was such an awesome character because he was wreaking havoc for the sake of it, regardless of who he was screwing over (be it Batman, Harvey Dent, or mobsters) because he thrived on chaos. Even better was The Joker's chemistry with Batman (and everyone else pretty much) - Ledger fucking owned that role. Bane's motivations seemed kind of trite and I couldn't take him seriously with that Darth Vader meets dandy fop voice. AND IT WAS SO LONG. I fell asleep for a bit. The good thing was that I saw a matinee, so I only paid 7 bucks.

On to what I really wanted to say: FUCK B&R. I watched this with Rifftrax and it was still hard to finish. I remember liking it when it came out, but that's because I was fucking 10. It makes sense that Schumacher would yell "This is a cartoon!" on set because the way Freeze and Ivy talked was the most embarrassing and preposterous thing I've watched in a really long time. I like Uma Thurman and her part in this bummed me out so hard. Clooney phoned in the entire role. I was also so confused as to why Batman and Robin were buddies to begin with. There was no explanation. At all. Like, why is this dood chillen with an eccentric "playboy" millionaire? Oh, and DIAMOND HOCKEY? What was that?!?!? I can't wait to hear the episode on this because this movie was so fucking awful. I honestly don't know which is worse at this point, Battlefield Earth or B&R.

[Shannon]

I just want to make it known that I won't be tolerating any Batman Forever hate.

Batman Forever is NOT the bad Batman movie and I will fight anyone who says otherwise




I already watched B&R last week because I thought this ep had already dropped for whatever reason and it is so terribly terrible. It only further cemented the point I made above, Batman Forever ISN'T the bad one.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace]

The commentary track on "Batman and Robin" is pretty fascinating, as Schumacher owns up to the stuff he WAS responsible for while also explaining how WB really didn't give a shit about the quality of the movie, how they were more concerned about selling merch. If something in the movie looked like a toy, that was the point, because they made so much more on the tie-ins than on the movies themselves. Rather than try to repair a franchise that seemed to be running out of steam, they just decided to go balls out and not even hide the fact that this was a giant commercial. I'm half-surprised that the Batmobile wasn't decked out NASCAR-style.

Speaking of the tie-ins, the plastic Alicia Silverstone Batgirl Taco Bell cup was my boozing cup for most of my military career. That thing was fuckin' awesome. It had to be shortly after that that they stopped really making those things to last. I remember in the early 80's having some Return of the Jedi and Star Trek III fast food restaurant pieces that were damn fine glassware.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace]

Shannon, on 01 August 2012 - 09:46 PM, said:

I just want to make it known that I won't be tolerating any Batman Forever hate.

Batman Forever is NOT the bad Batman movie and I will fight anyone who says otherwise




I already watched B&R last week because I thought this ep had already dropped for whatever reason and it is so terribly terrible. It only further cemented the point I made above, Batman Forever ISN'T the bad one.

"Forever" was certainly the most re-watchable of the bunch. It's fast-paced and pretty fun, and you can just have it on in the background while you're doing other stuff. It kind of reminds me of "Alien Resurrection" in that way, kind of dumb but entertaining. "Batman and Robin" is toxic. I mean, sure, it's fun to bag on and watch with friends, but there's really no other reason for it to see the light of the day. I remember feeling embarrassed as I watched it in the theater. I watched it for the first time in a while recently as every podcaster and his brother was gearing up to do their Batman series discussions, and I probably didn't remember a good 70% of the film. I'm not sure if straight up forgot it all, or if my mind is just trying to protect me...

[MarshLandMonster]

PlanBFromOuterSpace, on 01 August 2012 - 08:14 AM, said:

I would SO like to see Clooney of today given another shot at Batman, like if they ever decide to do a proper "Dark Knight Returns" a few years down the road, where an older Bruce Wayne comes out of retirement, he'd actually be perfect.

They are...
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2313197/

It'll be animated so you know it'll be dope.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace]

I know that's coming, that's why I said a proper "Dark Knight Returns". I've liked a lot of the animated DCU stuff, but to a lot of people, it's still JUST cartoons and they won't take it seriously unless something's live action. The fact that these are all made for the home video market kind of makes it hard to look legit too, no matter what the quality, which is a shame.