DISCLAIMER (skip if you don’t give a shit): I haven’t reviewed Guillermo Del Toro’s movies since 2004, when Drew McWeeny got him to write a blurb for a book I self-published (later used by Titan on my other books). I never met or e-mailed the guy but it was a harsh, self-imposed rule to avoid any perception of being easier on his movies because of that connection, or worse, actually doing that. But I decided I want to write about PACIFIC RIM anyway. Maybe it was just a 9 year rule.
Since I haven’t reviewed them all here’s where I stand on Del Toro: been a fan since MIMIC. BLADE 2 is my favorite, followed by the three Spanish language movies in reverse chronological order. I enjoy the HELLBOYs but don’t love ’em. The second one frustrated me because it has many flashes of brilliance but doesn’t all come together for me. I like the movies he produces, also.
Here’s a not-perfect but surprisingly enjoyable family sports robots drama from the visionary director of, to be frankly honest, CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN (remake) and THE PINK PANTHER (remake) and a bunch of other shit like that. Obviously the title is a cheap stunt, they’re trying to make you think Shaquille O’Neal is in it, so please spread the word that that’s not the case. It’s also not officially based on the beloved intellectual property Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots, even though it’s about boxing robots. It’s credited as being partly based on a Richard Matheson short story called “Steel” (also turned into a Twilight Zone episode starring Lee Marvin), but I say it’s suspiciously similar to Menahem Golan’s OVER THE TOP. (read the rest of this shit…)
note: this review is excessively long and convoluted and takes forever to get to the point, but only as a clever form-is-an-extension-of-content type reference to the movie it describes, in my opinion. Unfortunately I could never match the feel of the movie no matter how hard I tried. It’s like when some asshole reviews a Dr. Seuss movie in rhymes or some shit like that.
introductory remarks/overture
My friends, we have lost. Michael Bay has defeated us. First he invaded the shores of the genre we hold most dear. He brought us gifts of explosions, while behind our backs he robbed us of the very language of geography and context we use to communicate what is exploding and who or what is endangered by said explosion. Then he confiscated our property, buying up our favorite low budget horror classics to rebuild as slick, soul-less product – just to crush our spirits. And now he has completely subjugated us. (read the rest of this shit…)
Today, as we celebrate the opening of the third Steven Spielberg produced Hasbro adaptation about overly detailed space robots with different accents wiggling around and smashing buildings, let’s also take a moment to note the tenth anniversary of that one time when Spielberg tried to make a thoughtful robot movie.
Daft Punk are those two French guys who played the robotic club DJs in TRON’S LEGACY, and as long as they were on set Disney must’ve figured they oughta get them to record the score that for me at least made that stupid movie sort of awesome. They are better known as musicians and makers of cool music videos than as actors or filmatists, but this here was their feature film directational debut.
ELECTROMA is a movie with no dialogue, no human characters, and no Daft Punk music. It does star the two robot-masked Daft Punk characters (with their band logo studded into the back of their leather jackets), but apparently they’re not even played by the actual guys.
It has little moments that remind me of other movies that I happen to love: a drop of THEY LIVE, a slight whiff of HOLY MOUNTAIN. But mostly it reminds me of BROWN BUNNY remade with robots and no blowjob. There’s about 10 minutes of plot stretched into 74 minutes of movie. It’s not for everybody, or most, or very many. I thought it was great though. (read the rest of this shit…)
Stuart Gordon’s ROBOT JOX is the timeless story of some Robot Jox. It’s a post-apocalyptic world where the surviving factions of humanity fight over territories in sanctioned robot-on-robot battles. During the time of this story the Americans and Russians are fighting over Alaska. So this is the story of those robot battles and of the jox that jock the robots.
The robots aren’t alive, they are controlled by jox. Robot jox, if you want to be specific about which type of jox they are. These robot jox train in the martial arts and what not to prime their bodies to do moves that will be duplicated by the robot body around them. They have teams of course to build their robots and work on new weapons and help train them. So it’s like a futuristic cross between UFC, NASCAR, and war. (read the rest of this shit…)
SURROGATES is TERMINATOR 3 director Jon Mostow (plus the writers of TERMINATOR 3-4) doing another robot movie, this time free of the expectations and mythology (and budget, from the looks of it) of the TERMINATOR series. The only thing they’re chained to is the “graphic novel” the ads say it’s based on, which means a comic book. Luckily they don’t have to be too careful about adapting it because nobody ever heard of it until it was being made into a movie. You show me someone who has read it and I’ll show you the guy that did the copy editing. I was gonna say the mom of the guy who wrote it but I doubt she read it either. This is not some iconic one everybody knows like Alan Moore’s Watchmen or Garfield’s Big Fat Hairy Deal. (read the rest of this shit…)
Okay, first off, this is not a fair review. I didn’t go into this thing in good faith. I never thought there was a possibility I would genuinely like this movie. So don’t think I’m trying to be objective here. But I’ve been getting emails and comments for months asking me to review this sequel to a movie I hated, and there’s a hell of a conversation going on in the comments for my review of the first one. And to be honest I was strangely excited to see it. It just sounded so insane, and as a fan and scholar of the summer blockbuster movie maybe it was important that I see it, just like I saw MY GIANT for the sake of Seagalogy. Whatever my excuse is, the same guy who got me into the first one for free hooked me up for this one too. So your wish is my command. (read the rest of this shit…)
By now you’ve heard of WALL-E. Lovable robot, etc.
I’m no cartoon fetishist, but I’m not blind. Pixar is America’s most consistently great studio, and on first glance this is probaly the best they’ve done so far. You never thought you’d see something like WALT DISNEY’S 2001 A SPACE ODYSSEY, but that’s what the first act of this feels like. This movie is deep. There is a poetically tragic beauty to it that has never been captured in any cartoon all the way from PINOCCHIO to BARBIE’S FAIRY MERMAID CASTLE 2 or even (arguably) OSMOSIS JONES. (read the rest of this shit…)
Three words for you about TRANSFORMERS: Ho. Lee. Shit. Not as in “Holy shit, I was blown away, it was a blast as well as AWESOME!” but as in “Holy shit, society really is on the brink of collapse.”
Usually if a movie is already playing in theaters I don’t send my review here, I just use it at my geocities.com/outlawvern sight, but jesus, SOMEBODY had to say something. I can’t believe how many positive reviews I have read of this. I think Harry’s was the only negative I saw, but he was polite about it. I read Moriarty’s review before the screening and I thought wow, what if I actually like this movie? Like me, Moriarty hates Michael Bay’s movies from head to toe, style and content, and me and him agree on all kinds of stuff. I don’t remember too many cases where I thought he was being too easy on a movie, at least not a big one like this (only one that comes to mind is the much smaller DAREDEVIL). I never thought I would like this movie until I read his review. He had me about 80% convinced that it would surprise me and win me over, like LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD did. And I might have to seek counseling after enjoying those two movies in a row, but that’s life. (read the rest of this shit…)
WAYS YOU CAN SUPPORT THE SHIT OUT OF VERN & OUTLAWVERN.COM
if that's your thing:
1. Patreon
Toss me a couple bucks a month, support the good shit, also get access to a bunch of exclusive writing. This is my primary source of writing money that has allowed me to cut down to part time at the day job. Thank you!
2. Buy my books from your local bookseller or somebody
(NOTE: My ten year contract has passed on the Titan books, so I don't get residuals on them like I do WORM ON A HOOK and NIKETOWN, but I would love for you to read them because I'm proud of them)
EXTRA CREDIT: Review them on Amazon! That would really help me out. Unless you didn't like them, in which case forget I said anything.
3. If you ever buy from Amazon, go through my links or search engines
(you pay the same amount you were gonna pay anyway they cut me a little slice)
I also have an Amazon UK one:
(I can't get the search box widget to work anymore, so click on MOONWALKER and then search for what you want.)
4. My exciting line of fashion and leisure products
(I get a couple bucks per item, you get a cool t-shirt, mug or lifestyle item)
5. Spread the word
Tell your friends about my reviews and my books and everything. Only cool people though please, we don't need a bunch of suckers and/or chumps around here.
THANKS EVERYBODY. YOUR FRIEND, VERN
* * * *
Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
KayKay on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “Hehehe… as our patron saint of barroom philosophy and Ace Cooler Dalton once grunted: Opinions vary. Mine? I’m downright stoked…” Dec 27, 04:14
Curt on Alphabet City: “RIP Amos Poe. The films of his I’ve watched so far include THE BLANK GENERATION (essential), THE FOREIGNER (which I…” Dec 26, 18:45
CJ Holden on Trancers: “Likewise. Don’t think I ever heard anything bad about her personally, but she is sadly someone who started out in…” Dec 26, 09:16
Dreadguacamole on Trancers: “CJ – I’m not much of a TV person, so all I had to be judgemental about was her post-TRANCERS…” Dec 26, 09:02
CJ Holden on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “Eh, I liked the first two AVATARs a lot, but the last Nolan joint that I actually enjoyed was THE…” Dec 26, 09:00
KayKay on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “CJ, unless you’re into paying premium prices for cinematic Ambien, skip this dud. Pocket your cash and wait for Nolan’s…” Dec 26, 07:47
CJ Holden on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “You guys, 22€ to see the movie in IMAX 3D HFR? And that’s just the cheapest seat! I feel like…” Dec 26, 02:13
Skani on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “I find myself in the same position as Adam and Chuck*, where almost the only thing I have to say…” Dec 25, 20:46
KayKay on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “I will admit Walter Chaw’s outrage can overwhelm his obvious talents as a film critic sometimes, but the man does…” Dec 25, 18:45
Chuck on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “I am glad the people who like these movies can enjoy them. They are aggressively not my thing. Don’t even…” Dec 25, 17:37
Skani on Worm on a Hook: “Season’s greetings, Vern and Denizens of Verlandia! About two weeks ago, tragedy struck our household. I set down my eight-year-old…” Dec 25, 09:37
VERN on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “Well, he also co-directed a 3D concert film with Billy Eilish.” Dec 25, 09:00
Adam C aka TaumpyTearrs on Avatar: Fire and Ash: “Man, I can’t even watch these things to enjoy the action and criticize the scripts like everybody else because I…” Dec 25, 00:12
DISCLAIMER (skip if you don’t give a shit): I haven’t reviewed Guillermo Del Toro’s movies since 2004, when Drew McWeeny got him to write a blurb for a book I self-published (later used by Titan on my other books). I never met or e-mailed the guy but it was a harsh, self-imposed rule to avoid any perception of being easier on his movies because of that connection, or worse, actually doing that. But I decided I want to write about PACIFIC RIM anyway. Maybe it was just a 9 year rule.
Here’s a not-perfect but surprisingly enjoyable family sports robots drama from the visionary director of, to be frankly honest, CHEAPER BY THE DOZEN (remake) and THE PINK PANTHER (remake) and a bunch of other shit like that. Obviously the title is a cheap stunt, they’re trying to make you think Shaquille O’Neal is in it, so please spread the word that that’s not the case. It’s also not officially based on the beloved intellectual property Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots, even though it’s about boxing robots. It’s credited as being partly based on a Richard Matheson short story called “Steel” (also turned into a Twilight Zone episode starring Lee Marvin), but I say it’s suspiciously similar to Menahem Golan’s OVER THE TOP. 
note: this review is excessively long and convoluted and takes forever to get to the point, but only as a clever form-is-an-extension-of-content type reference to the movie it describes, in my opinion. Unfortunately I could never match the feel of the movie no matter how hard I tried. It’s like when some asshole reviews a Dr. Seuss movie in rhymes or some shit like that.
released June 29th, 2001
Daft Punk are those two French guys who played the robotic club DJs in 
Stuart Gordon’s ROBOT JOX is the timeless story of some Robot Jox. It’s a post-apocalyptic world where the surviving factions of humanity fight over territories in sanctioned robot-on-robot battles. During the time of this story the Americans and Russians are fighting over Alaska. So this is the story of those robot battles and of the jox that jock the robots.
SURROGATES is 
Okay, first off, this is not a fair review. I didn’t go into this thing in good faith. I never thought there was a possibility I would genuinely like this movie. So don’t think I’m trying to be objective here. But I’ve been getting emails and comments for months asking me to review this sequel to a movie I hated, and there’s a hell of a conversation going on in the comments for my review of the first one. And to be honest I was strangely excited to see it. It just sounded so insane, and as a fan and scholar of the summer blockbuster movie maybe it was important that I see it, just like I saw MY GIANT for the sake of Seagalogy. Whatever my excuse is, the same guy who got me into the first one for free hooked me up for this one too. So your wish is my command. 
By now you’ve heard of WALL-E. Lovable robot, etc.
Three words for you about TRANSFORMERS: Ho. Lee. Shit. Not as in “Holy shit, I was blown away, it was a blast as well as AWESOME!” but as in “Holy shit, society really is on the brink of collapse.”
