Against the Crowd Blogathon 2016: Dell's Entry and Day 3 Recap

Kick-Ass 2

Directed by Jeff Wadlow.

2013. Rated R, 103 minutes.

Cast:

Aaron Taylor-Johnson

Chloe Grace Moretz

Christopher Mintz-Plasse

Morris Chestnut

John Leguizamo

Jim Carrey

Donald Faison

Lindy Booth

Olga Kurkulina

Augustus Prew

Clark Duke

After his exploits in the first movie, David Lizewski (Taylor-Johnson) is no longer fighting crime as his alter-ego Kick-Ass. These days, he's just trying to lead a normal life. Meanwhile, Mindy Macready (Moretz), or Hit Girl, is vigorously training for her return to action. Finding normal life a bore, David relents and starts working out with Hit Girl and the two decide to form a team. She's got issues of her own, though. Emotionally, she is torn between honoring her father's dying wish for her to continue his life's work as a superhero and her guardian, Det. Marcus Williams' warnings about the inappropriateness, illegality, and pure danger of that lifestyle. She opts out of the crime-fighting business. Still, David is in luck. Through some rigorous internet searching he hooks up with a group of superheroes calling themselves Justice Forever, headed by Colonel Stars and Stripes (Carrey). Of course, things aren't all hunky-dory. The main issue is that Chris D'Amico (Mintz-Plasse), aka Red Mist from the first movie is really pissed about how things turned out in that initial flick. With lots of money at his disposal, he recreates himself as a super-villain and starts putting together his own team for the sole purpose of killing Kick-Ass.

Hit Girl's personal conflict takes up as much of the spotlight as Kick-Ass, if not more. It's just as well since Chloe Grace Moretz is clearly a better actor than Aaron Taylor-Johnson. In an ultra-violent superhero flick built upon trying to apply comic sensibilities to our world, she brings real depth and weight to her character. It's a character given more room to breath as she isn't boxed into reacting to Nicolas Cage this time around. To really sell it, though, she has to convincingly handle the physical aspects of her role. She does so very well. I'd argue hers is the most physically demanding role in the movie and she pulls it off without a hitch.

Christopher Mintz-Plasse is another highlight as our bad guy. Understandably, some viewers may be annoyed by him, but I think that's what the movie is going for. He's a class A Jerk, a privileged brat, remorselessly evil, and at least a little racist. The gallery of criminals he hires is a fun collection of baddies he identifies by stereotyping their ethnicity. The most prominent of these people is Mother Russia (Kurkulina). In my review of Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Part 2 I noted there is a character who looks like Drago from Rocky IV with boobs. Mother Russia is the live action embodiment of that. Combine this with her flat out ruthlessness and she might be the scariest woman you've ever seen.

Like it's predecessor, Kick-Ass 2 is a sharp spoof of superhero culture, both on the page and the screen. Lots of the dialogue is simplistic, slogan filled, and declaritive. It sounds like it, but it is not lazy writing. In fact, I'd say it's the exact opposite because it's going out of its way to sound that way. It's the way comic book characters often speak. Going back to our bad guy, he does this and laces every tirade with profanity. That demonstrates how much of a spoiled brat he is and that he's part of a reality closer to our own than The Avengers. As far as his use of stereotypes, it is jab at the way non-Anglo characters have been portrayed since the inception of comic books. Look back at the history of non-traditional (read: not white) characters in not just comics, but pop culture at large, and you'll see lots of stereotyping. John Leguizamo, as Chris' driver/helper/friend calls him on it. To this he responds with a line calling them archetypes which perfectly echoes the excuses used for how these people are portrayed.

Alongside broader topics such as those, KA2 narrows its focus a bit and targets the superhero team. The Watchmen seems to be the biggest target. This is ironic because that movie, and the graphic novel it's based on, essentially tries to do the same thing as KA2, bring superheroes nearer to our reality. The Watchmen just goes about the task in a somberly and as an intense examination of this world. KA2 flips things around to focus more on the superhero world and does it in a comedic manner.

I know. I know. I've seen the scores on rottentomatoes.com and metacritic.com. The people who get paid to have an opinion on this sort of thing hate this movie. Many of my fellow hobbyists who just blog about movies are in agreement with the pros. I just can't follow the flock on this one. Is it as good as the original? No. Personally, I'm on record grading it as a classic so there is almost no way this could reach that lofty status. However, I still find it to be highly entertaining and way smarter than it has been given credit for being. Like Nicolas Cage in the first movie, Chloe Grace Moretz hits it out of the park with what is already a massively underappreciated performance, in my book. And yes, I would welcome a Kick-Ass 3.

MY SCORE: 7.5/10

Kick-Ass

Directed by Jane Goldman and Matthew Vaughn.
2010. Rated R, 117 minutes.
Aaron Johnson
Christopher Mintz-Plasse
Mark Strong
Chloë Grace Moretz
Nicolas Cage
Omari Hardwick
Michael Rispoli
Clark Duke
Garrett M. Brown
Dexter Fletcher

Like a lot of boys, Dave (Johnson) wonders what it would be like to be a superhero. He even carries the fantasy one step further and tries to act it out in real life. He gets his hands on a green wetsuit, names himself Kick-Ass and takes to the streets looking like a jade ninja. From there ensues a wild ride full of perfectly just over the top violence and fueled by an absolutely wicked sense of humor. It’s based on the graphic novel of the same name.

This isn’t Batman Begins so there’s no real training for superhero. Things don’t go smoothly. They go about as good as if you yourself decided to don tights and become a crimefighter. Actually, they go better because he doesn’t wind up dead within the first few minutes. Despite becoming a media sensation, he’s not a very good superhero.

Closer to the real deal, but more homicidal than most, we learn, is Hit-Girl (Moretz), a pint-sized killing machine and her father Big Daddy (Cage). Like everyone else who’s watched this movie I have high praise for Hit-Girl. She totally steals the show. We need more Hit-Girl. However, I’ve not seen anyone give Nicolas Cage his just due. I get that there’s a lot of Cage hatred out there. He’s done a lot of dreadful movies. I also understand that most of KA’s audience is too young to remember what Cage is making fun of. His parody of Adam West’s version of Batman is just dead-on and completely hilarious. Well, it’s hilarious if you have the old TV series as a reference point. If so, you’ll recognize everything he does and might laugh yourself to tears.

This brings me to my next point. KA isn’t just an action-comedy. It’s a brilliant spoof of all things superhero. It’s simultaneously reverential and irreverent. It lovingly skewers the genres of literature, television and cinema that birthed it, holding their feet to the fire even as it gives them a hug. Comic book fans will notice the subtleties that make KA special. For instance, notice the unspoken joke of our hero wearing glasses in his regular life but not when dressed as his alter-ego. What makes it great is that even if you miss those little touches you can still have a great time watching it. This is because the best spoofs use the genre they’re spoofing for inspiration, making fun of that genre’s absurdities while also working within its confines and stand alone as narratives.

In those dreadful “____ Movie” (Scary, Date, Dance, etc) flicks there appears to be no love for whatever they’re trying to parody. It’s all mean-spirited and void of creativity. They merely reenact a scene from some other movie and add something gross to it. When they’re over, you can’t really remember the story it’s trying to tell. Here, you needn’t have seen any specific movie to get most of the jokes. You only have to be familiar with a certain type of movie. This is why Young Frankenstein works for people who’ve never actually seen the original Frankenstein or Scream for people who aren’t necessarily fans of slasher movies. Kick-Ass is one of the best spoofs.

The Opposite View: Stephen Himes, Film Snobs

What the Internet Says: 8.1/10 on imdb.com (#183 all time as of 8/20/10), 76% on rottentomatoes.com, 66/100 on metacritic.com

MY SCORE: 10/10