Going Attractions: June Releases - Just like last month, these are the big time films that came out in June. I will see precisely zero of these in the theatre, but I will happily speculate on whether I will catch them on cable.
Man of Steel -- Never met a Superman movie that was worth a damn. Although I do remember a couple of humorous moments in the second Christopher Reeve film. The plane rescue in the previous reboot was pretty good. The two-part Mole Men episode in the Superman TV series from the '50s was about as good as TV sci-fi got at the time (I'm guessing -- it was 9 years before my existence). That's about all the good I have to say about Superman. I was a Marvel Comics kid, not DC, so even then I didn't cotton to the Big S. I thought the movie Hollywoodland about the rise and fall of George Reeves (the '50s TV Superman) was well done for the most part, even to point of liking Ben Affleck in it. Of course, the real enduring legacy of Superman is that it made Jerry Seinfeld want a girlfriend named Lois so much he raced Duncan Meyer. Until then, He Chose Not To Run!
So, no. I doubt I'll watch it.
This is the End -- Whoa, what a concept. Endless self-referential irony in a movie that is 100% cameos. Future film historians will look back on this movie as the pinnacle of Hollywood post-modern comedy. It's absurd to even offer an opinion. Better to offer a sneering review of the opinion along with droll some meta commentary. Still, Seth Rogen's posse can be pretty funny so I'll likely watch it. Hell, if I could zone out to Hot Tub Time Machine I can zone out to this.
The Purge -- Negative. The only thing I want to know is at what point Landru shows up. (If you got that reference you are true geek. Respect.)
World War Z -- As much as I admire Brad Pitt's work, there is only so much you can do with zombies, what with their deceased nature. Don't get me wrong, I love zombies, per se. They are the ultimate video game cannon fodder; the new nazis in Castle Wolfenstein, if you will. And you can pretty much do anything you want with them with moral impunity because they are already dead (necrophilia aside). But you just know someone is going to come along and humanize them. Have a pretty girl fall in love one in defiance of her parents. We'll have a zombie rom-com. Then it will be over. We'll have to find new target for a advanced lasers and plasma pulse weapons, never mind plain old chainsaws. Cuz they'll have rights. Wait. You say it's been done? Crap. What's left now? Orcs? Skrulls? So I guess this film is the last hurrah of traditional zombies as nothing but a gore source. I suppose I'll watch it if I happen to stumble upon it while channel surfing, before they ban it for being offensive to the living dead. Civilization continues to decline.
