the alabama phoenix festival

Every year, starting like, last year or something, Birmingham has hosted a geek-fest known as The Alabama Phoenix Festival, which is a small version of the San Diego Comic Con or the Dragon Con that happens around the country... I didn't get to go last year, but because our podcast--The Deucecast Movie Picture Show--was actually a guest of the Festival, I was somewhat expected to be there.

There are a few facets to the Alabama Phoenix Festival itself, which include the Exhibition Hall, a large ballroom area full of vendors, artists, dealers, writers and so much more.  They had everything from a LEGO corner (four large tables just covered in LEGOs where people could sit down and just build stuff), to a huge Kingdom Comics area with lots of comics and toys to The Alabama Ghostbusters, who had several large set up areas... plus, a group is building a life sized Millennium Falcon, and you could sit inside a life size cockpit of the Millennium Falcon.  I mean, how stinkin' cool is this.

There were also "Panels", or discussion groups set up all during the weekend, all day long.  Topics included Anime... Ghostbusters... Star Trek... Star Wars... Lord the Rings... making costumes... making armor... Avengers... comic books in general... there was also a room for "Bronies" and "Pegasisters", which from what I understand, was pretty much one of the two or three most popular rooms the entire weekend.

Anyway, here are some little notes, stories and pictures from the weekend...

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What's this "Bronie" or "PegaSister" you speak of?  Adult male and female fans of My Little Pony.  No, I'm not kidding.  Seriously, stop laughing, I'm not kidding you at all.  This exists.  And it's big.  They had a two hour singalong where every song from every episode of the latest incarnation was playing, and the entire room sang loudly and proudly.

The gem of the night came, though, when my buddy Hurricane Rhett let his daughter go in there unattended.  When people were answering questions and discussing their love for the Ponies, little Catalina, 7, stood up and proudly proclaimed how her daddy had watched every episode with her, how her daddy loved the Ponies, and how he kinda gets upset when she watches My Little Pony without him.  On an unrelated note, I saw Chris Hansen this weekend, walking around with some sort of transcript, a plate of cookies and a stool to tell people to "Have a seat right there."

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This is the man, Brock Parker, one of the leaders of the Alabama Ghostbusters.  And yes, there is such a thing, and has been for several years.  He has his own working proton pack.  He's a buddy of mine on Facebook for a few years, and we finally meet in person.  Not that unusual, except we probably grew up around 15 miles from each other, as he's from Enterprise, Alabama, I grew up in Samson, about 20 minutes Southwest on a country backroad through Five Points.  Not the Birmingham downtown 5 Points, I mean were five country roads come together to form a big circle, and a great place to say "Meet me at..." when you either want to fight or make out.  Or both.  Up to you.  Where was I?

 

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I couldn't attend on Friday, as I wasn't feeling good, plus I had to help The Lovely Steph Leann take care of our offspring, but Mikey, Shawn Sharp, Hurricane Rhett, P!nky (our other The Deucecast co-host) attended, got some good pics, met some good people and had a good time.

 

Saturday morning, I was on a panel with Mikey and another podcaster, Shazbazzar, from the TechnoRetro Dad's podcast (he also co-hosts a Tron Podcast, which shows his Tron Love, considering you have only 2 movies a short lived cartoon series, you don't have a ton to work with) concerning the upcoming Star Wars Episode VII, and our hopes for it.  Turned out to be a lively discussion amongst the three of us with help from the audience, including a dude in a Star Trek uniform who knew his Star Wars stuff. 

 

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Ladies and gentlemen, Darth Vol.  Yup.

 

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I sat on another panel on Sunday morning, a "podcasting" panel, hosted and moderated by AJ Wiley and Paul Smith, hosts of the Gobbledygeek Podcast, a popculture cast that's picking up steam in this area quite a bit.  Along the panel were hosts from other shows, including several from the Earth Station One network and mostly pop culture.  There was even an Auburn Football show and a personal podcast hosted by a dude who just "talked about whatever I want to talk about".  Sounds like my kind of cast.

 

It was a good hour, as we all discussed why we started podcasting, where we thought our shows were going, our formats, our content being family friendly or not (The Deucecast is, many are not), and so on.  I knew I was there with some heavyweights, so I had to chime in as much as I could, which I think I did quite nicely, holding my own.  We'll release the show as a podcast episode, and I think Gobbledygeek will release the same hour discussion, at least in part, as one of their shows. 

 

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Tommy Mac takes a ride in the cockpit of the starting phase of the lifesize Millennium Falcon.  This is being built somewhere else, and will be on display when it's finished.  I mean, a full sized Falcon?  First, it's going to be insanely big... and I would probably pass out from the sheer joy I'd have, especially if I could walk inside of it.

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There was a costume contest on Saturday night, where everyone who was wearing a disguise of any kind could sign up, walk across the stage, be judged by the judges and hopefully win stuff.  It was entertaining, though only a few costumes really, really stood out.  There were several Deadpool outfits, two of which really should have had the guy wear a cup of some sort... lots of witches, fairies, Dr Who related stuff, a few Walking Dead nods, and a full on Iron Man suit, battle worn, and an Iron Patriot suit, with flashing lights and an AC/DC soundtrack.  Holy cow, it was awesome. 

However, the winners of the costume contest included a pretty convincing Jor-El outfit, and a Jim Lovell Space Suit--both great, but Iron Patriot should of taken that prize home.  They even brought up four of the fan favorites to the stage for the audience to vote via applause, with Iron Man and Iron Patriot being two of them.  When the host asked for applause, Hurricane Rhett and I stood up cheering. 

There was also a chick in an impressive handmaid antebellum dress ("I even made my underwear!" she yelled from the stage) and a costume that I was not familiar with, someone in a nautilus helmet.  Must have been popular, though, as the audience went nuts over the guy.  And he won. 

The host was interesting as well... I didn't know her costume, but it allowed her the opportunity to place the mics between her cleavage and talk into it. 

The kids contest was also funny, as there were are cute costumes all around.  Rhett's daughter, Catalina, was a Zombie School Girl, though she didn't win--she might have done better if she'd played more to the crowd.  Then again, the judges were off, because one cute 3 year old showed up in an incredibly awesome Kid Icarus outfit... and lost to another kid in a... Terminator? outfit?  It was cute.  But nothing like Icarus. 

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A working, moving R2D2, courtesy of the 501st Legion.  I really want to join the 501st Legion one day... though the restrictions and qualifications are like, hard core.  And expensive.

 

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I didn't have any quarters, or I probably would still be there playing.

 

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We were about to leave after the costume contest when we heard they were doing Who's Line Is It Anyway on the mainstage.  So, Mikey, Shawn, Hurricane Rhett, our friend Lisa B-Dub, her friend Something or Other and Tommy Mac and I stuck around to watch.  And it... it was... oh em gee... it was just terrible.  Not funny. At.All.  The jokes were flat, they didn't even follow the rules of the game they were playing, they stuttered and stammered and it was just... bad.  I am sure the people in there were pleasant enough in real life, but onstage, this night, this group of people were not humorous in the least... to the point I winced a few times.  It was painful.

 

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Set up across the room from the Alabama Ghostbusters, its the Florence, AL, Ghostbusters that provided the Ecto-1, which is pretty close in detail.

 

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Towards the end of the night, we were approached by a young lady named Sarah.  She was a UAB student in psychology, and asked if we would be willing to take a survey.  Thinking it was survey about the Alabama Phoenix Festival, most of us said "Sure thing," and took the clipboards to help out.   It was three pages long, and it was absolutely insane.

 

It was not about the Alabama Phoenix Festival, that was very clear from the first few questions, and as we soon learned, it wasn't about any festival at all.  It was about... well, the psychology of men and women.  It was about preferences, feelings, emotions, stereotypes and even more.  While I figured this would still be anonymous, we had also signed a waiver at the beginning, so our name was actually on the survey.  Pages 1 and 2 were easy enough, though a little strange, but then Page 3 came.

 

All in a "Give a number 1 through 5, with 1 being strongly disagree, 2 being disagree, 3 being neither agree nor disagree, 4 being agree and 5 being strongly agree" answer format, it was questions about men and women, and the way we view each other.  Questions about whether we men think we are better then women, whether we are uncomfortable when a woman makes more than we do, wondering if women have more potential in the workfield than men, and then, my favorite... "Men should always save themselves first, then women, in a disaster situation." 

 

When we all finished, we all let Sarah know that we felt the survey was a little manipulative (it was) and not easy to answer truthfully (it wasn't)... "So, if you put 'agree' here, are you saying you 'agree' with what it says you shouldn't do, or should you put 'disagree', because of the way it's worded...?

 

Sarah seemed a little disinterested in our response to the survey, especially when Hurricane Rhett and I said the following:

 

Me:  So in this question about whether men should save themselves first in a disaster situation... I guess my question for that is... how hot is she?  Because that might determine what we as men do?

 

Hurricane Rhett:  Yeah... and then, can she cook?  Can she clean?  Because if the answer to those questions are both Yes, then I'm a little more inclined to break a sweat over her rescue...

 

Sarah stared at us, forced an uncomfortable smile, and simply said, "...wow...".

 

It was awesome.

 

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Our new friend, Shazbazzar, in a Star Wars Clone Wars panel.  

 

About that Star Wars Clone Wars panel... having never seen a single episode of the heralded series, I chose to sit that panel out, though Mikey and Shaz again led. There were two more guys that were supposed to be there, but failed to show, so again, it became a lively discussion amongst the two panelists and the audience. I barely had anything to contribute, though I did read a little about Jedi Master Sifo-Dyas, who was working with the Kaminoans to... you know what, it doesn't matter.

 

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Stan Daniel and I discuss Star Wars and Disney for a solid hour.  And it was magical.

 

 

The final one of the three panels I sat one was probably my favorite.  Stan Daniel, owner of Kingdom Comics, and one of the heads of the Alabama Phoenix Festival is also like me, a huge Disney fan.  So our topic was "May the Mouse Be With You... Always", which was simply Star Wars & Disney.  It was supposed to be about merchandising, and much of it was, but we delved into Harry Potter and Universal's coming on strong, the prospects of a new park for Disney, what to do with Star Wars in the parks, hopes for the new movies, and Jedi Mickey.  Afterwards, our friend Hurricane Rhett, in the audience, pointed at me and said, "I knew he knew Disney.  But this guy KNOWS Disney."  I was proud.

 

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I love Tinkerbell. And I didn't mind a tattooed Tinkerbell.  I told her that I was excited to get my picture with her, and she made a comment about how she'd had two stalkers earlier today. Unsure if that was true, or just saying that because I came on way to strong, I laughed and told her I had the same issue when I wore my Tinkerbell costume.  After she laughed, and then swallowed the vomit that she thew up in her mouth, we got a picture. Her real name is Shay Blaze.

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We also had dinner on Saturday, and lunch on Sunday, at Mugshots, a burger joint that I liked very much.  My best mate Wookiee joined us and enjoyed the last day of the Festival, so it was good to have him around.  The food was excellent, reasonable for the location and what it was and the service was also enjoyable.

 

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I told Stan that I was surprised there was no Harry Potter panel of any kind... they even had a "Hobbit: Book versus Movie" panel, but absolutely nothing Hogwarts, and how they should consider that next year.

 

He asked me what I was thinking, and I told him any number of topics would work... Harry Potter: the Books versus the Movies... Predictions for the upcoming trilogy (which I do not agree with)... Discussions of the locations and little seen characters... anything like that, though what I really wanted to discuss was the Legacy of Star Wars vs The Legacy of Harry Potter, including Universal and Disney in particular.  That is a conversation I could spend hours on, and am planning it for a blog very, very soon.

 

He loved the idea so much that he said he would seriously consider submitted a Harry Potter track of panels next year, but he also wants myself and Mikey to come and debate in a forum against a local children's author and a local Harry Potter historian ("she knows Harry Potter like it's her Bible", Stan said later, which is good because if she's like me, I don't know my Bible nearly as well as I should).  That will happen sometime later this summer, so that should be fun.

 

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All in all, we had a blast at the Alabama Phoenix Festival. Finally met Brock Parker, attended a real life Ghostbusters panel, saw how big the cockpit of the Millennium Falcon would actually be, met a tattooed Tinkerbell, whispered, "I love you!" as I walked away probably hopefully making her feel all kinds of awkward, discussed Disney, Star Wars and Harry Potter at length, saw a real R2D2, a real Iron Patriot, a real Iron Man, about 72 Harley Quinns, a Joker, a Dr. Who phone booth and just got to hang with my boy-oyz.  So it was great.

 

By the way, what is it with Doctor Who?  I mean, five years ago, few people cared, and now the TARDIS phone booth thing is everywhere.   Should I be in on this?  Do I have time for this?

 

Will be making a return next year, as we are already considering doing a live show from there and having a table in the Exhibition Hall to broadcast from and do live games from. 

 

So, listen to The Deucecast Movie Picture Show once per month (though on iTunes, we have a back catelog of over 75 shows you can listen to as well), like us on Facebook and all that. 

 

x-men love

Oh, do I love the X-Men... I collected comic books as a kid, and I thank X-Men for that.  I walked down to the IGA Foodmart in Samson, Alabama, and would get a few issues every month, as my allowance would allow it... and when they released the X-Men vs The Avengers 4 issue limited series, which centered around the arrest and trial of Magneto, I was over the moon.  Still have all 4 issues in good condition buried in my comic boxes.  The reason they are only "good" and not "mint" or "near mint" is because I read them about 50 times each... loved that storyline, plus the pictures of The Avengers locked up with the X-Men in an actual physical brawl.



 

Through college, I couldn't buy many comics, and I kinda lost touch with the stories and the series, but in 2001, when I knew there was an actual "X-Men" movie coming out in May of that year, starring some dude named Hugh Jackman, plus Halle Berry and Captain Picard and, of course, the young and beautiful Anna Paquin... well, I just had to go get me some X-Men comics.  And I did, stopping by Captain Comics (was over on Lorna Road, though the shop has been closed for at least 10 years) and diving headfirst into several series, but my favorite were, of course, The X-Men, followed by The Fantastic Four (I had a comic thing for Sue Storm) and The Avengers.  Because I was working two jobs, I had some money to work with at the time... I likely dropped $50, sometimes $80 per month on comic books--I'd take them to my little cube at the radio station office I worked in, and in between projects, I'd read. 

But it was truly the X-Men movie that sparked my revival.  Now, I don't buy many comics (re: any) because they are just so doggone expensive... when I was buying them, and my monthly issue of Mad Magazine, back in the late 80s, the comics were about $1.00 each, maybe $1.25, and my Mad Magazine declared on the front cover "$1.99 CHEAP!"... when I had my comic buying renaissance in the early 2000s, they went from $1.99 to $2.50 to $2.99 each in the span of about 2 years.  Now?  $3.99 for a regular issue... the art work and graphics are awesome, but when it costs $40 for ten different issues?  Nope.

I guess for those not fully seeing the X-Men appeal, maybe you don't know what I'm talking about... here's a nerd explanation...

First, X-Men are a team of mutants--humans who were born with various "gifts", everything from shape shifting to extraordinary healing... back in the 60s, Stan Lee came up with the concept of "mutants" to explain how to give some of his characters powers without making them otherworldly.  They are mostly Earth-born, but different.  And the mutant struggle for acceptance has been many times connected with the struggle of the homosexual community in what they've gone through over the years for acceptance and such.  Not sure if that's where the artists were truly going with that over the years, but there you go.

Psychic and wheelchair bound (long story) Charles Xavier helps to round up some of these young mutants to train them to start a team, the X-Men, with the likes of Cyclops (fire shoots out of his eyes), Beast (scientist Hank McCoy turns blue and... beastly), Jean Grey (another psychic) and various others, usually doing battle with the evil mutant Magneto, who can control metal at will.

Of course, there is Wolverine, aka James Logan, a sometimes out of control rough n tumble mutant who's special power/gift is healing, but he also has bone claws that can come out of his hands--in a later storyline, those become "adamantium", an almost unbreakable metal. 

So then you've got the bad guys, like Magneto and Mystique and The Brotherhood of Mutants, who believe that normal people are inferior, and that mutants should rule, and will do whatever they need to do to rule such "ungifted people"... you get the drift.

All this leads to "X-Men: Days of Future Past", the movie we watched last night... based on one of the most popular storylines in the comic series history, it makes a few changes to the original story to tell a tale of time travel, dark pasts, darker futures and assassinations.

The movie opens years into the future from the present day, where giant robot Sentinels are wiping mutants off the face of the Earth.  Through some trickeration, Professor X and Magneto, along with young mutants Shadowcat (also known as Kitty Pryde), Pyro, Iceman, Bishop, Warpath, Colossus and a few others help to send Wolverine back in time.  The purpose is to stop the then-young mutant Mystique from assassinating scientist Boliver Trask (played to the hilt by Peter Dinklage).  The killing sparks a series of events to which the Sentinels are then created and sent out to murder the mutants (leading to the future we saw at the beginning of the movie)

However, when they stop Mystique, they discover things to be even worse.  Hugh Jackman is Wolverine, and by that I mean, he IS Wolverine.  All others in this franchise of films can be replaced--but he is an important to X-Men movies as Robert Downey Jr is to the Avengers series.  He's the focal point.

The stellar cast also includes the gorgeous-in-whatever-she-does Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique, in full blue body paint... Sir Ian McKellen reprising his older Magneto role... Ellen Page as Kitty Pryde... James McAvoy as the young Charles Xavier... and Michael Fassbender, who owns the screen every time he's on it, as the younger Magneto.

The movie itself was spectacular.  The action was great, the story was great, the script was well done, and new mutant Quicksilver (Evan Peters) nearly stole the film out from under everyone... the "Time in a Bottle" sequence is one of the most well done X-Men sequences since the opening scene of X2: X-Men United with Night Crawler.

Sorry, did I lose you again?  Well, the opening scene of the 2nd X-Men movie, aptly titled X2: X-Men United, introduce the mutant Night Crawler, who can teleport, and its an amazing scene.  The Quicksilver scene here was nearly as good.

Finally, there is the matter of all those other X-Men films, and how does this connect?  The answer is simple.  It doesn't.  Except for when it does.  Except for those times it almost does, but doesn't, but then does.  "Days of Future Past" draws heavily from the previous film, "X-Men: First Class", and has several nods to the first two movies, X-Men and X2... it kinda ignores "X-Men: The Last Stand", the 3rd film, which is ok because several of us ignore that one too. And only sorta references the two stand-alone Wolverine films, "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" and "The Wolverine"...

...but as you'll see at the end of this film, the writers were clever enough to set it up where all that doesn't matter, and from here, they can kinda do what they want. 

There you have it.  Go see "Days of Future Past", even if you aren't a comic fan, you'll catch on pretty fast.  Go read some graphic novel collections of the X-Men, including the original story, as told in Uncanny X-Men #141 and 142.   Watch this movie, then read this hilarious spoiler filled explanation of everything you just saw.


X-Men: Days of Future Past is 3rd in my Happy Summer 100 list.

to campbell on his first birthday (post 900)

This is post #900.  I had something a little more "elaborate" for this "milestone", but is it really a milestone?  Its just moving from the 800s to the 900s.  So I waited for today to blog, a day with a little something to it.  Yes, its been over a month, and for those of you who kept checking the site on a regular basis looking for new content, thank you.  I really appreciate you sticking with me.  And yes, Clouds in My Coffee rolls on.  But here is what I wanted to say tonight...

Dear Campbell,

This is your dad.  Today you celebrated your first birthday . You don't remember anything about it, I am fairly certain, and I'm guessing now if you are reading this, you are probably about 10 or 11.  Maybe 9.  Maybe 13, I dunno.  What year is it, 2023?   The point is, this is your Dad's blogsite that, I'd like to think, is still going strong with somewhere around 4,000 posts--or maybe it ended in 2013, before I got to 1,000, who knows.

You were born one year ago on this date.  Yesterday, a year ago, I got a call from your mom that things were progressing quicker than we thought... And it was the next day, or today-one year-that you came to meet us... (it was a week later when we brought you home)

This was you, maybe two weeks old.  You've grown a little since.

Your birth was actually 4:37p in the afternoon, and my plan was to write this up and have it posted at exactly that time today, but that didn't happen.  Today was filled with cleaning up The Cabana (where we live at this moment), anticipating your birthday party.  And if you know your mom, she was trying to get things done and cleaned and wiped down and such... trust me, I thought it was a bit silly to spend a ton of money on a party you don't remember, but by now, I'm sure you've seen the pictures. 

What to tell you about your first year?  Well, the biggest songs of the year belongs to a dude named Gotye, called "Somebody That I Used to Know"... a chick named Carli Rae Jepsen doing a tune called "Call Me Maybe"... and some pop star from Korea named Psy, doing this goofy song called "Gangnum Style".  If you've never heard of it, go find it on whatever version of iTunes you have on your 17th generation iPod Touch or whatever.

For movies, "The Avengers" is really all you need to know.  Cause that movie was awesome, and by the time you read this, you will have seen it about 2,000 times, thanks to me.  And if  the latest Star Wars movies were awesome (or awful), then this is the year that it all went down with Disney and Lucasfilm.

But that's not why I'm writing this open letter to you, for the world to read.  I'm writing this to tell you how much I love you, Campbell.

I watched a movie yesterday, while you slept in my arms.  You had your bottle and were totally zonked out.  You have (had?) this thing with your pacifier where you suck on it... but when you get sleepy and are drifting, the paci moves less and less... and eventually, it falls out of your mouth... gotta say, its darn cute.

Anyway, it was this movie from 1996 called "Ransom", starring Mel Gibson and one of your dad's favorite actresses from his teenage years, Rene Russo (she was also in Lethal Weapon 3 and 4, and Major League, both some of my favorite movies)... and in this movie, they play the parents of a kid named Shawn.  The kid is kidnapped by the bad guy--Gary Sinise, who was in "Forrest Gump" and a few other films, and he's also the lead commander guy in Mission: Space at Epcot.  Well, he was in 2013, anyway.

I hope I don't spoil this for you--its a decent film, though a bit predictable, so unless you just find it on Starz in Black or something, I wouldn't make a huge effort to see it... but towards the end, there is a scene where both Tom (Mel) and Susan (Rene) thinks that Shawn has been shot and killed... and they both have deep emotional breakdowns on the balcony.  Now, this is a movie I've seen several times over... but not really since you came into our lives... and as I watched Tom and Susan cry, fall apart, I actually teared up a little.  Because, though I tried not to, I imagined what would happen if we lost you.  And I could barely finish the movie.

You probably know I'm a big Stephen King fan... one his first books is called "'Salem's Lot", and though I won't go into the plot line (unlike "Ransom", this book is something I can highly recommend--when you're older, anyway), there is a part where a teenage mom is frustrated at her newborn baby, and she ends up striking him in anger, punching him in the face.  I usually re-read this book every year around Halloween, and in October 2011, this part came and went, only adding to character development... well, this time, in October 2012, this part turned my stomach, because I couldn't imagine anyone hurting you (or any other child) like this.  It gave me chills.

Our jobs as your parents are to protect you, and we'll do our best.  We will fail sometimes, and sometimes you'll catch heat for things you didnt do, and sometimes we may punish you too harshly for something small, or inconsistantly, and then other times, it might be that we are too distracted to talk to you and so on... we aren't perfect.  But we love Jesus, and we are hoping you will find Him too, one day. 

Make sure its real and that you understand it before you make the that step, though.  See, Campbell, your mom and I... we love you so, so much.  And in loving you so much, we want what's best for you.  Trust us when we say, what's best for you is, in fact, a life in Christ.  It won't be easy.  It will be tough, as a matter of fact.  But God promises to love you, take care of you, give you hope and a future.  As much as we love you, He loves you a billion times more than we ever could... and He wants to take care of you. 

We love watching you learn new things.  Lately, you've learned how to open drawers and cabinets... and even more so, you are just now figuring out there is stuff IN those drawers and cabinets.  You love crawling up to the dryer and banging on it with your hands, because you love the hollow sound.  And you will go up those stairs like no one's business. 

You are very healthy, you seem pretty happy, and we are proud to be your parents.  You are one today.  We only get about 1/4 of your life to raise you right, and out of the 18 years we have, we have 17 left now.  Wow. 

Now I'm going to go to bed--where you might be sleeping.  I love you, my sweet son. 

And happy birthday.

your dad

ps... please stop messing with the Blu-Ray Player.  I hate having to keep un-plugging and re-plugging it. 

pps... I know tonight at your party was kind of loud and obnoxious.  This is called "Alabama Football Gameday".  Your dad is a Florida fan, but everyone else belongs of the Roll Tide Nation.  Get used to the yells.

Captain America Does His Duty

Chris Evans (l) as the title character, greeing a fawning Hayley Atwell (r)

Sometimes you have high expectations for movies, movies that you cannot imagine not blowing you away, which is dangerous because if its not good, nay, great, you feel underwhelmed..  "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2" is a great example of the former, and "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" is a big example of the latter.

Comic book movies are even more so... for every "Spider Man 2", you have a "Spider Man 3" as well as "Green Lantern".  For every "X2: X-Men United", you have a dozen "Elektras"... so I've learned over the years to not raise my expectations too high when it comes to putting Marvel--and especially DC--on the screen.  "Thor" was a pleasant surprise.  "Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer" was not. 

So when "Captain America: The First Avenger" was announced, I had some reservations.   It had to be good, because not only was it the final set-up before "The Avengers" movie came out in May of 2012, but also as it followed some great successes like both Iron Man movies (and yes, I liked them both) and Thor.

The movie starts with the familiar Marvel opening (the animated flipping pages) but now a Disney graphic as well, which is a little weird, and anyone who knows anything about Captain America knows right from the first scene how this movie will eventually end.  I won't spoil it here, in case you truly have no clue, but it's almost as known as the Superman lore of coming from Krypton.

Quickly, though, the movie moves to the early 40s, in the height of the US' involvment in World War II, and we see a young Steve Rogers trying desperately to get into the Army.  He wants to serve his country so, so badly, and it is even worse when he sees his best friend Bucky Barnes get taken and go overseas.

So when Stanley Tucci shows up and tells him to volunteer for an expiramental program that the military is developing, one that will counteract Hitler's science program called Hydra, Steve Rogers immediately jumps on board.  Hydra is being led by Johann Schmidt, and he's captured a mysterious cube full of energy which has allowed the Nazis to create a super weapon. 

Of course, Steve Rogers becomes Captain America, but to do so, he has to go through the expiramental program, which he does, develops a love interest, SSR Peggy Carter (played wonderfully by Hayley Atwell), clashes and follows Col. Chester Phillips (Tommy Lee Jones, who just eats up the screen with this type of character), and of course, The Tuch.   The Lovely Steph Leann and I love The Tuch.

Neal McDonough as Dum Dum, looking alot like the character in the
comic books.

And, of course Cap becomes a hero in the war, but not before he takes the long way around, in a scene that I didn't expect yet found hilarious and fitting to the story.  Cap also collects a band of soldiers to go into battle with him, including Dum Dum Dugan (That Guy Neal McDonough in a really-grown handlebar mustache and bowler hat) and Gabe Jones (Derek Luke, the Biker Boyz Boy himself).  And at some point, you know Cap and Johann Schmidt--more commonly known as The Red Skull--will go toe to toe in the climax.

My thoughts on the film?  Absolutely fantastic.

First, the story itself is solid.  It does veer into camp-territory at times, but its purposeful and light when it does.  The jokes aren't hokey or corny, except when they are, and when they are, its an homage to the comics.

Secondly, there are lots of references to the comic and its lore.  Everything from Tony Stark's father Howard being a major player in the development of the serum to the program itself--Captain America is actually Weapon I... for a point of reference, Wolvering is Weapon X, the tenth in the line of expiraments trying to make a super soldier. 

Forget Elrond the Elf King Guy... Hugo is best when he's a bad boy

Hugo Weaving is such a good bad guy too... borrowing his sneer from The Matrix, he's completely believable as a crazy, crazy guy wanting to take over the world, and the "cosmic cube" he finds is going to help him do it--if you saw "Thor", and stayed for the credits, thats the same cube that makes an appearance in the extra scene.

Finally, Chris Evans does his triple duty in comic book filmdom... first, he was The Human Torch in both the good Fantastic Four movie (the first one) and the bad Fantastic Four movie (the second one), and then last year's not great, yet still enjoyable "The Losers", and here, he's just great as Steve Rogers.  Scrawny at first, then bulking up to fill the costume and be the hero, he is great as someone who knows what its like to be powerless, which gives him the respect for the power he gains.  Word is that the F/X people couldn't replicate Chris Evans' movements via CGI, so they just filmed him, then shrunk his body on screen.  They used green screen to fill in the backgrounds where his body used to be before it was shrunk.

Its a little over 2 hours long, and its wall to wall fun, with very little language and the violence runs along the lines of comic-book-violence only.  As in, would I let a 3 year old Campbell Isaiah see this movie?  No.  Would I let a 7 year old Campbell Isaiah see this movie?  Probably.  Cause it rules.

Don't forget to stay through the credits, because there is the obligatory extra scene... and this one is a doozy... it's the actual "The Avengers" trailer for the May 2012 film.   I thought I was going to pee myself when I saw Robert Downey Jr's Tony Stark talk to Thor, with The Black Widow in the background, Hawkeye with his bow and arrow and Captain America with his shield.

Loved it.  Saw it in 2D, wouldn't recommend 3D unless you are just jonesing to pay the extra.

ps... do not... I repeat, DO NOT, watch the 1990 "Captain America" film.  Its awful.  Its terrible.  And I don't mean bad like, "its so bad its awesome", or bad like "guilty pleasure" or even bad like "its so bad its craptacular", I mean "bad because its terrible".  You have been warned.

The Summer of Blogging Day Forty Six