The Boys: I’m kind of mixed. I certainly enjoyed the dynamic between the members of the team. But there were times where it felt too dark and mean spirited, And yes I realize that Garth Ennis doesn’t write about puppies and sunshine
Whereas what I like about it is how it is less mean spirited than the comic!
I've thought the boys is a really good adaptation. It's not got the dark humor of the comic, but I think that it has been really good.
I think Eric Kripke may have learnt a thing or two from those 15 years of Supernatural! ;)
By even giving characters like The Deep their own plot threads through the season it's great TV writing, rather than the early The Boys arcs in the comics which were Ennis doing a Marshal Law tribute act for the most part. Crass parody of specific superheroes gets their arses kicked by our heroes, rinse and repeat.
I always found the Simon Pegg caricature for Hughie a distraction in the comic, and it was hard to see why people liked Butcher to begin with, so Jake Quaid and Karl Urban made it more accessible for me. And all the other Boys were as likeable as their comic counterparts.
Karl Urban's accent is all over the place in the pilot though. Bit better in the subsequent episodes, but his British swearing needs some more practice.
The biggest disappointment is the lack of Terror means we don't get the metaphor for Butcher being Dennis the Menace, the most iconic British comics character coming to kill American comics icons.
The best changes is casting Elizabeth Shue as Stillwell , as that has a domino effect on improving all the other Vought characters too, especially Homelander. The creepy mother complex and jealous over her baby is much more effective than his early comic portrayal.
I loved that Simon pegg was the dad. I thought that was a nice touch, especially since they didn't make him look like Wee Hughie. I'm not ashamed to say I laughed when I saw him.
@dubbat138 I honestly didn't think that New Jack did anything but shoot interviews. When New Jack he was going to hurt you, you a forehead full of staples.
@dubbat138 I honestly didn't think that New Jack did anything but shoot interviews. When New Jack he was going to hurt you, you a forehead full of staples.
New Jack retired from the ring 4 or 5 years ago. In the shoot he is claiming he has "2 or 3 big shows coming out soon". The only one he talks about is a bounty hunting reality show.
Met New Jack back in 2005 when XCW out of Pascagoula booked him. I am friends with the owner so after the show,and the cops had left,I got to hang out a bit with Jack. Nice dude but I won't lie I was on edge the entire time expecting him to get a bit crazy. But Jack was laid back and just wanted to know where the nearest strip club was.
On episode 6 of the Boys and damn this is good. I love the comic. And had heard lots got changed for the TV show. The changes so far work for the show.
Conan the Barbarian. Hadn’t seen it in years still pretty cool. Was this the first film to feature a Marvel character on screen
Conan isn't really a Marvel character any more than Star Wars is. I don’t even consider him a comic book character, per se, since he was around for 40 years before he was ever put in a comic book. Yes, Marvel was publishing Conan comics at the time the movie was made, but they had no input into the film other than the fact that Roy Thomas (who ironically was exclusive to DC at the time) wrote a screenplay for it that wasn’t used.
Captain America first appeared on screen in 1944 in a movie serial. But if you want to limit it to feature films, then the correct answer is Howard the Duck in 1986.
Unless you count the Captain America Serial... in 1944.
Conan the Barbarian. Hadn’t seen it in years still pretty cool. Was this the first film to feature a Marvel character on screen
Conan isn't really a Marvel character any more than Star Wars is. I don’t even consider him a comic book character, per se, since he was around for 40 years before he was ever put in a comic book. Yes, Marvel was publishing Conan comics at the time the movie was made, but they had no input into the film other than the fact that Roy Thomas (who ironically was exclusive to DC at the time) wrote a screenplay for it that wasn’t used.
Captain America first appeared on screen in 1944 in a movie serial. But if you want to limit it to feature films, then the correct answer is Howard the Duck in 1986.
However, I did read YEARS ago that the Conan movie was based upon the popularity and public knowledge of the Marvel Comics far more than the pulp stories. Essentially, the movie was made possible because of the comics.
Even Conan's physicality was based on the look in the comics, rather than the physical descriptions in the prose material. (I want to say I read this in an OLD issue of Comics Scene or Starlog).
And, of course, William Stout famously storyboarded the movie (at least in part) as a comic book, as opposed to traditional storyboards.
Conan the Barbarian. Hadn’t seen it in years still pretty cool. Was this the first film to feature a Marvel character on screen
Conan isn't really a Marvel character any more than Star Wars is. I don’t even consider him a comic book character, per se, since he was around for 40 years before he was ever put in a comic book. Yes, Marvel was publishing Conan comics at the time the movie was made, but they had no input into the film other than the fact that Roy Thomas (who ironically was exclusive to DC at the time) wrote a screenplay for it that wasn’t used.
Captain America first appeared on screen in 1944 in a movie serial. But if you want to limit it to feature films, then the correct answer is Howard the Duck in 1986.
However, I did read YEARS ago that the Conan movie was based upon the popularity and public knowledge of the Marvel Comics far more than the pulp stories. Essentially, the movie was made possible because of the comics.
Even Conan's physicality was based on the look in the comics, rather than the physical descriptions in the prose material. (I want to say I read this in an OLD issue of Comics Scene or Starlog).
And, of course, William Stout famously storyboarded the movie (at least in part) as a comic book, as opposed to traditional storyboards.
I think I've had a similar conversation here before. I wouldn’t say the comics were solely responsible for the popularity of the character, because the paperback reprints went through several editions during the late ’60s/early ’70s, and their success was the reason Roy Thomas tried so hard to convince Stan to pick up the Conan license in the first place, and were the main source of visual reference for the comic. But, yeah, no doubt they played a large role in convincing a studio to do a sword-&-sorcery movie.
I'm having some mixed feelings about The Boys. I'm enjoying it more than the Preacher adaptation, which I despise. I guess it's because I'm not as attached to The Boys comic series as I was to Preacher, which I consider to be one of my all time favorite comic stories. I gave up on the Preacher adaptation after the first season because I strongly felt that it was so unnecessary to be so drastically different from what was already a great narrative with great plot points. I feel the same with The Boys but the overall premise is so damn fascinating. I only have one more episode to go with The Boys but like Preacher, not sure if I'll be back for the next season.
One thing I will say about these Garth Ennis adaptations is that the casting is on point. I think the casting of the three main leads in Preacher is superb which makes it even more annoying to me that they couldn't follow the comic series narrative. I think the casting for The Boys is equally good. I'm especially getting a kick out of Anthony Starr as Homelander. He's awesome playing a psychotic piece of crap like Homelander.
I'm not one of those geeks who think that a visual medium adaptation has to follow the original source material word by word or comic panel by comic panel. I just think that if the original comic was received well enough, why fix what's not broken. I don't get why Seth Rogan and company have to make these changes. Say what you will about Game of Thrones' Dan B. Weiss and David Benioff but they mostly followed the narrative and major plot points of the first 5 books and that's what put the show on the map. Most would agree that the seasons that followed the book was better and much more well received than the last 3 seasons that went past the books. Just my opinion.
Say what you will about Game of Thrones' Dan B. Weiss and David Benioff but they mostly followed the narrative and major plot points of the first 5 books and that's what put the show on the map. Most would agree that the seasons that followed the book was better and much more well received than the last 3 seasons that went past the books. Just my opinion.
I'm with you up until this. They began diverting further and further after the third book and pretty much only held onto a few vestiges of the fifth book.
I just finished Jessica Jones season 3 and while I loved most of the season, what they did to a character ruined it for me. The character happened to be female and so, for me, this marks the second time this year where a show has ruined a very interesting take on a female hero (& far more interesting than Jessica herself IMO) by turning her into a homicidal maniac in order to end the show with a cliched (& somewhat contradictory given that the genres feature irrefutably evil people) message about the dangers of fighting overtly evil people with violence.
GLOW Season 3 dropped on Friday and I binged it over the weekend. I originally came to the show two years ago for Alison Brie (love the show COMMUNITY) but the strong writing and characters, dipped in 80s stylings, has made this one of my favorite shows. Great stuff!
GLOW Season 3 dropped on Friday and I binged it over the weekend. I originally came to the show two years ago for Alison Brie (love the show COMMUNITY) but the strong writing and characters, dipped in 80s stylings, has made this one of my favorite shows. Great stuff!
I still haven't watched Season 2 yet. Liked the first season though.
Watched GLOW season 3 twice now. FIrst viewing was over 2 days the weekend after it came out. Then Tuesday and Thursday this week Mary and I watched it.
Right now got on the nice uncut print of the Mutilator that Arrow video provided to Shudder.
Just saw Tank Girl for the first time. Easily one of the worst movies I've ever seen. While I'm sure there are some misogynists in Hollywood like anyplace else, I truly don't understand how anyone could generalize Hollywood as "misogynist" when they coughed up the money for disasters like this one . Surely those producers thought someone might be interested in this debacle. Why? What made them think that? Someone convinced the producers there was going to be a market for this (and it seems faithful to the comic) to the tune of laying out millions of dollars. It got me to thinking that it's no wonder the non-comic-reading Hollywood producers (who certainly aren't known for nuanced thinking) were so wary about making a film based on a comic book lead with a female until Wonder Woman proved they could actually be huge blockbusters.
People always point to the horrible comic book films starring men (and there were many), but that point ignores that there were some enormous hits mixed in there with Superman 1 and 2, the Batman films, 3 Blade films, the X-Men, Spider-man. Hollywood had learned that these films were a slot machine gamble, like most films. You might lose, but that they could pay off big time. (And it took Uslan a decade to get a serious Batman to the big screen, despite the huge success of the first two Superman films.) Whereas with female led comic book films, prior to Wonder Woman I think every single time Hollywood laid out the millions to make one, the film was not just a disappointment, but considered egregiously bad, critically and commercially: Red Sonja, Supergirl, Sheena, Barb Wire, Tank Girl, Elektra and dear god, Catwoman (although at least that one's so bad-it's-good). Hollywood producers were wrong (as they were for decades when it came to most comics properties) but I can see why they imagined bombing big time since that's what all those movies did.
Just saw Tank Girl for the first time. Easily one of the worst movies I've ever seen. While I'm sure there are some misogynists in Hollywood like anyplace else, I truly don't understand how anyone could generalize Hollywood as "misogynist" when they coughed up the money for disasters like this one . Surely those producers thought someone might be interested in this debacle. Why? What made them think that? Someone convinced the producers there was going to be a market for this (and it seems faithful to the comic) to the tune of laying out millions of dollars. It got me to thinking that it's no wonder the non-comic-reading Hollywood producers (who certainly aren't known for nuanced thinking) were so wary about making a film based on a comic book lead with a female until Wonder Woman proved they could actually be huge blockbusters.
People always point to the horrible comic book films starring men (and there were many), but that point ignores that there were some enormous hits mixed in there with Superman 1 and 2, the Batman films, 3 Blade films, the X-Men, Spider-man. Hollywood had learned that these films were a slot machine gamble, like most films. You might lose, but that they could pay off big time. (And it took Uslan a decade to get a serious Batman to the big screen, despite the huge success of the first two Superman films.) Whereas with female led comic book films, prior to Wonder Woman I think every single time Hollywood laid out the millions to make one, the film was not just a disappointment, but considered egregiously bad, critically and commercially: Red Sonja, Supergirl, Sheena, Barb Wire, Tank Girl, Elektra and dear god, Catwoman (although at least that one's so bad-it's-good). Hollywood producers were wrong (as they were for decades when it came to most comics properties) but I can see why they imagined bombing big time since that's what all those movies did.
I doubt most people at the time of Tank Girls' release had any idea it was based on a comic book, nor does the original trailer make any attempt to sell it to you as being based on a comic, or anything you've ever heard of. It is possible that this might have been seen as an example of a SF movie with a female lead that did not open, but I would be surprised if anyone at that time saw it as a judgment on female comic book movies, specifically, as it was a comic and a character that largely no one in the mainstream audience had ever heard of.
Catwoman was a different story, given an A-list (at that time) Star, high budget, major studio, and well-known character. People tried to make that flop mean other things, and given what it should have had going for it, that makes a more compelling argument.
But given Tank Girls unknown character, modest budget, spotty studio, lesser known star, I think that one got chalked up to “well this quirky thing didn’t play”, and would later, after a summer that had Johnny Mnemonic, Congo, Judge Dredd and Waterworld, get folded into stories about how it was a really bad year for SF (I remember it well. I started working in a movie theater that summer. I finally was getting movies for free and it was a really s*it year for movies). But I don’t recall Tank Girl was seen as proof of much else beyond that, if people even noticed it much at all. If anything, in the years since, when it now pops up in a named genre category on a streaming service, it probably gets more scrutiny as a comic book movie, or strong female lead movie, then it actually was positioned at the time.
I am sure you are right that the bulk of the audience did not know the film was based on a comic, but the audience does not decide what films get made. The studio executives who put up $25 million dollars for Tank Girl were certainly aware that this was based on a comic with a cult following they hoped there would be a bigger market for. Like the producers of those other films, they weren’t just wrong, but very wrong. These films weren’t just mediocre, they were critical, and worse (to execs), financial, flops,
Im not saying they were smart to think that would always be the case especially with a property like Wonder Woman, but I can see why they did. Something like WW could not be made cheaply if they wanted to do it right (and thank god they didn’t do it on the cheap) unlike successful but relatively cheap to produce video game films like Lara Croft and Resident Evill. (They even coughed up cash for Bloodrayne and some sequels(!)). For execs, it seems to me that the female led comic book film was the slot machine that always came up lemons no matter how cheaply you made the film as opposed to the ones starring male heroes which rarely, but sometimes, not only made blockbuster money but spawned a franchise.
Its human nature for more and more people to buy lottery tickets as the potential payout increases. For Hollywood studios it’s never just about how much they think they can lose, but how much they believe they might potentially gain.
@Vertighost honestly, given that there have been less than 10 female led superhero movies in total, and that 2 of them have been as big as WW and Captain Marvel in terms of hits, that is likely a same or maybe even better hit ratio if you similarly crunched the numbers on the male-led side.
Especially if one were to dig as deep into the past and into the drek and pull the male equivalents of things like Tank Girl and Barb Wire.
I’m not personally going to do that math, but there have been a lot of male-led crap superhero movies, too, and I would not be surprised if only 2 out of 7 of those could be considered big hits. So I’m not sure what point is trying to be proven, other than there are no guarantees. But for what it’s worth, female-led superhero films have actually had some big successes despite very few times ever up at bat.
@David_D, my original and ongoing point was that, prior to the enormous successes of WW and Captain Marvel (both of which I enjoyed esp CM) studio executives would have understandably viewed female-led comic book movies as the slot machine that always came up lemons, whether they had a big budget or small. They were obviously mistaken to assume this would continue to be the case, but given the enormous failures of the entirety -literally every film however few - of the pre-WW contingent I can understand why they were gun shy, as opposed to the idea I have frequently heard that Hollywood execs were all mostly just misogynists who dislike women. (Although I’m sure some were/are.) Tank Girl got me to thinking about these pre—WW films.
You seem to be making the point that since WW there have been enormous successes despite having few times at bat. I agree and don’t think I’ve suggested anything to contradict that.
Apologies to fans of Tank Girl, I’m sure you’re out there. Lord knows I’ve liked my share of bombs.
Comments
I've thought the boys is a really good adaptation. It's not got the dark humor of the comic, but I think that it has been really good.
By even giving characters like The Deep their own plot threads through the season it's great TV writing, rather than the early The Boys arcs in the comics which were Ennis doing a Marshal Law tribute act for the most part. Crass parody of specific superheroes gets their arses kicked by our heroes, rinse and repeat.
I always found the Simon Pegg caricature for Hughie a distraction in the comic, and it was hard to see why people liked Butcher to begin with, so Jake Quaid and Karl Urban made it more accessible for me. And all the other Boys were as likeable as their comic counterparts.
Karl Urban's accent is all over the place in the pilot though. Bit better in the subsequent episodes, but his British swearing needs some more practice.
The biggest disappointment is the lack of Terror means we don't get the metaphor for Butcher being Dennis the Menace, the most iconic British comics character coming to kill American comics icons.
The best changes is casting Elizabeth Shue as Stillwell , as that has a domino effect on improving all the other Vought characters too, especially Homelander. The creepy mother complex and jealous over her baby is much more effective than his early comic portrayal.
I loved that Simon pegg was the dad. I thought that was a nice touch, especially since they didn't make him look like Wee Hughie. I'm not ashamed to say I laughed when I saw him.
@dubbat138 I honestly didn't think that New Jack did anything but shoot interviews. When New Jack he was going to hurt you, you a forehead full of staples.
I've been looking at that Hawaiian shirt butcher wears for an episode and half knowing that I have seen it somewhere.
I've been buying shirts from them for years. The Uber nerd in me says time to move on; the rational side says dude they make awesome shirts
Met New Jack back in 2005 when XCW out of Pascagoula booked him. I am friends with the owner so after the show,and the cops had left,I got to hang out a bit with Jack. Nice dude but I won't lie I was on edge the entire time expecting him to get a bit crazy. But Jack was laid back and just wanted to know where the nearest strip club was.
Even Conan's physicality was based on the look in the comics, rather than the physical descriptions in the prose material. (I want to say I read this in an OLD issue of Comics Scene or Starlog).
And, of course, William Stout famously storyboarded the movie (at least in part) as a comic book, as opposed to traditional storyboards.
One thing I will say about these Garth Ennis adaptations is that the casting is on point. I think the casting of the three main leads in Preacher is superb which makes it even more annoying to me that they couldn't follow the comic series narrative. I think the casting for The Boys is equally good. I'm especially getting a kick out of Anthony Starr as Homelander. He's awesome playing a psychotic piece of crap like Homelander.
I'm not one of those geeks who think that a visual medium adaptation has to follow the original source material word by word or comic panel by comic panel. I just think that if the original comic was received well enough, why fix what's not broken. I don't get why Seth Rogan and company have to make these changes. Say what you will about Game of Thrones' Dan B. Weiss and David Benioff but they mostly followed the narrative and major plot points of the first 5 books and that's what put the show on the map. Most would agree that the seasons that followed the book was better and much more well received than the last 3 seasons that went past the books. Just my opinion.
I just finished Jessica Jones season 3 and while I loved most of the season, what they did to a character ruined it for me. The character happened to be female and so, for me, this marks the second time this year where a show has ruined a very interesting take on a female hero (& far more interesting than Jessica herself IMO) by turning her into a homicidal maniac in order to end the show with a cliched (& somewhat contradictory given that the genres feature irrefutably evil people) message about the dangers of fighting overtly evil people with violence.
Right now got on the nice uncut print of the Mutilator that Arrow video provided to Shudder.
Screwball on Netflix. Billy Corbin's fantastic documentary on the biogenesis scandal.
Before you watch that put on The Bash Brothers Experience
Let's bash!
You might enjoy Screwball, everybody in the whole movie are dopes. It's a Miami documentary by the guy who did cocaine cowboys and square groupers.
Just saw Tank Girl for the first time. Easily one of the worst movies I've ever seen. While I'm sure there are some misogynists in Hollywood like anyplace else, I truly don't understand how anyone could generalize Hollywood as "misogynist" when they coughed up the money for disasters like this one . Surely those producers thought someone might be interested in this debacle. Why? What made them think that? Someone convinced the producers there was going to be a market for this (and it seems faithful to the comic) to the tune of laying out millions of dollars. It got me to thinking that it's no wonder the non-comic-reading Hollywood producers (who certainly aren't known for nuanced thinking) were so wary about making a film based on a comic book lead with a female until Wonder Woman proved they could actually be huge blockbusters.
People always point to the horrible comic book films starring men (and there were many), but that point ignores that there were some enormous hits mixed in there with Superman 1 and 2, the Batman films, 3 Blade films, the X-Men, Spider-man. Hollywood had learned that these films were a slot machine gamble, like most films. You might lose, but that they could pay off big time. (And it took Uslan a decade to get a serious Batman to the big screen, despite the huge success of the first two Superman films.) Whereas with female led comic book films, prior to Wonder Woman I think every single time Hollywood laid out the millions to make one, the film was not just a disappointment, but considered egregiously bad, critically and commercially: Red Sonja, Supergirl, Sheena, Barb Wire, Tank Girl, Elektra and dear god, Catwoman (although at least that one's so bad-it's-good). Hollywood producers were wrong (as they were for decades when it came to most comics properties) but I can see why they imagined bombing big time since that's what all those movies did.
Catwoman was a different story, given an A-list (at that time) Star, high budget, major studio, and well-known character. People tried to make that flop mean other things, and given what it should have had going for it, that makes a more compelling argument.
But given Tank Girls unknown character, modest budget, spotty studio, lesser known star, I think that one got chalked up to “well this quirky thing didn’t play”, and would later, after a summer that had Johnny Mnemonic, Congo, Judge Dredd and Waterworld, get folded into stories about how it was a really bad year for SF (I remember it well. I started working in a movie theater that summer. I finally was getting movies for free and it was a really s*it year for movies). But I don’t recall Tank Girl was seen as proof of much else beyond that, if people even noticed it much at all. If anything, in the years since, when it now pops up in a named genre category on a streaming service, it probably gets more scrutiny as a comic book movie, or strong female lead movie, then it actually was positioned at the time.
I am sure you are right that the bulk of the audience did not know the film was based on a comic, but the audience does not decide what films get made. The studio executives who put up $25 million dollars for Tank Girl were certainly aware that this was based on a comic with a cult following they hoped there would be a bigger market for. Like the producers of those other films, they weren’t just wrong, but very wrong. These films weren’t just mediocre, they were critical, and worse (to execs), financial, flops,
Im not saying they were smart to think that would always be the case especially with a property like Wonder Woman, but I can see why they did. Something like WW could not be made cheaply if they wanted to do it right (and thank god they didn’t do it on the cheap) unlike successful but relatively cheap to produce video game films like Lara Croft and Resident Evill. (They even coughed up cash for Bloodrayne and some sequels(!)). For execs, it seems to me that the female led comic book film was the slot machine that always came up lemons no matter how cheaply you made the film as opposed to the ones starring male heroes which rarely, but sometimes, not only made blockbuster money but spawned a franchise.
Its human nature for more and more people to buy lottery tickets as the potential payout increases. For Hollywood studios it’s never just about how much they think they can lose, but how much they believe they might potentially gain.
@Vertighost honestly, given that there have been less than 10 female led superhero movies in total, and that 2 of them have been as big as WW and Captain Marvel in terms of hits, that is likely a same or maybe even better hit ratio if you similarly crunched the numbers on the male-led side.
Especially if one were to dig as deep into the past and into the drek and pull the male equivalents of things like Tank Girl and Barb Wire.
I’m not personally going to do that math, but there have been a lot of male-led crap superhero movies, too, and I would not be surprised if only 2 out of 7 of those could be considered big hits. So I’m not sure what point is trying to be proven, other than there are no guarantees. But for what it’s worth, female-led superhero films have actually had some big successes despite very few times ever up at bat.
@David_D, my original and ongoing point was that, prior to the enormous successes of WW and Captain Marvel (both of which I enjoyed esp CM) studio executives would have understandably viewed female-led comic book movies as the slot machine that always came up lemons, whether they had a big budget or small. They were obviously mistaken to assume this would continue to be the case, but given the enormous failures of the entirety -literally every film however few - of the pre-WW contingent I can understand why they were gun shy, as opposed to the idea I have frequently heard that Hollywood execs were all mostly just misogynists who dislike women. (Although I’m sure some were/are.) Tank Girl got me to thinking about these pre—WW films.
You seem to be making the point that since WW there have been enormous successes despite having few times at bat. I agree and don’t think I’ve suggested anything to contradict that.
Apologies to fans of Tank Girl, I’m sure you’re out there. Lord knows I’ve liked my share of bombs.