Benjamin Grimm

Don't these kinds of lists come out more often than they ought to? It seems there's a new list every few months. Of this group of 100, there are two that I saw for the first time in just the last year or two: The Bridge on the River Kwai and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre. I enjoyed them both, but liked Treasure a lot more.

Some I'm not sure of, but by my count I've seen 60 of the 100.

Have you heard anything about a Magneto movie? I seem to remember reading a rumor about it a few months ago, but it didn't seem like an authentic rumor to me. Captain America is reportedly going to be a "partial" period piece. I guess that means that either the first part will be set in World War II and then he'll get frozen in the ice, or else maybe the World War II stuff will be told in flashback. Incredible Hulk does have an all new cast from the awful 2003 movie. I've heard it referred to as a "relaunch", so hopefully it will have an all-new origin as well and have nothing to do with the first film. I sense that critics will howl with laughter at the Thor movie. They really have to move ahead carefully with that one, I think. Spider-Man 4, 2009? Interesting. Sub-Mariner yes, Aquaman no. I wonder if that's because people think that Vincent Chase's Aquaman movie was really made? I remember a TV entertainment journalist reporting that the second Pirates of the Caribbean movie had broken Aquaman's box office record.

I know I saw The Rock, and seem to remember thinking it was okay. I'm not sure about Armageddon. Is that one of the two killer asteroid movies that came out around the same time? All I remember is that one had Bruce Willis and one didn't. One involved astronauts landing on an asteroid, and one didn't. I saw one of the two, but don't know which one. All I remember is that the one I saw had Tea Leoni in it. I don't even remember if I liked it! (I guess that means I was lukewarm towards it.)

What? Is three inches bad? I... Oops! Never mind!

I'm surprised to learn that he got as small as 3.75 inches.

Bumping this just in case anyone else has seen it by now and would like to cast a vote. Today Spidey 3 starts its seventh week in the theaters. That's a pretty long run, isn't it? I don't pay attention to such things, but I wonder how long most hit movies stay in release, and how quickly the flops are shut down?

Paste Pot Pete and the Trapster are the same guy. (After a few appearances in Strange Tales he realized he needed a better name and a costume.) I think the name change came in FF #36, the first time the Frightful Four got together. The evil FF had three previously seen characters: The Wizard and Pete, who had teamed up in Strange Tales, and the Sandman who up to that point was (I think) just a Spidey villain. The fourth member of the team was a brand new character, the mysterious lady known as Medusa. When the Wizard found her she wasn't living with the Inhumans. Instead she was living in a cave, wearing a yellow dress, and using her hair to toss the locals around. (Gosh, I love that old Lee and Kirby stuff!) I was talking about this with my son the other day. Now that so many Marvel characters have been (or soon will be) on the big screen, it would be cool if they started to tie it together into an onscreen Marvel universe. Having the Torch in the next Spidey movie would be a good way to start.

I don't think I know who Carnage is. I'd prefer the fourth movie to be a Strange Tales kind of movie where Spidey teams up with the Human Torch to fight the Wizard and Paste Pot Pete.

If I remember right, Vic, you weren't too crazy about the first two Spidey films. The third one is definitely the least of them. And I agree, they should tell a good story and use whatever characters fit into that good story.

I'm not familiar with Phoebe Zeit-Geist. I sense a potential spinoff thread where we fill in those blank word balloons, though.

When I think Frank Springer, I think Invaders. I believe he inked the first dozen or so issues of that title. Roy Thomas writer, Frank Robbins penciller, I believe.

Electro.

No, Venom isn't worth the price of admission. And I'm sorry, but I have no idea who Bruce Campbell is.

No, no nudity. I took my ten-year-old AND my five-year-old.

Well, they didn't want to set up Spider-Man 4 because they didn't know there would be one, and they didn't want to leave loose ends. We still don't know but given the box office the movie has done, I think a fourth movie is now inevitable. Whether it has the same cast and crew won't be known for a while.

This movie wasn't made with a Spider-Man 4 in mind. There may yet be one, but this movie doesn't set us up in any way for what might come next.

Probably so they can sell three times the merchandise. Actually, each of the villains did play a key role not only in the action, but in the theme of the movie, so the reason probably isn't as crass as merchandising. Though I'm sure the suits don't mind that aspect. Spidey 2 was terrific, but when it comes to comic book movies I judge them by the ten-year-old inside of me. The first movie gave me multiple goosebumps. Spidey 2 only once. And Spidey 3 not at all. My order of preference is the same as the order in which the movies were produced, but in my opinion the quality gap between Spidey 2 and Spidey 3 is greater than that between 1 and 2.

I enjoyed a Spider Weekend with my son this past weekend. We watched Spider-Man on DVD on Friday night. We then watched Spider-Man 2 on Saturday morning, and then on Saturday afternoon we went to the theater to see Spider-Man 3. I liked it. I didn't like it as much as I liked Spider-Man 2, which I didn't like as much as I liked Spider-Man, which remains my favorite Marvel Comics movie.

I saw a couple of clips on Letterman. Movie looks unwatchable.

He'd be ranked lower on the 2006 list because of his shorter tenure.

This is all from IMDB. Iron Man is due out in 2008. Jon Favreau directs. Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark. Gwyneth Paltrow is Pepper Potts. Plus Terrence Howard as Jim Rhodes, Jeff Bridges as Obadiah Stane and Shaun Toub as the Mandarin. I like Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark. (My first choice, Clark Gable, is dead at the present time.) I don't remember who Obadiah Stane is. A business rival of Tony Stark, I believe. The Incredible Hulk is in pre-production for a 2008 release. IMDB says, "Casting is currently underway" which gives me a measure of hope that they're starting fresh and not creating a sequel to that awful 2003 movie. Maybe this time they'll get it right. (I want to see Rick Jones playing the harmonica in the desert, and Bruce Banner throwing him into that ditch just as the bomb goes off!) Thor is also in pre-production for a 2009 release. (It will be hard to do the character justice without making a very silly looking movie, I think.) In the category of "Announced" we have Nick Fury in 2008. (Here's the plot description: "A daring amateur boxer from Hells Kitchen is recruited by the Army for some top-secret assignments. He soon is promoted to captain, where he puts together the First Attack Squad, a group of elite soldiers who carry out elite missions.") and Captain America in 2009. ("Unassuming Army officer Steve Rogers volunteers for a top secret research project that turns him into Captain America, a superhero dedicated to defending America's ideals.") Hopefully any Captain America movie would be set in World War II, and we'd see the Red Skull, Baron Zemo, and, of course, Bucky. (I'd also like to see the Sub-Mariner and the Human Torch and Toro too but that's probably too much to ask.)

Maybe they only had room for 47 prospects.