Benjamin Grimm

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 think the special effects could have handled Iceman. My guess is that they didn't want him to look like Frosty the Snowman. He would have been much cooler (no pun intended) if he was covered with frost and riding on that ice slide. It didn't ruin the X-Men movies for me, but I feel less of a connection the the X-Men than I do to the FF, Spidey and Hulk.

I didn't hear that. It's pretty much how they handled Iceman, though.

Boy, I hope that report is wrong.

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.)

Yeah, that was made up, as was the entire origin of both the FF and Doom.

Maybe they only had room for 47 prospects.

If you were to go to a movie theater in Teheran you'd probably be able to see a few.

Could be. Although knowing that crowd, it's more likely a Pop-Tart overdose.

Holy crap, Rey Ordonez is in 14th place??? Ahead of Rusty Staub??? If I had to guess, I would have picked Rey's lifetime hit total to be closer to about 40.

I think there are still plenty of Muslim bad guys in Hollywood productions.

Only at the very beginning. He led Galactus to Earth so that he could feed on the planet's life energies. But when he met the lovely albeit blind sculptress Alicia Masters, he realized that the human race was worth saving, and he turned on Galactus. He's been one of the good guys ever since.

I was also surprised that Borat was in the "adapted" category. I guess it's because it's based on a character he played on Da Ali G Show. I'm wondering why Letters from Iwo Jima isn't in the foreign language category. Isn't it just about entirely in Japanese? (I'm really looking forward to seeing that one, by the way.)

It turns out I've seen exactly ten 2006 movies to date. Eight of them I saw in theaters, one on DVD (Cars) and one on an airplane (My Super Ex-Girlfriend, on the return flight from Tokyo). Here they are in order from my favorite to least favorite: Borat X-Men: The Last Stand Superman Returns Monster House Cars Happy Feet Departed, The Eight Below Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest My Super Ex-Girlfriend I would say that I enjoyed the first four. The next four were "okay" and the last two were pretty bad.

I don't know. Probably not at a movie theater. (When does it open, by the way?) Taking two kids to the movies on a Friday night requires more incentive than Ghost Rider offers. It may turn out to be a good movie (or not; I have no idea) but it offers zero goosebump potential. The Ghost Rider character never meant anything to me. I'm looking forward to Iron Man in 2008, though. Robert Downey Jr. is reportedly going to play Tony Stark, which should be interesting. I'm glad they didn't cast a 23-year-old, which would have been a bad sign.

Falling twice, huh? Actually, I never got to the goosebumps stage with the original Fantastic Four movie. Rereading the thread that CF bumped this afternoon confirmed that I went in to that movie fearing the worst. That trailer for Rise of the Surfer got my spine-tingling in a way that no part of the first movie did, so we're already ahead of the game. At this point I'm eagerly awaiting the second FF movie. As more information becomes available I may start feeling differently, but right now I'm fired up. Spider-Man 3 on May 4. Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer on June 15. Pencil me in for opening night for both pictures.

I've noticed that in movies that have people in them, you usually see at least one scene where somebody is sitting, and at least one other scene where somebody is standing. Anyone else notice that?

The first movie didn't do much for me, but this trailer gave me goosebumps: http://www.apple.com/trailers/fox/fantasticfourriseofthesilversurfer/large.html

Edgy DC wrote: Nothing personal. No offense taken.

My votes weren't included.

Jack Matthews, writing in The Daily News, called Happy Feet the "best movie of the computer-generated era." It was a fun movie, and visually beautiful. But I wouldn't call it the best computer-generated film. Off the top of my head, I know I prefer Toy Story, The Incredibles, Shrek, and Monster House. In Happy Feet the few humans that we saw looked very realistic. I'm sure they must have been actual actors who had a CGI effect added to them. If in fact they were completely computer-generated, then the animators did an astounding job.

Well, it looks like, as someone who doesn't love this movie, I am in the minority, but at least I'm not alone.