Monday, September 18, 2006

 

The New Fantastic Four

I finally got around to watching the new Fantastic Four on Cartoon Network. My eyes are still getting used to the French anime-inspired design.

Let’s start with the costumes. Okay, I know the four-or-five color costume exists to simplify animation and reduce costs, but even by my own low expectations regarding the aesthetics of TV animation the costume design looks primitive.

The look of Ben Grimm (The Thing) is alright, I suppose, but this version of Johnny Storm looks like a member of Tangerine Dream, post-plastic surgery.

Dr. Reed Richards looks more like a spiky-haired UCLA student than anything else.

Sue Storm is the only character which seems to be an improvement over the original. And that’s about it for the main characters.

The Fantastic Four redux is less of a travesty than Loonatics (arguably, it is not a travesty at all) but many aspects of Fantastic Four leaves a bitter aftertaste—action sequences are not that compelling, the first episode (which doesn’t even seem like a first episode) is a pathetic intro to what will hopefully be an engaging season; and what the hell is up with these “alien trial” plots? I’ve seen these in the mid-90’s Bureau of Alien Detectives series, and they were beginning to grate after a while. Fantastic Four is not going to improve upon the “alien trial” genre anytime soon.

I think that after viewing the 3rd episode, I’ll take a pass on the rest of the season and wait for the season DVDs to hit Wal-Mart or Target shelves. Assuming that, when the series finally does make it to DVD I’ll have the copious amount of time needed to canvas the entirety of the first season of Fantastic Four.

Monday, September 04, 2006

 
Steve Irwin, the Crocodile Hunter, is dead. Killed by a stingray. WTF?

For some reason, because of this tragic bit of news, I had really hoped today's date would have been 4/1.

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