Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
::Today's soundtrack: Lightning Seeds "You Showed Me" ::
Well, these past few years certainly have seen a major influx of comic book movie adaptations, haven't they? In the spring of 2005 I did Rant 102 in which I counted down my all time top ten comic book movie moments. In the short amount of time since then, there have been not only many new movies of this genre, but many great ones. So many that I feel like we're due for another round to pay props to those scenes of wicked awesomeness. Now, I'm not saying these noteworthy moments are replacing the last batch, no. These are some of my favourite moments in the comic book movies which have come out since my last list, so these are all from recent movies only. So, without further ado, for your consideration (WARNING, may contain spoilers!):
Colossus and Wolverine perform the "fastball special" (X-Men 3). When you can get classic characters to perform their signature moves on screen, what can go wrong? In this case, nothing, unless of course you have a problem with pure joy.
Flint Marko has to "pull himself together" after falling into a particle accelerator (Spider-Man 3). Yes, this movie overall did not quite stand up to its predecessors, but this one scene struck me as very well executed. Marko has been fused with the sand in the accelerator and his consciousness has to not only figure this out, but find the determination of will to once again become cohesive. The way he starts, and falls apart, starts and disintegrates into a pile again, until the inexplicably intact locket and photo of his daughter gives him the drive to make himself whole again. There is no dialogue in this scene, but they manage to pull off revealing emotions nonetheless.
The swelling of Samuel Stern's head (The Incredible Hulk). They honestly could not have done this tiny speck of foreshadowing better. If there is ever going to be a direct sequel to this film, they already have the perfect villain outlined and ready to go, allowing them to bypass a clumsy origin story. The head-swollen character The Leader is a classic Hulk villain and an obvious choice, but there are only so many radiation based accidents that can go on and not seem too contrived, right? That little nod and wink, to me, was the perfect set up.
The death throes of the elemental (Hellboy 2). Sometimes when a movie relies too much on special effects they can run the risk of "tossing the whale" so to speak. Meaning that an effect can be so poor as to take you out of the illusion entirely. However, after Hellboy kills the giant forest elemental and its death causes grass and flowers to grow, it is indeed beautiful to behold.
The Joker's disappearing pencil trick (The Dark Knight). Completely self contained and brief, this is the scene which everyone is going to quote to their friends and post on their blogs once it's available on YouTube. It's an easily accessible and understandable snippet of pure Joker evil and insanity. If you want people to know what sort of character the Joker in The Dark Knight is, and how he differs from Jack Nicholson's version in Tim Burton's Batman, it's all summed up in about five minutes right there.
Bruce Wayne requisitions Lucius Fox's inventions for the purposes of "spelunking" (Batman Begins). The exchange here between Bruce and Lucius is both charming and brilliant, funny and essential to the plot. It's just plain terrific writing.
Tony Stark escapes being held captive by terrorists (Iron Man). This was a truly amazing sequence and a great way for us to get to know "Tony Stark, the genius" rather than just "Tony Stark millionaire playboy jerk." The whole sequence of him constructing his crude armor suit and then finally putting into use was very deftly done as to not only introduce us to the Tony's brilliance, but also his strong sense of morals, turning him into someone we could support as a hero.
Hellboy and Abe Sapien sing Barry Manilow (Hellboy 2). Probably the last thing you'd expect in a movie about supernatural crime fighting would be a scene involving two of our lead characters getting drunk and singing along to "Can't Smile Without You." As a bonus this bit also had some great dialogue going for it: "My body's a temple." "Now it's an amusement park."
V blows up buildings to the strains of the 1812 Overture (V for Vendetta). You know, if I were to blow up buildings, this is exactly how I'd do it. The entire movie embodies so many things that I love (V is quite the snappy dresser, isn't he?), but this is the absolute stand out moment of the whole thing.
The transformation of Harvey Dent into Two-Face (The Dark Knight). Okay, so this didn't exactly happen all in one scene, but I think you can gather it all up into one big moment without too much of a stretch. The whole thing starts out so very subtle and then suddenly, literally explodes in your face and it works. It works on so many levels. And the best thing about it is that the way Dent evolves from pure hero into utter villain it is so very believable. It wasn't just being deformed that sent him over the edge (like say, in Batman Forever), no, it was a culmination of events with an inevitable result. The most excellent thing about it is that it doesn't only expand on Dent's character, but also on the Joker as well. It shows just how much effort, thought, and preplanning he put into this scheme, how hard he studied all of the players, predicted their reactions to certain events, and so on. And it is all pure 100% classic signature Joker, too. I see this as a variation on the events of The Killing Joke story, where the Joker tries to do nearly exactly the same thing to Jim Gordon. This entire gambit is a shining example of the writers of the film adaptation completely understanding and properly interpreting an icon like the Joker for the big screen and they totally nailed it.
And that's that, kiddos. You know, a clever person might be able to take my last list and this one and combine into one most excellent top twenty, but who's got the time? Anyway, please, by all means leave me your thoughts, opinions, and reactions to my picks in the comment thingie below. Did I forget a moment you thought should have made the list? Do you think this whole thing should have been comprised entirely of moments from The Dark Knight? Think something I chose is totally lame? I'd love to hear it all.
William the Bloody (still a fanboy, now more than ever)
