Solo (1996)

When you think of the movie Solo, automatically one would assume its the prequel Solo: a Star Wars Story, a movie that did not receive much critical praise. This is not that movie, however its a disaster that pre-dates that movie.  Which would then lie the question of what was this original Solo  movie?  If the Hans Solo movie was cursed by making comparisons, what curses did this film inherited?  More importantly if it was that bad why have we not heard of it?  even at the release of Solo: a star wars story.

Well sit back and know it was a long long time ago,  a science fiction story, about a secret military mission that gone awry, when the latest military's prototype, an A.I. Android concluded that self preservation means keeping it's own long term memories over the military's desire to erase and restart his initial programming was it's primary objective.

Based on Vietnam veteran Robert Mason's first novel called Weapon. Whereupon an android named Solo lives among Nicaraguan villagers after he deems them innocent while his government handlers targeted them for execution. 

Weapon was published in 1989, making the original story pre-dating all the circa 1990's action troupes of that decade; stamping a precedent in original concept over movies of that decade (but not the 80's). This was screenwriter David L. Corley first commercial big budget theatrical movie adaptation, according to IMDB he continued to write three more adapted screenplays, all of which went straight to video.  Executive Power and Angel's Dance where films in which he also directed; and nearly a decade after the release of  Solo, David L. Corley wrote his final screenplay Jean  Claude Van Damme's movie titled Second in Command, a direct to video which was abysmally received by both critics and audiences and thus concluded his career in Hollywood and the film industry in general.  

 Solo's debut in theatres was August of 1996 and is ranked 160th in highest grossing films of that year. Making just over 5 Million dollars at the box office, with a projected budget of 19 Million dollars, the film was a financial disaster.  The movie was released one year after Van Damme's Universal Solider;  a film about a slowly self aware cyborg who turns rogue from his military handlers.

 Solo shares the  1991 story of Terminator 2's idea of a boy and a deadly robot bonding, and why the robot can't conceive of an emotion - in this case laughter as oppose to tears of sadness. The film shares an underlying comparison to the 1986 movie Short Circuit where a robot becomes self aware and runs away from its military benefactors  for its own self preservation  over the risk of losing its own long term memory, as it's battery source bleeds out; that until his creator and friend arrives to give him a new one.  The film borrows  visual cue's and the echoing sound ideas of laughter in a  jungle which can be seen in the 1987 film Predator. 

Popularizing itself with Michael Jordan's Nike commercial Ad  and utilizing his most famous Gatorade slogan "Be like Mike"-  Solo  uses a rolodex of familiarity of established pop culture with the hopes that the zeitgeist will carry over into it's box office receipts.

 Life after Solo, for a revered  Mario Van Peeple's career was very much under the radar for the remainder of that decade, until the semi successful movie Judgment Night; but it would take the 2001 release of Will Smith's Ali to gain recognition and awarded accolades for his supporting role.  That comeback bumped up his Hollywood status and saw Mario return to the Director's Chair since 1994's New Jack City; telling the story of his father's celebrated career in Badassssss! which garnered multiple Independent Spirt award & NAACP image award nominations.

On its own Solo fits the category of a 90's blockbuster film, with its' budgeted action, use of guns, explosions, chops, punches, and memorable one-liners. The success of this film rested on in its very own use of words when it decided to deal with the devil.

Hancock (2008)

 Initially titled "Tonight, He Comes", to which in context of the final movie, makes no connective sense , This film center's around John Hancock, the second conceived movie title, before settling to the single name ' Hancock'.

Featuring  Will Smith in the lead role, The movie was slated for a 2007 release, but due to changing of directors, problems with film board advisory warning and conflicted test audiences reactions;  the movie was trimmed and scenes re-shot. To the point of it barely resembles the original 1996 script of Vy Vincent Ngo.

Not much is publicly known of the original version as it was rumored to be gorier with a more sadder ending as Hancock suffered PTSD and had violent outbursts, The film script was initially sought out by director Michael Mann, Tony Scott and couple of other directors, as screenwriter Vince Gilligan took over and re-wrote the screenplay after creative differences with Vy Vincent Ngo had him walk away from the project.  The film had to pass the film advisory board twice to avoid the initial R- rating.  Test audiences did not like the movie and a particular scene of Will Smith.

In Ngo's version, Hancock was sexual frustrated, as he could not have sex with women, on the condition when he orgasmed it would kill them. Test audiences did not find it funny and the concept was one of the reasons for a R-rating.  Peter Berg came on board as director and had that scene re-imagined with Hancock being a hero dealing with alcoholism.  Berg sited the movie Leaving Las Vegas as an influence in which its leading star becomes a suicidal alcoholic,

 
It was in the re-write that critics notice the movie, and made their complaints; as the first two thirds of the film had Will Smith being charming and comedic with our hero causing millions in damages and become callous with consequences. To a tragic figure where the stakes in the movie had very real dramatic pull, the sudden shift in tone caught the ire of many film critics, but audiences still loved the movie as it became the 4th highest grossing movie of the summer of 2008.  Which wasn't much when the final budget of the film was just over a 150 Million.  

As for the initial title, I as a blog writer can only speculate as being a horror reference of the violence Hancock would inflict onto the character of Mary in the original draft, or its a double entendre for the character's short falls. 

The film also ear marked the beginning of the end of physical media, as it posed as a litmus test in consumers viewing habits.  Sony who is a divisional  producer of the film,  Offered an exclusive deal, if you owned a new Bravia television set and had an internet connection you could download the film and watch it at your leisure. One month before the release on DVD and Blue Ray.  This was the film that ushered in the proven success of video-on-demand to be a viable platform. The 2009 CES convention saw technology and distribution shift that way.

 

Franz Kafka

 

Franz Kafka was a German novelist and short story writer, was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia, on  July 2, 1883.   He came from a wealthy family and was mostly home schooled before studying law in Prague.  He suffered through a short lifetime from ill health, loneliness, and unhappy love affairs.  This air of depression and despair permeates his introspective novels with the same minuteness of detail that is found in the works of Marcel Proust.

Kafka's major works  were not published until after his death. His most famous novels included  The Trial (1925). The Castle (1926),  and America (1927). Kafka believed in numerous mystic cults and was convinced that he possessed clairvoyant powers. Among his other works were Metamorphosis (1916), The Country Doctor (1919), In the Penal Colony (1919),  and The Great Wall of China (1931).  He died June 3, 1924.

Director David Cronenberg earlier work drew great inspiration from  Kafka's book Metamorphosis, in which the protagonist  Gregor Samsa, wakes to find himself transformed into an insect.   The book has been adapted into a stage play starring Tim Roth and has been reinterpreted in both television and film many times over. The 2006 animated movie Flushed Away has a scene where a stove falls through a floor of a house,  to show a cockroach  reading a French translation of Kafka's The Metamorphosis.

Another well received novel was "The Trial" where an  near invisible authority has arrested and begins to prosecute a man Joesf K., but the nature of his crime in neither revealed  to him or the reader.  It is atmospheric state re-imagined in episodes of the twilight zone. It can be said that films like Cube, Vivarium, Escape room, and the Saw franchise took a little bit of inspiration from the work of Franz Kafka.

Falcon & Winter Soldier

A question(s) that can be ask at the conclusion of the season can be,  Was this meant to be a set up for a Captain America 4 film, or was it designed to set-up, some up coming characters for what is to be expected in phase 5.  With an appearance of Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, who becomes the connection to the Black Widow movie, are we seeing the formation of the Thunderbolts?  The series also shows us a former Captain America test subject whose next generation becomes a future Avenger according to the comics, We the audience at the final episode get a new Captain America and why he is worthy of the moniker over a highly decorated and cookie cutter American Soldier, We also get fallout from the Winter Soldier movie, with Baron Zemo out of prison, the people of Wakanda learning that the murderer of their beloved King escapes prison would have never of sat well, A resulting action is given but does it carry the cathartic weight it should promise?  .  Bucky Barnes who seeks atonement for his decades of past sins in order to find forgiveness for himself and from the father whose son he's slain. The series does spend time giving us a compelling set up, but leaves the audience without the emotional impact as is should have provided by cutting out the moment of truth discussion that could be messy and overwhelmingly hard hitting.

On many levels the series disappoints because not every problem or set up in story telling it chooses to introduce in the 1st half of the series will have a conclusion, epilogue, or resolution. Some characters mostly villains' will come to a tragic end, Then there are characters like the Power Broker, who on the identity reveal leaves more questions than answers. Why expose your chemist, it eventually causes the loss of you most coveted investment,  Why not neutralize Karlie the leader of the flag-smashers earlier in the series when there was an opportunity to do so, had clearly presented itself .. Whatever happened to & where is Zemo now?, clearly the Butler did it!  When it comes to the murder of the 6 flag-smashers.   The Raft,  does Valentina have some control there?  John Walker,  an official Captain America knock off to be given the name 'The U.S, Agent' sometime in the near future, Does he become a Thunderbolt or does Valentina have other designs for him? 

Each episode has at least 1 spectacular stunt sequence from an aerial dogfight to a battle on two moving trucks on the freeway. The budget and time spent can clearly be seen on the  small screen, the detail exceeds some of the best choregraphed battle sequences found on any CW  show.  Understandable the finale and some pick up shots for the series was delayed due to the Covid--19 outbreak, which could explain the quick ending and abrupt choices the show makes to conclude this season.  Sharon Carter where does this show leave her? Her character feels like Dexter Morgan in the original series finale as he speeds away in a boat under the cover of a hurricane.

 

Howard The Duck (1986)

Howard the Duck paved the way on how late 20th century Hollywood gaged comic book adapted movies. Its not the first adapted film to hit the big screen, but from a creative stance it makes all the difference in the world.

 During the early 1990's when Marvel Comics was in financial turmoil, they were willing to sell all there  film distribution rights of all there characters to Sony Pictures for 25 Million dollars. At that time Sony believed the only character worth any film value to be shown theatrically was Spiderman and purchased the film rights for only 10 Million Dollars.  In hindsight that deal was horrible for both sides, overtime to inject a cash flow, Marvel granted distribution rights to varied characters to different companies, like Fox owning the X-men and The Fantastic-4, Paramount owning the Hulk,  Sony Pictures having Spiderman and all the Spider-verse characters. For it's deal Sony Pictures made back 10 times the purchase cost of the first Spiderman movie, which still saw a massive profit after the film's budget of $7 million dollars , and the cost for marketing and payment to the National Assoc. of Theatre Owners (NATO), Sony made $114 Million on its opening day weekend which at that time was the highest box office gross for any film in history. and gave an instant profit of $50+ million after expenses were paid out. Spiderman (2002) made just over $403 Million Domestically and more than double that worldwide. So of course the sequel would be in the works and possible a trilogy, if lightning in the bottle would catch twice the company would jump on that without a second thought.

Go back 16 years before the release of Spiderman, which was 3 years after the release of Return of the Jedi. George Lucas and his company Lucas films purchased the film rights to Howard the Duck, a Marvel Comic intellectual property and made it into a feature length theatrical motion picture .  And Marvel's first film ever to hit the big screen.  In short, the film was a commercial failure for a film with a budget of $30 Million ($76 million today with inflation) only made back $38 Million Worldwide, meaning after all expenses, the film never made a profit, it was in the red, George Lucas was was still the process of building Skywalker ranch and had to sell off parts of his company to payback the banks. The most notable sale was a small animation company he sold to Steve Jobs the CEO of Apple. that company would go on to becoming the multiple award winning animation company Pixar films. 

For nearly 30 years Howard the Duck was remembered as disaster of a movie Critics and audiences did not connect with this film , on a revisit - Rotten tomatoes scored this film 15%.  This in turn made investor uneasy to invest large sums of money into a comic book genre film,  A decade later Blade received mixed critical reviews but connected with the audience and in the 2000's  investors saw value in telling these character stories with the debut of X-men,  Batman, Spiderman these films had a more modest/ limited budget in the beginning and saw great commercial success, Daredevil, Elektra, Ghost Rider, Sin City saw a split of public and critical opinion but proved this was a fertile ground to harvest.

Howard the Duck ridiculed notoriety did not taint it's cast.  Tim Robbins, is all but forgotten that this was his breakthrough role, Jeffrey Jones later that year was distinctly remembered for his role playing principal Ed Rooney in Ferris Buller and would go onto be a character actor in about 70 film.  The leading star Lea Thompson, was a household name with the release of Back to the Future, and continues with developing a list of films under her belt,  as both an Actor and Television Director, but never reached that  commanding leading lady role in Hollywood.  As for the actor Ed Gale the man in the Howard the Duck suit, he continued to work as a stunt man for another decade, and would appear in over over 100 Television shows and commercials. 

Howard the Duck would make his return to the big screen 28 years later in a small cameo appearance in the post credit scene of Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) movie. The character and his movie has slowly built a cult following and Disney's Marvel Studios of  today has future plans for this character who in his 1986 theatrical release gave us the first notion of a multi-verse.  

What If (2021) series

The Incredibles (2004)

 

The Incredibles' are Pixar's sixth animated feature length movie and the 3rd film to garner the company an Oscar win. In total the animated studio has collected 10 academy awards for feature length movies, Finding Nemo was their first. This film received 4 nominations and took home 2, best animated feature film, and best sound editing.   Pixar was originally owned by Lucas Films but sold off to Steve Jobs (Apple CEO) to cover the massive loss Lucas films endured with Howard the Duck (1986), while investing heavily and amassing debt to create his Skywalker ranch. Ironically enough 20 years later Pixar  would slowly return home in 2006, for a deal believed to be a 7.4 billion dollar purchase.  As Disney purchased the company and shortly thereafter its founder Lucas films in 2012 for an estimated 4 billion dollars.  

The Incredibles was the first superhero themed animated movie to win an Oscar, the genre would not be recognized for a full decade until Big Hero 6, and again  4 years later with Spiderman: into the spider-verse winning the Oscar gold in 2019.  These films captures the imagination with visual effects and and unprecedented imagination  and it  took almost as long to make as to win.  Jason Lee who was the voice the for Buddy/Syndrome spent only 4 days in a sound booth .  While Craig T. Nelson who was the voice of Bob/ Mr. Incredible took nearly 2 years to complete.  It seems that the approach with Pixar  is that the story is more important than the animation, but being an multiple academy award wining and leading animation studio in the entire world, animation is what they are the very best at. 

The film's story is the bedlam of the animation. Usually delving deep, telling an emotional story of the family dynamic with the dilemma of a family coping in suburban life. Running the risk of being uprooted from witness relocation as their past lives calls back hauntingly. Inside Out  and UP  also gave a real life emotional story to connect with its audience, as the Incredibles gave you the everyday husband and wife / nuclear family going through  past regret and family struggles as their kids go through their own coming of age moments.

The Incredibles is many regards is an awakening for each character beyond it being a superhero film, but when it becomes just a superhero film the movie goes full out to tell an amazing story with an orchestrated explosive score to accompany the action.  An example to best illustrate this remark was when the son Dash discovers he can run on water and with unbridled passion. Its race through a wild jungle and a discovery of levels of excitement.

Venom

Venom on a beach with Spiderman's masked skull in hand uttering "Spiderman alas I killed him well".

From Amazing Spiderman 347, re-iterating an infamous misquoted Hamlet line. The issue takes place after the full completed story arc of the first time Spiderman and Venom had ever fought where the only way to get rid of Eddie Brock and the Symbiote from Peter Parker's life was to make them think they had won.  With Spiderman dead leaving the lethal protector contented with life left on a tropical beach away from New York and the rest of the civilized world. That was until the first emergence of Carnage and Spiderman's desperate need of this lethal enemy who would know how to stop him. Using the logic of my enemy's enemy is my friend. 

That issue was released way back in 1991.  Fast forward to 2021 a deleted scene of Venom Let there be carnage has Eddie and Venom happy on a beach, with the defeat of their latest enemy Carnage.  The difference now being the enemy to bring them back into civilization is the emergence of Spiderman.

As much as the MCU, and their Marvel adapted properties forge ahead with great success; Their designed remains cyclical, Marvel comics has a treasure trove of stories and crossovers spanning well over 50 years that can provide a blueprint to keep historic readers happy and engage the newest fan onto the big screen. The post credit scene of this recent  Venom  movie offers an example of that cross-section.  While setting up what will be Spiderman's No way home, a continuing expanding endeavor of Marvel Studios, in partnership with Sony pictures.  The recent No Way Home trailer can also show how the chaos can possible lead into the multiverse of madness.

Venom,  the Sony pictures' theatrical release, had its debut on the big screen in the fall of 2018, offering  the world the emergence of  Eddie Brock a failed reported and an Alien Symbiote known as Venom, in a world without Spiderman.  Venom Let there Be Carnage offers us the same world without a Spiderman, as Venom's greatest adversary Carnage emerges, An offspring who's host was as deadly and unpredictable as it's alien counterpart. Like any good story, the villain, be it Eddie Brock or Cletus Kasady (aka Carnage), the villain rarely sees themselves as a villain, they are in fact the hero of their own story.  Cletus was denied the love of his life, a Romeo and Juliet story with both characters  sentenced to death to be forever apart.  

Let there be Carnage keeps some of it's comic book origin. Cletus was in prison and bonded with Venom's offspring.  The screenwriters just shuffled the how and why Brock/Venom would be in prison next to Cletus in order for this to happen. Characters like Anne Weying, Riot, Shriek, Carlton Drake, She-Venom were all characters that existed in the comic book lore.  As Sony picture's sandbox of legally owned  characters are tied only to the spider-verse.  In truth they possess only a finite set of characters in which to tell these stories without Spiderman. , As Sony's number one Marvel export  is given a opportunity to be shared within the greater Marvel Cinematic Universe. while quietly offering  a world where his friendly neighborhood league of characters like Morbius and Vulture can exist, but told in pocket corners of the world.

A question remains. What is Venom now with the emergence of Spiderman? We were given an anti-hero without a Spiderman,  As we have no origin or connection to the webslinger, what does the future hold? Can Venom play nice and work with Spiderman,  as Eddie continues to try to control the ethical dilemma of eating brains of alleged bad guys.