Smallville = Action Comics

Smallville is a far better superhero TV series than Heroes. Smallville is a way more fun show to watch. They don't posture like they're more profound or original than they are. As far as I'm concerned, they have hotter chicks. More importantly, Smallville's characters have the advantage of being the established DC Comics heroes beloved by generations: Superman and his Superfriends.

For a second, just a second, I thought they were gonna kill Chloe. And for that second I was a little relieved because then I would have been done with Smallville for good. But no, she wakes up naked in a morgue. And I'm also glad because now's not the time to leave Smallville.

After hating this show for five seasons I rather enjoyed it in its sixth by embracing both its dumbness and its improvement with the addition of Green Arrow, Martian Manhunter, and the Justice League.

The best part of Smallville today is that they seem fully committed to turning the show into Action Comics. Smallville is much more now than the hoary "teen Superman growing up" concept they've beaten to death. Little by little over the years, and full-on in season 6, Smallville has become the DC Universe on television.

The roll call of the opening credits' main cast of characters this season is comic geek heaven:

SUPERMAN
LEX LUTHOR
LANA LANG
CHLOE SULLIVAN
LOIS LANE
JIMMY OLSEN
SUPERGIRL
with
LIONEL LUTHOR
guest starring
BIZARRO
and
THE MARTIAN MANHUNTER

This show is now four very hot chicks surrounded by superheroes and supervillains. The Kents are gone, everyone is 21 or older, the pretenses that they are kids in school and must go to classes, etc. look ripe for permanent abandonment. If Clark somehow finally does the 180, stops being a selfish dumbass and begins acting like SUPERMAN, that will be the final piece of the puzzle missing. As Smallville turns into Action Comics: The Television Series, it's finally really finding itself. As series reinventions go, this is pretty fun. Still dumb, sure, but mostly fun.

Clark really needs to get on with learning how to fly. It's time he wore the tights and cape. It's time he really, finally becomes Superman. And stops being such a douche.

Resident Evil: Extinction (**)

RESIDENT EVIL: EXTINCTION

September 25, 2007

Resident Evil: Extinction was a watchable bad movie. It was better than the second one so it has that in its favor. The first thing that annoyed me was that all of the trailers, TV spots and print ads sell this movie based on the Las Vegas setting but the Vegas sequence is only about ten minutes, fifteen tops.

There were all kinds of dumb logic gaps and plot holes that are typical of a Paul WS Anderson-written movie:

* The beginning where Milla Jovovich runs into the hillbilly family. It had nothing to do with the main story. We figured they were cannibals but instead they just capture people and feed them to zombie dogs. Why does the hillbilly family go through all the trouble of luring people to their town just to feed them to zombie dogs? Why do they even keep a kennel of zombie dogs? How do they get the zombie dogs back in their cages? It's not like zombie dogs take instruction or are trainable. It was a pretty stupid and unnecessary sequence. It doesn't establish Milla is a bad ass; we have two prior movies that told us that. And it didn't set up her new power of telekinesis, which came later. Stupid opener.

* The Umbrella board of directors threatening to take the antivirus project away from the crazy doctor. Why even threaten? If they have someone better at Umbrella who can do the job, why are they even wasting time with the crazy doctor? They don't even like him. The entire interplay of how the Umbrella corporation functions makes no sense. But then I suppose that's why those dumbasses got the entire human race infected and turned into zombies.

* Ali Larter (is hot) having doubts about the plan to take the caravan to Alaska. What was her backup plan? Keep driving around the desert and wait to be eaten? They already established that they had drained all the small towns dry of supplies. Yet the leader of the caravan needed to be convinced to take plan B, a chance at hope, instead of her current plan A of prolonging the inevitable death by zombie consumption.

* Las Vegas buried in sand. WHAT?! First of all, that could never happen in five years. Second, yes, Vegas is in the desert in Nevada, but it's a dry desert. It's not like the surrounding desert is dunes of sand like the Sahara or Tunisia. The explanation of "no one was here to keep the sand away" is retarded. No one in Las Vegas today "keeps the sand away." It makes no sense. Also, it doesn't seem like the filmmakers have ever been to Vegas. There were no casinos or buildings in between the Venetian all the way to the Stratosphere. And when the caravan parks they park in front of the Paris, send someone up the Eiffel Tower, but suddenly they're at the Venetian? Those casinos are at least a half mile apart.

* The scene that made me laugh out loud was when the crazy doctor injected a zombie with antivirus and restores a portion of his humanity temporarily. First, he hands him a cell phone. Zombie remembers how to use it. Then a digital camera. Oh sure, the zombie knows how that works. Point and click. After the zombie proves he can recognize complicated items, THEN he hands him the child's toy! "Circle... not fit in square? GRRAARRR! I'll kill you!"

I very quickly got tired of the lousy one-liners passing for dialogue:

"Sorry about this, Stevie."
"Maybe the desert took it back."
"Good thing we like a challenge."
"I wish I had a smoke."
And so forth. Most of the bad one-liners were delivered in Milla Jovovich's husky "I'm such a bad ass chick" voice. Obviously one doesn't attend Resident Evil movies to hear witty banter but it was still annoying.

There was other stuff I thought was stupid but I can't remember now. Still, though, the movie was all right.

Oh, so what the hell ever happened to Jill Valentine?

The Bourne Ultimatum (****)

THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM

August 3, 2007

One word text message review of The Bourne Ultimatum as I left the theatre: "Wow!" 

The Bourne Ultimatum is a cinematic perpetual motion machine. The action and Matt Damon himself as Jason Boune are wound tightly then the tension builds and builds until the explosive release. Then a quick breather, a change of city (Moscow, Paris, London, Tangiers, Turin, New York City), and immediately back to more crazy ass action. When you travel the world with James Bond, you see the high class hotels, casinos, and hottest babes of the world's greatest cities. When Jason Bourne is your tour guide, you spend your time in streets, train stations, alleys and tunnels. The girls aren't nearly as hot but there is never, ever a dull moment. Mr. Bond can't make that promise.

Maybe it was during the hyper fight to the death with the Asset in Tangiers where Jason Bourne used a book as a weapon, jamming it into the Asset's throat before choking him to death in the bathroom shower with a hand towel. Or maybe it was when Bourne hot wired a car in the Port Authority parking lot and backed it at high speed off the roof to escape. Or maybe it was the literally smashing finale of the car chase in New York when Bourne's stolen police car rammed and flipped into the car of another Asset. No, it was definitely much earlier than that, in London, when Bourne was nearly as omniscient as Agatha in Minority Report as he helped a reporter for the Guardian evade capture in Waterloo station. That was when I sat back and marveled, "Holy shit, this is fantastic. I'm having an incredible time!"

Even Julia Stiles didn't harsh my Bourne movie buzz, though I didn't get what I've been clamoring for since the first movie: a bullet right through her flat face. (Why do I have it in for Julia Stiles, you ask? Sit through a movie called Down to You one day.) When Stiles tentatively dropped the revelation on Jason Bourne that they were more than just friends, back when he was a young, fresh-faced killer-to-be just signed onto the super-duper top secret and illegal Treadstone project, now renamed Blackbriar, I loved Bourne's lack of reaction. "You don't remember anything?" Stiles asks. No recognition from Bourne, nothing. ("Nope, sorry, not interested, don't care.")

Stiles is no Franka Portente, whose spectre hangs over Jason Bourne along with his quickly resurfacing memories of how he came to be the first and best of Treadstone's super assassins. Portente never should have been killed off at the start of the second Bourne (she's the first to agree) but to the filmmakers' credit, they've taken that boner and made the best of it, making Portente's death a driving force in Bourne's story. 

The Bourne Ultimatum is the top shelf of the new order of action films. Director Paul Greengrass delivered one of the best action films of the decade, the best of the three Bourne movies*, and one of the best films of the year. Greengrass took his epileptic shaky camera style and refined it. His camera doesn't shake quite as much as in The Bourne Supremacy and his direction is more confident and sure. There is no fat that needs to be trimmed, nothing extraneous or unnecessary. Storywise, this is the clearest, least confounding of the Bourne movies. But the Bourne identity lies foremost in its action and adrenaline rush and this is where Ultimatum shows its supremacy.

Finally, I love that all three Bourne movies end with Moby's "Extreme Ways", with Ultimatum's remix being more aggressive and in your face. While I'm perfectly happy with this Bourne trilogy and I don't think we need any more, if Greengrass and Damon some day decide they want another go, well then as Moby says in the song: 

I would stand in line for this. There's always room in life for this. 

August 4, 2007  

While I was getting my haircut this morning, I thought of Jason Bourne.  A curious thing about him:  For a man who spent three years on the run with the CIA trying to kill him at every turn, he manages to keep his buzzcut nice and trim. Johnny Unitas trim.  Bourne has a haircut you can set your watch by.  You'd think he'd get all shaggy and scraggly, but no.  Bourne prioritizes keeping his look clean and neat.  Maybe he has Flowbees hidden in his many safe deposit boxes all across Europe.

July 7, 2012

After numerous (you read that right, numerous) re-watchings of The Bourne Trilogy over the last five years, I've settled on the preference that my favorite and the best of the three is The Bourne Supremacy. That ending, man. When Jason Bourne breaks into that Russian girl's apartment and apologizes to her for killing her parents -- gets me every time.

The Simpsons Movie (****)

THE SIMPSONS MOVIE

Family Matters

Why is The Simpsons Movie exxxcellent? It marks the first time in the series' 18 year-plus history that the all-star team of ten writers assembled for The Simpsons Movie (whose "names you should memorize", chided Homer during the credits) successfully maintained a complete 90 minute narrative. (The longest continuous story in the series' history previously was the "Who Shot Mr. Burns?" two-parter in 1995. The Simpsons Movie was twice as long as that.) The Simpsons Movie's runaway box office success is a wonderful validation for the incredibly talented team of writers, producers, animators, and the voice talent lead by Dan Castelanetta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, Hank Azaria, Harry Shearer, etc. It couldn't happen to a better, more deserving group of people. (And they'd be the first to agree.)

More importantly, The Simpsons Movie is a loving tribute to the Simpson family. It's been many years since the Simpsons' family unit was itself the focal point of the story. Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie are here on the big screen in all their glory and lovable imperfections, and we're given the most caring and complete glimpse at all of their emotional cores since the early days of the series.

When Homer watches his wedding video and "Close to You" by The Carpenters plays, longtime fans remember it as Homer and Marge's song, going all the way back to when they were in high school. (The episode where Homer falls for Marge as a teenager remains one of the sweetest in the series' venerable history.) Bart's struggle to reconcile his growing attachment to Ned Flanders with his disappointment in Homer reminds us that while he should be 28 years old in real time, Bart is still a ten year old boy who needs his father. Lisa's awesome budding relationship with the Irish new kid in town, Colin, brings back memories of her failed past relationships with Nelson Muntz and Ralph Wiggum, as well as her doomed future relationship with Hugh Parkfield. Lisa's subplot of meeting a boy who likes her (who isn't Milhouse) might be the best in the entire movie. And Maggie probably is the best accident of the three Simpson children if you count how many times she's saved her father's life.

It is regrettable that in order to protect the main narrative and keep the focus on the Simpson family, some of the very best of the show's unbeatable supporting cast didn't get to have their moment. Just about everyone who has ever lived in Springfield got to have some face time, but in terms of speaking roles, the Springfield Elementary cast got shafted. Principal Skinner never said a word, nor did Superintendant Chalmers or Groundskeeper Willie. No Rainier Wolfcastle, but that is understandable considering the presence of President Schwarzenegger. No Sideshow Bob at all! (Maybe in the sequel, if they listen to Maggie's first word, and judging from the opening weekend box office, it's assured.) It's a shame Mr. Burns only got two quick scenes and Smithers never said anything. 

On the other hand, Chief Wiggum and Ralph Wiggum did extremely well for themselves and Ralph probably has the best line in the entire movie. Moe, Lenny, and Carl got some business, and Krusty had some great lines. Nelson set the record for "Ha ha!"s guffawed, while Martin finally took revenge for 18 years of bullying from Jimbo, Kearny and Dolph, as well as learning a valuable lesson for why a bully bullies at all. I wish the movie were longer and they could have given everyone some business, but then there's always the show itself. 

The Simpsons Movie is for everyone. For us, the die hards who've grown up with the show (two decades, almost, and counting!) and for anyone who's ever laughed out loud at any of its past 400 episodes (and counting!). Watching The Simpsons Movie was pure joy, the movie itself a magnficent balance of the show's irreverent humor and ability to tug at the heartstrings with genuinely sweet and tender moments. It's safe to say you'll never forget the sight of naked Bart's doodle as he skateboards through Springfield, or Homer giving everyone double middle fingers, or Marge yelling "Throw the goddamn bomb!" 

The moments I loved included Homer still calling Jesus "Jebus", Bart calling Flanders "sister" and his "Oh my God!" when he drank Flanders' cocoa, the writing on the pig crap silo ("Return to Homer Simpson. (No Reward)"), Tom Hanks loaning the government his credibility, Colin insisting his father isn't Bono, Milhouse's line "Global warming is a myth! More study is needed!" before taking a Nelson punch to the gut, Bart drunk on whiskey ("I'm troubled"), the looks on the animals' faces when they watched Homer and Marge rock the casbah, the EPA drivers bemoaning Homer's misspelled road signs (SOP), and Homer's line to Spider-Pig, "Maybe we should kiss to break the tension."

For me, the callback of all callbacks was near the end of movie, after Bart and Homer jump Springfield Gorge on a motorcycle: There's a blink-and-you'll-miss-it shot of an ambulance crashed into a tree. It's a simple callback, not drawing attention to itself but there for those with quick eyes and long memories. In season 2, "Bart the Daredevil" 17 years ago(!), Bart tried to jump Springfield Gorge on a skateboard and Homer saved his son's life by inadvertantly taking his place. Homer missed the jump and hilarously crashed down the mountainside. Then in a stroke of comedy genius, he is airlifted into a waiting ambulance that crashes into a tree immediately. Homer's gurney rolls out of the ambulance and he falls right back down the mountain. 

It was the breakthrough moment of the series to date, the bit people were talking about at the watercooler the next day. That segment was the series' first classic comedy moment. And in The Simpsons Movie, when Bart and Homer together make the jump Homer failed to complete way back when, we see that the ambulance is still there. That was a great little treat for the longtime fans, those of us who've been there since the beginning, who remember. Moments like that are why I love the show and why I love The Simpsons Movie.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS

July 26, 2007

I'm not planning on spoiling a thing for anyone still reading, about to read, or just waiting for the movie.
My copy arrived from Amazon Saturday morning. It was waiting for me when I woke up. I don't have a secretary or appointments, but if I did, I'd have told her to cancel all my appointments and sent Pam home. I had some reading to do. Now, I'm notoriously not a fast reader, I usually take my sweet time and can take weeks to finish a book, but by Sunday night, I'd read 690 pages, including the pivotal reveals that not just this book but the events of the whole series hinged upon. (And I was happy at how I right my guesses were, made two years ago in a head to head with Rob.)
Only 69 pages left. The most important 69 pages of the saga. The big finish. I put the book down Sunday night. Waited three days and finally dived back in.
Having concluded the saga of Harry Potter, it's taking effort to wipe the smile from my face. The ending is everything it needed to be. It's wonderful.
Honestly, for much of the first half of the book, I wasn't digging it. I was impatient and growing annoyed with J.K. Rowling's storytelling choices. What I expected to see happen as set up in Half-Blood Prince wasn't what she was giving us. The answers I was looking for weren't there. I felt strung along, even bamboozled. I began to wonder if I was going to be betrayed. I still feel there are flaws and problems, but then how could there not be? One person was crafting an intricately complex web, tying together myriad characters and events. Human error was to be expected. But did Rowling know what she was doing? Did she know where she was taking us? Did she still have the magic?
Yes. She was just warming up.
I said to someone recently in defense of the Harry Potter films that I prefer Harry in the movies as played by Daniel Radcliffe to the Harry in the novels as written by Rowling. I always felt the movie Harry was less whiny, more heroic, a superior portrayal. I went onto to say that I couldn't give a fuck if the Harry in the book died but I'd be ripshit if the Harry in the movie died.
Rowling astounded me. In my mind's eye, she gradually and deftly in the course of Deathly Hallows merged her Harry with the Harry in the movie so by the end the end, Harry was the best of both mediums. The Harry I enjoyed watching in the movies was the Harry at the end of the book facing Voldemort for the last time (that's not a spoiler.)
And then she laid all the cards on the table. All the mysteries solved. All the answers revealed. She had to deliver and she delivered. She delivered it all.
Now that it's over, I'm satisfied. Totally satisfied. Like I just ate a great meal. I was told a great, epic story and it was worth the years and thousands of pages read and re-read. It's not the greatest story ever told, or the most original, or one that will shape the rest of my life in any way. It was simply excellent. Most importantly, like every great story must, it had a great ending worthy of what came before.
Harry Potter is over, but the best part is, it still isn't. Two more movies to go, and I can't wait to see the Deathly Hallows movie. I can't wait to see those actors play these parts, to see the battles brought to life and the answers to all the questions dramatized, to see the end of the circle on the silver screen. Lots of the book will likely have to be excised, nothing new there, but the parts that matter, the sequences that beg to be filmed, will have to be there. I can't wait to see that finish play out.
I'm happy. "All is well."

Sunshine (***)

SUNSHINE

You're Not The Only One Staring At The Sun, Afraid Of What You'll Find

I like starships and phasers and Klingons and Jedi and giant transforming robots more than the next guy, but sometimes I crave a story set in space where none of the humans wear colored pajamas and swing lightsabers to fight aliens with bumpy foreheads. Every now and then, I get my wish.

With Sunshine, Danny Boyle's first foray into science fiction, he broke the pattern of my liking every other one of his pictures. His previous film, Millions, is one of my favorites, and now with Sunshine, he's two in a row with me, delivering one of the better sci-fi films I've seen in recent years.  

Sunshine is not a space opera like 2001 or a metaphysical think piece like Solaris, but contains elements of both as well as Alien and 28 Days Later. It's a great story written by Alex Garland, with interesting characters, an intriguing premise, terrific music by John Murphy and Underworld, ideas both big and small, and a bravura visual style. Sunshine overreaches a bit in its third act and adds an element of horror that seems to be at odds with what had come before, but the foundation for it was sufficiently laid out and it's used as a vehicle to portray the light and the darkness of the spiritual element of the story.

Fifty years from now, the sun is dying. Earth is caught in a solar winter. The human race is on the verge of extinction. An international assemblage of eight scientists on board the Icarus II spend years in space hoping to deliver a payload that will detonate into the sun and cause a new star to be born inside the dying one. Imagine spending years in space with the same seven people, hoping against expectations that your mission can possibly succeed when there are no guarantees it would. Meanwhile, the specter of the previous Icarus mission, which failed and was never heard from again, hangs over our astronauts. 

Sunshine is not a live action cartoon like Armageddon. Boyle and Garland have far more realistic ideas about how such a desperate mission of traveling millions of miles to re-ignite the sun would turn out. Sunshine presents an overwhelming problem to the survival of the human race and makes it damned clear that Bruce Willis isn't here to make you feel good about it.  I almost wished one of the characters was shown watching a DVD or whatever they'll use in 50 years of Armageddon, so they'd feel even worse about how screwed they are. The harsh reality of Sunshine was the polar opposite of funny Owen Wilson and Steve Buschemi in cracking wise in space and Ben Affleck playing with animal crackers on Liv Tyler's stomach while Aerosmith blasts the soundtrack. 

The crew of Icarus II, played by an excellent cast lead by Cillian Murphy, Rose Byrne, Chris Evans, Cliff Curtis and Michelle Yeoh, are not necessarily the best of the best with the Right Stuff. They're all intelligent but flawed people who are presented with a series of obstacles where they are forced to make difficult choices that inevitably result in death and tragedy. Their performances are all layered and effective, but the standout here is Chris Evans as Mace, the ship's hotheaded engineer. As the Human Torch, Evans was one of the few bright spots of the Fantastic Four movies but in Sunshine, he shows he's a better actor than he's been allowed to be in his rotten comic book movie franchise. Evans exhibits genuine leading man qualities. If they'd just listened to Chris Evans, things might have gone better for the Icarus II. But they didn't.

In the course of the choices the Icarus II 's crew makes and the events that happen to them, they gradually discover an unforeseen element that is sabotaging their mission and trying to kill them, which directly relates to what happened to the crew on board the Icarus I . When the villain is revealed, the horror element introduced is jarring and seems out of place, but I understood why this choice was made and I liked it the more I contemplated it. 

The spiritual element and questions raised are intriguing. The sun dying becomes an allegory for whether God has decided that Man must die. By using our science and attempting to re-ignite it, can Man defy God? In the face of the sun's overwhelming heat and light, can Man see God's face and touch Him? 

Sunshine is exactly the kind of "hard" science fiction film I like. It's smart and stylish, it makes you think and makes you feel, and it's bleak . Sunshine holds you at bay, then creeps under your skin and fills you with awe and dread. It's flawed and sometimes difficult but Sunshine's the hot shit.

The Condemned (**1/2)

THE CONDEMNED

Stone Cold! Stone Cold! Stone Cold!

Jim Ross claims he saw The Condemned three times in the theatre. If that's true then by God, that ol' Okie must be in love with his good friend Stone Cold Steve Austin. It's a shame then that even Good Ol' J.R.'s repeat business didn't stop The Condemned from becoming the lowest grossing WWE Film at the box office. The Condemned's failure sank the fledgling WWE film division and relegated any future WWE productions to go straight to DVD. Thing is, The Condemned is the best of the WWE Films. That isn't saying much; See No Evil and The Marine are pretty shitty, but The Condemned is surprisingly watchable and enjoyable as a pure action B movie.

By now, after seemingly thousands of commercials, every WWE fan knows the basic plot of The Condemned: On a remote island, ten death row inmates, eight men and two women, all killers, are forced to fight to the death. The sole survivor wins his freedom. The entire sordid affair is broadcast as "www.the_condemned.com" live over the Internet for profit by Breck, a slimey producer out to exploit the "reality" of people killing each other for a fortune in pay per view Internet dollars. On the surface Breck is a stand in for Vince McMahon, but he didn't father a bastard leprechaun, and he's as much a commentary on someone like Girls Gone Wild maven Joe Francis and sleazy network producers as he is a riff on the beloved Chairman of WWE.

The first thing I found interesting was that the burden of carrying the movie doesn't fall on the shoulders of Stone Cold Steve Austin, which is the fatal mistake The Marine did with John Cena and See No Evil did with Kane. Austin ostensibly plays the lead role but the movie takes a minimalist approach to how much Austin is on the screen. He pretty much appears only when he's needed and spends a considerable amount of time off screen. Austin wisely doesn't try to do or say too much and doesn't veer very far at all from his bad ass wrestling persona. Even when he manages to call his girlfriend back in the States to tell her he's still alive, he keeps the mushy stuff to a bare minimum. 

The filmmakers make every moment Austin appears on the screen count. Stone Cold's performance isn't stunning by any means, but as the default hero of the story he's pretty solid. (Still, I think I'd have preferred seeing the heel Stone Cold of 2001 who liked singalongs, needed hugs from Vince McMahon, and was terrified of eating his wife's cookies. Maybe if there's a sequel...) The main thrust of the action on the island is handled by Vinne Jones, who plays a damn good heel, especially when he's not wearing a fake muscle suit, a toilet bowl on his head, and screaming, "I'm the Juggernaut, bitch!"

Meanwhile, Breck is the center of all of the drama regarding the ethics and morality of broadcasting the deaths and even rapes happening on the island. A couple of Breck's crew members, including his hot girlfriend, actually have a conscience and attempt to put a stop to what they're doing, while the rest of his crew are as amoral as their employer. The movie even point blank accuses the audience (our culture at large) of being the problem for watching the_condemned.com and considering watching people die entertainment. The moralizing is heavy handed and as blunt as a steel chairshot to the head. But fuck, I was pretty surprised it was there at all. The movie's ethical position plays full force when Stone Cold and Vinnie Jones force the tables to be turned on Breck and his crew and they're forced to pay the piper for the roles they played on the show.

The action isn't filmed with any great panache but the filmmakers wisely kept the fighting realistic. It's a pretty fucking violent movie with people getting shot, stabbed, beaten, run through with arrows, and exploding. Probably half of the "condemned" die by explosion. If you want to see people get blown up real good, this is the DVD for you. When one of the "condemned" is raped by Jones and his little Japanese sidekick, the movie wisely doesn't show it but makes its occurence the lynchpin for moral outrage. The breakdowns of when the condemned attack each other, what they're after, and when and why some of them forge alliances were well thought out. Again, there's a level of thought in design and competency of execution on display in The Condemned that was unexpected and commendable. Especially from a movie bearing the credit "Executive Producer Vince McMahon."

While I don't need to see The Condemned ever again, I had fun and I'm not sorry I saw it, which I can't say for Cena or Kane's movies. And that's a big get. Although whoever picked the song that closes the movie needs to take a Stone Cold Stunner and a beer bath. When I think of the music to represent the Texas Rattlesnake, the Bionic Redneck, the Toughest SOB in WWE, I don't think Nickelback.