Obama and Palin Meet… Archie Andrews?

News
September 22, 2010

The fine folks in sunny Riverdale have a pair of powerful visitors, sweeping into town later this year. Scratch that. The fine folks in Riverdale have one powerful visitor and one ex-governor / tea-party activist sweeping into town later this year. Why? Because student politics is a national level issue when it’s Archie Andrews vs. Reggie Mantle! The fate of Riverdale High, and by proxy, all of our nation comes down to who will take over the student body. Think about it. Unemployment is still rampant throughout the states. The war in Iraq is over, but we’re swimming in debt over it. The mighty dollar isn’t what it used to be. But it all will come down to who will represent the student body… everyone’s favorite every-kid, Archie, or that rule-breaker, Mantle “The Magnificent”. While we’re not even sure how the President and Mrs. Palin will find Riverdale, given that it, like Springfield of The Simpsons fame, exists devoid of a literal state address… we can be positive though, that the visit will make history.

Hitting comic book shelves in late December, and then January, the Obama / Palin two-part storyline should draw politically minded fans to the rack quicker than Jughead dashes to Pop Tate’s on new flavor day. We here at ComicMix wanted to share the pair or covers for the December/January solicits. Give a gander at our sitting President and the media’s favorite Hockey Mom as they shed their animosity for one another, all over a chocolate malt.

ARCHIE #616
“Campaign Pain” Part 1.

President Barack Obama and famed politician Sarah Palin get involved as Student Government campaigns spiral out of control at Riverdale High! The race between Archie and Reggie gets hot as campaign chaos reaches to the top, forcing an impromptu visit from these big-name politicos, who get pulled into the fray!

Script by Alex Simmons, art by Dan Parent, Jack Morelli, and Digikore Studios. Cover art by Dan Parent and Tito Pena. On Sale at Comic Shops: DEC 22, 2010, Newsstands: Week of JAN 4, 2011

ARCHIE # 617
“Campaign Pains,” Part 2

When President Obama and famed politician Sarah Palin arrive, Riverdale becomes the center of a national crisis! Archie and Reggie have each claimed support from one of these political powerhouses, but they don’t! Now Riverdale is in chaos and when the Secret Service gets involved it only gets worse!

Script by Alex Simmons, art by Dan Parent, Jack Morelli and Digikore Studios. Cover art by Dan Parent
On Sale at Comic Shops: 1/26/11, Newstands: Week of FEB 8, 2011

AIRSHIP 27 PULP ON SALE! LIMITED TIME ONLY!

News
September 22, 2010

AIRSHIP 27 BUY ONE GET ONE FREE SALE ONE DAY ONLY!!!

LIMITED TIME ONLY!! Michael Poll, Cornerstone Publishers is offering any two Airship 27 Productions titles for the price of one.
All folks have to do is go to his site (http://www.cornerstonepublishers.com/) choose one book, add it to the sale
cart – then in the comments section add a second title of equal or lesser value than the first. They will be billed for only one book. This is a ONE DAY SALE only. Ends at midnight tonight.

INTERVIEW-MIKE McGEE

News
September 22, 2010

MIKE McGee, Co-Creator and Writer of EL GORGO!,
AP: Who is Mike McGee?

MM: Well, for the purposes of this interview, I’m one of the founders of the late, lamented Frontier Publishing, which ran serialized fiction by such luminaries as, uh, Derrick Ferguson; and more recently, I’m the writer and co-creator of EL GORGO!, a comic book about a gorilla luchador who punches sea monsters.

AP: Give us the background stuff. You know the drill: where do you live, where do you work, etc.

MM: I’m from Cleveland, but I’ve lived in the Metro DC area the last few years.

AP: How long have you been writing?

MM: Forever, basically. When I was a little kid, I had pretensions toward writing and drawing my own comics, but I soon discovered that literally every other kid I knew was a better artist than I was. So that was a blow. Anyhow, I could write okay, so my course was set, pretty much.

AP: Who is EL GORGO! ?

MM: El Gorgo is a genius talking gorilla luchador who’s also a superhero, a rock star and a historical novelist. He doesn’t sleep a whole lot.

AP: Why is EL GORGO! “The World’s Most Awesome Comics Magazine”?

MM: We-ellll…you know, we call it that in the spirit of fun, which is what the book’s all about, but honestly? Slapping that on the cover really does keep us on the beam, I think. It’s a challenge Tom and I have laid down for ourselves – can we make the book live up to that? We definitely try every time to make it the most awesome comic that we can do. EL GORGO! is a comedy, and in the sense that the tagline is kinda over-the-top it’s a joke, but it’s not really a joke. It’s more like a distant Shangri-La just off the horizon that we’re always striving toward – never mind that it could be and it probably is just a mirage and we should really think about drinking some water and maybe comb a few of these scorpions out of our hair – and we’re getting there one panel of a monkey punching a dinosaur at a time.

AP: Is it safe to say that EL GORGO! is inspired as much by the pulps as by comic books?

MM: Uh, in the sense that superhero comics took their inspiration from the ‘30s-era pulps, sure. There’s probably a little bit of Doc Savage in El Gorgo…really, a little bit of all those characters who were super-capable autodidacts with limitless resources and boundless idealism to go along with their teeth-gritting and ass-kicking. Our main inspiration is (as I think is obvious to most people who read EL GORGO!) the work of Jack Kirby, and because Kirby drew every single kind of comic book there ever was to draw, he did at least one pulp adaptation back in the ‘70s: JUSTICE, INC., which was actually a comic about The Avenger, only I guess DC couldn’t call it that, for obvious reasons. I have pretty fond memories of reading a random issue when I was a kid, and it’s possible some of that’s crept into EL GORGO! somehow or another.

AP: What do and your co-creator/artist Tamas Jakab have planned for future issues of EL GORGO! ?

MM: Oh, man, so much! Probably much more than we’ll ever live long enough to get down on paper, or pixels, or however people choose to read it. When we started the book, it was intended as a one-shot, and then it became a miniseries, and before long it turned into this whole epic we may never have time to finish. In the next few issues, we’re going to learn a lot of El Gorgo’s backstory, encounter his arch-nemesis, and venture off to the Himalayas – it’s gonna be a good time.

AP: You wrote a story for the Pulpwork Press anthology HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD. How did that come about?

MM: Well, I was invited aboard, and I nearly didn’t do it because I really couldn’t get a handle on the genre at first at all, but then I saw the cover by Jim Rugg (he of the comics Street Angel and Afrodisiac), and that was that. If I could have a story underneath that artwork, I knew I had to do it.

AP: Tell us about your co-writer on that story: Chris Munn.

MM: Chris kinda saved my ass on that story, because I didn’t have the first clue what to write about, and Chris had a killer idea and no time to write it himself – this thing that was kind of a cross between High Plains Drifter and The Wicker Man (the one without Nicolas Cage as Woman-Hating Bear-Man), which right away I knew I could do a lot with. I’ve known Chris for a really long time; he’s a really good guy, and a great writer. Unfortunately, we didn’t collaborate as directly as we’d both hoped would be possible on “The Town with No Name” – I wound up writing the whole story myself, but it is Chris’s story, too, which I know has been overlooked in a few places. His name is on it as well, as well it should be.

AP: Are you a western fan at all? Weird or otherwise?

MM: I’m a huge fan of Joe Lansdale, who’s written in and who halfway invented the horror western genre, at least as most people know it today. The influence may be indirect, but I don’t think HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD would exist without books like The Magic Wagon and Dead in the West, to say nothing of his collaborations with Tim Truman and Sam Glanzman on their Jonah Hex comics of the ‘90s. As far as just western-westerns go, I’m also a fan of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian and think “Deadwood” may be the best drama ever to run on television (though, I dunno…”Breaking Bad”…), but I have to admit, I’m not terribly well-versed in the classics of the genre. Westerns on film just moved too slow for me when I was a kid – I’d always switch them off if one of the other UHF stations had Godzilla or a horror movie or something. I probably turned off half the movies John Ford ever made (though as an adult I’ve fallen in love with The Searchers). Like, John Wayne just bored the hell out of me when I was a kid, though I get the appeal now. But I always did dig Clint Eastwood. So…I guess I’m more of a western fan than I thought I was when I started to answer your question, but I wouldn’t say I’m like a western aficionado.

AP: There’s a HOW THE WEST WAS WEIRD 2 in the planning/development stage. You planning on contributing to that?

MM: I’m thinking about it!

AP: What other writing projects are you working on now?

MM: Oh, I think it’s bad luck to get too much into stuff like that. I’m working on a few things, though.

AP: Here’s your chance for a shoutout or to pimp something. Go.

MM: Okay! As far as shoutouts go, naturally I’ll mention there’s some great stuff at Pulpwork Press (http://www.freewebs.com/pulpworkpress/) people should be checking out, if they haven’t done so. And of course everyone should read EL GORGO! (http://elgorgo.com/) and if they like that, there’s some really terrific stuff coming out of Action Age Comics (www.actionagecomics.com) that’ll be very much up your proverbial alley.

AP: Any final words of wisdom from Mike McGee?

MM: For the love of God – turn off your computer and go outside! It’ll all still be here when you get back.

Win a Digital Download for ‘300’

News
September 22, 2010

“We are Spartans!”

Join your voice once more as Zack Snyder’s wonderful 300 invades iTunes with as a digital download with Extras starting today! Relive the action on your iPad, iPhone, etc…plus see behind the scenes footage and interviews with lead actor Gerard Butler and Snyder.

The Warner Bros. movie is now available for purchase at iTunes.

ComicMix readers, though, can win a a free digital download from our friends at Warner Digital. All you need to do is tell us before Thursday at 11:59 p.m. what you would have done in a similar situation. We’ll judge the answers and select one lucky winner.

ALL PULP BREAKS 10,000 VIEWS!!!

News
September 21, 2010

That’s right, pulpsters! Thanks to your need to know pulp news, All Pulp has now had over 10,000 visits in its less than three week life! The Spectacled Seven definitely thanks you all for your readin’, interest, and attention to what we are tryin’ to do here! Keep on comin’ and bring a friend with ya, let’s make ALL PULP what it should be, the leading source for Pulp news anywhere!

DC Comics In Upheaval

News
September 21, 2010

In a statement released this morning on DC’s The Source Blog, DC Comics is continuing to clean house and as they put it… “Build a company for the future.” Let’s take a second to see where exactly the axe is falling, and what that future may look like.

The first major change Lee and DiDio mention is the increase of production over at MAD Magazine, which now publishes on a bimonthly schedule. In addition to the increase there, obviously they are branching the brand out with the aforementioned new cartoon show.

Past this bit of news though, it seems DC is ending an era or three within its offices and engaging in some heavy corporate streamlining.

First, everything non-comics will be making the move to the left
coast. The folks at ComicsBeat covered it well, but the basic gist is simple: many folks may be looking for new work come the new year as anything related to the development and production of feature films, television,
digital media, video games and consumer products (all of DC Direct, for example) as well as the
company’s administrative functions moves to a Warner Bros.-managed
property in Burbank, where they can consolidate all the overlap of those departments with WB Consumer Products and the like. It’s not clear yet whether this will include comics sales and marketing.

Next, Wildstorm is closing down and being absorbed into DC. As they said:

After taking the comics scene by storm nearly 20 years ago, the
WildStorm Universe titles will end this December. In this soft
marketplace, these characters need a break to regroup and redefine what
made them once unique and cutting edge. While these will be the final
issues published under the WildStorm imprint, it will not be the last we
will see of many of these heroes. We, along with Geoff Johns, have a
lot of exciting plans for these amazing characters, so stay tuned. Going
forward, WildStorm’s licensed titles and kids comics will now be
published under the DC banner.

Essentially this means that the Wildstorm Universe will simply be known as “Earth 238” or whatever number Grant Morrison assigns it. DC will allow time for readers to forget about Grifter, Maul, Spartan, Fairchild, and the other lost boys and girls in the Wildstorm Universe… and come back with a few Brand New Amazing Mini Series with hope that those feeling nostalgic for big biceps, bigger guns, and really big boobs will revive the now dying universe of characters.

Also, let’s not forget the other imprints of Wildstorm, including Homage Comics (Astro City), and the Alan Moore founded America’s Best Comics (Tom Strong, Promethea)… all of which is currently up in the air. Astro City creator Kurt Busiek was quoted as saying: “They haven’t said anything yet about creator-owned Wildstorm books.
Presumably they want to talk to us first. And right now, they’re busy
absorbing what this means for them. So I doubt I’ll know anything for a
day or two.”

Bleeding Cool has the best take I’ve seen on Wildstorm’s death of a thousand cancellations.

Note also that with this move, the editorial staff at Wildstorm will be undergoing a “restructuring” as well. It will be “folded into the overall DC Comics Digital team, based in Burbank…” While we don’t know specifically what restructuring will occur, obviously, it seems the team will shrink in its cross country move from Manhattan to L.A. Makes us wonder if DC was promised a shot at The Tonight Show as well.

Next to fall? To no one’s surprise, ZUDA. The webcomic imprint, which had its site shut down back in July, will cease to be after this week. As they said:

After this week, we will cease to publish new material under the ZUDA
banner. The material that was to have been published as part of ZUDA
this year will now be published under the DC banner. The official
closing of ZUDA ends one chapter of DC’s digital history, but we will
continue to find new ways to innovate with digital, incorporating much
of the experience and knowledge that ZUDA brought into DC.

ZUDA, which had very little going for it by way of mainstream popularity or attention, doesn’t come as a shock to anyone. With webcomic giants like Scott Kurtz and the boys at Penny Arcade doing just fine, the ZUDA project never really found its legs, past the success of one of it’s initial offerings, Bayou, by Jeremy Love.

The DCU Source Blog in question ends with a long blurb about the future of the company, and it’s increased focus on the “digital initiative”. They even go on to note their happiness at the success of their current digital offerings, which bring in “…anecdotal stories of lapsed readers returning to the art form and
of brick and mortar stores gaining new customers who sampled digital
comics.” We here at ComicMix would love to talk to some of those folks and hear said stories, because we’ve not been privy to any “I gave up paper comics with the Death of Superman, read Action Comics #701 on ComiXology, and rushed back to my local brick and mortar store that stayed in business during those 18 or so years, to start buying comics again!” stories.

As more turns up on this, we here at ComicMix will let you know. Stay tuned…

Review: ‘Glee the Complete First Season’

Reviews
September 21, 2010

[[[Glee]]] is frothy, delightful television that is as prone to being over-the-top as it is to be emotionally powerful. That it can successfully veer from one extreme to the other is one of the more impressive aspects of the Fox series, created by Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan. The show burst into the public consciousness with the clever airing of the pilot in the waning days of the 2008-2009 season and got people excited with something fresh and seemingly original (at least for prime time; no doubt Fox saw its potential after Disney’s success with [[[High School Musical]]].

When the show arrived last fall, it proved it was able to blend soap opera, music, and dance with an oddball assortment of characters with several vying for breakout status before Jane Lynch’s Sue Sylvester captured pop culture’s heart. The plight of the misfits that find themselves forming a glee club at Ohio’s William McKinley High School is the overarching theme as the team grows from a sextet to a full squad and prepares for sectionals and then regionals. As a result, we see them working on numerous pieces and with the show’s ratings climb, they stuffed in even more musical numbers which has neatly resulted in several soundtrack CDs already available.

When the show took an extended hiatus, Fox Home Entertainment released Glee, Volume One: Road to Sectionals to tide fans over. Now, in time for the premiere of season two this evening, Glee; The Complete First Season is out in both standard DVD and Blu-ray sets.

The show revels in its absurdity and doesn’t once try to make us think any of these characters are real or that the high school is really a place for learning. After all, we never see the kids in any academic class nor is homework ever a factor. Apparently, few of them need jobs or when they do can take them without breaking a sweat. We know there’s a faculty because we see them in the lounge where some of the more embarrassing adult shenanigans get discussed.

Where the series fell down was properly making us care for the dilemma Will Schuester (Matthew Morrison) faced with his ditzy, desperate, deceptive wife Terri (Jessalyn Gilsig). Her fake pregnancy sub-plot was totally wasting time for other stories and her expulsion from the marriage seemed pre-ordained and yet, she remains attached to the show like a barnacle that won’t go away.

(more…)

Twilight: Messin’ With the Kids’ Brains

News
September 21, 2010

Since science has cured all disease, and we’re living in a world with jet packs and super-candy (which never causes tooth decay, don’cha know), a symposium was called to finally figure out why teenagers are so influenced by the art and media with which they surround themselves. Led by Maria Nikolajeva, the conference was held in England just a few weeks ago. Nikolajeva, a Cambridge University professor of literature, brought together “people from different disciplines to share what we know about this turbulent period we call adolescence.” Why, you ask? We’re guessing that Nikolajeva (we love typing that name) has a teenage daughter who recently started wearing black, talking back to her, and becoming infatuated with pale boys who drive their own ’96 Honda Accords. We’re just guessing, though.

Thanks in part to an in-depth article on MSNBC, there’s plenty to glean from this recent conference. Some facts we learned? According to Karen Coats, a professor of English at Illinois State Univeristy, “the teenage brain processes information differently than a more mature brain.” We’re blown away. Really? Coats (again, an English professor…) goes on to add that the teenage prefrontal cortex goes through a growth spurt before puberty, followed by a period of organizing and pruning of the neural pathways. We asked Doctor Gregory House of Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital about this fact, and he was quick to add “Duh! It turns out right before and even during puberty, kids’ noggins get bigger. And as boys grow hair in weird places, and girls grow sweater puppies…their bodies are flushed with hormones and other science-type stuff that makes them act out in odd and strange new ways.”

(more…)

THE LONG MATINEE – Movie Reviews by Derrick Ferguson

News
September 21, 2010

THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN

2003

20^th Century Fox
Produced by Trevor Albert and Don Murphy
Directed by Stephen Norrington
Screenplay by James Robinson
Based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill

The concept of THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN is so simple that I’m honestly surprised nobody before Alan Moore thought of it. Here it is in a nutshell: From time to time many of the great fictional heroes (and sometimes villains) of the past and present have found it necessary to come together to form an alliance against evil so overwhelming that it threatens to conquer or destroy the world. They do so under the authority of a special Branch of The British Secret Service, under the direction of a mysterious figure known only as M. This alliance is known as The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. It is rumored that members of Leagues past and present have included Dr. Syn, Sherlock Holmes, Captain Blood, Lemuel Gulliver, Robin Hood, Tarzan, Doc Savage, The Shadow, James Bond, and many, many others. But for the purposes of this review we’re going to look at a particularly unique grouping of The League, one led by the world famous adventurer Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery)

Allan Quatermain is an old man, living in Africa, drinking his days away and only wanting to be left alone. However, events in the rest of the world bring him back into action. A mysterious man known only as The Phantom is threatening the governments of the world into a global confrontation and there is seemingly no way to stop him since he has advanced weapons such as automatic weapons, body armor and tanks. Quatermain is brought to London where he is introduced to M (Richard Roxburg), The current head of the British Secret Service who informs Quatermain that he has been chosen to lead the newest incarnation of The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen whose membership includes Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah), The Invisible Man (Tony Curran) and Mina Harker (Peta Wilson) who has the benefit of vampiric powers due to he relationship with an infamous Transylvanian count. Quatermain and his team quickly acquire the grown up Tom Sawyer (Shane West) who is now an agent of The United States Secret Service. Dr. Henry Jekyll (Jason Flemyng) and his monstrous alter ego Mr. Hyde as well as the immortal Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend) also join up and they’re all off an adventure that takes them all over the world from London to Paris to Venice to a final confrontation at the top of the world in the frozen Artic where the secrets of The Phantom are revealed and the destiny of a new century will be decided as The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen make their final stand.

You’re going to have a lot of comic book fans that will tell you not to see THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN as they feel that the movie bastardized Alan Moore’s concept. I’ve given the trade paperback of the comic to several people whose opinions I trust and they have told me that while they like the comic and appreciate it for what it is they wouldn’t have gone to see a movie that was strictly based on the comic book. However, those people have also said that the greatly enjoyed the movie version and I think that’s because the movie version does exactly what it’s supposed to do: provide us with two hours of thrills, adventure and excitement. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s not the comic books but it is a great piece of outsized, overblown, pulp action/adventure taken to the extreme and part of the reason I had so much fun watching the movie was that I could see the directors, actors and special effects guys just saying “the hell with it” and allowing themselves the room to have fun with the concept and just working with the material they were given and making sure they delivered.

THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN is a movie I loan out to friends and family often when they ask me what’s a good Saturday night movie. First off, you’ve got Sean Connery who’s simply great. When he made this movie he was 75 years old and he’s the only 75-year-old actor in the world who can get away with beating the snot out of actors half his age and look totally convincing doing it. Other actors look embarrassingly silly in their older years trying to do action scenes but somehow Connery can still pull it off and look convincing. There’s a bunch of great scenes he has with Shane West’s Tom Sawyer where the characters obviously build a father/son type of relationship, especially in the scenes where Allan Quatermain and Tom Sawyer are chasing down Mr. Hyde across the rooftops of Paris and a later scene aboard Captain Nemo’s Nautilus where Quatermain teaches Tom how to shoot. Peta Wilson is terrific as Mina Harker who shows a delightfully dark side to her character and I really liked how Naseeruddin Shah played Captain Nemo. As far as I know this the first time the character of Captain Nemo has been played racially correct in a movie and he supplies the team with their technological/transport support. And his fight scenes are among the best in the movie as he gives Captain Nemo a distinctive martial arts style. He plays Captain Nemo in a way unlike any other actor that’s ever played before and I think he’s probably the only actor who might have read the graphic novel the movie was based on. There’s a certain way he carries himself and the way he says his lines that make you sit up straighter and pay attention and his fight scenes are among the best in the movie. Listen to how he says: “Behold Nautilus…The Sword of The Ocean” and tell me that ain’t downright cool.

That’s not to say that the movie is without its flaws. I really didn’t like how the CGI guys went nuts on the effects. Especially when it came to Mr. Hyde and The Nautilus. In this movie, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are more like the Marvel Comics version of Dr. Bruce Banner and The Hulk than the Robert Louis Stevenson original. And Captain Nemo’s Nautilus is huger, bigger and more technologically advanced than any modern day aircraft carrier. And the scenes in Venice make absolutely no sense whatsoever. There’s a whole lot of yelling and chasing around and fighting and shooting but when it’s all over you’re wondering: “What was that all about?” Not to mention that there’s absolutely no mollyfoggin’ way something as big as The Nautilus could navigate the canals.

But there are a lot of little nice touches. The obvious one is where Quatermain is receiving his assignment to assemble The League from M. And if you don’t appreciate the humor of Sean Connery once again getting orders from M then you really need to go back to Basic Film School. And pay attention to the scene between M and Quatermain because in the background are huge portraits of former Leagues. I also liked how Captain Nemo’s First Mate has a running joke in the movie where he has to keep introducing himself: “Call me Ishmael”

There’s some incredible fight sequences and plot twists that I honestly didn’t see coming and even though I felt the final fight between Mr. Hyde and The Phantom’s main big bad who has ingested a near lethal dose of the Hyde formula was yet another reason for the CGI boys to go wild I liked the relationship between Mr. Hyde and Captain Nemo as they struggled to find a way to defeat their foe as well as the ending scenes between Allan Quatermain and Tom Sawyer.

So should you see THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN? I see no reason why you shouldn’t. Don’t listen to your comic book reading friends who’ll tell you that it’s nothing like the comic book. Of course it isn’t like the comic book. It’s a movie and a pretty damn good entertaining one. Go ahead and watch it and have fun for what it is: it’s purely pulp action/adventure designed to get you interested in reading the source materials and characters it’s based on. No more and no less. But that doesn’t mean you can’t have a good time watching THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN before you read the material it’s based on.

110 minutes

Rated PG-13

News
September 21, 2010

THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN

2003

20^th Century Fox

Produced by Trevor Albert and Don Murphy

Directed by Stephen Norrington

Screenplay by James Robinson

Based on the graphic novel by Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill

The concept of THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN is so simple that I’m honestly surprised nobody before Alan Moore thought of it. Here it is in a nutshell: From time to time many of the great fictional heroes (and sometimes villains) of the past and present have found it necessary to come together to form an alliance against evil so overwhelming that it threatens to conquer or destroy the world. They do so under the authority of a special Branch of The British Secret Service, under the direction of a mysterious figure known only as M. This alliance is known as The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. It is rumored that members of Leagues past and present have included Dr. Syn, Sherlock Holmes, Captain Blood, Lemuel Gulliver, Robin Hood, Tarzan, Doc Savage, The Shadow, James Bond, and many, many others. But for the purposes of this review we’re going to look at a particularly unique grouping of The League, one led by the world famous adventurer Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery)

Allan Quatermain is an old man, living in Africa, drinking his days away and only wanting to be left alone. However, events in the rest of the world bring him back into action. A mysterious man known only as The Phantom is threatening the governments of the world into a global confrontation and there is seemingly no way to stop him since he has advanced weapons such as automatic weapons, body armor and tanks. Quatermain is brought to London where he is introduced to M (Richard Roxburg), The current head of the British Secret Service who informs Quatermain that he has been chosen to lead the newest incarnation of The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen whose membership includes Captain Nemo (Naseeruddin Shah), The Invisible Man (Tony Curran) and Mina Harker (Peta Wilson) who has the benefit of vampiric powers due to he relationship with an infamous Transylvanian count. Quatermain and his team quickly acquire the grown up Tom Sawyer (Shane West) who is now an agent of The United States Secret Service. Dr. Henry Jekyll (Jason Flemyng) and his monstrous alter ego Mr. Hyde as well as the immortal Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend) also join up and they’re all off an adventure that takes them all over the world from London to Paris to Venice to a final confrontation at the top of the world in the frozen Artic where the secrets of The Phantom are revealed and the destiny of a new century will be decided as The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen make their final stand.

You’re going to have a lot of comic book fans that will tell you not to see THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN as they feel that the movie bastardized Alan Moore’s concept. I’ve given the trade paperback of the comic to several people whose opinions I trust and they have told me that while they like the comic and appreciate it for what it is they wouldn’t have gone to see a movie that was strictly based on the comic book. However, those people have also said that the greatly enjoyed the movie version and I think that’s because the movie version does exactly what it’s supposed to do: provide us with two hours of thrills, adventure and excitement. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s not the comic books but it is a great piece of outsized, overblown, pulp action/adventure taken to the extreme and part of the reason I had so much fun watching the movie was that I could see the directors, actors and special effects guys just saying “the hell with it” and allowing themselves the room to have fun with the concept and just working with the material they were given and making sure they delivered. THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN is a movie I loan out to friends and family often when they ask me what’s a good Saturday night movie.

First off, you’ve got Sean Connery who’s simply great. When he made this movie he was 75 years old and he’s the only 75-year-old actor in the world who can get away with beating the snot out of actors half his age and look totally convincing doing it. Other actors look embarrassingly silly in their older years trying to do action scenes but somehow Connery can still pull it off and look convincing. There’s a bunch of great scenes he has with Shane West’s Tom Sawyer where the characters obviously build a father/son type of relationship, especially in the scenes where Allan Quatermain and Tom Sawyer are chasing down Mr. Hyde across the rooftops of Paris and a later scene aboard Captain Nemo’s Nautilus where Quatermain teaches Tom how to shoot.

Peta Wilson is terrific as Mina Harker who shows a delightfully dark side to her character and I really liked how Naseeruddin Shah played Captain Nemo. As far as I know this the first time the character of Captain Nemo has been played racially correct in a movie and he supplies the team with their technological/transport support. And his fight scenes are among the best in the movie as he gives Captain Nemo a distinctive martial arts style. He plays Captain Nemo in a way unlike any other actor that’s ever played before and I think he’s probably the only actor who might have read the graphic novel the movie was based on. There’s a certain way he carries himself and the way he says his lines that make you sit up straighter and pay attention and his fight scenes are among the best in the movie. Listen to how he says: “Behold Nautilus…The Sword of The Ocean” and tell me that ain’t downright cool.

That’s not to say that the movie is without its flaws. I really didn’t like how the CGI guys went nuts on the effects. Especially when it came to Mr. Hyde and The Nautilus. In this movie, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are more like the Marvel Comics version of Dr. Bruce Banner and The Hulk than the Robert Louis Stevenson original. And Captain Nemo’s Nautilus is huger, bigger and more technologically advanced than any modern day aircraft carrier. And the scenes in Venice make absolutely no sense whatsoever. There’s a whole lot of yelling and chasing around and fighting and shooting but when it’s all over you’re wondering: “What was that all about?” Not to mention that there’s absolutely no mollyfoggin’ way something as big as The Nautilus could navigate the canals.

But there are a lot of little nice touches. The obvious one is where Quatermain is receiving his assignment to assemble The League from M. And if you don’t appreciate the humor of Sean Connery once again getting orders from M then you really need to go back to Basic Film School. And pay attention to the scene between M and Quatermain because in the background are huge portraits of former Leagues. I also liked how Captain Nemo’s First Mate has a running joke in the movie where he has to keep introducing himself: “Call me Ishmael”

There’s some incredible fight sequences and plot twists that I honestly didn’t see coming and even though I felt the final fight between Mr. Hyde and The Phantom’s main big bad who has ingested a near lethal dose of the Hyde formula was yet another reason for the CGI boys to go wild I liked the relationship between Mr. Hyde and Captain Nemo as they struggled to find a way to defeat their foe as well as the ending scenes between Allan Quatermain and Tom Sawyer.

So should you see THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN? I see no reason why you shouldn’t. Don’t listen to your comic book reading friends who’ll tell you that it’s nothing like the comic book. Of course it isn’t like the comic book. It’s a movie and a pretty damn good entertaining one. Go ahead and watch it and have fun for what it is: it’s purely pulp action/adventure designed to get you interested in reading the source materials and characters it’s based on. No more and no less. But that doesn’t mean you can’t have a good time watching THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN before you read the material it’s based on.

110 minutes

Rated PG-13

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THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN

2003

THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN

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