Kick-Ass Review

To start off, I want to be clear that this is the movie we are talking about. I know that this is a site for video game reviews and other such news but I felt strongly enough about this movie that I figured you, the reader, needed to know how I felt. We all belong to the same geeky nerd genre anyway. Also, there might be spoilers abound.

Kick-Ass is beautiful. The fine folks behind this movie deserve credit for making this movie look as sweet (I literally mean candy-coated here) as possible. Everything is a bright color (like someone just flicked the color boost switch on the side of the camera) and it all makes you feel like you want to be part of the Kick-Ass version of New York City (you know, aside from all the thugs and gangs that this movie pays homage to). The style of all of the fight scenes even makes you feel bad-ass Kick-Ass. This is the kind of movie that I cannot wait to own on Blu-Ray.

But then, if you are like myself, and a fan of comic books, you probably read the comic - right?

Well then, I am sorry to say that you are ass-kicked in this representation of Kick-Ass.

Granted that the comic was not yet finished before the movie's screenplay there were bound to be some differences between stories; it was my hope that these would not be too major. This is the story of a kid named Dave who decides that the world needs a hero and that he is going to be that guy. He feels empowered by his suit until everything goes wrong. There are real heroes out there who are not about the flashy nature of it all and Dave gets mixed up in it all. He quickly discovers why being a superhero is not all fun and games.

The first of my laundry list of story complaints was that I was disappointed with how Kick-Ass got his name especially seeing that they kept the same basic You-Tube scene in there. I was also disappointed when they assimilated scenes from the comic together so that the events were all happening to main characters. I did not feel like there was too much or too little content in the comic that these unnecessary liberties needed to be taken.

There are a few major twists in the comic that really impressed upon me but in the movie they all fell flat or did not even exist. The movie was not shy about throwing the whole Red Mist thing right out there in the open. It was also not shy about completely blasting the whole Big Daddy/Hit Girl story to pieces.

The casting for the movie and the character portrayal were perhaps some of the worst parts of the movie. First - McLovin. I am sorry but Christopher Mintz-Plasse was only cast in this movie to drawn in the SuperBad crowd and while it may be to understand that from a business decision, from a I don't want you to butcher this movie standpoint all I can literally think of is "face. palm." It ruined the revelation of his character and just the whole character itself. Ace Enders Aaron Johnson did a good job portraying Kick-Ass but the decision to portray him as more pathetic in the movie was a poor one. I cheered for his minor victories in the comic but again in the movie everything came out like a whimper and in the end Kick-Ass ends up using guns just like everybody else. The portrayal of Hit Girl was almost spot on if not for all of her use of guns and Big Daddy, played by Nick Cage, was far too skinny.

My last on the long list of complaints is where the film makers try to appeal to us gamers. There is a scene where Hit-Girl ends up in the dark fighting everybody in a warehouse alone, I know - shock of shocks. What you did not know is that the illustrious film makers decided that they wanted to appeal to us gamers by putting in a DOOM (movie) style FPS moment while she is taking everyone out. I rolled my eyes through the whole part.

In the end if you did not read the comic perhaps Kick-Ass was a good movie. There are a lot of people out there who disagree with my thoughts on the movie. At the end of the day I wanted to like the movie but it was really just a terrible garbage mess. Sometimes I want to like something so badly that I just tell myself that I like it. You may be able to find a few glimmers of a decent comic book movie but just remember that you are looking through shit.