I just finished up Marvel Zombies: The Return the five part series in the Marvel Zombie Universe and I have to say, well I’m kind of burnt out on Marvel Zombies.  When these side stories first hit the stands I was blown away by the thought of all of the Marvel Universe being turned into Zombies and the only survivors would be the super humans.  The first two series were pretty good.  I enjoyed them and looked forward to them.  Then I picked up Dead Days an off shoot of the main title.  And I started to fall behind and get lost.  I got caught up thanks to Rob at Limited Edition Comics on the Hill in Cedar Falls and I also picked up the Marvel Zombies 3 Trade at one of the book stores closing at the mall for like $5 bucks.  So I’m all up to date on it and the final verdict.  I’m done with Marvel Zombies.

In Marvel Zombies: The Return Zombie Spider-Man has teamed up with Zombie Wolverine and eventually Zombie Hulk in an alternate universe battling Zombie Fantastic Four, Zombie Hank Pym and a cast of thousands of known and little know Marvel Superheros searching for food on alternate universes.  This is where the plot starts to lose me and where Marvel jumped the Shark on this.  So by the end of the this we are right back at square one with no resolution and no real conclusion.  Not to mention the Marvel Zombies one shot that I also picked up that had the zombies crossing over to two different Monkey Universes with superheros from those universes being apes.  By the end of this series and the one shot I was completely lost on and had no idea who was who and what universe they were suppose to be in and who was a good guy and who was an ape or gorilla.  AHHHHHHHHH!

So that’s it Marvel.  Stop with Marvel Zombies already.  It’s run it’s course and you know that too.  Of course if you decide to make a movie based on this franchise I will be first in line to watch Galactus and the Silver Surfer get eaten alive by Spider-Man and Giant Man (keep that in mind and also since you kicked me in the jimi by removing Sam Raimi from Spider-Man 4 and deciding to reboot the franchise in 2012 using the Ultimate comic books as your source material bring Sam in to direct this would you?).

So that’s it folks, the guy with a Zombie Spider-Man T-shirt and a Marvel Zombies Universe T-Shirt is saying no more to the Marvel Zombies.  I’ll leave my zombie reading to the best ongoing zombie series out there which happens to be The Walking Dead (read this immediately, in fact stop reading this blog right now walk, no run to your nearest comic book store and buy every thing you can find on The Walking Dead).  On top of that I just learned that AMC is a go on Frank Darabont’s adaptation for The Walking Dead to come to the small screen!

So there you have it folks, brave into Marvel Zombie’s territory if you must, but avoid most of it after the fourth trade paper back.

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One of my Netflix buddies saw this when it hit theatres and had good things to say about it so I was anxious to finally see this one for myself.  After I finished watching it I thought to myself “man I really wish that would have been better”, but unfortunately it wasn’t.  Moon (by the way try not to read too much about the film on IMDB there is a huge spoiler on there) places it’s self squarely in the realm of Kubrick’s 2001.  It really has that same kind of vibe of space and loneliness.  It also shares a similarity with HAL in the voice work by Kevin Spacey as GERTY the computer that knows more than it’s letting on.  To talk much about the plot would be a disservice to my readers and give too much away that might hinder your own enjoyment of this quiet little film.

There are a few things to note about this.  Sam Rockwell does a great job with the character, he’s alone on a space station after three years with out live human contact.  You can sense his paranoia and stir crazy mindlessness through out the performance.  Second the film was directed by David Bowie’s son Duncan Jones.  The film has a lot of promise with its quiet atmosphere and building tension (which I think should have been leveled up to make this film really memorable).  Jones shows some real promise in the future especially since this was his first major motion picture and the first film in a planned trilogy of Moon films.  Lastly the score was done by Clint Mansell, while that name may not be a Howard Shore or Danny Elfman music nerds like myself will recognize Manell’s name from his stint in the pioneering sampling/hip hop/industrial/punk band Pop Will Eat Itself.  Mansell has done well for himself after the demise (or at least on hiatus) Poppies with lots of great scores for films including Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream (if you haven’t seen that movie do so now).

All in all Moon is a time killer with some good atmosphere but by the end you’ve got it all figured out and there really isn’t any sense of resolution or conclusion to the story.  Which makes since now seeing as how Jones wants to make three of these movies.  I’d give it a go but don’t expect fireworks.  *** Stars.

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So a couple of weeks ago I watched this new documentary on Netflix called Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation on their Instant Watch service (in HD mind you).  It’s a great little documentary about B-Movies and the film industry in Australia.  Before George Miller ever did Happy Feet he directed Mad Max in Australia, it just goes to show you that every body starts somewhere.  In the documentary many notable Australian filmmakers were interviewed and one notable American Quentin Tarantino (when doesn’t he get interviewed about exploitation movies any more?).  So I watched the Doc with pen and paper in hand and wrote down the titles of stuff that I found interesting.  Then rushed to my Netflix queues and started adding everything that was available.  The first one in the pipes was Dead End Drive-In, I can sum it up like this, Mad Max in a Drive-In.  Yep that about does it.

It wasn’t terrible and it wasn’t great, it’s just kind of there.  First there isn’t a lot of exposition to what’s going on.  Basically it’s 1990 and the world has gone to hell in a hand basket.  Wall Street crashed again sending the world into chaos.  So in Australia they decided to lock up the undesirables in a concentration camp at a Drive-In and feed them movies, music videos and junk food 24/7.  Sounds like the perfect life doesn’t it?  Well Jimmy wants out.  And quite honestly I’m not sure why Jimmy got in there in the first place actually.  All he did was go to the Drive-In to catch a movie with his gal Carmen and then his tires get stolen and he’s there forever.

So that’s the basic premise.  Jimmy then spends the next hour trying to survive the local thugs who all look like extras from an 80′s Billy Idol video.  It has its charm, and a fair dose of nostalgia for anyone that remembers what MTV looked like in the late 80′s.  Did they really need to play that Pat Benatar video over and over and over and over again?

The movie would probably get a PG-13 rating today, it had a little bit of foul language and a couple of topless scenes but the violence and blood and gore was few and far between.  Also in the documentary Tarantino talked about how Austrialians love their cars almost as much as American’s do and from this movie you can totally see that.  Every body lives in their cars and the entire culture of the movie revolved around Jimmy and his brothers ’56 Chevy.

There was also a sub-plot that was put in there towards the end that dealt with racism and mass hysteria surrounding people blindly following the lead of a bunch of people that have no idea what they are talking about and are simply misinformed bigots.  The sub-plot really doesn’t go anywhere and it’s not like Jimmy saves the day and frees everyone from the binds of ignorance and racism.  At the end of the day Dead End Drive-In is a nostalgic piece of film history that has been forgotten!  If you’re looking for a cheesy way to kill 1 hour and 27 minutes you could do a lot worse.

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