Or — what I prayed high school was going to be like.
Category: Movies
The best movie & TV posters of 2016
The best posters of 2016 were for the movie Suicide Squad.
Suicide Squad
One of the ways I judge the best posters of the year is if I’d like to have them hanging on the walls of my office — and boy-oh-boy would I love to see the posters for the movie Suicide Squad hanging there. What I think works so well about them is they break a lot of design “rules” by using elements like hyper “acidic” colors — or colors that a painting professor I had used to say, “were so intense they hurt my teeth” — and diverging design components that you’re not supposed to use.
Which, in lesser hands, could make the posters look amateurish, but instead makes the ones for Suicide Squad stand out from the flood of superhero posters that have come before. Posters for similar movies have, not so much failed, as failed to live up to expectations, in that they all kind’a look the same. I don’t think anyone would mistake the Suicide Squad poster for, say, a Captain America poster. And in an industry that seems to generate lots of campaigns that look the same as every other poster campaign, the ones for Suicide Squad have a wholly unique aesthetic.
Arrival
I am a sucker for sci-fi movies. I’ll give just about any movie or TV series labeled “science-fiction” a try as long as it looks interesting enough. And the posters for the movie Arrival makes that movie look reeeeeeeally interesting. They feature these colossal alien ships that look a bit like a cross between a squished hockey puck and a sunflower seed impossibly hovering in the sky. And the whole campaign puts these ships at different locals around the world which adds to the immense scale of the ships and the movie as well.
Better Call Saul
I’m a big fan of the TV series Better Call Saul and I only wanted to see the premiere of the second season even more after the release of these posters. Here, the character of Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) is walking across the street at a crazy angle, and it’s just him that’s being affected by the slant. I love all the taglines this poster could have but doesn’t. Like, “It’s not easy being bent” or even, “Becoming a criminal is an uphill battle.” And the poster for Better Call Saul on Netflix is just as good with Odenkirk sitting oddly on a bench with the tagline, “The truth is how you look at it” above.
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story
The poster for last years’ Star Wars: The Force Awakens was all right. It seemed to be a modern version of those classic Drew Struzan Star Wars posters of old, except that instead of Struzan traditionally illustrating the posters someone created a photo illustration. And while the poster for Rogue One is a photo illustration too, I think where that poster is unexpected whereas The Force Awakens is in line with what’s come before is that Rogue One has its own unique look and color scheme. So much so that I don’t think anyone could mistake it for another Star Wars film.
Stranger Things
The poster for the breakout TV hit of the summer Stranger Things is just as cool as the other posters on this list but in its own way. This poster is illustrated in the Struzan style and has just enough nostalgia factor that even if the series weren’t a good as it is I’d still be a fan of this poster.
Captain America: Civil War & Star Trek: Beyond
I thought the posters for Captain America: Civil War and Star Trek: Beyond were top notch too. The poster for Captain America takes a closeup shot of Cap and Iron Man battling each other from the perspective of Cap — and there’s a companion poster out there too that shows this action from opposite angle. And the poster for Star Trek: Beyond is so different then the other modern Star Trek posters while at the same time utilizing design elements from classic Star Trek posters that it’s breathtaking. Interestingly enough, the poster doesn’t have Star Trek anywhere on it, we just get the Enterprise swooping on a field of color with the words “Beyond” below.
The X-Files
The X-Files revival TV series might have been a bit of a mixed bag, but that doesn’t mean that the poster campaign released to promote the show wasn’t creepy as all get-out! “I still want to believe” indeed!
Deadpool
I don’t think I could call myself a true poster aficionado if I didn’t include at least one poster for the movie Deadpool on this list, the most PG of which features the title character making the heart sign with his hands with “Feel the love this Valentine’s Day” below.
Pitch Black (2000) concept art
10 Cloverfield Lane review
Grade: B-
I have a difficult relationship with the Cloverfield movies. The first movie, about a gigantic monster attacking New York, is something that I think was practically designed to appeal to me but didn’t. I think what hurt that movie the most was all its plot-holes as well as the idea that a character in the movie would film everything that was happening regardless of the consiquences — even to the point where they were about to die. That being said the latest 10 Cloverfield Lane is a better movie than the first Cloverfield, but not by much.
Kind’a Signs meets Silence of the Lambs, in 10 Cloverfield Lane the character of Michelle (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) is in a car accident and awakens in a bunker built by Howard (John Goodman) where she also finds Emmett (John Gallagher Jr.) who tells her that the end of the world has come and everyone outside of the bunker is dead. Michelle has a hard time buying this from Howard since he’s a grade-a weirdo, but when Michelle does get a glimpse of the outside world and all the horrors that entails she decides that maybe staying in the bunker with normal and nice Emmett and odd and crazy Howard might not be such a bad idea after all.
Much like with Cloverfield, 10 Cloverfield Lane has its share of plot-holes from a room that controls air filtration that’s cut off from the rest of the bunker and is only accessible via crawling through airshafts (!?) to Emmett and Michelle being able to hide things from Howard in a relatively small bunker. But for whatever reason I don’t think these holes hurt 10 Cloverfield Lane as much as they did in Cloverfield. I think that’s mostly because since Cloverfield was shot in the first person fauxcumentary style and 10 Cloverfield traditionally it made it seem less like the characters were doing things to get the best shot and more like they were behaving somewhat in their own self interest.
I think what hurts 10 Cloverfield Lane the most is that there’s really no mystery with the characters at all. Michelle starts off as a strong woman who’s leaving her boyfriend for one reason or another and ends the movie the same way. Emmett starts off nice and sweet and innocent and ends the movie the same way. Howard starts off as the obvious villain in that he acts so odd and weird and ends the movie the same way.
I think if it weren’t so obvious as to who the characters really were in 10 Cloverfield Lane and what their intentions were right from the start this would have been a much better movie. With the film only really having three characters in it I think we really need to be kept guessing as to who is who and what everyone’s intentions really are. Otherwise there’s no puzzle and when we finally see what’s happening on the outside I think any investment the audience has in the characters of 10 Cloverfield Lane is long gone.
Direct Beam Comms #51
Movies
The stereotypical movie based on a comic book has characters wearing spandex and jumping around in some city in the process of being leveled while kicking one and other in the head. And to a certain extent over the last few years that’s true, most movies based on comic books are about superheroes and villains. But sometimes there are movies released where the ties to the comic book source material isn’t as obvious.
Swamp Thing (1982)
Based on the comic book of the same name created by Len Wein and Bernie Wrightson , the Swamp Thing movie is an interesting modern take on the classic monster movie where the monster’s played by a guy wearing an obvious rubber suit. Written and directed by Wes Craven, Swamp Thing a decent flick that I don’t think is like any other comic book movie before or since. That’s not to say that it doesn’t suffer from a low budget, it does. Boy oh boy it does.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)
Though many think the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise came from the cartoon series that began in 1987, in fact this billion dollar empire really began in 1984 with the comic series of the same name by Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird. The TMNT comics were a much more hard-edge version of the characters than what they became, those turtles bled, and early issues of which are quite good and very collectible. The 1990 live-action movie was more in tone with the lite cartoon series but I think still holds up well today.
The Rocketeer (1991)
Seemingly created to try and cash in on the Batman movie craze of the late 1980s and early 1990s, the film version of The Rocketeer failed to live up to expectations and was considered a flop at the box office. Based on the comics series created by Dave Stevens, his version of the character was more in-line with something like Indiana Jones with the character zooming off with his rocket pack to all sorts of adventures which included fighting Nazis and meeting Doc Savage. The film version was interesting, but owing to the limitations of the time was a much smaller movie with the Rocketeer only really flying and doing adventurous things a few times in the film.
The Crow (1994)
It seems to me that a lot of the production design of the movie Seven was taken after the creators of that movie sat down and watched The Crow. Which is the grittiest and darkest movie based on a comic that I’ve ever seen. Originally created in 1989 by James O’Barr, The Crow comic was this sort of proto Goth masterpiece where the Crow is as likely to take vengeance on the thugs who murdered his girlfriend and himself as he is to recite poetry in a cemetry by moonlight. Much like with the original TMNT comics early issues of The Crow are quite collectible and popular.
Blade (1998)
Another action/martial arts movie like The Crow that doesn’t seem to be a comic book film is Blade. Created by Marv Wolfman and Gene Colan, Blade was a supporting character in the 1970s Marvel horror comics craze as a vampire hunter but found new popularity in the early 1990s when there was a resurgence of those horror characters like Ghost Rider then. Blade the movie really doesn’t have any connection to the Marvel comics, when it was produced comic movies were uncool and anathema in Hollywood, and features the title character (Wesley Snipes) as the hunter of vampires.
Road to Perdition (2002)
The 2002 movie Road to Perdition starring Tom Hanks and Paul Newman is about a 1930s gangster looking for vengeance on the man who killed his wife and son. Both the movie and comic book, created by Max Allan Collins and Richard Piers Rayner, are quite good and it’s a shame that today Road to Perdition is a mostly forgotten movie.
300 (2007)
I remember being really into the movie 300 when it first came out. I saw it twice in the theater, but I’m not sure it’s a movie that holds up that well today. Created by Frank Miller, 300 is essentially a condensed version of the comic book about the Battle of Thermopylae. 300 is an exciting movie with lots of action but I think in the end it doesn’t have much story.
Dredd (2012)
One of my favorite comic book movies is Dredd which was originally created by John Wagner and artist Carlos Ezquerra. Dredd started as a sort of Dirty Harry of the future spoof but has since morphed into something different. It can still be seen as a spoof today, but in an age of ultra-macho action heroes it’s surprising that so far Dredd’s been unsuccessful on the big-screen since it seems like he’d be the perfect fit.
The Reading List
This week in pop-culture history
- 1951: Kathryn Bigelow, director of Near Dark and Strange Days is born