Confessions of a Comic Book Guy is a weekly column by Steve Bennett of Super-Fly Comics and Games in Yellow Springs, Ohio. This week, Bennett looks at
Justice League vs. Teen Titans and anticipates
Kong: King of the Apes.
Well, as many predicted, the second-weekend box office for
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice dropped and dropped hard (see "
Number One With A 'Sinker'"). Producers more and more rely on international sales to make this kind of expensive blockbusters profitable, but in China, the movie came in fourth behind
Bodyguard, a Sammo Hung action picture, and
Zootopia. And in Japan, it came in third, behind the anime
Assassination Classroom: Graduation and
Doraemon: Nobita and the Birth of Japan 2016. Coming in fourth was
Kamen Rider 1: The Movie, a live-action film celebrating the 45th anniversary year for the bug-eyed cyborg justice motorcycle rider.
While I still have yet to see
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice I did see the latest DC Universe Animated Original Movie,
Justice League vs. Teen Titans (see "’
Justice League vs. Teen Titans’ Trailer"). These direct to video films generally adapt comic book stories or, at least, are geared towards an older audience who are more likely to be familiar with the characters’ current continuity. But the tone of this one is frankly all over the place. As presented the Justice League are all pretty much their post-"New 52" selves right down to their costumes. And while I’m frankly grateful the Titans aren’t anything like their current comic book incarnation, they do seem to be caught in a place that’s somewhere between the way the characters looked and acted in
Teen Titans and
Young Justice. And while it is admittedly nice seeing a more serious version of the Titans again I wish the film's tone could have been just as serious. When Raven reveals to the Titans that she's the daughter of the extra dimensional demon Trigon, Beast Boy chimes in with, "Your mom did it with Satan?!?!?!?"
Justice League Vs. Teen Titans tries hard to achieve high drama but unfortunately ends up being both bland and blase.
Back in 2014, I reported that a CGI animated series
Kong: King of the Apes was coming to Netflix (see "
Confessions of a Comic Book Guy--Follow the Stream"). But I must have totally blanked on the whole thing because I was sincerely surprised when it showed up on the list of movies and TV shows coming to the streaming service this month. Solely on the basis of a piece of promotional art showing a kid-friendly Kong with a kid riding on his shoulder, I suggested that this new series might be partially inspired by the 1966 Rankin-Bass cartoon
The King Kong Show, in which Kong fought the expected assortment of aliens, monsters and even had his own personal mad scientist, Doctor Who.*
The premise of
Kong: King of the Apes is that in the near future the greatest of the apes is "framed by an evil genius who plans to terrorize the world with an army of enormous robot dinosaurs," and "must rely on the help of three kids who know the truth about him." I suppose it’s too much to hope that the "evil genius" will also be named Doctor Who and his creation, Mechani-Kong, will make an appearance (because the only thing better than a giant ape is a robot giant ape). But it does have King Kong fighting robot dinosaurs and frankly that’s good enough for me.
Kong: King of the Apes premieres on Netflix on April 15.
* No relation to the British Time Lord of course. Although I was a fan of the show what I didn’t know for decades was this Doctor Who also shows up, more or less, in the 1967 film
King Kong Escapes. A "loose adaptation" of
The King Kong Show featuring an epic showdown between the actual article ape and his robot duplicate. But while the cartoon Who was a generic pharmacist smock-wearing mad scientist, the movie version was a flamboyant, dapper Asian (in the movie’s credits his name is spelled as "Dr. Hu") Bond-type villain.
The opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the writer, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the editorial staff of ICv2.com.
