Before this weekend, few people knew much about Iron Man other than he was a comic book superhero in a red-and-gold suit that might or might not actually be iron. After a $100 million-plus box office opening, though, it’s safe to say Marvel has a new franchise on its hands.

He is Iron Man: Who knew that a real life
of addiction would set him up so well in
his acting life to play Tony Stark?

The movie starts off with action, then jumps back a bit with a flashback to set up the characters. It’s a good way to let people dive into the movie. The action scenes are well-paced in the movie and the CG looks great. Even the quieter scenes are entertaining thanks to the film’s good sense of humor. (Robert Downey Jr.‘s back-and-forth with his robotic/computer assistants is genuinely funny.)

The cast is great — Downey’s portrayal of the brash Tony Stark is spot-on; Gwyneth Paltrow makes a good assistant to Stark — clearly smitten by him, but also willing to stand up to him; and Terrence Howard and Jeff Bridges (yes, that’s really him) provide solid characters as well.

With so many entertaining and “that was suh-weet” moments, it’s hard to criticize the movie. I just hope they follow it up with equally strong sequels. The last thing we need is something like Iron Man vs. Smelting Man.

My interest in The CW’s revival of Beverly Hills, 90210 has been fluctuating wildly with every bit of behind-the-scenes news. Initially, it was very low; we already have Gossip Girl. But then word was that Veronica Mars creator Rob Thomas would be writing it. Interest spikes. But then he backed out because of other projects. Interest falls. Hilary Duff is rumored to be joining the cast. Interest plummets further. Lori Loughlin (TV’s Aunt Becky) is signed. Interest non-existent. But now word is Lucille Bluth herself, Jessica Walter, will be moving from the O.C. (don’t call it that) to the world’s most famous zip code. Interest back. You’re killing me, Buster!

Un trailer pour 50 cents 2

Ze 50 cents, ‘e is, ‘ow you say, ze rap star in zis game.

Romantic comedies have changed significantly since Julia Roberts’ heyday in the 90s. Perhaps it was because the public saw that they were uninspired, insipid drivel. Or maybe it was just that America’s Sweetheart couldn’t act, or they realized her Mona Lisa Smile was more of a Joker rictus grin. Regardless, over the past few years, the typical rom-com was hijacked by Judd Apatow and transformed into something different entirely: Something men wanted to watch.

Sure, Apatow’s oeuvre centers around a man-woman love story, but it also focuses heavily on bromance, the platonic love between the male lead and his friends. Michael Cera and Jonah Hill’s sleeping bag declaration of love in Superbad epitomizes this phenomenon; their relationship is the real love story in the movie.

Baby Mama seems to be a female response to this trend, a womb-ance, if you will (you don’t have to). And who better to kick it off than Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, the two women largely responsible for shattering Saturday Night Live‘s glass ceiling. Fey plays Kate, an overachieving exec whose biological clock is ticking loudly despite her being single. When she finds out her chances of conceiving are tiny (courtesy of a hilarious, underused John Hodgman), she enlists Poehler’s Angie as a surrogate.

Fey and Poehler’s chemistry, perfected over years on SNL, is undeniable, and their odd couple routine wrings big laughs out of what is a fairly average script by Michael McCullers (Austin Powers). But like with Apatow’s movies, what’s most interesting is not Fey’s fledgling relationship with Greg Kinnear, but the one with Poehler. It’s this bond that changes her, makes her question who she is and grow.

The film never quite reaches the giddy heights of Apatow’s best, but Fey and Poehler elevate the middling material as best they can. It’s a small step for romantic comedies, but a giant leap for womankind.

In Smart People, Dennis Quaid plays Lawrence Wetherhold, a literature professor who’s too smart for his own good. He has nothing but contempt for his students, whose names don’t even register. And he dismisses his colleagues as hacks, even the ones who (unlike him) are getting published. He’s arrogant and self-involved with visibly little reason, using his wife’s death as an excuse—rather than justification—for his misanthropy.

After his car is towed, Lawrence’s pomposity lands him in the ER, where the doctor, a former student (Sarah Jessica Parker), informs him he won’t be able to drive for six months. Enter Gig Matrix favorite Thomas Haden Church as the irresponsible but lovable adopted brother-cum-chauffer, who joins overachieving Republican daughter Vanessa at the Wetherhold house.

Continue reading The Misanthrope

I haven’t enjoyed a Sonic game since Sonic Adventure 2 on Dreamcast. In fact, I’ve actively hated pretty much every single one. So why do I still get my hopes up every time Sega decides to shit out a new Sonic game?

When I saw the leaked screens for Sonic Unleashed, I felt a familiar stir. And then I saw that Sonic will transform into a werewolf in this game. Yes, the hedgehog will turn into a werewolf. How do they even come up with this stuff?

My eyes rolling instinctively, I couldn’t help but wonder why this bothered me so much. I had no problem with Link getting all Teen Wolf in Twilight Princess, and one of my favorite games of all time has you playing as the wolf goddess of the sun. But a werehog? That’s just fuckin’ dumb.

Tom Clancy and Ubisoft seem to think they’re on to something: If the people liked GRAW in 2006, they’ll love GRAW 2 in 2007. And if they liked Rainbow Six: Vegas in 2007, they’ll love R6:V2 in 2008.

There was a recent era in which we only had to lament this annual release strategy as it related to sports games. Developers couldn’t possibly revolutionize football passing or puck physics or free-throw shooting in 11 months, but we needed those marginally improved graphics and updated rosters, so we opened our wallets. Annual shooters, though, expose the real shortcomings of such a rushed development cycle. There’s no time to take the game in a radically (or even moderately) different direction, so we end up with a handful of gameplay tweaks and AI revisions bolted onto last year’s game. Sometimes the result is $60 worth of buggy, poorly translated garbage (see: GRAW2), and sometimes the result is Rainbow Six: Vegas 2.

Custom face creation … well, it could
be better

Vegas 2‘s big change, as far as I’m concerned, is the expansion of the first game’s character creation and experience components. You now use your created guy in every mode of the game, and you can accumulate experience and fabulous firearm prizes as you gun your way through the campaign, not just multiplayer. All the goodies you get in campaign are available in multiplayer, and vice versa. My primary concern in pretty much any game is unlocking whatever can be unlocked, so this is a welcome change. Most of the equipment in the first Vegas was simply beyond my grasp because I rarely played online.

Most of Vegas 2‘s other improvements fall on the online side of the fence. The full campaign is now co-op-able with two players, replacing last year’s four-player, cut-scene-less oddity. Beyond that, Ubi could have added zombie walruses to the multiplayer; I’ll never know because I’ll never play it.

Grafting new features onto last year’s game also seems to have roughened up some of the edges. I lost my teammates at one point and had to backtrack through the level to convince them it was OK to come out of their hiding places. It’s possible to shoot bad guys through wooden crates or thin walls, but not through chain-link or orange plastic construction fences. And certain cover objects seem to prevent you from moving the way you’d like, making it impossible to work the so-vital lean-and-shoot tactic with much success.

The Ubi-Clancy cabal seems set on milking its franchises as frequently as possible, and in that light, Vegas 2 could have been much worse. But it’s odd to see bugs introduced into these quick sequels, which are clearly little more than tarted-up expansion packs. It’s no GRAW 2, thankfully, but I can’t help thinking Vegas 2 could’ve been much stronger (and maybe its own game, instead of a weakly connected sequel), if Ubisoft had been willing to give another year to bake.

Ang Lee’s version of Marvel’s Hulk was anything but incredible, but that isn’t stopping Transporter director Louis Leterrier from try, try, trying again. The bad CG is back, and it looks like Ed Norton is going to find out what Eric Bana knows all too painfully well: It ain’t easy being green.

Sam Fisher and Solid Snake had better watch out. The trailer for Sierra’s forthcoming The Bourne Conspiracy game looks to capture all the kinetic, frenetic thrills of the films. Unfortunately, they couldn’t capture Bourne himself; Matt Damon’s pretty mug is AWOL.

As the Gig’s regular (three or four) readers know, I have a penchant for romantic comedies. But they tend to be pretty formulaic. It’s hard to break too far from boy meets girl; boy loses girl, either through a misunderstanding of some sort or through his being an ass; and finally, boy wins girl back (often by rushing to an airport). And, admittedly, Definitely, Maybe doesn’t stray terribly far from the usual, but it has enough different about it to feel fresh.

Damn you, Ryan Reynolds, for taking more
than your share of the hotties!

In this case, it’s boy meets three girls and loses all three. The movie starts out with Will Hayes (a decent if not overly endearing Ryan Reynolds) as the newly divorced father of Maya (Abigail Breslin, of last year’s smash Little Miss Sunshine). Maya demands to know the story of how Will met her mother. He decides to tell the tale of the three women he dated (played by Elizabeth Banks, Isla Fisher and Rachel Weisz), but let Maya figure out who her mother is. And so his tale of loves found and lost begins.

Ignoring the fact that no man could ever be so lucky as to date three women as gorgeous and enchanting as the characters played by Banks, Fisher and Weisz, the movie does a nice job of portraying fairly realistic relationships and characters. Maya is probably the least realistic character just because she’s so darned precocious, but you can’t help but love how funny and adorable she is. She’s the new Dakota Fanning, but without the vaguely Children of the Corn creepiness.

The movie is fun, funny and enjoyable. I still enjoyed its counterpart, Love Actually more, but it’s definitely worth checking out. There’s no maybe about it.