Episode 3: The Super Green Lost Ark

In this episode I talk about my thoughts on Super 8 and Green Lantern. I also play a couple voice mails, and talk about the Critics Choice TV Awards. The main part of the show though is devoted to some history and discussion about one of my favorite movies of all time, Raiders of the Lost Ark.

If you with to comment, please call the voice mail line or e-mail us.

Click below to listen to Episode 3, enjoy.

Green Lantern Review

Overall Rating: C

Spoilers will come later.

Just got back from seeing Green Lantern, and I didn't hate it. So that's something. Since this movie has been getting horrible reviews, and has 24% on rotten tomatoes I went in with pretty low expectations. That is how I suggest you go into this movie. I'll get more specific later, but it's not the best. It's not a bad movie at all, but it's really nothing more than a popcorn movie. While the action is great and the special effects are used quite well, the writing and acting are both very poor. The jokes were poor as well. While Green Lantern is not a silly comic at all, Ryan Reynolds still is behaving the way he always does. His dry sarcastic delivery of some of the jokes worked at times, but more often it did not. The story is pretty good. They ease you into the world with an expository voice over combined with very nice visuals that both explains everything to you, and reminds you that this is only a comic book.  More on the story later in the spoiler section.

Green Lantern is a DC comic classic, and this is their only movie in the year of the Marvel comic book movies. The comic book is very popular and has been for many decades, so they had a lot to work with here. The cast did an okay job, some much stronger than others. As I said above, the action was the true winner in this movie. I was very pleased how the Green Lantern effects were visualized in the movie, and even though large amounts of CGI were needed I thought they were seamlessly integrated into the real life surroundings. I saw the movie in 3D and had serious issues with that aspect. I felt it added nothing to the movie, and in various scenes it seemed incomplete, or problematic.

Read on for more, and Spoilers

What's new for June?

It's almost June and that means 2 things. It gets very hot here in New Jersey, and there's new content for us to geek out about.

Here are some of the things we will be covering during the month of June. We will try to post reviews of these TV shows, and movies so check those out.

TV Shows:
Falling Skies on TNT starts June 19. For those who don't know, this is a pretty big new show from the folks who know drama. Falling Skies takes place after an alien invasion apocalypse. Looks like it'll be pretty dark, and the cast looks good too. This will be one of the few American sci-fi shows on TV so I hope it does well.
Falling Skies website

Futurama on Comedy Central on June 23. This epic series returns for the 2nd half of its 6th season. Since this is not a serialized show I'm not sure if we'll do reviews for them. I personally love the series, so I promise I will try.

Weeds on Showtime on June 27. Everyone's favorite show about a pot selling mom returns for its 7th season. While I have not been totally happy with the direction the show has taken the past couple seasons, I still love it for being one of the strangest series on TV. I'm hearing that a lot has changed since the end of season 6, so I'm looking forward to this one very much. Since it's on Showtime it does include nudity and profanity, and of course drug use.

Movies:
X-Men: First Class opens June 3. I was a bit concerned for this one, but the trailers look AMAZING. It really could be the best comic book movie of the year. I'm a big X-Men fan, and I'm putting a lot of my continuity and canon issues aside. I plan to see this with a big group on Friday, so expect a review either that night, or Saturday morning.

Super 8 opens June 10. This is my pick for the movie of the summer. J.J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg! I cannot wait for this movie, and love how mysterious the plot still is. I hope it's more than a monster movie because that seems to easy. I know that will be an aspect of it, but I just hope there's a lot more.

Green Lantern opens June 17. This is DC's shot at some of the comic book movie love this summer. Picking Ryan Reynolds was a smart move, but lets see how the movie turns out. Green Lantern is not a funny, happy go-lucky story like Spiderman can be. It's dark, and a bit scary. I hope they got that right. The trailers do look excellent though, so I'm hopeful.

The Flashbacks Podcast:
Episode 2 on June 6: This is our 4th anniversary and we'll be discussing a lot of things. Check out our talkshoe page for more info.

Episode 3 on June 20: Most likely this show will cover the various movies that opened during the off week. We also will begin our our single show flashback discussions. Don't know the show yet, but tune in for more info.