Black Adam - 2/5

This movie takes a good idea for a super hero story and muddies the water with bad dialogue, clunky exposition, and forced character motivations. The special effects are very good, but its penchant for depicting violent deaths stands head and shoulders above its peers in the genre. It suffers from the same problem as Superman, granting its protagonist too much power to allow for coherent stakes. Surprisingly, Pierce Brosnan’s Dr. Fate gets the best character arc in the whole runtime.

Content warning: violence

Closest comparison: It’s like Suicide Squad (2021) by way of Man of Steel (2013).

Setting: Adventure
Plot: Super hero
Tone: Action

Batman: Gotham Knight - 3/5

This movie is a collection of shorts, related by plot but unrelated in direction, voice acting, or artstyle. The end result is an interesting amalgam of artistic differences, but the story throughline is a solid genre narrative. I found most of the artstyles to be offputting, but if you like them you’ll enjoy this movie more than I did.

Closest comparison: It’s like the Animatrix by way of Batman: The Long Halloween.

Setting: Noir
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Noir

Batman: Year One - 3/5

This movie is more grounded addition to the Batman mythology, a less fantastical prequel than many of the other entries. The story is solid and straightforward, pretty much what anyone with any knowledge of Batman would expect at this point, but with all the crazy interpretations out there it’s nice to have a standard by which to measure.

Closest comparison: It’s like The Batman by way of The Long Halloween.

Setting: Noir
Plot: Crime
Tone: Super hero

Batman: The Long Halloween - 3/5

This movie takes its time to allow Batman to do his sleuthing, something a lot of other Batman movies gloss over, but it somehow manages to squeeze in plenty of classic villains and action along the way. The film is split into two parts, and there’s a jarring jump between the two, although the plot recovers pretty quickly afterward. Still, it ends up dragging on a bit too long and many of the twists and turns that take up a sizeable chunk of the runtime don’t end up mattering when all is said and done.

Closest comparison: It’s like The Batman (2022) by way of Batman: Hush (2019).

Setting: Noir
Plot: Mystery
Tone: Super hero

Batman Ninja - 3/5

This movie starts with time travel and gets progressively over-the-top from scene to scene. Fans of Shonen anime will appreciate its revelry in the tropes of the genre translated to the Batman mythos. Fans of Batman what-if scenarios will enjoy the translation into recognizable archetypes. Everyone else will just be confused. But for its target audience it’s a lot of fun.

Closest comparison: It’s like One Punch Man by way of Dragonball Z, with a Batman skin on it.

Setting: Adventure
Plot: Shonen Anime
Tone: Super Hero

Batman: Gotham by Gaslight - 2/5

The main problem with this movie is that none of the characters act like themselves. The overall story is mostly fine, but when all very popular characters behave in random or even bizarre ways it makes the twists that rely on previous knowledge of the characters pointless. The aesthetic is pretty cool, but the movie doesn’t make the most of it.

Closest comparison: It’s like Bad Blood by way of Hush.

Setting: Noir
Plot: Serial Killer Mystery
Tone: Super Hero

The Hyperions - 3/5

This movie is a quirky indie super hero film that comes through with a lot of heart in the end. It’s consistently chuckle-funny, never reaching the hilarity to which it seems to aspire. It does a good job working around its tiny budget, though some of the seams show in the finished product. There’s a heavy layer of style that masks many budget restraints, and how that style strikes you will largely determine your mileage with this film.

Closest comparison: It’s like Umbrella Academy directed by Wes Anderson.

Setting: Super Hero
Plot: Family Drama
Tone: Indie Comedy

Moon Knight - 4/5

This show is carried by the absolutely spellbinding performance from Oscar Isaac. The action is sparse but solid, and the archaeology is fun but about as historically accurate as Indiana Jones. There are a few places where the show cuts away from what promises to be a really cool action scene, only letting the audience see the aftermath which is unfortunate. It’s adventurous, but with deep, strong characterization for the main hero and villain. It’s a big step up in quality from the other Marvel and Star Wars shows Disney has created in the past several years.

Content warning: child abuse

Closest comparison: It’s like Deadpool by way of Daredevil.

Setting: Adventure
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Action

The Batman (2022) - 4/5

This movie is yet another reinvention of Batman, this time both more grounded and more gritty than Nolan’s trilogy. It chooses style over convention many times, which could have made the chase scenes hard to follow, for example, but the direction masterfully guides the audience to keep up with the action. Pattinson is good as Bruce Wayne but really shines as Batman, and the script focuses on the intimidatingly silent detective more than the super-human super-rich super-hero. The Riddler’s riddles aren’t sublime, but they’re more than good enough to carry keep the audience intrigued until the answers are revealed. This film’s primary sin is its length, clocking in at four minutes shy of three hours, when a deft editor could have trimmed it down by a solid half hour if he had been allowed to do so.

Closest comparison: It’s like Batman Begins by way of Joker (2019).

Setting: Crime
Plot: Detective
Tone: Thriller

Batman: Hush (2019) - 2/5

This movie boasts a better story than it can deliver. Most of the Batman villain A-list villains are in the movie, but only two or three have any impact on the plot. The plot is more like a soap opera than a super hero movie, and it attempts to tantalize without following through with any substance. The final reveal is lackluster and less interesting than no reveal at all.

Closest comparison: It’s like Suicide Squad (2016) by way of Batman: Bad Blood.

Setting: Neo Noir
Plot: Detective
Tone: Super Hero

Venom: Let There Be Carnage - 2/5

This movie is similar to its predecessor, but with a darker, true crime vibe. Half of the runtime is dedicated to tracking down a serial killer’s past, which will be more engaging for some audience members than others. The fight scenes are fine in theory but are destroyed by shaky cam, which is especially bad given that it’s basically all CGI. But the movie really goes off the rails in the final battle, where the plot comes together just to fall apart.

Closest comparison: It’s like Venom (2018) with a dash of Se7en.

Setting: Super Hero
Plot: Super hero
Tone: True Crime

The Suicide Squad (2021) - 4/5

This movie is a tour de force rebuttal to its previous installment. It’s a colorful, blood-spattered comedy corral, with a plot that actually works and consistent stakes. It retreads some story beats from the first installment but improves them just to flex. It takes bizarre situations and obscure characters, then injects them with pathos and treats them with more care than the rest of these non-MCU superhero cash-grabs.

Content warning: Gore

Closest comparison: It’s like Guardians of the Galaxy by way of Deadpool.

Setting: Military
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Dark Comedy

Suicide Squad (2016) - 2/5

This movie has an infamously bad reputation, but it’s not entirely warranted. The premise is great and in a few choice parts the execution is as well. But there are just so many bafflingly terrible plot, character, and directoral decisions that it bring down the good parts, making them fewer and further between as the movie goes on.

Closest comparison: It’s like Army of the Dead (2021) by way of Justice League (2017).

Setting: Disaster Action
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Action Comedy

Spider-Man: No Way Home - 4/5

This movie is attempting to be a love-letter to Spider-Man fans and MCU fans alike, and in many ways it succeeds. There’s much better character development here than in the previous two Spider-Man movies, and the main cast rises to the challenge with superb acting. The fight scenes are much better than Far From Home, both in conception and execution. That being said, the first half hour is pretty painful in its attempts at humor and there are a few throw-away lines that are cringey attempts at being ‘woke’. At this point in the MCU every film is carrying a lot of baggage, and how this one hits any given audience member will only vary more and more, this film very much included.

Closest comparison: It’s like Spider-Man: Far From Home by way of Doctor Strange (2016).

Setting: Super Hero
Plot: Sci-Fi
Tone: Comedy

Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings - 3/5

This movie is more interesting with regard to what it introduces to the MCU than it is interesting in its own right. The action choreography is excellent and Simu Liu is outstanding as Shang-Chi, but the cinematography is so shaky that it’s difficult to tell what’s going on most of the time. Most of the runtime isn’t action or Marvel worldbuilding, but slow inter-personal family drama that far overstays its welcome. Still, there’s plenty of colorful forgettable fun to be had for the whole family, though kids may doze off in the middle.

Closest comparison: It’s like Venom (2018)

Setting: Modern Myth
Plot: Hidden World
Tone: Super Hero

Black Widow - 2/5

This movie could have been so much better than it is. Taskmaster is completely wasted as a villain, never getting the choreography and cinematography to showcase the fighting skills that make the character unique. Florence Pugh is easily the best part of this movie, and while that’s great and I would gladly see a Marvel movie starring her as Yelena, it overshadows Scarlett Johansson’s erstwhile time in the sun, though this is also Scarlett’s weakest performance as Black Widow. The script also keeps trying to redeem characters without earning the turn-around, and it sours the overall story.

Closest comparison: It’s like Close (2019) by way of X-Men: The Last Stand.

Setting: Espionage
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Action

Loki (Season 1, Disney+, 2021) - 3/5

This show is fun and interesting, but has several problems holding it back. The show poses a lot of good questions about the multiverse, but season 1 ends on a cliffhanger without resolving almost anything which is very annoying to say the least. The set design and costuming is gorgeous, but some of the new superpowers and worldbuilding rules are very problematic in their retroactive implications. Owen Wilson does an outstanding job, but the writers seemed to want to write for a post-Ragnarok Loki and sloppily shoehorn 6 years of character development into one scene. It also seems to think it’s ‘woke’, so all the female characters are stronger, smarter, and more competent than all of the men. Ironically, this backfires by making the two male leads by far the most interesting characters. This show could have been great, but in the end it has nowhere to go.

Closest comparison: It’s like Doctor Who by way of Brazil (1985).

Setting: Sci-Fi
Plot: Sci-Fi
Tone: Action Comedy

Blade: Trinity - 2/5

This movie starts out as a competent action movie but ends up turning in circles and losing its way. The Dracula thread is fumbled to the point of being boring, which is impressive in its own right but not in a good way. There are some good action scenes, but the second act turnaround feels abrupt and unearned. There’s a distinct Joss Whedon knock-off vibe in some of the quirky character concepts, but with no development it falls flat.

Closest comparison: It’s like Buffy: The Vampire Slayer by way of Iron Man 2.

Setting: Post-Noir Goth
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Action

Blade II (2002) - 3/5

This movie has all the great action and practical effects that are the hallmarks of director Guillermo del Toro, but it falls short in other places. Firstly, it immediately retcons a major plot point from the first movie, backtracks some substantial character growth in the main character. Secondly, the script plays a little loose with the stakes, utilizing physics-defying gadgets and out-of-nowhere character switches for pivotal plot points. Thirdly, the film severely underutilizes Donnie Yen giving him not even a single good martial arts scene, which is in itself a crime. But for all of that the movie is absolutely dripping with cool visual style and so viscerally engaging that it holds up admirably under its own weight.

Content warning: bloody

Closest comparison: It’s like Blade (1998) by way of Hellboy II: The Golden Army.

Setting: Post-Noir Goth
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Action Horror

Blade (1998) - 3/5

This is a solid super hero movie, but since it was blazing a new trail at the time it takes a few missteps along the way. The action is pretty good and the blood sprinkler opening scene is low-key iconic. Still, there are several bad story choices and the finale is mostly underwhelming. There’s plenty of entertainment to be had here, but don’t look too deep.

Content warning: bloody

Closest comparison: It’s like Batman Forever by way of The Matrix, with vampires.

Setting: Post-Noir Goth
Plot: Super Hero
Tone: Action Horror