The New Nick Fury

Well, Sam Jackson's out. Even if he still wants the role, he's out it my mind. Yeah, I know that sounds like fanboy blasphemy, but hey, that's why they call me the Anarchist. Maybe it's just me, but I've always had a certain philosophy when it comes to casting: the character is more important than they actor (feel free to quote me). I still haven't completely forgiven Gene Hackman for refusing to shave his head for Superman. So when I heard Samuel L. Jackson was walking away from the role of Nick Fury because he wanted more money, my thought was this: screw him, lets move on. Jackson was quoted as saying: “I would love to do it. I’m not sure that they would love for me to do it. It seems as though they’re having money problems," and “they’re caught up in the economic crisis also. Iron Man 1 didn’t make much money, so they can’t afford to pay the rest of us anymore.” Frack. You. You are either a colossal snob, an incredible idiot, or both. Iron Man made over $582 million worldwide. If they can't afford you, then you've got to be the most greedy dick on the planet.

What the hell happened, Sam? You used to be cool. Crap, only two months ago you were cool. You practically held the record for never turning down a role. Seriously man, you were in The Spirit, you'd do anything! Now your gonna turn down Iron Man 2 because you want more money? Dude, the money you'd make off of your rep alone after being in that movie would be more than they could ever pay you. You want to be remembered? You want true cinematic immortality? Just a guest role in a series like Iron Man, one that will doubtless be remembered as this generations Terminator or RoboCop, would cement your place in history permanently. But is all you care about is money, then clearly your not as cool as we all thought you were. Maybe you never were. Are you are now is just another soulless Hollywood demagogue.

Well, now that my disillusioned rant is out of the way, it's time to move on. And by move on, I mean fruitlessly harp on my personal choice for the new Nick Fury, since obviously nothing I say will be have any effect on the film's outcome. Of course, if Hollywood execs started listening to me, I could really call myself an anarchist, could I? Anyway, it's highly unlikely that they'll simply write Nick Fury out of the movie. They might try to simply have him be an unseen character, spoken of but never actually appearing. Now I'd be really upset if they did that because I have my own horse in this a race, someone who I'd like to see even more than Sam Jackson. I'm an old school comics guy, and as much as I like the Ultimate Marvel Universe, I will always be faithful to the originals, especially Nick Fury. After all, the original's been around for 40 years, while the Ultimate version's less than a decade old. The first, cigar-chomping, blue jumpsuit-wearing, Infinity formula-laced, WWII vet Fury deserves to be in the film, and there's one guy in particular who'd be perfect for the role. No, it's not David Hasselhoff (but that'd be ridiculously cool). It's Thomas Jane. Yes, Thomas Jane.

I know, not the most obvious choice right? Besides, he already played the Punisher for Marvel, right? Well, Marvel already rebooted that franchise again (worst call since the Star Wars prequels!) so he's home free. And I no I've said this before, but the guy's a total badass. And believe it or not, I wasn't the one who came up with the idea of him playing Nick Fury. Not long after The Punisher came out, Tim Bradstreet, who had done some promotional artwork for the film, convinced Jane to pose as Nick Fury for the cover of Punisher #13. Take a look as these shots and tell me Tom Jane would not rule as the director of SHIELD.

Movie Review: Outlander

Outlander is a movie about 3 things: vikings, dragons...and aliens. One of these things just doesn't belong. The story kicks off with an alien starship crashlanding in ancient Norway. The lone survivor, Kainan (Jim Caviezel) emerges and is almost immediately captured my a clan of Viking raiders. They believe that he was responsible your the recent mysterious destruction of several villages. In truth, the culprit is a alien dragon-like monster called the Morwen, the same creature that killed the rest of Kainan's crew and crashed his ship. When the man-eating Morwen sets it's sites of the Viking clan, Kainan must form an alliance to trap and destroy the beast before it devours them all.

Pros: You know what, forget it. Its pointless to do the standard pros and cons segments. You know the cons, and they may not even be cons, it all depends on how you look at it. If the idea of aliens and vikings in the same movie makes you roll your eyes, if your saying right now "this is the stupidest thing I've ever heard", then clearly this film is not for you. But if you're think "Aliens and vikings? AWESOME!!" then my friend, you will not be disappointed. You will either love this film or hate it, and I myself am firmly entrenched in the former catagory. When it comes to B-movie awesomeness, it does get much crazier, or much better, than this.

This is by nor means a B-movie cast, though. I'm still trying to figure out how they got John Hurt & Ron Pearlman. Well, I guess if they'll do Hellboy II, they'll do anything. Ron Pearlman tragically is not in this film for very long, but man, is he badass when he is. Y'know that part of the trailer where a bald, tattooed viking smashes a guy's head between two war hammers? Yeah, that's Ron. Our star, Jim Caviezel, is a very underrrated actor. Most people only know him from The Passion of the Christ, but not some of his lesser known films like The Count of Monte Cristo, I Am David, and The Thin Red Line. Sophia Myles is a certified hottie...oh, and a talented actress, and just as underrated as Caviezel. She like a likable version of Kate Winslet. The only actor I really didn't like was John Huston, who seems to be doing his best Eomer impersonation. Whoever played the Morwen wasn't creditted but he was born for the role (what else are you gonna do when you a giant glow-in-the-dark lizard).

For a budget of only $47 million, the film looks pretty good. Eragon didn't look any better on more than twice the money. While brought to life with obvious CGI, the Morwen looks pretty good, and definitely has a creative design. It's sort of a combination of a lizard, and tiger, and an angler fish. The fights are pretty cool too, I mean how can you go wrong when you give Ron Pearlman duel war hammers?

Few movies have a concept this bizarre. But somehow it all gels together. It's kinda like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. They're both patently riduculous concepts that somehow work. This is something that must be seen in all it's sweet b-movie glory.

Overall, I give Outlander a Silver Anarchy Coin.

Click her to visit the official website for Outlander.