Comic Book Movies

Most of you know that I am a big comic book fan. I've been one all of my life. I've collected G.I. Joe, The Avengers, Spider-Man, Batman, etc. Seeing as over the last 25 years, movies based upon comic books have become very popular, and since at least 2 more are do out this summer (Batman Begins, Fantastic Four) I thought I'd do a Top Ten of what I think are the best comic book movies, as well as a countdown of the top ten actors/actresses in these types of movies. My criteria is:

• Loyalty to the comic books
• I've actually seen the movie (Sin City would probably be on my list, but I haven't seen it)
• Live Action (Cartoons won't count, which disqualifies Transformers: The Movie or Batman: Mask of the Phantasm)
• My personal favorites

Here are my top ten comic book based movies.

1. X-Men 2 - The story is loosely based upon the graphic novel 'God Loves, Man Kills', which I own. Excellent movie.
2. Spider-Man 2. The elevated train fight scene may be the best comic book movie fight scene ever.
3. Batman. The Dark Knight returns! Jack Nicholson as the Joker. What else need be said?
4. Superman. Classic. Plus Marlon Brando as Jor-El.
5. Spider-Man. The origin of Spider-Man. Bruce Campbell has a cameo.
6. Batman Forever. The fight sequences are very good, even if Tommy Lee Jones was too psycho as Two-Face.
7. X-Men. For once, a comic book movie with lots of characters doesn't give anyone short thrift.
8. Superman 2. Superman vs. Kryptonian criminals.
9. Hellboy. I haven't read the books, but the movie was fun. With Nazi demons, how could it not be?
10. Batman Returns. Alfred actually helps Batman beyond butlering.

My Top 10 Comic book movie character/actors:

1. Magneto (Ian McKellen). Simply the most true to the character acting done.
2. The Joker (Jack Nicholson). Jack is Jack.
3. J. Jonah Jameson ( J.K.Simmons). Small role, but he does a great job of hating Spider-Man.
4. Superman (Christopher Reeve). He will always be known as the Man of Steel, even after his death.
5. Spider-Man (Tobey Maguire). Does an excellent job as the conflicted teenaged web slinger.
6. Poison Ivy (Uma Thurman). The movie was incredibly awful, but she was realistic to the comics.
7. Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe). The costume was a bit too metallic for me, but he does play a great psycho.
8. Wolverine (Hugh Jackman). He certainly looks right, down to the hair. Plus, they actually let him kill some other characters.
9. Hellboy (Ron Perlman). Didn't read the books, but the character was interesting.
10. The Riddler (Jim Carey). Even though he was a little over the top, he did play up the aspect of the obsessed genius and his riddles.

Simple Questions

• Channel 7 in Detroit has as its news slogan "7 on your side!" I always thought that the news was simply "news" or, to put it another way, a reporting on what happened. If that's the case, doesn't that infer that they should be on NO ONE's side but the facts?
• It seems to me that Julia Roberts is on the cover of People Magazine every couple of weeks. Does she own a portion of the company?
• How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?
• You always hear about people complaining that weather forecasters are wrong when they say it'll be sunny 2 days from now, and it rains. If we can't trust them to be accurate 2 days from now, how can we trust them when they say that global warming is occurring 40-50 years from now?
• We always hear stories about male pedophiles with little boys, but we never hear of any female pedophiles with little girls. Isn't that discriminatory?
• If an economist makes a prediction in a forest, and no one is there to hear him, is he still wrong?