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So I just finished watching King of Fighters the movie. A few days ago I gave a review for Tekken the Movie. I thought I would compare the two. Both were live action movies made for western audiences.

Just like Tekken, I was unfamiliar with the game story line for the King of Fighters games. This gives me an advantage over those who are aware of the original story as both movies probably butchered the game story. The dialog in KoF was a bit cheesy at times but overall I was pretty happy with the story. Three ancient artifacts help teleport fighters into another dimension via Bluetooth hands free devices (lol, no joke!) and they are able to battle it out with one another to finally win the title “King of Fighters.” In this other dimension is an evil being called “Orochi.” Which is a Japanese term for a snake or serpent. Orochi wants to escape the dimension and probably rule/destroy our own.

The cast had quite a few familiar faces. Francoise Yip, Maggie Q and Ray Park were all in the movie. I like all three actors and have been following their work for quite some time. Ray Park almost always plays an antagonist. He handles the role well though I’m looking forward to him being a good guy in a future action movie. He was Snake Eyes in the GI Joe movie but he didn’t speak in that movie and he was covered in costume. Sean Farris played Kyo Kusanagi and received top billing but I’m not really familiar with him. I did see “Never Back Down” but I’ve mostly forgotten that movie. Will Yun Lee was also in the movie. I had to look up his name as I recognized him but couldn’t remember his name. I’ve seen him in a few other shows and enjoy his characters.

The special effects in the movie were pretty cool. They were battling with different color fire balls/chi/enery or whatever you wish to call it. IMDB.com listed the movie’s budget at $12,000,000 so I found the effects to be surprisingly “special” for their cost.

If I had to recommend King of Fighters or Tekken, I would definitely suggest King of Fighters. Though I did enjoy both, King of Fighters was slightly more enjoyable.

I wonder if there will ever be a Virtua Fighter movie.

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I just finished watching Tekken. It’s a live action movie based on the popular series of video games.

I did enjoy the movie. There was some decent fighting and it wasn’t too excessive. That is to say, the fights lasted a reasonable amount of time. A 10-minute battle gets boring (see the Matrix 2). My one grievance with the movie is toward the end…

***PLOT SPOILERS***
The tournament’s winner is declared yet 3 fighters had not yet been eliminated. I realize that their fights would be unnecessary to continue with the plot, but to me the movie feels incomplete without those minor battles.

I also found Jin’s lack of monogamy amusing. Society tends to assume that a couple will be exclusive. So when Jin and Christie are having their fun in the middle of the movie, I couldn’t help but laugh when Jin goes back to his chocolate-loving girlfriend after the tournament.
***END PLOT SPOILER***

So I won’t say it was a great movie. I won’t even say it was a good movie. It was an entertaining movie and I wouldn’t warn anyone away from seeing it. Though to be fair I am not familiar with the Tekken storylines so for all I know they butchered the plot, which is highly likely.

Next video game movie on my watch list is King of Fighters.

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Yesterday I was trying to decide if I should see Green Lantern in 3D or the regular version. I went online to see if there were any opinions. All I found were unkind movie reviews.

One such review was written by someone named Josh Wilding. My biggest grievance of his laundry list of complaints is about the abundance of unnecessary humor in the movie. About half way through the movie I couldn’t help but wonder, “where’s all of these hit and miss jokes Josh promised?” Sure there was some levity early in the movie but that was necessary for Hal Jordan’s character. Hal was supposed to be an irresponsible guy. Having him acting care free is how you portray that. Later on in the movie things naturally change. The humor was actually quite minimal; especially when compared to another comic book movie, The Green Hornet. Even Iron Man had more jokes being cracked and yet that was a great movie.

As far as how this rates against other comic book movies, I’d say it was certainly better than Elektra, Daredevil, Punisher 1 and 2 and Ghost Rider. I’d rate it at about the same level as the Ed Norton Hulk, Wolverine Origins and the Fantastic Four. That puts it right below Iron Man and Thor.

So anyway, I usually never listen to critics. This time I did and I was hesitant to see Green Lantern. I ended up not going for 3D and I’m now wishing I had paid extra for it as it was definitely an enjoyable movie. If you were on the fence about seeing this movie, definitely go see it.

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Well I just got back from Thor. I’ve been jazzed to see this since I saw his hammer at the end of Iron Man 2. Note: there is more to see after the credits of Thor so stick around. I had never read much Thor when I collected comic books. I started right around the time that Thor was gone/dead/missing and Eric Masterson had to take over. I don’t remember the stories now since that was 20 years ago but I do remember liking it. Even so, that was really the origins of Thunderstrike, not Thor.

From what I know about Norse mythology, the Asgards were not too badly portrayed. Growing up, I had been under the impression that Loki was the god of mischief. Later in my college years, I was told that Loki was the Norse god of fire but he was also a very clever god, responsible for helping the other gods obtain many of their relics. There was no mention of a god of fire in the movie.

Over all the movie was better than I expected it to be. I’m not sure if I liked it as much as I did Iron Man, though it has to be close. Iron Man has been one of my most favorite of the new comic book movies. Natalie Portman gets more gorgeous every time I see her. I can’t rate her ability to act because every time she smiles on screen I’m too busy swooning. Idris Elba was pretty cool as Heimdal. I was impressed with his character Stringer Bell in the Wire (horribly boring show) as the drug deal who goes to college to learn more about business. I also recently watched the first series of Luther, a show Idris stars in over in the United Kingdom.

Over the last six months I’ve been dealing with a vendor that sells licensed Marvel t-shirts. I’ve got a few Thor shirts and some of them are really bad ass. You can see them on eBay:

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