Rapid Review: Super (2010)

“You don’t butt in line! You don’t sell drugs! You don’t molest little children! You don’t profit on the misery of others! The rules were set a long time ago. They don’t change.”
– Frank D’Arbo

SYNOPSIS: After his wife falls under the influence of a drug dealer, an everyday guy transforms himself into Crimson Bolt, a superhero with the best intentions, but lacking in heroic skills. – via IMDB

So I checked this out because Eric absolutely loved it, and it looked interesting. Let me tell you, this is totally not what I expected it to be. At all. Dark comedy for sure, but the biggest thing that comes from this is real sadness, loneliness and desperation. I felt so freaking sorry for Frank. Everything about him was just pitiable, and Rainn Wilson did a great job in bringing his character to life. Kevin Bacon was a serious asshat, icky! Then, of course, there is Liv Tyler, post screwing up her totally beautiful face. Ellen Page, too, is a character that is pretty cool until she puts on her costume. It’s like she totally freaks out, and I didn’t like it. Overly sexualised, manic, stupid, I could not bear her character by the end of it, which is quite disappointing. Not to mention one absolutely disgusting forcible scene that comes up towards the end – it did not sit well with me at all. Anyway, this story starts and it is already sad, injects some strange bits of humour in here, but it didn’t always work for me (and I am a big fan of a dark comedy), and it keeps going, sad, depressing, lonely. Those words are truly the three words to describe Frank and his existence. Nathan Fillion pops up from time to time as the incredibly ridiculous Holy Avenger, and the little TV stints he and the “students” had cracked me up – Fillion is always up for the crazy. Let’s not even forget to mention that Rob Zombie voiced God. That was awesome. I think the best thing about this film was the cast, hands down. The story was good, albeit a little silly, but I liked it. I enjoyed that everything was not perfect for The Crimson Bolt – he looked absurd, his crime fighting took forever to take off, when it did it was legitimately violent (like some fry cook literally going out and busting up dealers, totally the thing you could picture if someone did take this on), and his partnership building with Boltie was just so strange. It looks like I have had a lot to say about this, but I actually haven’t really had anything to say about it. It is dark, it is strange, it is weird, it isn’t bad, it is something you are certainly going to have to check out in order to make up your own mind about it.