David Goyer’s The Invisible hits theaters Friday and I am elated. Elated I tell you.
"Why are you so excited to see a film like this?", you wonder.
I am not. I am just so friggin’ tired of that commercial that’s been running since a guy named Lumiere was sucking air. It’s just so high concept and what an annoying trailer and what a leading actor. He seems like a vacuum of emotion of which the likes we’ve not seen since I walked out of X-Men: The Last Stand.
Speaking of…
Marvel and Fox have taken a stand of their own and they’ve brought Goyer along for the ride for the Magneto prequel we’ve been threatened for quite a few years now.
A Magneto prequel, apparently complete with Ian McKellan on board to some extent though the film is apparently mostly an origin story and since Ian is a very studly older gentleman they’ll probably get that kid with Brian Thompson’s face from Hannibal Rising to play him.
Now I’m not one to criticize comic book franchisers trying to make their bones, wait I actually am. Marvel is riding high on the inexplicable minor success of Ghost Rider and the impending windfall of Spider-Man 3 (which outsiders say may have cost in upwards of $500,000,000) and being your own studio means that you can do whatever you want, second guessers be damned. They can make a Paste-Pot-Pete quadrilogy if they want, AND THEY SHOULD. But does this character have the wattage to sustain a feature? There’s already David Benioff’s Wolverine to consider and I hear there’s a pretty sexy Todd Solondz Northstar project on the horizon. Additionally Bryan Singer’s Holocaust flashback [a great band name] was all the origin I needed. Who needs a superhero prequel when Wikipedia exists? Also, let it be known that the figurative jury is still out on Mr. Goyer as the go-to creator of comic book movies.
I love Batman Begins. Folks who claim to be in the know tell me he isn’t reason I love Batman Begins. Blade: Trinity is only a little bit better than a night in a Tiger Shark’s colon. My guess is that The Invisible will be transparent. I want to like him. He seems to have the right mindset, but he gave me the cold tattooed shoulder at Comic Con and that doesn’t help.
Did I mention that Goyer’s directing the movie? Not writing it, but directing it. I am not wholly sold on the film, by the way. That said, if this is going to be to its source films as Elektra was to Daredevil, fine. I just assume that’s a mistake the boys at Marvel don’t want to make again. Until Paste-Pot-Pete III: The Eye of Braxus.