Quick show of hands – who loves laughing at babies plunging from tall buildings?
Anyone?
The creators of “The Flash” sure do, and while it’s never in doubt the tykes will survive it shows the commitment the film has to nuclear-grade silliness.
It trumps all, especially storytelling and logic.
Ezra Miller’s solo DCEU project isn’t without laughs. Far from it. It’s still such a smorgasbord of juvenile antics it breezes by without leaving much behind.
Miller is back as Barry Allen, the super-speedster now awaiting his father’s trial for the death of his mother (Maribel Verdú). He’s innocent, Barry says, but he knows there’s not enough evidence to spare pappy (Ron Livingston) serious jail time.
Right away it’s clear “The Flash” isn’t sweating many story details, a harbinger of things to come.
Barry discovers he can go back in time by running at lightning speed, so he does just that to stop the events leading up to his mother’s death.
Naturally, as we’ve learned in “Spider-Man: No Way Home” and the recent “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse,” tampering with time has … consequences.
Our hero doesn’t listen.
Suddenly he’s standing beside a younger version of himself (Miller, again) in a time loop where his mother never dies. Except that changes the course of history, leaving mankind unable to ward off a Kryptonian menace, General Zod (a disinterested Michael Shannon).
We definitely need another hero beyond the titular one, and if you’ve seen the trailers you know some of what’s coming next.
“The Flash” starts strong, albeit a baby gag that doesn’t know how quickly it wears thin. Director Andy Muschietti (“It”) delivers some eye-popping action, complete with familiar super faces.
The frothy tone is disorienting at first. Yes, we’ve seen Batfleck before, but he’s usually grim and uncompromising. Now, he’s cracking wise as if the SnyderVerse never happened.
(Just wait for the next DCEU tonal snap when James Gunn officially takes over)
Still, the movie is full-on entertaining, and Barry’s grief over losing his mother grounds some, not all, of the scenes.
The plot is straightforward, too, and we know the tidal wave of Easter eggs is but minutes away. Yet the return of Michael Keaton as Batman still disappoints. He’s introduced in a ludicrous fight scene, suggesting the older Bruce Wayne gave up crime-fighting decades ago. (the reason why is, yet again, absurd)
The next moment, he’s springing into action like it’s 1989. Is any of this gonna make sense?
Not really.
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Other plot devices soak up too much screen time and make the logic gaps in the “Fast & Furious” saga look quaint by comparison.
We still have Miller, whose geeky hero is a welcome change from the usual fare. The actor, who uses they/them pronouns off screen and boasts a gargantuan rap sheet, proves curiously endearing no matter how much an individual “Flash” scene stumbles.
“The Flash” plays out like “Justice League Lite,” complete with the introduction of Supergirl (Sasha Calle). It’s hard to know if she’s either a terrible casting choice or Muschietti’s direction dooms any chance of Calle deserving future Super gigs.
The best superhero movies are as insanely long as “The Flash” (2 hours, 24 minutes) but manage to let characters breathe between the CGI madness.
And “The Flash” is all about CGI, often in ways that suggest the studio cut corners at the worst possible times. Much of the superhero action plays out like a video game, disconnecting audiences from the humans allegedly portraying various heroes.
It’s 2023. Middling FX should never take us out of a blockbuster experience. Unforgivable.
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We’re already exhausted by the multiverse gimmick, intended to bring back beloved characters/actors for a tall, sweaty glass of Member Berries. “No Way Home” made that gimmick matter, and it’s now clear how difficult that task remains.
“The Flash” is all about squandered potential.
Seeing the mighty Keaton resume a role that silenced all the naysayers 30+ years ago? Meh, let’s just pretend he’s 30-something and let CGI/stuntmen do most of the heavy lifting. Oh, and make him repeat some classic lines from the Tim Burton feature but without any of the gravitas.
Miller’s singular screen presence? The actor’s character is too busy striking Flash poses to get lost in the role.
The return of Shannon as Zod? A great screen villain reads his lines like a Trump voter is standing behind the camera.
You’ll laugh, early and often, at “The Flash.” Once the laughs subside you’ll realize just how inferior the film is to both the hype and previous super epics.
HiT or Miss: “The Flash” isn’t a dud, and it’s never dull. The super silly saga reminds us the genre’s better days remain behind us.
YOUR “REVIEWS” ARE WORTHLESS. You are the other side of the liberal reviewer who gets mad if there isn’t a requisite number of PERVERTS in the film. None of you have integrity. You all jump on your hobby horses and ride!
Receipt Number One: YOU WRITE THIS: ” Miller is back as Barry Allen, the super-speedster now awaiting his father’s trial for the death of his mother (Maribel Verdú). He’s innocent, Barry says, but he knows there’s not enough evidence to spare pappy (Ron Livingston) serious jail time”.
AND THEN STRANGELY YOU WRITE THIS
“Right away it’s clear “The Flash” isn’t sweating many story details, a harbinger of things to come.”
The story of his mother dying is LITERALLY in EVERY FLASH BOOK , COMIC, OR THOUGHT PROCESS ABOUT BARRY ALLEN’s MOTIVATIONS. So what “STORY DETAIL” is “not sweated”???
Receipt Number 2: “Except that changes the course of history, leaving mankind unable to ward off a Kryptonian menace, General Nod (a disinterested Michael Shannon).”
YOU DON’T EVEN HAVE ENOUGH INTEGRITY TO GET THE NAME OF THE G-D CHARACTERS RIGHT …………it’s GENERAL ZOD and yet you call MICHAEL SHANNON “DISINTERESTED”??????
Receipt number 3 : How can this statement exist ….. “The plot is straightforward, too, ” IN A WORLD WHERE YOU ALREADY SAID THIS….” Right away it’s clear “The Flash” isn’t sweating many story details,” IF THE PLOT IS “STRAIGHTFORWARD” HOW DID THEY NOT “SWEAT” THE DETAILS. Oh, and your criticism of what this character “should have learned’ from OTHER MOVIES is absurd.
I literally could examine the BIAS in EVERY SENTENCE you wrote but the lesson remains clear, LEFT WING BUTT PLUG USES and RIGHT WING JACKOFFS shouldn’t review movies !!! GENERAL NOD indeed.
You’re literally defending a criminal name Ezra Miller.
Holy s***. Triggered much? So every professional movie critic has to have Marxist sympathies or they’re ‘RIGHT WING JACKOFFS’?
I am curious why you felt the need to throw politics into your movie review and what a “Trump voter” has to do with anything related to this topic. Please explain.
It’s because if you want to make any money on the internet doing news you have to feign dislike for republicans so they won’t stop giving you coke anymore.
The entire leftist woke ideology is inserted into most holly-weird movies today. The real question is why do Americans put up with this dogma??
Made no sense to me either. That was the point where I decided to go see the movie and will probably love it.
Don’t. I don’t want to see Ezra Miller anymore.