Antonis and Stavros Fylladitis’s short fan film “Superman Awakens” is an absolute accomplishment. It’s only four minutes in length but it conveys a very interesting and intriguing story that is complimented by the massive animation. Rather than attempt a live action film, “Superman Awakens” is animated through CGI, created with Unreal Engine 5 using Lumen technology, and tells the tale of a Superman that has lost it all and is trying to find a reason to keep going.
Tag Archives: Fantasy
Superman and the Mole Men (1951)
One thing many people tend to forget about Superman, is that he’s not all about super powers and fighting bad guys. A lot of times he also uses his super powers for things like keeping the peace, and protecting the small guy. “Superman and the Mole Men” is a very good serial that works as an allegory for racism. Superman finds himself in the middle of a war between misunderstood mole people, and a lynch mob that is hell bent on hanging them, if for no other reason that their appearance frightens them.
Superman is Still the Hero We Need
Superman has always been deemed as something of an antiquated superhero by many, but I’ve always turned to him in my need for a good superhero fix. Ever since I was seven, I devoured everything and anything that had Superman featured. That also included Richard Donner’s “Superman: The Movie.” It not only featured Superman, but it featured one of the Supermen that I grew up with. Along with the Max Fleischer Superman, and George Reeves Superman, Christopher Reeve was the big dog in the superhero universe. Reeve’s boyish charm and staunch determination made Superman a hero you could look up to and depend on.
Super Mario Bros. – The Great Rescue of Princess Peach! (Super Mario Bros.: Peach-hime Kyūshutsu Dai Sakusen!) (1986)
By 1986, the world had only gotten so far as “Super Mario Bros.” on the Nintendo/Famicom, so Masami Hata’s “The Great Rescue of Princess Peach!” as a movie stretches as far as it can on very little source material. With the original NES game, they only gave you so much about the lore, and motivations of the villains, so the anime movie itself relies on a bizarre, anemic plot that, I can assume, is not at all canonical.
The Super Mario Bros. Movie (2023)
It’s been about thirty years since Nintendo allowed one of their IP’s to be translated in to a feature film, and now that video game movies have upped the ante in substance, the time is right for a return from the Mario Bros. Their mascot Super Mario makes his big screen return in a new animated feature from the studio that gave us the (ugh) Minions. In spite of that fact, “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” is really quite good, and dare I say one of the best video game movies ever made. As with most IP’s of Mario’s ilk, there was some ballyhoo around casting decisions made for his return, but “The Super Mario Bros. Movie” comes out looking quite shiny.
Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (2023)
We are in desperate need of a fantasy movie renaissance, and I truly hope “Honor Among Thieves” is the one to lead the charge. It takes a true D&D fan to really know how to bring this universe to life and director John Francis Daly rises to the challenge brilliantly. “Honor Among Thieves” is one of the more refreshing genre pictures of 2023; it’s a movie that is filled with so much appeal for any audience. I dare say that it might even open the door to a new generation of players.
Shazam! Fury of the Gods (2023)
Hey, it’s better than “Black Adam.”
That’s about the biggest glowing opinion I can give “Fury of the Gods” when all is said and done. The follow up to the 2019 crowd pleaser is a perfectly fine film. It’s a solid adaptation of a unique comic book series, and it’s a good chance this is the last time we’ll see “Shazam!” with this cast. That being said, I liked “Fury of the Gods” even if I wasn’t a big fan of how much they toned down the content to make it so much more appealing to the younger audience. “Shazam!” had demons, and “Fury of the Gods” has unicorns.