14 Really Good Movies from 2017

24. King Arthur: Legend of the Sword

I like King Arthur stories, but I'm not a stickler about the way they're told (super evident in that my favorite Arthur movie is that one with Clive Owen and Keira Knightley). And since Guy Ritchie movies always have a high floor of enjoyability for me, I had a great time with this. It's not a great King Arthur story, but it's a really fun Guy Ritchie medieval action flick. If "Guy Ritchie medieval action flick" sounds cool to you, I recommend it.

I gotta say, though, that I'm glad plans for a whole Arthurian "universe" springing from this have apparently been cancelled. Nobody needed that and none of the characters here are worth multiple movies about.

23. The Fate of the Furious



As much as I'm a fiend for this series, F8 (as it should have been called) didn't even crack my 20 Most Anticipated Movies of the year. That was due to the hackneyed suggestion in the trailer that Dom goes rogue and betrays his team. Since there was 0% chance that his defection was real, I rebelled at the whole concept. And I wasn't crazy about the promise of Jason Statham's Han-killing character joining the family, either. I went into F8 with arms crossed and needing to be won over.

And it was rough-going for a lot of the movie. Charlize Theron is wasted as a super-serious and self-important hacker who growls the worst dialogue I've heard in a few years. "Did you ever think you'd betray your family the way you did today?" And even though I'm all for previous movies' tossing cars between skyscrapers and parachuting them out of airplanes, I found the complications around the New York car chase ridiculous and unbelievable, but not as fun as skyscraper jumping and automotive skydiving. And Statham's transition to the good guys' side was as clunky as I feared it would be.

But about the time that Helen Mirren showed up, I decided to just jump on board. She's awesome, her relationship to the other characters is awesome, the final chase across the ice lake is awesome (confusingly shot at times, but still awesome), and Jason Statham is the most awesome of all. Enough so that I forgive the movie for making him a good guy, even if I don't completely forgive him for murdering one of my favorite characters. There's a devastating missed opportunity when he doesn't dive out of the airplane with a baby in pursuit of Theron, but oh well. This isn't one of the best Fast/Furious movies, but it's good enough and I ended up having a really great time.

22. Justice League



I was skeptical, but hopeful. I hated 50% of Man of Steel and probably 90% of Batman v Superman, but Wonder Woman was such a drastic course correction that I was encouraged that Warner Bros had finally learned its lesson. Not that Wonder Woman was a flawless reroute. And I didn't expect Justice League to be either. Seeds were planted in BvS that were clearly intended to grow into dark trees, so these sequels were going to have to ignore or retcon those in order to lighten the mood. I'll probably have more to say about that when I get to talking about Wonder Woman.

Justice League did a nice job of it though. Steppenwolf is a boring villain, but his plan at least made sense, as did the heroes' response to it. And I was surprised to like all the heroes. I'm an easy mark for Wonder Woman and Aquaman, but Flash was a pleasant, funny surprise and I really liked his and Cyborg's character arcs. I went into this ready to hate emo Cyborg, but he grew out of that. In fact, all the heroes had to make compromises so that community became a major theme of the film. They even figured out how to make an inspirational Superman. It's not a great movie, but the series is finally headed in a direction that I'm interested in and that's a pretty big accomplishment.

21. How to Be a Latin Lover



How to Be a Latin Lover is about a selfish gold-digger (Eugenio Derbez) who gets dumped for a younger man (Michael Cera). While he's looking for his next wife, he moves in with his sister (Salma Hayek) and her young son (Raphael Alejandrois) and learns the value of family. The movie doesn't move far from the usual formula for this type of story, but it's very funny and the three leads are all super charming.

The rest of the cast is great, too. Rob Lowe plays a fellow gold-digger, Linda Lavin is his insanely wealthy wife, Kristen Bell is a frozen yogurt manager who gives Derbez a job, Raquel Welch is his intended next victim, and Rob Corddry is her extremely protective chauffeur. If you have any fondness (or even just patience) for this kind of story, Latin Lover is a charming one.

20. The LEGO Batman Movie



I expected too much. I loved how funny and touching The LEGO Movie was and thought that this would be more of that, just with a ton of Batman references. The trailer promised a story about Batman's realizing that he needs other people, which I thought would allow for some interesting comparisons with Justice League.

And while it is very funny and I'll enjoy revisiting it and picking up references that I missed the first time around, it doesn't have the emotional punch that I hoped for. The emphasis on family is nice, but Will Arnett's Batman is still pretty inscrutable, so the lesson he learns feels very surface.

Don't get me wrong, I laughed a lot and had a great time. But I expected this would be at least a Top 15 movie, if not a Top 10.

19. Atomic Blonde



Atomic Blonde is a great spy story with a super cool agent. I like that it's set in the Cold War and I love the heavy use of '80s New Wave music. I even like how the song choices fit with what's going on onscreen ('Til Tuesday's "Voices Carry," for instance, when two characters are trying not to be overheard), but I understand how that might be annoyingly on-the-nose for some.

The plot is complicated, with a lot of double- and triple-crossing to keep track of, but while I was often kept guessing, I was never confused. And it all tracked for me in the end. Looking back after all the reveals have been made, I have some questions about why certain characters did what they did, but I'm not calling that a flaw until I've been able to see it again with the knowledge of what everyone's up to.

The selling point is the action sequences. There are a few big fights and they're all staged differently and even have different tones from each other. One is a brutal, very prolonged fight in a stairwell, for example, while another in a posh hotel is slow motion and operatic.

18. Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets



I was a little nervous about Valerian. The trailers looked fantastic and I like the two leads quite a bit, but I'm never sure what I'm going to get from Luc Besson. That's especially true when he's only producing, but he also directed Lucy and I hated that movie. I was getting a similar vibe about Valerian that I did about Jupiter Ascending, another attempt at a bold space opera by unpredictable (in the sense that I can't predict whether I'm going to like any given film of theirs) filmmakers. I enjoy Jupiter Ascending, but it wasn't as cool or cohesive as I'd hoped it would be. And I was concerned that I'd feel the same way about Valerian.

I didn't love it, but I like it quite a bit and it works a lot better than Jupiter Ascending. People seem to be divided on Dane DeHaan and Cara Delevingne as the leads, but I love both those guys. DeHaan was an effective Harry Osborne in Amazing Spider-Man 2 and another of his movies made my Top 10 this year. I hear the complaints that he's channeling '90s Keanu Reeves and I'm not going to say that it's not true. What I do push back on is that this is a bad thing for a big, fun adventure movie. I'm not as familiar with Delevingne's work, but she brings a lot of personality to Laureline and totally works for me as the soul of the film.

I agree with the criticism that there isn't a lot of romantic heat between the two leads. That's the film's biggest weakness. There's a big chunk of backstory missing in which Valerian has supposedly turned from a Bond-level womanizer to being ready to settle down in a committed relationship with his current work partner. The movie tells me that this is true and eventually convinces me that Valerian at least believes it to be true, but I never see it or feel it myself. And since I don't quite believe it, I wonder why Laureline does. That's the only thing that keeps me from full-heartedly loving the film, though. The rest is awesome.

It's gorgeous and every scene change brings new ideas and things I've never seen before. It may be the only time that I've ever watched a movie in 2D (always my preference) and thought that I should go back and watch it again in 3D. I wanted to immerse myself in the world even more.

The movie is also funny and exciting and I love how it's about overcoming fear and selfishness with love and compassion. As I watch it more, I expect that my problems with the central romance will become less important. I may not care whether Valerian and Laureline smooch, but I'm fully on board with their work relationship. They make a great team and I want more of them.

17. Murder on the Orient Express



A gorgeous, well-acted film. I would love it more if I wasn't so familiar with the plot that there aren't any big surprises, but that couldn't be helped. And it's not like I'd want them to have changed the solution to the mystery anyway.

Branagh does add some things to the story. Mostly in terms of Poirot's motivations, but also some other details and even an Easter Egg or two for Agatha Christie fans. I was never bored or felt like I'd seen it all before and I'm thrilled that there's already a sequel planned. I could go for a Miss Marple cameo in that to spin off into her own series of movies. An Agatha Christie cinematic universe is something that I wholeheartedly support.

16. John Wick: Chapter 2



The first John Wick was in my Top 20 of its year, so I was eager for another one. The sequel didn't disappoint. More great action and more of that bizarre society of assassins that was such a highlight the first time around.

I love the "Chapter 2" concept as well. Chapter 1 was a complete story, but Chapter 2 uses and expands on the events of the previous movie to launch into a new direction. It opens up the world and lays groundwork for future chapters, which is exactly what I want in a sequel.

15. Logan



I feel kind of bad for putting Logan this low on my list, because I want to applaud it for trying something so different with the superhero genre. But I have mixed feelings about the movie and  having seen it a couple of times now I'm still not fully in love with it.

It's got fantastic performances all around, especially by Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, and newcomer Dafne Keen. I love Logan and Xavier's relationship and Keen's Laura is as kickass as she is heartbreaking.

But I don't feel as emotionally connected to any of it as I want to. The first time I watched it, I wondered if the distance was because it's set in the future and has that "What If...?" aspect to it. I hoped that whatever barrier I erected because the story "doesn't count" was something that I would eventually get past in repeat viewings. And I did like it more the second time. The alternate future thing didn't bother me at all. But something's still missing.

I think my problem is that everyone keeps trying to make Logan feel fatherly towards Laura. I love the story of his having given up on most of the world and learning to connect with this little girl, but there's an extra layer of pathos that the film keeps trying to spread on by insisting that Logan and Laura are biologically family. The thing is that when they meet, Logan is not her father in any way that actually makes that word meaningful. She was given his DNA without his permission.

This isn't to excuse his initial attitude about her. He's a jerk and his overcoming that is the best thing about the movie. But I also don't believe that he owes her anything specifically because of their genetic connection. His responsibility to her is general and I get frustrated when I feel like the film is trying to force it to be more.

Back on the positive side though: I paid closer attention to the Shane quotes and themes the second time. I've been itching to watch Shane for a while anyway, but now I'm interested in seeing if a better acquaintance with it will affect future viewings of Logan. The line, "There aren't any more guns in the valley" is especially powerful.

14. Get Out



Not the horror movie that I expected, but a powerful, provocative thriller that perfectly balances its tension, humor, and message. I'm not sure that characters' actions early in the film make complete sense once everything is revealed, but it's so strong at everything else that I don't really care. And what an ending.

13. Blade Runner 2049



Denis Villeneuve's sequel doesn't equal Ridley Scott's original in terms of art direction and the score, but does it ever excel in terms of story. I love the multiple layers of symbolism and characterization and the way that mystery leads to mystery. There's clearly room for a sequel at the end, but I also felt like I got a complete story and an excellent. thought-provoking one at that. Dan, Ron, and I talked at length about it on N3rd World, so listen to that for more thoughts. It's a wonderful, complex movie that's worth discussing.

12. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales



Opinions on this movie have been largely negative, so I want to preface my thoughts with a reminder that I'm a hardcore fan of pirates in general and this series in particular. I didn't care much for On Stranger Tides, but I sincerely love the initial trilogy, including At World's End.

Having said that, I also love Dead Men Tell No Tales. It's silly and it doesn't explain everything, but those are both things that I love about the series. It fixes a problem I had with Stranger Tides, which was trying to make the story about Jack Sparrow. The initial trilogy was all about Elizabeth and Will, with Sparrow thrown in for flavor. Dead Men returns to their story through their son and it totally works for me. Powerfully, in fact. I don't know if there was sea mist in our theater or something, but I definitely felt moisture on my face by the end.

The new character Carina's being pretty awesome was an added bonus. She's no Elizabeth Swann, but I like her and would love to see where her story goes. Which sums up my feelings for the whole series at this point. After Stranger Tides, I hoped that a fifth movie could put the series back on track and that's what's happened as far as I'm concerned. The future of the series is up in the air, but my finger bones are crossed for it.

11. Thor: Ragnarok



I was so encouraged that Taika Waititi was directing this movie. Thor's my favorite Marvel movie superhero and Waititi's Hunt for the Wilderpeople was a Top 3 movie for me last year. I knew he'd bring a lot of humor, but also heart to the film.

And it is funny. Almost to a fault, because it doesn't feel like it belongs in the same series as Thor and Dark World. It leans into the comedy more heavily than I wanted and I think that's what's keeping it out of my Top 10. But I do like the jokes and the movie also brings in a supremely threatening villain and a massive shake-up to the series' status quo. Both of those things are pretty great.

7 Days in May | Blood Father and La Belle et la Bete

Blood Father (2016)



Look, I wanna be mad at Mel Gibson and I am. But just like I'm mad at Tom Cruise and still go to his movies, I love Gibson's acting and I'm usually curious about what he's doing. Blood Father looked like a callback to what Gibson does best: playing unhinged heroes with a lot to lose.

In this case, he's an alcoholic ex-con with a lot to apologize for who's too far beyond redemption, but would settle for some peace in his later years. That goes out the window though when his estranged daughter calls him out of the blue in desperate need of money and help. When he offers it, he's pulled into a nasty situation with violent consequences.

I like that Gibson's character is drawn back into the criminal world, but he doesn't just settle in like he's always been there. He's old and weary and every step of the way it's clear that he's making sacrifices for his daughter. As the title gives away, it's a movie about parenthood that uses violence and crime to accentuate the extreme love that Gibson's character feels for his daughter. I liked it a lot.

La Belle et la Bete (2014)



I didn't make it to the theater last week and even if I had, the live action remake of Disney's Beauty and the Beast is more a curiosity than a must-see. But I've had this French version on my To Watch list for a while and by sheer coincidence it made it to the top just as the new one's coming out.

I've talked before about what I really like in this story, so any new interpretation has my attention, but I also totally dig Léa Seydoux (Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, SPECTRE) and was attracted to the idea of seeing a French version of this French fairy tale. Also, the visuals are lush and imaginative.

It is an imaginative take on the story, but I was disappointed by the quality of the CG effects that are never quite believable. Some of the story changes are good (I love the explanation for why and how the Beast got to be the way he is), but others just seem like excuses for some over the top effects (that again, aren't that spectacular anyway). It's a worthwhile version of the story, but unfortunately not going to become a favorite one for me.

The Wild Life (2016)



Absolutely miserable. Didn't even finish it. I was warned, but you know what? "Nice job" to whoever put together that trailer. You got me. The trailer has fun music and cuts clips together in a way that looks like actual humor. The movie does none of that. It's dumbed down to five-year-olds and reminded me of an amateur Sunday School puppet show. Glad this was a Netflix DVD and not something I paid money to watch.

Henry V (1989)



I kind of gave up blogging about my British History in Film project. I'd like to get back to that. But I haven't given up actually watching the movies. I left off blogging about Edward II, but since then I've watched the mini-series World Without End (2012) that deals with fallout from the events of Edward II (as well as the Black Plague) and started The Hollow Crown, another TV series from 2012.

The Hollow Crown is a great idea. It presents Shakespeare's Henriad tetralogy as a complete story, using as many of the same actors from play to play as possible. Ben Whishaw (Q in the current Bond films) plays the tragic Richard II who's usurped by Rory Kinnear's (Tanner in the Bond movies) Henry IV. Jeremy Irons plays the aged Henry in Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2 with Tom Hiddleston as his son, the questionable Price Hal. At first, I wasn't sure how Richard II fit thematically with the other plays (other than just showing Henry IV's rise to power), but then Shakespeare helped me out with a line of dialogue explaining that IV is so worried about Hal because he sees in Hal the same traits that made IV want to take Richard's crown in the first place. It's a powerful story about fathers and sons, but also about duty and responsibility.

Before I watch the Hollow Crown version of Henry V, I wanted to revisit Kenneth Branagh's version, which made me realize nearly 30 years ago(!) that I actually could enjoy Shakespeare's history plays as much as I did Hamlet and A Midsummer Night's Dream. I've seen it countless times, but not recently, so it was great to see it again and especially fun to rewatch it now with all the backstory of the earlier plays finally in my mind. Branagh includes some scenes from those plays in Henry V as flashbacks and it was also cool when I watched those plays to recognize where I was for a moment.

Branagh's Henry V is still powerful and funny (so funny) and I'd forgotten how stirring Simon Rattle's score is. I used to have the soundtrack somewhere and need to find it again or rebuy it.

Anyway, looking forward to seeing how The Hollow Crown interprets it now.

Zorro (1957-61)



I'm on a huge Zorro kick lately and it's because of this show. I'm about halfway through the 39-episode first season and it is so awesome. Guy Williams is the definition of swashbuckling and perfectly plays the balance between dashing Zorro and passive Don Diego. Gene Sheldon is also delightful as Diego's mute manservant Bernardo and Henry Calvin is a joy as the good-hearted, but wrong-sided Sgt. Garcia.

I expected most of that, having watched an episode or two as a kid, but what I'd totally forgotten was the amazing sets and matte paintings. Disney threw some real money at this and created a wonderful fantasy landscape for southern California with all kinds of great cliffs and passes and skull-shaped mountains.

And I had no idea that the storytelling was so 21st Century. Each episode is more or less self-contained, but they also connect and build on each other to tell longer stories. The first 13 episodes pit Zorro against the ruthless Captain Monastario and I was shocked when he actually succeeded and that storyline ended. Then, just as Zorro's thinking of retiring, a new enemy shows up in the form of a secret society that uses eagle feathers to communicate. I'm in the middle of that story now and loving every minute of it.

It's got me wanting more Zorro, so I've been reading The Curse of Capistrano, the original Zorro story by Johnston McCulley that was serialized in All-Story Weekly. I'll report more on that later, but I'm very much enjoying it so far, too. It's briskly written and I'm surprised to be over halfway through without seeing one mention that Don Diego and Zorro are the same person. Once I finish that, I'll make a project of rewatching my favorite Zorro movies.

The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles (1992-93)



This year is the 25th anniversary of Young Indiana Jones, so I decided I should probably finally watch the whole thing. I was a fan back in the day, but its sporadic schedule made me miss a bunch of episodes and I finally just gave up.

The DVD collection (which is what's on Amazon Prime for me to watch) has Special Editioned them, but I don't really mind. They've taken out the framing sequences with the 90-year-old Indy and I'm kind of sad that those aren't available for me to watch if I want to, but I also didn't especially like them. And I do really like that the episodes are reorganized into chronological order instead of jumping around between 10-year-old and teenaged Indy.

David asked me if I recommend the show and I don't know that I do. Not unconditionally anyway. I'm enjoying it, but it's very different from the adventures of Harrison Ford. Each episode has its small mystery or adventure, but the focus is mostly on introducing a new place or historical figure. It's entertainingly educational; it's just not thrilling in the way that Indiana Jones is known for.

I'm partway into the 10-year-old's travels with his parents and governess as they follow Henry Sr on a lecture tour. We've been to three different parts of Africa, and a few places in Europe (Paris, Vienna, and Florence, so far). Highlights include Lukas Haas as Norman Rockwell, Danny Webb (Henry V) as Picasso, and Max Von Sydow as Freud.

Underground (2016-present)



Finally, I'm about halfway through the first season of Underground and am loving the show. It starts off as sort of a disturbing, Southern version of Downton Abbey. It never focuses long on the owners of the Macon plantation (which is good, because they're horrible), but there's instead a stark contrast between the lives of the house slaves and the field slaves. Neither group is well off, but they have different challenges that are fascinating to learn and think about.

Mixed into that story is another one about John Hawkes, the brother of the plantation's owner Tom. Both brothers are from the north, but where Tom has become a slave owner, John very strongly believes in abolition. So he and his wife Elizabeth consider becoming a part of the Underground Railroad and have to weigh the costs of participating in an illegal, but morally right endeavor.

Very quickly though, the focus of the show becomes an escape plan by a group of the Macon slaves. It's led by Noah, who's tried to escape once before, but managed to hide the fact even though he was caught. Smart guy and Aldis Hodge is absolutely captivating in the part. The rest of the group comes from a mixture of people hand-picked by Noah for their talents and/or abilities to get things that the group will need. And not all of them have the group's best interests at heart. Once they run, the show takes on a Walking Dead feel with slave hunters standing in for zombies. It's a brilliant show that constantly changes the way it tells its story so I'm always guessing and always intrigued.

Jam of the Week: "Burn the White Flag" by Joseph



As I try and make another go of this "7 Days in May" feature, one of the things I wanna do each week is share a song that's making me happy. This is one of my favorites from last year. It's rowdy, folky, and has hand claps. I'm a total sucker for hand claps.

Movies I Missed in 2015: Part 1

As usual, I'm gonna spend the month of January looking back at the movies of 2015. And as usual, before I rank the ones I saw, I'll spend some time listing the ones I wanted to see, but didn't.

The Missed List is usually smaller than the Watched List, but it gained ground in 2014 and actually caught up in 2015. As of right now, there are 36 movies on both lists. Lots of reasons for that, most of them boring. But because I hope to sneak a couple of movies off the Missed List and onto the Watched this month, I'm going to break the Missed List into a few sections, giving me time to watch a couple of them before I reach the end. Again as usual, I'm listing these more or less in the order they were released.

Feel free to let me know in the comments which I need to bump to the top of the To Watch List.

1. Paddington



Trailers for this made it seem like the last thing I'd want to watch - a slapsticky affair trying to draw humor from putting refined Hugh Bonneville in ridiculous situations. But by all accounts - and I do mean all - this is really good and touching and I need to give it a look.

2. Match



Love all of these actors, especially Patrick Stewart, and this looks like a great role for him. Lots of character stuff with a little mystery thrown in for fun. Should've seen this by now.

3. McFarland USA



I'm a sucker for underdog movies and I like the cast of unknowns. Except for Costner, of course, but lately he's been resurrecting the good will I felt for him early in his career.

4. Everly



Salma Hayek plays a woman under siege in her own apartment. Trailer makes it look less like The Panic Room and more like Machete though, so I'm very curious.

5. The Salvation



Seems like every year there's a Western that I totally missed hearing anything about. This time it's got Le Chiffre and Vesper Lynd and I'm all in.

6. The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel



Loved the first one and I have every reason to believe I'll love the second one, but its mere existence feels unnecessary to me. I didn't really want more with these characters, but now that there is more, I'm compelled to revisit them.

7. Cinderella



Not my favorite fairy tale and I was super irritated that the trailer told the entire story. That's always a sure way to keep me out of the theater. I'm fond of Kenneth Branagh though and I've heard that he does put fingerprints on the story instead of just straightforwardly retelling it, so I'm curious.

8. It Follows



I'm picky about the horror movies I watch, so I rarely go when they first come out. Instead, I'll wait and listen for the buzz to figure out what the good ones are. This one has a swarm around it.

9. Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter



I have no idea what to expect from this other than it looks gorgeous and the Coen Bros' Fargo is a driving force in the plot. Curiosity engaged.

10. Woman in Gold



I either love or am fond of so many people in this movie: Helen Mirren, Ryan Reynolds, Katie Holmes, Charles Dance, and Elizabeth McGovern. And I'm interested in the themes about art and ownership that The Monuments Men thought about, but didn't explore fully enough for my taste. Also: courtroom drama.

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit (2014)

My expectations for the new Jack Ryan movie were really stinking low. I've enjoyed the couple of Tom Clancy novels I've read (Clear and Present Danger and Without Remorse), but I wouldn't exactly call myself a fan of the books. I loved the first three movies based on them though. Hunt for Red October is a great thriller and Alec Baldwin's Jack Ryan is a different kind of hero: an analyst who prefers to think his way out of problems rather than use violence. Hiring middle-aged Harrison Ford for Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger made a lot of sense then, letting the character continue to be an intellectual instead of an action star.

I never saw Sum of All Fears, partly because I'm not super fond of Ben Affleck as an actor, but also because I hated the concept of de-aging Jack Ryan. I was afraid that he'd become just another actiony superspy. I still have no idea if that was true for Sum of All Fears, though no one's ever recommended it to me as a must-watch, but it was also my fear for Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit. It felt like such a cynical gimmick for Paramount to reboot the series, like they wanted their own Bond or Bourne series and this was the way they were going to get it. If it hadn't been for the cast, I wouldn't have even bothered with it.

I can take or leave Chris Pine, but Keira Knightley and Kenneth Branagh are people I love. I'll watch pretty much anything with either of them in it. I'm also interested in Kevin Costner at this stage of his career. I was hot and cold on him in early days (mostly cold except for The Untouchables and maybe Bull Durham), but in spite of the huge problems I had with the way Pa Kent was written in Man of Steel, there were no issues with the way Costner played him. I was looking forward to seeing him mentor Pine in Jack Ryan.

10 Favorite Movie Characters: Adaptation Edition

Siskoid started it this time. Since we both limited our original 10 Favorite Movie Characters lists to characters who'd originated in movies, he thought it would be fun to do a separate list of characters adapted from other media. And so did I.

I didn't start off with extra rules for myself this time, but in order to trim my list down to 10 (from an original 23) I decided that the final cut would be made up only of characters where I actually prefer the movie version to the original. I'll list the other 13 at the end without much in the way of additional comments.

Incidentally, I'm glad I waited to read Siskoid's list until after I finished my own. His would have heavily influenced mine since I also love - amongst others - Michael Caine's Alfred and JK Simmons' Jonah Jameson.

1. Robin Hood (Robin Hood)



I didn't see Errol Flynn's version of Robin Hood until I was an adult, so my childhood image of the character was shaped mostly by Howard Pyle's thorough, but mostly dry accounts of his exploits. As a result, I loved the idea of Robin Hood, but didn't truly fall in love with the character until Disney turned him into a dashing, cunning, swashbuckling fox (whom I still prefer to Errol Flynn, by the way).

2. Henry V (Henry V)



Kenneth Branagh is single-handedly responsible for making me fall in love with Shakespeare. His performance in Henry V is what did it. Until then I thought Shakespeare's history plays were pretty dull, dry stuff (I'd never seen one performed at that point), but Branagh brought it to life. He made it exciting to watch young, foolish Prince Hal transform himself into a competent and inspirational leader.

3. Gomez Addams (Addams Family, Addams Family Values)



Let's face it: Gomez Addams in Charles Addams' cartoons doesn't have a lot of personality. And though John Astin is funny and charming as the character, he doesn't equal the hilarious, manic insanity of Raul Julia's performance. Julia made me want to be Gomez. (Though Angelica Huston as Morticia didn't make the fantasy any less appealing either.)

4. Hawkeye (The Last of the Mohicans)



I couldn't make it all the way through James Fenimore Cooper's famous novel. Conversely, I can't stop watching the Michael Mann movie. One of my favorite things to do is watch Daniel Day Lewis play dapper, stuffy Cecil in A Room with a View and then immediately watch him as the iconically rugged Hawkeye. His range as an actor blows my mind.

5. Porthos (The Three Musketeers)



The literary Porthos is okay, but he's also an arrogant, vain blowhard. Platt's version, on the other hand, is a dashing pirate. I wish this production would've spent some money on costumes, because other than that it's my favorite adaptation of The Three Musketeers.

6. Rogue (X-Men)



I've always been a big fan of Rogue and by all rights I should have hated the changes they made to her in X-Men. But Anna Paquin made me love her all over again as a completely different character by combining the least annoying parts of Kitty Pride with the pathos of Rogue. And Paquin is such a talented actress that I root for her so much harder than I root for the comics version (who, frankly, can be infuriating at times).

7. Boromir (The Fellowship of the Ring)



I hate Boromir in Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring. He's a whiny, deluded, backstabbing bastard. I get that we're supposed to think he's more than that, but we're not given any reason to see him as more. Not until Sean Bean came along we're not. Thanks to him and Peter Jackson's script, Boromir becomes a tragic character that I deeply wish could've come to a different end.

8. Susan Pevensie (The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe)



I saw the Narnia films before I read CS Lewis' series and wow was I ever disappointed in Susan as Lewis wrote her. The film version of Susan is the most hesitant of the Pevensie siblings, but she eventually comes around and her early reluctance makes her final acceptance that much more sweet and powerful. I like her much more than Lucy who seems to come to faith so easily. Susan's more relatable because she has to work so hard. Unfortunately, Lewis' Susan never overcomes and becomes a symbol of lost faith. What a rip off.

9. Tony Stark (Iron Man)



Comics Tony Stark: Rich jerk who's only interesting when he's making me hate him for killing Captain America.

Movie Tony Stark: "I'm sorry. This is the fun-vee. The humdrum-vee is back there."

10. Scotty (Star Trek)



Absolutely no disrespect intended to James Doohan who eventually turned Scotty into a sweet, lovable character, but his young Scotty wasn't sweet and lovable. Maybe I'm missing the point (and let me know if I am), but as far as I can tell he was mostly there to fix the ship, run the transporters, and occasionally make us chuckle. Simon Pegg's Scotty, on the other hand, was the brightest spot in an already fun, bright movie.

Characters I like about the same as the versions they're adapted from:

• Ebenezer Scrooge (pretty much every version of A Christmas Carol)
• James Bond (as played in Doctor No, From Russia with Love, Thunderball, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, For Your Eyes Only, The Living Daylights, Goldeneye, Casino Royale, and Quantum of Solace)
• Frankenstein's Monster (as played in Bride of Frankenstein)
• Captain Blood (as played by Errol Flynn in Captain Blood)
• Jayne (Serenity, which is kind of cheating since it was the same actor playing the same character from Firefly, but still...)

Adapted characters I like, but have never seen or read about the original version:

• Lucy Honeychurch (A Room with a View)
• Amos Starkadder (Cold Comfort Farm)
• Mouse Alexander (Devil in a Blue Dress)
• Severus Snape (the Harry Potter films)
• John Rambo (First Blood)
• Cal McAffrey (State of Play)
• Mr. Knightley (Emma)
• V (V for Vendetta)

Return of the Awesome List: Holmes vs. Thor

Holmes stills



/Film has a couple of new stills from Guy Ritchie's upcoming Sherlock Holmes movie. That's Jude Law and Robert Downey Jr. as Watson and Holmes above, obviously. You can see the other one here.

Branagh on Thor



Kenneth Branagh has confirmed that the Thor movie will be awesome. By which I mean that he'll be directing it. Branagh can do zero wrong as far as I'm concerned, so any worries I had about enjoying Thor are gone. I'm now unconditionally enthusiastic.

He says that they're currently working out the story and how the effects will work, but they don't have a cast yet. "Someone sensational is going to play the part but it is early days." I sincerely hope he casts himself as Fandral.

The only thing he's revealed about the story so far is that it's "a human story right in the center of a big epic scenario." He obviously has a lot of respect for the property though, saying that Marvel "sort of raided (Norse mythology) in a brilliant way."

Seriously, I can't possibly describe how excited I am right now.