Ultimate Avengers 2: Rise of the Panther (2006)
Fall of the Plot
Guess what I found on my After-Christmas Crap Search? It was either this or an animated
penguin. But I figured the penguin would sit outside my house and embarass me
in front of the whole neighborhood. This DVD would sit inside my house and
only embarass me in front of....well, my dog.
Now that the novelty of having an Avengers animated feature has passed, all that's left is the actual plot.
That's the biggest problem with this sequel, as things have actually degenerated. The Black Panther
is thrown in to keep the novelty factor chugging along, but that also falls flat.
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| The Coming of... Panda Bear Man! |
Picking up where the last "movie" left off, the Avengers and SHIELD are still hunting
the EVIL Chittari aliens. As this episode opens, the Chittari are invading Wakanda.
It's not much of an invasion, though. Chittari general, Herr Kleiser (the alien Nazi guy
from last time) kills Wakanda's King and resident Black Panther, T'Chaka. It's a fairly
brutal and needlessly violent death, too. All the other alien troopers,
despite having a skirmish with Wakandan troops soon disappear. This is all part
of the Chittari's "master plan" to takeover the world through Wakanda's vibranium mound.
Five minutes in and the movie had already lost me. Big powerful shape-changing aliens
need to take over the isolationist nation of Wakanda. Instead of invading, they draw out one 60 year old guy
in a Black Panther costume and kill him. When that's done, they sit back and rest. Fairly strange,
because the Black Panther doesn't appear powerful at all. No mention is made of
why killing just the king would be strategic or important. Well, it's important..
as a hook to bring the Avengers over to Wakanda.
As expected, T'Chaka's son, T'Challa soon picks up the Black Panther costume. In his father's lab, he
finds newspaper clippings of Captain America and decides to travel to New York to enlist his help. All
the other Wakandan officials are distrustful of foreigners and forbid T'Challa from seeking outside help.
T'Challa, being a master of timing, decides to break into Captain America's bedroom at 12:30 am
to "enlist his help". Um, you could have maybe called first? If I'm asking a relative stranger for help,
my first plan isn't usually "sneak into his bedroom in the middle of the night". Ehh, whatever...
it's not important at all... except as a hook to have Cap and T'Challa jump around a building.
T'Challs goes back to Wakanda shortly after, but the Avengers follow (by the way, they're
officially called "Avengers" this time out). They sneak into Wakanda, then sneak back out. As they're leaving,
Cap sneaks back in, then sneaks back out again. The Chittari take this chance to blow up the
Avengers' giant aircraft (which has multiple levels, a kitchen, bar and a spiral staircase). Thor
manages to teleport everyone away in time, though.
The rest of the flick is a Big Dumb Fight. Avengers vs. aliens. Like all aliens, the Chittari
take to sending talk lanky walkers all around the world, sorta' like the tripods from, ohh...
I dunno, War of the Worlds, the Justice League animated premiere and any other sci-fi flick. A
few subplots are tacked in, in an attempt to spike some interest and give the conflict more
impact.
One plot involves Cap's constant flashbacks to World War II and Kleiser. Cap comes off like
a guy driven by nothing but vengenace. He keeps talking about "killing" Kleiser. Sure, he's a soldier and all, but
having the lead superhero constantly talk about killing someone isn't too..what's the word... heroic.
Thor has his own subplot about seeing the future and the death of the team, coupled with Odin's
reluctance towards Earth/Midgard. It gets all of two minutes, less time than it
took me to type the last two sentences.
Another cavernous subplot includes Giant-Man/Hank Pym and the Wasp/Janet Pym. Jan's pissed
off at Hank for cosntantly trying to boost his ego and impress people. It causes her to resent him
and she cuts herself out of their relationship. In the flick's climactic
battle, Hank wants to be the Big Hero and take out the main alien ship. It's another ego boost, the
same exact thing that Jan supposedly hates. But this time, Jan is suddenly "touched" by
Hank's ego-pumping efforts, cries for him, and realizes she loves him. Huh? Women are tough to figure out,
but cartoon women are frickin' impossible.
More jumbled stuff happens! Black Panther and Captain America drown Kleiser in a giant vat of...
well, we're not told, but I assume it's vibranium. The vibranium hardens and Kleiser is buried in
a giant pool of the stuff. Shortly after, the Wakandans ask T'Challa what they should do
with Kleiser's body. "Bury him" he says. Huh? Thought his body was under a couple tons of hardened
vibranium. The Wakandans are apparently complete dolts in this flick, it seems. The Big Alien
Ship crashes into a neighboring country and all the Wakandans cheer. "Yay! Our neighbors just got
nuked! Wooo!".
Black Panther also gets shot in the chest at close range and it appears he's going to croak.
Next scene, he's under some rubble and no worse for wear.
How did that Big Alien Ship blow up? Well, Iron Man and Giant-Man flew into it for the old
Death Star Vulnerability trick. Cover me Wedge, I'm going in!
Yup, in the middle of it is a power core that can be zapped with
SHIELD's special Gamma Gun. Seems threadbare to me, when these amazingly powerful
superheroes need to rely on GUNS to defeat the bad guys.
There's hardly any teamwork or innovation throughout the whole thing. The Avengers all
smash or shoot stuff. It wouldn't have been too hard to work in some nifty double-team moves.
Maybe have Iron Man toss a shrunken Giant-Man at a spaceship for a Pym-ball
Special. Giant-Man then grows to giant size and smashes the thing. Hell, I would've
even settled for a double-team clothesline from two heroes. Nope, just shoot n' smash!
The Hulk makes a small appearance towards the end, in what is almost a cameo. When everything's
All Blowed Up, the Avengers have a melancholy celebration picnic at their base. Black Widow's
in a slinky dress and appears to be flirting with Iron Man. Next scene, Captain America
grabs her and they begin making out. That's that, and the flick comes to an unsatisfying end.
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| The 86 inch pythons, brother! |
The Special Features are typical DVD-Extra fare. This time, Mark Millar and
Bryan Hitch, creators of the "Ultimates" comic book talk about their work.
This feature isn't out of place, but it almost needed to be on the first
Ultimate Avenegrs DVD, not this one. A gag reel featuring animators
screwing around is also included. It reminds me of those SuperFriends
voiceovers you can find on YouTube-- where they all speak the lines
from "Office Space" or say "Wassssup". Trailers for upcoming DVD releases
of "Iron Man" and "Dr. Strange" close out the extras ("Iron Man" doesn't
look too interesting, but I might pick up the "Dr. Strange" disc).
If you
purchased your DVD at Target, you'll also get an extra disc containing digital comics
for Dr. Strange and Iron Man. Nothing you wouldn't find in your typical torrent download. I can't get into
these, since I always read my comics on the shitter and don't take my computer in there with me. Although, maybe
I can kill a few minutes at work reading 'em.
Overall, I was disappointed with this DVD.
Prosaic fight scenes, vapid "emotional" subplots and some gapping plot-holes ruin any
momentum the "Ultimate Avengers" had from their first installment. They didn't have much
momentum, so things are ground to a freezing halt. Similar to what happened to
Captain America, I wouldn't mind tossing this DVD into the frozen Arctic waters and
not seeing it for another 60 years. Maybe that animated penguin wasn't such a bad idea.
It might've had some garage sale re-sale value at least.
Find out more at : www.ultimateavengers2.com
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