"Thumbs Up"... Kind of...

WARNING: I'm about to go into full Comic-Book Guy mode, so just a heads up.

Never has such a frustrating movie come my way!  The comic book lover in me wants to embrace this thing, giving it at least a *** star rating.  The subtle references are spot on as is the over-your-head-but-not-mine dialogue (mostly delivered by Kevin Smith).  Meanwhile, the film lover in me wants to totally bash the hell out of this abortion of a movie advertised as a "hillarious" mockumentary.  So, how do I decide?

First up, the acting.  Mark Hamill decided to surround himself with voice actors like himself.  This is both a positive and a negative.  While some are easy to see why they stay V.O. actors, others are actually quite funny.  Most notable are Tom Kenny (TV's Spongebob Squarepants as well as having a few random parts on the sketch-comedy series "Mr. Show") and Billy West (Fry from "Futurama" [it's actually kind of easy to tell] as well as the voice behind "Looney Toon" characters young and old).  West probably has the best part, especially a hilariously awkward love scene between his character and fellow V.O. actress Lori Alan.

The real area where this thing sinks is when it strays from its mockumentary roots.  It seems that everytime it drifts away from it's improv style, everything just stops and the eerily un-funniness sinks in.  It probably could have been much better if Hammill had just played himself and rather than create something, he could have just been an interviewer of sorts and make something along the lines of "Trekkies."  Also, the stoner cameraman just isn't funny at all (pretty much a cheap knock-off of Otto), and should have stopped while he was ahead... which was never.

So, I present two different ratings:

Comic-Book Fans: ***1/2 out of ****

Normies: *1/2 out of ****

...God, I'm so confused...

DVD Extras: ***1/2 out of ****

I will say this: for a straight-to-video release, Miramax really went all out with this great 2-disc set.  The interviews are incredible (especially when Hammill does his voices at a Comic Con) as is the commentary where it seems everyone goes into funny voices mode.  Really, the only downfall is the deleted scenes, which were gracefully dropped.

I know i'm a little out of date here but I just got this film because before now it was way too much for me

I'd consider myself a normie, I know less about comic books than a 3 year old who rips them up and drools on them but after watching this film which is boring at times, it's a really good film with voice actors you don't even know like Pinky and The Brain and Spongebob

I actually hope when they talked about the p and b movie, it actually happens