The Big Picture: The Big Letdown

[punipunipyo]

Wait... what superman? I thought it was Dragonball Z the movie... wait.. superman? WTF? But... superman NEVER lets the bad guys get away with killing so many... He'd NEVER reveal his ID THIS EASY, and he's NEVER let him self down to his enemy's level... he ALWAYS wins by overcoming/overwhelming/overpowering the baddies... I thought this was simply Gouku not knowing super sayan power yet... I mean... we even saw the sayans rip jets with their own hands! just like the cartoons!~ wow... well played, Mr.Nolan... well played... you fooled Zach too; to make him do the DBZ actions and slapped on superman costumes and fooled all of us... well played...

 

[endtherapture]

I just don't get how Bob can constantly fellate and praise The Avengers when that was a very shallow film. Man of Steel wasn't anything paritcularly deep, but it was more thought-provoking than The Avengers, why is that a bad thing?

Nowhere in this video did Bob even bring up the Avengers. This was all about DC and its recent failures.

And as a person who is unfamiliar with the source material of both the Marvel and DC universes, I have to say Man of Steel is incredibly shallow in what it presented. At the end of all the Marvel movies, I feel like I understood the characters. I got why Tony Stark was Iron Man. I got why Rogers was Captain America. I got why Thor was Thor, I got why Romanov was the Black Widow, I got why Barton was Hawkeye.

Note I'm saying why, not how. At the end of Man of Steel, I understood how he was Superman, but I didn't know why. There wasn't a character there. I feel like they were going somewhere with his whole childhood of having to deal with lots of noises and such, but all of that perceived empathy and self-sacrifice they tried to imbue in him was completely absent in the final act. All that collateral damage, all those people killed in the wake of their fight, and he didn't even try to lead them away to a more remote location. He was supposed to be some sort of embodiment of all humanity should be, yet he himself forgot all about that in favor of finishing up his fistfight.

It's not about Bob bringing up Avengers in this video, it's his long term trend of bringing up the Avengers as the pinnacle of modern filmmaking since it got released, in the majority of his videos, whilst also bashing Spider-Man, TDKR and Man of Steel.

It's an origin movie, Superman hasn't yet "found" himself and I'm willing to give that up in the first film to get a more interesting, character-driven sequel where Clark is finding it place in the world. It's going for a different arc.

That made no sense to me. And at the end when he killed Zod, it didn't even occur to me that he would find that to be such a problem. Again, I knew next to nothing about Superman going into this movie. I had no idea he was so against killing his enemies. So when Zod dies, I was just wondering why Supes was so torn up about it. For a moment, I wondered if it was all the carnage around him finally sinking in. It wasn't until later when I watched Bob's review that I realized killing wasn't something he normally did.

It's an origin story. That event OBVIOUSLY set up the fact that he's against killing in later films because it traumatised him so much. I don't get why people don't get this, it's so obvious.

I also felt like Lois's presence was completely unnecessary. Hell I can't even remember what exactly she contributed to the film's events--is there anything that literally wouldn't have happened without her? I mean, when she spots him in that glacier, he was already there. All she did was witness what happened on that ship, she didn't actually contribute anything. And then when she's locked up with him in that military base, the things he said to her he could have said to anyone else. In fact, he probably would have said them to anyone else, because he was completely in control of the situation. She doesn't do anything to help him that couldn't have been accomplished by anyone else, she doesn't aid in any amount of character development, all she seems to do is trigger exposition. She talks to Supes because someone needs to get him to talk about himself. She talks to his mother because someone needs to get her to talk about Supes. Her presence could have been replaced by a few flashbacks and a couple of military interrogators.

If there's another lesson to be learned by the Avengers here, it's that Man of Steel didn't use everything it put out on the table. In the Avengers, everybody is there for a reason, and everybody has an influence on the story's outcome. I was a bit disappointed that Natalie Portman didn't appear in the Avengers, especially since Pepper got at least a few moments on screen, but later I realized she didn't really have to be there, and that's where the film's strength was. It was dealing with a lot of strong characters, but it made sure every one of them got used. And in order for that to happen, there couldn't be any unnecessary characters to hold them down.

Lois and the Daily Planet crew were only there because it was decided they couldn't have a Superman film without them, so they kept them in there. But the story was not structured around their presence, they amounted to little more than window dressing. And it's not that they couldn't have found some way for them to influence the story, they just didn't. It apparently wasn't high enough on their priority list, somehow they decided that simply having them exist within the world was "good enough." Having the Black Widow and Hawkeye in the Avengers movie isn't awesome because the Black Widow and Hawkeye are members of the Avengers. It's awesome because they're in the movie, and they do awesome stuff.

So that's my general problem with Man of Steel. The film didn't do anything meaningfully or consistently enough for me to feel like I understand Clark Kent or Kal El by the end of it. Whatever points it set itself up to make were sabotaged later by other parts of the film.

Once again, it's an origin story, so it's setting up the characters and how they see Superman for further installments. There was some pretty cool action scenes like Lois in the ship being guided by Jor-El and Lois was a great female lead. If they'd just introduced Lois/all the daily Planet characters straight off in MoS2, people would've complained that they weren't around in the first movie and were shoehorned in.

War-Machine is in the first Iron Man movie right...when he doesn't really need to be? So that criticism can be leveled at Iron Man also.

 

[Teoes]

Bob just wants everything to be like The Avengers and all funny and upbeat and Robert Downey Jr. But we have The Avengers already...so what's wrong with Man of Steel going for a more serious tone? Nothing.

You've discussed a number of points with other users but I just wanted to bring this part up.

I think you've got the wrong idea here. He's mentioned in the past - Captain America review, I think - that actually he found it refreshing that for once the hero wasn't reluctant (Spider-Man), snarky (Iron Man) or brooding (Batman). He's also gone back to say that he'd perhaps been too kind on earlier Iron Man films. It's not that he wants everything to be funny and upbeat, it's that he's tired of so many things going the grimdark or miserable route. MoS was a pretty miserable film in the eyes of many.

 

[IronMit]

Zach Snyder looks like Mark Ruffalo.

Also, David Goyer is a hack and I blame him for this movie being what it was.

The movie was so bad it's impossible for me to blame it on any one guy.

It failed on every level; who's idea was it to have matrix pod babies? Some sort of kryptonion socialist-communist failing utopia that harvests the planets core because that's what a pre-defined babies with no freedom would do? The foundation of this movie was pure nonsense and on top of that they compounded on even more nonsense.

Then you 3 disaster flashbacks

Then you have plot holes including; centuries old off world colonies not being able to sustain themselves for even 24 years but have operational 'World engines' lying around

Then you have Lois spouting exposition every 5 minutes & popping up everywhere important

ZOD giving technobable every 10 minutes

Expecting the audience to care about Morpheus because he had one scene where he was annoying.

Superman killing Zod to save some middle class family after 100,000 + were already slaughtered

So many comments here of people saying Bob likes Marvel or Bob doesn't like it because it wasn't the superman we expected. We don't like it because it through and through garbage.
Most disappointing movie of the summer? try worst movie since The Medallion.

 

[endtherapture]

Bob just wants everything to be like The Avengers and all funny and upbeat and Robert Downey Jr. But we have The Avengers already...so what's wrong with Man of Steel going for a more serious tone? Nothing.

You've discussed a number of points with other users but I just wanted to bring this part up.

I think you've got the wrong idea here. He's mentioned in the past - Captain America review, I think - that actually he found it refreshing that for once the hero wasn't reluctant (Spider-Man), snarky (Iron Man) or brooding (Batman). He's also gone back to say that he'd perhaps been too kind on earlier Iron Man films. It's not that he wants everything to be funny and upbeat, it's that he's tired of so many things going the grimdark or miserable route. MoS was a pretty miserable film in the eyes of many.

The thing is...that's Bob's opinion. I think it's fair enough to have a serious superhero series with some gravitas, which Justice League might be, with room for maybe a bit more comedy in there (the Flash maybe?) and then having this bubblegum, funny, upbeat series in the form of The Avengers, then we get the best of both worlds.

Either way, I wouldn't say Superman was "broody" in this film, not nearly as much as Batman. He mourned the death of his Earth father yes, and had some struggle with himself over what was the right thing to do when Zod arrived, but that's one way of making Superman interesting, and relatable. There were PLENTY of uplifting moments in this film, namely when he learned to fly for the first time which just made me heart soar, and when he destroys the Drone at the end, and many more. Just because he wasn't constantly wisecracking and making cheesey comments.

I really liked this interpretation, and it's the only time I've actually enjoyed Superman as a character on film. They made Superman a human, relatable character, which is a marvellous achievement.

 

[Teoes]

Either way, I wouldn't say Superman was "broody" in this film, not nearly as much as Batman. He mourned the death of his Earth father yes, and had some struggle with himself over what was the right thing to do when Zod arrived, but that's one way of making Superman interesting, and relatable. There were PLENTY of uplifting moments in this film, namely when he learned to fly for the first time which just made me heart soar, and when he destroys the Drone at the end, and many more. Just because he wasn't constantly wisecracking and making cheesey comments.

I really liked this interpretation, and it's the only time I've actually enjoyed Superman as a character on film. They made Superman a human, relatable character, which is a marvellous achievement.

I didn't say Superman was broody/miserable in this film - I said the film was broody/miserable, which is the over-riding feeling I got from it. I won't argue that there's uplifting moments in MoS and points full of hope, but that's the source of many people's criticism, Bob's included - that characters harp on about hope, but in the end Superman doesn't really embody much hope here. He spends a lot of time in the action sequences with his war-face on, bellowing and punching things. Not exactly pinnacle of humankind's hopes and dreams material, that. I felt like the film was too angry and my lady thought the same when we went to see it together; it's a similar feeling that she got from District 9, which I thought was great, but she doesn't want to watch again because it's just such an angry piece.

Once again, it's an origin story, so it's setting up the characters and how they see Superman for further installments. There was some pretty cool action scenes like Lois in the ship being guided by Jor-El and Lois was a great female lead. If they'd just introduced Lois/all the daily Planet characters straight off in MoS2, people would've complained that they weren't around in the first movie and were shoehorned in.

It's funny that you say this in response to Lilani's post, where she's explained how she felt that those characters were shoe-horned into the first MoS film - and how respective supporting/secondary characters in the various Marvel origin films don't feel shoe-horned in, are more central to the story or the main characters' developments and actually do more.

But whatever - I doubt I'm going to change your mind and you're not going to change mine as we're both talking about our opinions, so like so many internet discussions this'll go nowhere, right?

 

[Zetatrain]

Only Zod (thanks to Michael Shannon's overacting) brought some much needed life into this film and was closet to having a definable character. I understood his motivation, I got understood goals, I even got his BACKSTORY from all that time spent on Krypton. And ya know what, he actually DID STUFF to go about achieving said goals. As far as I'm concerned, HE'S the main character of the movie and this movie was his Shakespearean tragedy...

Why couldn't he say 'yo superman.You know those many off world colonies we have I will just go there - 100% chance of success. Just let me suck out the codex from you'. end movie.

My memory is a bit fuzzy on the subject,but wasn't it explained that the reason those colonies were abandoned so long ago was because they didn't have the resources to self-sustain themselves (lack of resources and food)?

 

[Gronk]

This is getting really old, Bob. I know you don't like the all movies, you say so in your reviews. But making video after video where you keep bashing those movies? That's just petty bitterness.

Not that you care, but I'm really starting to lose respect for you, not personally ofcourse, but as a professional reviewer. Go review some new movies instead, please.

oh and by the way:

Man of steel: Loved it!
Pacific rim: Boring trash. Talk about missed opportunities.
Avengers: Shallow, boring trash.
Dark knight: Fell asleep.
Amazing spiderman: Haven't seen it, but since you just can't stop complaining about it, i might just have to.

 

[IronMit]

Why couldn't he say 'yo superman.You know those many off world colonies we have I will just go there - 100% chance of success. Just let me suck out the codex from you'. end movie.

My memory is a bit fuzzy on the subject,but wasn't it explained that the reason those colonies were abandoned so long ago was because they didn't have the resources to self-sustain themselves (lack of resources and food)?

I just rewatched a few scenes from the film. Zod says his been preparing for 33 years give or take until Clark conveniently activated the distress beacon on that ship in the ice.
How old was that ship in the ice? hundred? thousands of years? it was at least hundreds .They mentioned it- can't remember exactly.

So this spacefaring species of at least hundreds of years of experience that has many off world colonies, didn't make them self sustaining? They made world engines to teraform planets to make them habitable. Because transporting food across planets is the dumbest thing you could do. They have so many world engines Zod finds one lying around. Yet everyone is dead.

This is what you call a contrivance. The needed Zod to get his hands on a 'world engine' and weapons when he escaped prison, so they made up some rubbish about off world colonies that all conveniently died out in 1-3 decades but left a working world engine. Eventhough none of that makes sense.

There are small plotholes in movies like ' why didn't a character just do this', but this one is the foundation of everything that happens in the movie.

 

[Riobux]

Movie Bob, as always saying that changing comic book films for a wider audience as a negative thing. The problem with comic books is they are too out of touch and too retarded. For comic book fans, it's okay. However, when DC seems to do things like make light of suicide at the beginning of Suicide Awareness Month, it really is a sign of just how out of touch with reality the company is. Once you start getting into the writing of the comic it's self, the more out of touch they really are. For comic book fans, the various hi-jinks comic book companies do is completely fine and the wackiness and insanity of the writing is dandy. For everyone else, it's likely just a bit too much. So for a film to have anything resembling a budget, they do have to adapt that for the wider audience. Otherwise, it just simply wouldn't get touched and would go down as a controversy vehicle.

Seriously, people have to start admitting there are core problems with comics. There are core problems with everything, just the realisation that comic books are not the exception and noticing what these problems are is important for some sense of progression. At the very least, knowing it is able to put reviews in a different light. Comic books will barely ever be true to their source material, because doing that would get at least someone fired.

 

[Strazdas]

Now, I'll use the following quote, but this goes to all who are sharing this sentiment in the above comments:

the harping on the same movies over and over again is sort of making him harder and harder to watch.

Then don't.

These videos are a way for Bob to share his personal opinion, a fact he makes sure to mention often in the videos themselves.

All of you, complaining about his opinions or fixations being grating... Why are you watching his videos then?

Because beside his fixation with hating same movie over and over again, hes a pretty decent movie critic?

If you somehow fail to realize our right to critisize his opinion, watch this weeks Jimquisition.

 

[Winnosh]

This was one of the first movies I ever almost walked out on... And I saw Transformers 2 and stayed through that trainwreck

It was a fun stupid action movie but in no way a Superman movie.

Oops made a mistake it's early I usually can call something a fun stupid movie... this one is just stupid.

 

[Paradoxrifts]

The moral of the story is that if you're a creative sort who has been handed the reigns to a long-standing character that has seen as much endless reinterpretation and reinvention as Superman, it's probably better to strike out on your own and deliver a bold new vision then a patchwork quilt of ideas that have been plucked from the context which gave them meaning. Overall, I still liked it though. Actually it reminded me quite strongly of watching Bladerunner, so far as the movie consisted of a series of very nicely done and compelling scenes which didn't quite fit together quite so strongly as a united whole.

And is it just me or does Superman and Batman have the most schizophrenic audiences ever?

Just two people alone can watch the same movie and come away with completely different responses. With a character like Superman not only do you have that problem, but each person's own personal interpretation of the character would be a gestalt of many different versions of the same character which they've been exposed to over the years.

 

[Sejborg]

"The biggest most crushing disappointment of the summer 2013"

He is calling Man of Steel this? Wow. What movies has he watched this summer? How about The Hangover part 3, The Lone Ranger or After Earth?

Oh I see. "Disapointment". He had worked himself into a ridiculous frenzy of expectations. Bob, get over yourself. A critic who is getting carried away by hype is pathetic and unprofessional.

 

[Milanezi]

Movie Bob being a fanboy and saying he ALMOST NEVER gets hyped? Yeah right...
When I first saw Man of Steel I had my problems with it, but the main one was the level of destruction that went through Metropolis and how inconsequential Superman was at times. And then I got to thinking and had to ask myself "Metropolis goes through much worse every damn month when I buy the comics, I don't have a right to complain about a movie that is just as absurd as the comics", I mean no one would live in Metropolis in real life, every time something huge takes half the city or enslaves the people, or simply Brainiac takes a whole chunk of the city away, and I always "deal with it" in the comics, these dudes followed this disaster recipe in the movie and I complained, when i saw the movie a second time I had this in my mind and two other factors "Superman being a noob hero" (read that: he might be super as far as strength goes, but he's prone to mistakes nonetheless) fighting another guy who's strong as he is, AND doesn't give a shit, which means we have a battle of titans at hand. So yeah, realizing it DID have the comic book feel (a gritty version though...) made me feel more in touch with the movie. But of course Movie Bob is the guy with the job (*cough*critic*cough*) that entitles his opinion to be law (in Earth Bob).
And I really do believe Bob is exploiting his accent, he loves the whole "look he's using his Boston accent! He's mad wow!"

 

[JimB]

Now, I'll use the following quote, but this goes to all who are sharing this sentiment in the above comments:

The harping on the same movies over and over again is sort of making him harder and harder to watch.

Then don't.

These videos are a way for Bob to share his personal opinion, a fact he makes sure to mention often in the videos themselves.

All of you, complaining about his opinions or fixations being grating... Why are you watching his videos then?

Because beside his fixation with hating same movie over and over again, hes a pretty decent movie critic?

If you somehow fail to realize our right to criticize his opinion, watch this week's Jimquisition.

I think about half of the complaints regarding Mr. Chipman's videos are pretty hypocritical. Most of them--like the quoted example here, actually--are not criticisms at all, because they don't tackle the content of his message. They only say the person complaining is tired of hearing him deliver the same message over and over again, apparently with no self-awareness of how anyone else might be getting tired of hearing the "I'm getting tired of your message" message.

 

[Strazdas]

Now, I'll use the following quote, but this goes to all who are sharing this sentiment in the above comments:

The harping on the same movies over and over again is sort of making him harder and harder to watch.

Then don't.

These videos are a way for Bob to share his personal opinion, a fact he makes sure to mention often in the videos themselves.

All of you, complaining about his opinions or fixations being grating... Why are you watching his videos then?

Because beside his fixation with hating same movie over and over again, hes a pretty decent movie critic?

If you somehow fail to realize our right to criticize his opinion, watch this week's Jimquisition.

I think about half of the complaints regarding Mr. Chipman's videos are pretty hypocritical. Most of them--like the quoted example here, actually--are not criticisms at all, because they don't tackle the content of his message. They only say the person complaining is tired of hearing him deliver the same message over and over again, apparently with no self-awareness of how anyone else might be getting tired of hearing the "I'm getting tired of your message" message.

If he is tired of hearing our response, he can fully ignore it or say something about it. Its his choice. Or he could go the way Jim went in early days of Jimquisition, listened to constructive cirticism and improved his performance. Criticism can be of delivery method as well, not only the message itself. we are nto saying that he should not express his opinion about how he dislikes MOS. we are saying that once he did that he could move on to other subjects instead of repeating it constantly. we already know his opinion - he already said it. how about moving on?

 

[Lilani]

It's an origin movie, Superman hasn't yet "found" himself and I'm willing to give that up in the first film to get a more interesting, character-driven sequel where Clark is finding it place in the world. It's going for a different arc.

That is no excuse. If anything, it being an origin story should make the movie all about establishing the characters, because without the characters everything else is meaningless. Sorry about the Avengers comparison again, but really it's the best example and I'm going to prove to you people don't think it's superior just because the writing is more witty. The beginning of Iron Man was spent setting up how much of an egotistical asshole Tony Stark was. The beginning of Captain America was spent setting up Roger's tendency to pick fights he could never win on principle. The beginning of Thor was spent establishing Thor's status as the son of Odin and a selfish, immature asshole.

And the rest of their films spent their time around character development. Yes, other things happened, but they made sure the events did not overpower the significant change in character. The part of Iron Man that sticks out the most in my mind is the part when Tony is in the cave, hooked up to a battery, and building the machine that would not only save his life but define his future. The part of Captain America that sticks out the most in my mind is the training scene when Rogers and the other privates are told to get the flag down from the flagpole, and Rogers shows them all up by taking the pins out of the pole and bringing it down to the ground, where he not only shows up all the muscleheads but also for one of the first times gets rewarded for his selflessness--and he himself doesn't see it as a big deal, and doesn't make a big deal of being rewarded for it. And the part of Thor that sticks in my mind the most is when Thor is destroying the Bifrost, choosing to do the right and mature thing of saving Asgard and Earth rather than trying to leave it open to serve his own selfish ends.

These stories are nothing without their characters, and so is Man of Steel. Hell, it's where they get their titles from. The first movie should prioritize character development over everything else. Regardless of how much of their budget they blow on special effects, ultimately people go to a Superman movie to see Superman. The Krypton stuff is interesting and all, but that isn't where the meat of the film should be, even in an origin story. Actually, especially in an origin story, because like I said before all of this is nothing without characters. If I don't care about Kal El, I also don't care about where he came from. If I don't see a point in Lois Lane, I'm not going to look forward to seeing her in a sequel. And that is all the fault of the writers for favoring exposition over character development, and not looking hard enough to find a way to link the two.

It's an origin story. That event OBVIOUSLY set up the fact that he's against killing in later films because it traumatised him so much. I don't get why people don't get this, it's so obvious.

You keep saying this, and it's still not making it any better. If they wanted to set it up for him to be against killing people, they should have set it up long before then. And again, his actions in the final act with the fight should have reflected this. Character development 101: Actions speak louder than words. Remember all those favorite scenes from the Marvel movies I listed earlier? All actions. I didn't like those moments because of the "snappy, upbeat" writing, I liked them because they were satisfying moments which reinforced the tones and themes set up by the rest of the film. They were moments which reflected a greater pattern of development and change.

On top of that, your excuse doesn't make sense in the context of that scene. If he wasn't against Zod before he killed him, why all the hesitation in the first place? If he wasn't against killing before that moment, why was he even considering putting that family in that much more danger in the first place? And why would the death of someone who was trying to deliberately kill others be so much more traumatizing to him than the millions of lives he ruined by staging his fist fight in New York? If there's any trauma that should have occurred from killing, it should have been from that, not from snapping Zod's neck.

War-Machine is in the first Iron Man movie right...when he doesn't really need to be? So that criticism can be leveled at Iron Man also.

No, War Machine was in the second Iron Man movie, and it was a logical development in the story since Tony went public about being Iron Man. While Iron Man was about Tony growing up as a person, Iron Man 2 was about him figuring out his role as a hero, and it was Rhodes as War Machine that helped him come to terms with the fact that he wasn't invulnerable and that he did have a responsibility to those around him. Rhodes in the War Machine suit directly aided in Tony's character development.

But please, if you want to keep throwing secondary Marvel characters at me to distract from Lois's deficiencies, continue. I'm guessing you have no rebuttal for my assessment of her role in the movie, since you opted to distract rather than to explain. My memory of the film isn't perfect (it's much harder for me to remember disembodied events than specific character moments), so it is very possible I missed something. You're the expert, if Lois is such a great character then tell me what the point of her is. What did she do in Man of Steel, that couldn't have been accomplished by anything else? And how would the film's outcome have been impacted without bringing up the Daily Planet, apart from simply not having the Daily Planet in a Superman movie?

And there's one more thing I'd like to make abundantly clear before we go any further. I'm not saying you shouldn't like the film. If you enjoyed Man of Steel, then that's perfectly fine, and I'm not trying to change that. What isn't fine here is that you have opted to say that objectively, the characters and story are great, which simply isn't true. Just because a film isn't good doesn't mean you can't or shouldn't enjoy it, but your personal tastes do not substitute objectively good storytelling.

So again, I'm not asking you to dislike Man of Steel. But what I am asking you to do here is back up your claims that the characters and storytelling are objectively "great," and I'm hoping you aren't lying to yourself as an excuse to like the film. I enjoyed Star Trek: Into Darkness, and I am perfectly aware of all its flaws. I know the character development is a retread of the previous film, I know Scotty didn't get as much screen time as he deserved, I know the story is contrived and gimmicky. But I got some pretty good visceral thrills from it, and I got enough of a kick from Benadict Cumberbatch and Zachary Quinto that I can honestly say my overall feelings are a net positive.

So you can feel free to like Man of Steel for whatever reasons you do, that isn't what I want. What I want here is for you to stop trying to argue about objective storytelling problems with your subjective feelings about the film. It will get neither of us anywhere.

 

[Lilani]

He is calling Man of Steel this? Wow. What movies has he watched this summer? How about The Hangover part 3, The Lone Ranger or After Earth?

Because the standards were never that high in the first place for the movie that didn't even really need a part 2, the "Johnny Depp in redface" movie, and the M. Night Shyamalan movie ;-)

 

[Sejborg]

He is calling Man of Steel this? Wow. What movies has he watched this summer? How about The Hangover part 3, The Lone Ranger or After Earth?

Because the standards were never that high in the first place for the movie that didn't even really need a part 2, the "Johnny Depp in redface" movie, and the M. Night Shyamalan movie ;-)

I know. And you should too if you had read the rest of my post. Here, let me copy paste that for you:

"Oh I see. "Disapointment". He had worked himself into a ridiculous frenzy of expectations. Bob, get over yourself. A critic who is getting carried away by hype is pathetic and unprofessional."