Jim: Roundtable time and participating are: Remember our e-mail
address is thethirdestatesundayreview@yahoo.com and common_ills@yahoo.com Participating in our roundtable are The Third Estate Sunday Review's Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava, and me, Jim; Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude; Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man; C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review; Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills); Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix; Mike of Mikey Likes It!; Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz); Ruth of Ruth's Report; Trina of Trina's Kitchen; Wally of The Daily Jot; Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ; Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends; Isaiah of The World Today Just Nuts and Ann of Ann's Mega Dub. Ava and C.I. plan to just take notes but might chime in. This is a superhero roundtable suggested by a reader.You ask, we provide. This is a superhero roundtable. Superheroes are women and men with super powers -- plus Batman. That was a joke. Maybe it wasn't. Ann, I take it you didn't like Batman?
Ann: In the TV show played by Adam West, no. I couldn't stand Batman. He was pompous and he was fat. That's what we called him, the kids in my family, Fatman. I loved Robin and Ioved Batgirl. Pass on Batman unless it's Michael Keaton.
Jim: Not even Val Kilmer or Christian Bale?
Ann: No. Didn't mind Ben Affleck but I'm looking forward to Robin Pattinson, honestly. I'm interested to see how he will do.
Jim: Stan, you've enjoyed a lot of TV superhero shows but most got --
Stan: Cancelled! I loved THE CAPE, I loved NO ORDINARY FAMILY. Those two spring to mind immediately. I really miss both of those shows.
Rebecca: They were both good but I really do miss THE CAPE. I wish there was a campaign to bring that show back. Instead, we get a reboot of WALKER TEXAS RANGER. Come on now.
Wally: And don't forget NETFLIX. We had so many great MARVEL TV shows. JESSICA JONES, DAREDEVIL, LUKE CAGE, IRON FIST and THE DEFENDERS. Then they were all gone.
Jim: DISNEY+, they've said that they might do something with some of those.
Mike: If it's anything like what they did with WANDAVISION, pass.
Stan: Amen to that.
Wally: And that won't change the fact that we might have finally gotten Hellcat on JESSICA JONES. Patsy, Trish, was moving towards becoming her. I was waiting for Hellcat. I also thought that they cast those shows perfectly.
Jim: Does anybody watch those shows anymore -- go back and watch them.
Mike: I do with IRON FIST. My daughter loves that one best and so we rewatch it a lot.
Jim: I know Ty rewatches SENSE8.
Ty: I do.
Betty: Me too. That was a great show. Another show, similar to that, which I loved was THE TOMORROW PEOPLE which only lasted one season on THE CW. I will still watch that on THE CW SEED.
Jim: I loved THE TOMORROW PEOPLE. That was a great show.
Marcia: And that's the problem with liking a superhero show, a lot of them get cancelled and get cancelled quickly. That's changed a little with THE CW of late.
Jim: BATWOMAN has been renewed for a third season.
Marcia: And they should cancel it and put it out of its misery. Ruby Rose was perfect. Season one was perfect. They scramble now to justify and continue past storylines and characters and they should have known they'd be facing those problems by making a new character Batwoman. I also think Ruby was more prepared to fight for the character to be both more action oriented and deeper. Javicia Leslie seems too accommodating or maybe the writers don't listen to her? She's a good actress when she's given something to do but they don't give her much and the show is way too laid back for an action series.
Betty: And that wig is awful. The hair's too short and it sticks out. It looks like a book being opened up upside down.
Jim: Superhero looks -- when has an actor nailed it.
Ann: I'd say Gal Gadot and Lynda Carter both nailed it as Wonder Woman. I'd say Henry Cavill nailed it as Superman.
Rebecca: Ben acted the role well but I didn't feel he nailed the look in BATMAN V SUPERMAN. That may be in part due to the costume and the coloring of the costume.
Stan: Hugh Jackman nailed Wolverine. He was the perfect actor and he had the acting, he had the look, I don't know that anyone will ever be able to play Wolverine as well as he did.
Betty: Agree on Hugh Jackman but sometimes the actor is perfect but under utilized. The first three X-MEN movies did a better job with the female characters than all that followed; however, Halle Berry was perfect for Storm and she was given so little to do. I'm sick of that, in fact, women standing around and doing nothing or their powers being diminished which is the story of Scarlet Witch -- both in the MARVEL movies and in that awful WANDAVISION.
Jim: Any thoughts on Captain Marvel?
Rebecca: If it were Ms. Marvel, I might care. I loved Carol Danvers as Ms. Marvel back in the 70s comics.
Jim: Have the movies ruined any superhero characters?
Cedric: Green Lantern fan here and I will never forgive DC for that awful film. Up until DEADPOOL, I blamed Ryan Reynolds. But clearly he was not the problem. I will never get over how disappointing that film was.
Betty: Mystique.
Marcia: Thank you!
Betty: Rebecca Romijn was excellent as Mystique. I thought Jennifer Lawrence made a lousy Mystique.
Marcia: Same here. She was too strident, too serious. Rebecca made the character playful and interesting.
Betty: You nailed it. There was nothing playful about her performance. It was dour.
Wally: And made no sense. When was Jennifer Lawrence working with Magneto? She was a villain but Lawrence played her like someone with hurt feelings who stubbed her toe. Way too much drama.
Cedric: Her performance made me seriously question her acting ability. I'm not joking. She may not be a bad actress but she's not very versatile.
Jim: Would anyone say Halle Berry's Catwoman?
Ty: No. Halle played Catwoman beautifully. She was betrayed by a really bad script.
Jim: Okay and --
Ann: I'm interrupting. Can we pause for a moment? I don't need Scarlet Witch fighting Black Widow. I don't need movies where the woman can only fight a woman. That's part of the sexism that harms female superhero movies. CATWOMAN would have been a better movie if they didn't feel the need to pit Catwoman against a movie. Sharon Stone played a very dull villain -- I'm not attacking her acting, the character was poorly written like Mr. .Freeze in BATMAN AND ROBIN. This inability to honor women's strength and power results in a lot of garbage including WANDAVISION. This goes to exactly what Betty was talking about before.
Wally: I don't get why they do that. If they're afraid guys don't want to see it, everyone I know likes strong women. And SALT was a big hit. It's when women go timid or are watered down that they have a problem selling tickets to men.
Rebecca: There are a whole host of movies from the 90s -- women-led movies -- that outright sucked because they undercut the lead character. That list of films would include THE RIVER WILD starring Meryl Streep where, in the third act, her husband becomes this mini-genius and THE LONG KISS GOODNIGHT -- a film which I love until the last scene -- where the boyfriend Hal is suddenly also a spy in the final scene because, apparently, all it takes to become a spy is to sleep with one.
Marcia: I hate both of those movies because they so undercut the women. And Wally's right, strong women -- especially in an action film -- are important. Audiences -- male, female, straight, gay -- love them.
Wally: And often you get the woman you're supposed to root for, a strong woman, and a woman who is more frou-frou. Look at TWISTER where we root for Helen Hunt to get back with Bill Paxton over Jami Gertz because Helen is strong.
Cedric: Exactly.
Jim: Lois Lane?
Ann: When she works, she's strong. Like Margot Kidder played her in the original Superman movies.
Ty: Or Amy Adams in the more recent movies.
Stan: Or Elizabeth Tulloch on the new SUPERMAN AND LOIS. I really love that show, by the way.
Ann: I do too. I didn't watch it until I read Ava and C.I.'s review because I've seen so much Superman -- the fifties TV show, SUPERBOY from the 80s, LOIS & CLARK, SMALLVILLE, the movies, etc. But they really found a way to take a fresh look at the story.
Jim: Anyone want to rank the various Supermans?
Betty: Top five? Henry Cavill is number one, Tyler Hoechlin would come next, Dean Cain at third, Christopher Reeves at fourth, George Reeve at fifth.
Jim: I'm surprised Christopher Reeves ranked so low.
Betty: I didn't see layers to his performance. For Tyler to come in second is really saying something because I had a real crush on Dean in the 90s. And I'd add that Teri Hatcher was a strong Lois too.
Jim: What superhero movie in the last 20 or so years impressed the least?
Cedric: GREEN LANTERN. If we go back further the worst superhero movie may have been SUPERGIRL. But I'd argue that even GREEN LANTERN would be worse than that.
Jim: Nobody wants to say DAREDEVIL?
Mike: I don't think DAREDEVIL was a bad movie. I think a lot of the griping about the movie from critics was just exhaustion with Ben Affleck after the media blitz that was BENNIFER.
Ty: I liked DAREDEVIL.
Jim: Worst TV show?
Marcia: SUPERGIRL. The minute Calista Flockhart was reduced on that show, the life went out of it.
Stan: I think Mike would agree with me on this, WANDAVISION.
Mike: The last two episodes were huge improvements but that's no excuse for seven episodes of drivel. If this had been a movie, the first seven episodes would have been the first ten minutes. Because it was a TV show, they thought they could pad it out. It was awful. And I found SUPERGIRL boring as well.
Marcia: If I could add a category, Most Dependable Superhero Show, it would be THE FLASH. It doesn't get a lot of attention but it has been a very satisfying series -- episode for episode, season for season.
Jim: Thank you for that, Marcia. Does anyone have a superhero they want to see with a TV show or a movie that we haven't seen yet?
Ty: Readers will say Hellcat based on the e-mails.
Betty: SUPERGIRL was a joke but I'm going to say Power Girl. She was always a better comic book figure.
Ann: Batgirl. We haven't seen her since the 60s in live action and, no, I don't count Oracle, not even when she was wearing the Batgirl suit and using the device to help her walk.
Marcia: I would like to see them try Sheena again. Tanya Roberts recently passed and she was famous for being one of CHARLIE'S ANGELS, the film BEASTMASTER, the sitcom THAT 70S SHOW and the film SHEENA QUEEN OF THE JUNGLE. Sheena was one of the first, if not the first, female super heroes in comic books. Xena was similar to Sheena. I'd like to see Sheena in a TV show.
Wally: I'd like to see more episodes of HBO's TITANS -- there are a lot of great characters there.
Rebecca: SPIDER-WOMAN. With the gothic look the original comic book series had. Morgan Le Fay and the Brothers Grimm as villains. And hopefully the film Olivia Wilde's directing is about Spider-Woman as rumored.
Jim: Okay, we're going to wrap on that. This is a rush transcript.
Ty: Larry.
Jim: Thank you to Larry for the suggestion.