...And more stuff...

Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang- Shane Black does a parody of Shane Black movies, and by god, it works. Robert Downey Jr. plays a New York B-and-E man of the hopeless fuckup variety transported by a fluke to Los Angeles. He's being groomed for a part in a movie, and Val Kilmer plays a private eye, Gay Perry, who's coaching him on 'private eye stuff'. The consciously chaotic plot is something about a prominent producer's daughter's stand-in getting killed, so the real daughter's lawsuit against her dad is dropped, or something. Actually, if you
don't pay attention to the plot, you'll have a better time. The whole movie is a self-conscious take on the cliche's of Black's action-movie genre. Lovable fuck-up hero, straight-laced sidekick, cute girl in peril, it's all here. I'm more willing to go with it here then in, say, Kevin Smith's work, mainly since Smith's self-consciousness in his films comes across as whiny and defensive. Plus, Black's stock in trade, coming up with zingers for his characters, has never been better. Part of the fun for me was figuring out Black's mindset in writing this. Why is Gay Perry, well, gay? So there wouldn't be any conflict over Michelle Monaghan, the dame who's the pivot of the plot. Also, because in traditional Hollywood, gay is shorthand for 'sexually non-threatening, but gets all the best lines'. As he's gotten older, Val Kilmer's starting to get some of the mentor roles usually reserved for Liam Neeson. He's too boyish to ever have been a successful leading man, anyway.

It's unfortunate how drug abuse fucked up Robert Downey's career, but in this role, it seems to have given him a much needed humility. If Downey had played his character as smug and world-weary, the whole movie would've crashed on take-off. His tone through the movie is shellshocked, and his little bits of twitchy delivery send his role off into the sky. It's like everyone in the movie is in on a private joke, and Downey's character's attempts to get in on it make the gag that much funnier.

Venture Brothers- Did you ever wonder what Johnny Quest, boy adventurer, would've turned out as when he grew up? Me neither, actually. Venture Brothers takes a 'The Tick'-like premise, (Boy adventurer grows up, becomes under-achieving pill-popper, has two sheltered teen sons and a frightenly competent sidekick) and actually does something with it. I suppose the comparisons to 'The Tick' were what kept me away from it for so long. Well, now I'm a fan. While the stories have the same 'heros in their underwear doin' their laundry' theme that the Tick had, the writing is much sharper, (Christopher McCulloch, the series creator, worked on both the animated and live-action Tick) and the understated Alex Toth-inspired design is perfect. Another thing; unlike Family Guy, when Venture Brothers dives into 'non-sequitur' gags, they actually connect with the characters. It's the type of series that can only get better with time.