Kick-Ass

Beat-up Dumpster Bondage Man

"Shut Up. Kick-Ass."

Hello my friends, welcome back to The Tagline! I had realized a while back that I never really talked about Kick-Ass, and it seemed like now would be a decent time to do so, considering the recent trailer that was released for Kick-Ass 2 (and I'll probably talk about that a bit at the end). So for the uninitiated, Kick-Ass is a movie based on a comic series of the same name, starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson as David Lizewski, a dorky loser who is totally normal, gets mugged all the time, and reads comic books. One day, Dave decides that he wants to be a real life superhero, so he gets a special costume, goes out and challenges some common petty criminals, and then is immediately stabbed and hit by a car. Dave comes out of the hospital with an increased ability to get the shit beat out of him, which is good, because there's a lot of that in his near future. His costumed antics get him caught up in some heavy shit, involving costumed crime-fighting, thug-killing duo Hit-Girl (portrayed by Chloe Grace-Moretz) and Big Daddy (Nicholas Cage, doing his best Adam West Batman) as they attempt to take down crime and druglord Frank D'Amico.

I am constantly having versions of this nightmare.

When it was released, mostly people liked Kick-Ass. They liked it a lot. It's a movie full of violence and profanity, but it doesn't beat around the bush about what it's doing, its sharply written, and frankly its freaking awesome for those reasons. I know we shouldn't be doing the standing ovation for a movie that glorifies violence, but sometimes (like in a Tarantino movie for instance) it's just nice to watch bad guys get the shit beat out of them and then have their faces shot off. Because we live in Kick-Ass's world, one where there aren't real superheroes (well there are apparently a lot of people who dress up in costumes and patrol their neighborhoods, weird right?) and it would be nice if there were superheroes to blow up druglords with a rocket launcher. I'd personally really appreciate that kind of thing.

Just look at these fucking goons. I can relate man.

I think there's also a real part of me that can relate to the hapless goons that are Dave and his two (presumably only) friends Todd and Marty, because really, most of the people likely to go see this movie and be really into it are probably, or have at some point probably been a disenfranchised loser who just wished they had some influence over the shitty circumstances of their life. This movie is if nothing else, an escapist view at how life could be if you did something crazy, and it somehow worked out in the best way (things go a lot less smoothly for Kick-Ass in the comic version).

If you're having sex feelings right now, congrats you're
a pedophile.

Some people had problems with the movie, but weirdly their biggest problem seemed to be little Chloe (she was 11 at the time) saying bad words like "cunt" on camera. Apparently her butchering a whole fucking ton of people (or really ANYONE doing that) wasn't the problem, it was all the naughty, inappropriate language that she was using while she did it! How very wrong. To everyone who felt that way: go capital F FUCK YOURSELVES. Despite what some people seem convinced of, Children are actually really vulgar, and even if they aren't, saying a bad word isn't going to steal their fucking innocence anymore than being an actress in ANY movie probably would. Get the fuck over it. Also to the people who felt that Hit-Girl was somehow sexualized? If you really feel that way, you clearly have some personal issues you need to work out with a therapist. I mostly am just afraid that Chloe Moretz is going to fucking murder me (her upcoming appearance in a remake of Carrie is not making me feel any safer).

That is one gay looking taser dude.

How do I feel about the prospect of a Kick-Ass sequel? Nervous. For starters, they've switched directors, which can always end gruesomely. They've also tagged out the crazy Nicholas Cage for a probably equally crazy Jim Carey. Mostly I just wonder if you can DO a second movie that is about Kick-Ass, and have it be as good. The first one came kind of out of nowhere, and that was really part of what made it work. I hope it's something that can happen twice, but I guess we'll see.

That's all for today! Now I'm going to go pass out and hope I'm less sick tomorrow! See you Thursday.