I sat down tonight to watch the newest CD comics animated film SUPERMAN/SHAZAM: THE RETURN OF BLACK ADAM only to discover a bit of false advertising. I'm not complaining about this - as a matter of fact it has turned out be pretty damned great deal but you should be made aware. This is not a full length story. The Superman/Captain Marvel team-up is only about a 25 minute long tale. That's a kind of disappointing when the normal length of these animated adventures has been over an hour but the disc more than makes up for this by featuring three other short DC tales. The one showcasing Green Arrow I had already seen on the SUPERMAN/BATMAN: APOCALYPSE disc but the other two are new to me and both are fantastic. The Spectre makes his animated debut in a story that feels straight out of that brilliant, controversial 1970s run by writer Michael Fleisher and artist Jim Aparo published in Adventure Comics. The image of the 12 minute short has been given a faux aged look as if it were a ragged 35mm print and the score feels very much of the 70s as well. Adding to my enjoyment is the presence of one my favorite character actors Gary Cole as the voice of The Spectre and his alter ego Jim Corrigan. Excellent!
The third tale is a great Jonah Hex adventure scripted by Joe Lansdale from a recent story in the Hex comic book. I'm a sucker for a good western and this one fits the bill with another great group of voice talent getting things done very well. Thomas Jane makes a damned good Hex and Linda Hamilton is a saucy and devious antagonist. All I can say is bring on more of this kind of stuff, DC Comics. Bring on as much as you can produce! 
1 comment:
They included the Jonah Hex short on the Red Hood BluRay. It was excellent!
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