I was just a kid watching reruns of some classic TV shows from the 1960s, but I remember this opening monolog as well as William Shatner’s classic intro to Star Trek.  “Another challenge for the Green Hornet, his aide Kato, and their rolling arsenal, the Black Beauty. On police records a wanted criminal, the Green Hornet is really Britt Reid, owner and publisher of The Daily Sentinel; his dual identity known only to his secretary, and to the district attorney. And now, to protect the rights and lives of decent citizens, rides the Green Hornet!”

Believe it or not, The Green Hornet has been around for quite some time. He first appeared as a popular radio series that ran in the mid 30s through the 1950s. He later would grace the big screen in two successful movie serials. And then, of course, ABC would bring this crime fighter to televison in 1966 and 1967 during the height of the Batman crazy. Since then, one could only find the Green Hornet in televison reruns or the pages of some indie comic books. That is until Director Micheal Gondry and writer/actor Seth Rogen have delivered this hero to the big screen; and in 3D, no less. The big question is in this day of hit-or-miss super hero genre films, can Rogen and company deliver on one of my most beloved crime fighters? 

The cool thing about the Green Hornet (aside from his bad ass car, the Black Beauty) is he’s not your typical crime fighter. Instead of donning a mask and going out publicly to bust the bad guys, Britt Reid dons a mask and acts like local criminal. This allows him and his trusty valet Kato to get close to the criminals and break up their plans and let the police clean things up. 

The movie follows this formula quite well as Seth Rogen portrays Britt Reid. In the film, Britt is a spoiled playboy who inherits his father’s newspaper amd fortune after his untimely death. In his grief, Reid fires all of his father’s caretakers until he realizes that none of them can make a decent cup of coffee. ”Who used to make my coffee?”, he screams.  Well, that would be Kato (played brilliantly by Jay Chou) the former mechanic and secret martial arts wizard. Reid soon learns that Kato is a master inventor and has retro-fitted his father’s limo with bulletproof windows and other nifty gadgets. Together, they get drunk and head out to deface his father’s statue and in the process wind up breaking up a robbery. 

Reid comes up with a novel plan of using their new secret identities to pose as criminals so they can get close to the real bad guys. He uses the power of his newpaper to create the persona of the Green Hornet to generate attention and publicity. This does not sit well with the local crime boss, Benjamin Chudnofsky, (Academy Award winner Christoph Waltz, from Inglorious Bastards) and he vows to kill the Green Hornet so as to not lose any more power. What follows is a funny-at-times series of car chases and bar fights that try and piece themselves together into a coherent film. 

I’ll be honest, I wanted to love this movie. I’m a big fan of the Green Hornet and Seth Rogaen has made me laugh more times than I can remember. While not the perfect choice for the lead role, I was hoping he could pull it off and provide some laughs along the way. (I’m hoping the same for Ryan Renolds as Hal Jordan in The Green Lantern film this summer). However, Rogen’s portrayal of Britt Reid for 3/4s of the film is down-right annoying. Rogen’s Reid is a spoiled brat who never takes anything seriously and is seemingly unaware that he is driving everyone nuts. This is not the Britt Reid I remember from my youth, and I’d be okay with that if it were genuinely funny. Sadly, oftentimes it’s not. And that just makes him unlikeable, a trait not associated with super heroes at all. In the last reel of the film, Reid “gets it” and begins to take his role of The Green Hornet seriously, and the last thirty minutes of the film are quite enjoyable. But I have to ask if that makes up for the first half; and I’m not so sure. 

Cameron Diaz portrays Lenore Case, Reid’s personal secretary. Case has a degree in criminology and unwittingly helps Reid and Kato plan their next steps as vigilantes. Case is an important character in the canon of The Green Hornet, and as one of two people who know his secret identifty she provides insight and helps the team.  Here, Case is a comedic love interest as both Reid and Kato want to date her and then begin fighting, jeopardizing their entire plan. In the end, they do reveal to her their secret identities, but there’s no time for Case to grow as that character and we are left making a huge leap of faith that she has bought into what Reid and Kato are up to.   

Christoph Waltz graces us with a fine performance after his Oscar-winning performance as the “Jew Hunter”.  Sadly, his talents are wasted on a trite script and an unusual desire to become a masked vigilante himself. I found this strange because as a confident suit-wearing bad ass he was perfectly menacing enough. I guess that wasn’t funny so they pursued this angle instead. 
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The wonder of rubbing our smart-phones with a fingertip to do stuff has been upon us for several years now, as well as the glory of the App Store, a treasure trove of stuff that you can do in your browser with badly-written flash made into programs. As such, I thought I would consult you plebeians on what you feel is worthy to keep in your iPhone, and instruct you on the greatness of my own.

Or, in not seventy-six words, here’s the standouts on the iPhone I keep coming back to.

Pandora: Streaming internet radio of pretty much every genre imaginable over 3G. This is why I don’t listen to radio anymore. This app has stayed on my front page since I acquired it, and I use it almost daily.

Now Playing: A listing of movie releases and DVD releases that is fully integrated with rotten tomatoes and imdb reviews as well as Netflix. It does trailers, too. The app will find you and show you all the nearby theaters, what’s there, and what’s worth watching. Or what to ignore at the theater and throw on Netflix. It’ll also throw it on Netflix for you.

Urban Spoon: There are many, many better restaurant finders on your iPhone (AroundMe and the Google Maps app to name two), but there’s something compelling about rolling the slots and taking what comes up as your dinner choice.

Kindle/Stanza: I have both, but which you use will probably depend on what you like. Stanza has the best selection of downloadable, free, e-books available for the iPhone. The Kindle app syncs with your Kindle and remembers your place across both devices. This is witchcraft and utterly delightful.

Facebook: Yeah, if you have an iPhone you probably already have this app, but it bears mentioning as it works really, really well. Often better than the site itself. How about that?

Lux Touch: I mentioned this in one of the very first things I wrote for the site, and it’s been on my phone getting playtime since then. The free version of this app is Risk with AI bots. I’ve never bought the full version because this is all I need. Controls perfectly, runs well, and it’s Risk. What more do you want?

RogueTouch: This was a dollar or some such amount when I got it. Now it runs for $3. Totally worth it. It’s Rogue, the old-school dungeon crawl, on your phone, with a decent interface. Rogue has about fifty levels, and is in the “I hate your family” level of difficulty. This means that you’ve got a lot of replay value if you enjoy this sort of thing. Also a ton of variety in loot and a fairly large number of baddies to face. Saves anywhere, but you die and it’s back to the beginning.

Field Runners: Field Runners is a $3 tower defense game. When it came out initially it was barely worth that. Since then they’ve added new units, two new maps, unlockable game modes, and a ton of game modes. It has a pause/save anywhere function that is delightful (and should be on every game app, period).

Words/Chess with Friends: Every multiplayer iPhone game should play like this. ALL of them. It’s pass and play (or play by e-mail, if you prefer that image) Chess/Scrabble/whatever else they come out with that I will totally buy on your phone. The beauty of this is that you can take a turn anywhere.

Frotz: This one is hard to recommend for everyone. Frotz is Stanza, only for text-based adventures. If you can get by the iPhone keyboard (it has some shortcuts to help), this is a treasure trove of nostalgia. If not, you’ll hate it. Potentially has unlimited playtime, but again, some of the text-games are…not good. Free, so worth a try.

AP News Feed: Another one I’ve spoken of before, but this is a great little tool. Customizable homepage with stories from your area and all over. Video and photo. Updates and will do push notifications. If you want mobile news this is probably your best bet.

Midomi/SoundHound: Two names, one app. SoundHound literally listens to music you play/sing/hum for it, then finds you a title and group. Not as much useful to me as simply witchcraft. I can now hear a song in passing, identify it (provided I can listen to or hum 15 seconds of the tune), then purchase it myself (Midomi is linked right into your iPhone purchases, because these guys aren’t idiots). You also get a full lyrics page and links to YouTube videos, as well as Pandora radio tie-ins and similar artists. Essentially this is Now Playing for your music, as it can work with all your other cool music apps and devices to provide an awesome experience. I really should use this more.

Anyway, while I have six pages of apps on my iPhone, these guys are the standouts, and most of them are totally free. As of last look everything but the games can be acquired without paying a dime, and at $3 a pop you’re out lunch at Five Guys if you buy everything here.

So what’s on your phone?

For those of you all hip and trendy and in on what the kids are doing these days, here’s another Twitter link for you to follow.

Jon Favreau, director of the destined to be awesome Iron Man 2, is updating folks via Twitter on what’s happening during the Iron Man 2 shoot that’s going on right now. You can see updates such as:

“Mickey Roarke’s first day.” and “Rourke does not disappoint.” along with such exciting statements as “Stayed late to watch dailies. It’s great to see these characters come to life.” Also of particular interest are his comments on the fact that Larry Sanders is in the cast. Very interesting.

If this kind of thing excites you, as it does me, then you may want to add www.twitter.com/Jon_Favreau to your Follow list.

Thanks, as always, to Aint It Cool News for the awesome information.

John, Moe and Hilden talk about one of their favorite movie franchises, James Bond! With Quantum of Solace hitting theaters this weekend, we’re talking about our favorite Bonds, Bond Girls and theme songs in this episode of After Hours.

After Hours 15: James Bond

John’s I Am Your War Machine post reminded me of one of my favorite movie characters of all time: Mr. Rumsfield from The Burbs. As soon as that song popped into my head, I started remembering all the scenes from that movie and couldn’t stop laughing. So, as is our way here at Robot Panic, I had to share.

Bruce Dern is comic gold in this film and turns in one of the most consistently funny performances I’ve seen. It’s a shame this guy is as under rated as he is. This set of greatest Mark Rumsfield moments goes down as one of my favorite YouTube clips of all time.

There go the Goddamn brownies.

It’s our favorite time of year! Halloween approaches and John, Moe, Hilden and Christine sit down to talk about their favorite horror movies!

After Hours 14: Horror Movies

In a world, where movies define popular culture.
Where trailers take up at least 20 minutes of the actual movie time.
In a world, this world, there was a man.
A man named Don LaFontaine.
And he ruled…with his voice.

A Voice.
A voice that was used by..an artist.
The definition of movie previews.
A voice recognized by millions…
But a name known only to a few.

In a world…
A world where movies rule popular culture,
Don LaFontaine….is with us no more.
And we mourn.

For examples of work from the master, you can visit www.donlafontaine.com

Respect and admiration to Don LaFontaine from Robot Panic.

On movies:

So here’s how I’m going to work movies. Every whenever-the-fuck-I-feel-like-it, I’ll put together a top 5 of things you should have seen to avoid being mocked in mixed company. I’ll try to cover a variety of genres and time periods, but romantic comedies can choke on my vomitous rage and die.

So to start things out, I figured I’d begin with a top 5 list of the essentials. The movies everyone needs to see. The stuff that simply must be watched.

Of course I speak of the zombie movie.

Zombie movies have done a few interesting things. First, they’ve turned the horror genre on its ear. Instead of a lone masked (or scarred, or both) psychopath with superhuman abilities hunting down busty teenagers to maim them, we have the zombie. Its slow, stupid, about as agile as a cow driving a Hummer with 4 flats, and will go after anyone. This is a particular point of contention in most good zombie movies. While the victim in a garden variety slasher movie will inevitably bring about their own end by having premarital sex, drinking, doing drugs, or defying authority. the victim in a zombie movie is simply there. There is no bizarre moral lesson in this movie when a victim is consumed. Finally, zombies come in packs. There isn’t one of them, there’s a hundred. If you can handle a hundred, there’s a thousand. And honestly, you were fucked with a hundred anyway.

With this in mind, I shall begin the list.

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