Embracing the Fanboy Within

Good Lord. Here I am, a grown man, and I've been totally immersed in all things The Dark Knight since this past weekend. Batman is my absolute all-time favorite superhero -- specifically because his power consists of his sheer will and fortitude, coupled with deft ninja and detective abilities. Batman Begins has to be the greatest superhero movie ever made, partly because it's dark, rooted in reality, and epic in a manner the previous iterations could not quite incorporate. I went to see I Am Legend today on an IMAX screen, and my primary purpose in doing so was to see the impossibly awesome six minute preview of The Dark Knight. Now I'm in the middle of reading a shot-by-shot analysis of the film's trailer and it struck me that I am a complete and total Batman fanboy. It's a little embarrassing that at this moment I'm more concerned about the 7 month wait 'til July 2008 than I am about the state of the world. Maybe it's good to have a distraction that isn't 80-proof or wrapped tight inside Zig-Zag rolling papers.

I Am Legend is a good film, by the way, better than expected. Will Smith is pitch perfect in it, despite the gratuitous, ego-driven 20-second master shot of him doing pullups in his townhouse, sans shirt. Some might think it's the director's way of showing how he maintains that sort of Adonis-like physique while living off of veggies and canned foods in an imagined NYC futureworld. Methinks, however, it was strictly for the ladies who were dragged to the movie by their husbands and boyfriends.

But I digress. Back to The Dark Knight. Freaking love, love, love the trailer, and I'm not at all bothered by a new take on the Joker (Jack Nicholson was too good in the 1989 film, but Heath Ledger's variation looks to be 10-times darker and more realistic), and I love that they've kept virtually the entire cast intact (a testament to the filmmakers not making a steaming pile of Joel Schumacher-grade horseshit). This movie could seriously be the best sequel since The Empire Strikes Back.