PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *cosmological, psychological*
I have no great love for Lego versions of superheroes or anything else, and the spectacle of watching such characters devolve into broken-up bricks leaves me cold. Still, even though AQUAMAN: RAGE OF ATLANTIS also focuses upon a hero with a psychological crisis, the script handles the story with comic aplomb. (I pretty much have to designate RAGE a comedy, given that the end-threat is a gigantic device with the acronym SLURP.)
Despite the title, this is a Justice League adventure that just happens to place its emphasis on the importance of being Aquaman. The King of the Seven Seas gets humiliated in an encounter with Lobo, who's then driven away by the rest of the League.
Aquaman remains fairly chipper despite this setback, and invites his crimefighting buddies to join him for a visit to Atlantis, where the heroes meet Aquaman's wife Mera for the first time. However, Aquaman's half-brother Ocean Master has conspired with the evil Red Lantern Atrocitus to brainwash the citizens of Atlantis, so that they (including Mera) turn on their former king.
The heroes escape via dimension transporter, accidentally ending up on a near-waterless world. This happens to be one of the worlds victimized by Atrocitus, thus illustrating his plans for Earth. The script's means of giving Aquaman the chance to prove himself on a desert-world is pretty clever, but a lot of the Aqua-morale boosting gets tedious. The heroes return to Atlantis and have it out with the many pawns of Atrocitus. There's also a B-story showing a couple of Batman's aides, the "Barbara Gordon" Batgirl and the "Damian Wayne" Robin, fighting off invading Atlanteans, and Lobo not only comes back but is given a credible reason to lend aid to the heroes. Despite their participation in the overall battle, Lobo, Mera, and the two Bat-spawn all rate as "guest stars" within this light-hearted outing for the JLL (Justice League of Legos).
No comments:
Post a Comment