SUPERHERO DETENTION (2016)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *poor*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *comedy*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *psychological*

I've decided to term SUPERHERO DETENTION a comedy in that the premise seems inherently comic, even though there are few if any laughs actually present, and the script isn't consistent about generating them.

The most interesting thing about DETENTION is a slight similarity between its idea and that of THE INCREDIBLES. Though INCREDIBLES is in every way a superior movie, it does sport the unusual notion of a world full of superheroes who have more than a tiny smattering of supervillains with whom to joust. Even a lesser "superhero high school" flick like 2005's SKY HIGH at least establishes the existence of various super-rogues in its cosmos.

So DETENTION is a bit like SKY HIGH crossed with THE BREAKFAST CLUB. but only if the students in CLUB got out of detention in order to fight their first evildoer. The superhero school is about to have a special assembly to honor Kaelus, one of their foremost graduates at doing-- well, whatever superheroes do in this world. However, five fractious super-teens find themselves sentenced to detention that day for acting out. 

This turns out to be a blessing in disguise. Kaelus has turned against humanity because he hates all the missions (whatever they were) assigned him by the government. So he culls a few other super-powered aides, shows up at the assembly, and uses a device to drain away all the powers of both super-students and super-teachers. There's one catch, though: Kaelus didn't manage to get the last five students. (Technically, there's a sixth one, but she barely registers as a character and only comes in at the end for a labored "twist.")

I'm not going to descant on the specific hero-students, because the writer clearly meant them to be types: the Nerd, the Tough Guy, the Conceited Beauty Queen, etc. The writer paid a bit more attention to working out the application of their powers, and some of these are moderately clever. Still, the script doesn't follow through on the notion that Kaelus has drained the powers of about fifty super-persons, and the writers weren't able to come up with any rationale as to why he doesn't just stomp them all into paste.

I also won't comment in depth on the actors, though I think they all rendered serviceable jobs with what they were given. None of their names were known to me, so thirty years from now, it could be that the biggest point of interest about DETENTION could be as an early work for a future superstar, much as the teleseries MISFITS OF SCIENCE was for Courtney Cox.