User Reviews

Kind of a unique idea for a dark comedy. Competing comic book store owners trying to outwit each other for a prize collection. Unfortunately the crazed collectors are all, except one, unlikable, unsympathetic, and greedy. The movie is very uneven, with characters morphing from just scheming crazies, to murderers. It is at this point, when almost everyone has transformed into killers, that "Comic Book Villains" seems to have run out of ideas, and rapidly spirals downhill. If after the confrontation in the old ladies home, the script had been fully developed, the movie might have worked better on several levels. As it stands, it is at best, a very mediocre black comedy. - MERK

"Comic Book Villains" tells of an old lady who's sitting on her late son's valuable comic book collection and two competing comic book store owners who want it at any cost. Among its many deficits this shabby film has a handful of second rate actors, an amateurish screen play, obvious low budgetness, awful music, and a generally lame execution. Cinematic junk food. (C-)

Here's a great cast, with a good concept for a plot, how can it go wrong?

It can, if there's no writing! OK, that's not fair, if there's CONSISTENT writing. Like so many SNL skits, the first half is well developed, then, well, they have to end it somehow.

I had the same problem with this movie that I had with Monster's Ball. Now how could I mention those two movies together? One is the great academy award winning darling, one is a straight to video farce.

But both suffer from the fatal flaw: failing to convince me of the characters' motivations, and changes. In Comic Book Villains, we get a basic greed motive, but I didn't care what happened to any of the characters except Archie. That may have been intentional, so we wouldn't feel horrified by their bad behavior, but that just goes to show how de-sensitized we are to violence. It's a plot device to end a movie, not a logical or understandable part of the plot.

I guess if you feel you have to see all movies with references to comic books, go for it. But otherwise, use your 90minutes for something else.

Not sure what the director and writers were thinking when they made this movie. You have this interesting comic book movie that actually talked a lot about some of the older comics. That would for sure grab a certain type of viewer and the film could of had a following. Maybe even became a cult film. But half way through it went from being about comic books, to about killing people. It makes no sense. You could of made two crappy movies out of this one film. Small parts I did enjoy and that was mostly just some of the characters. Like I enjoyed Donal Logue and Danny Masterson. Logue really seemed to get his role and Masterson, although having a small part, seemed to get his also. Most of the other characters were OK or just awful. I really don't get Cary Elwes as his character. It just really didn't seem like his type of character and you can really pick it out in the film. Again, the story of the film just doesn't make too sense. Well too much sense on how they made it. The general background is easy to understand. People who love comic books fight to try to get a stash of old one of a kind comics that was left over by an old lady's dead son. But how they filmed it was just messed up. Eileen Brennan played the old lady and she was actually not that bad to watch. It shows even in a bad movie like this, the wise can still act.

"Comic Book Villains" requires a familiarity for the themes of comic books, rather than the comics themselves. There are three types of comic book 'geeks' in the movie: the hardcore collector, represented by Logue's character; the famous book reader, who knows everything about popular comics, but nothing about less-known ones; and the casual reader, represented by DJ Quall's character of Archie. His role is where the problems begin. Every moment that Logue, Rappaport, or Cary Elwes is on screen, the movie shines of brilliant observation and attention to dialogue. However, Archie was written as the ideal reader, a guy who understands that comics are entertainment, not reality. He epitomizes everything i dislike about this movie. Every scene he is in is either hinting at a message, or explaining a message. The theme Archie brings to the story is furthered by ridiculously pathetic acts of violence and obsession, which ruin the film's last 4th. If one were to watch the ending of the movie and then the beginning, he would not have any idea they belonged to the same picture. Take Natasha Lyonne's character for instance. At the opening of the movie, she is a bright woman who runs a comic book store very casually. A slow change and character ark would have been brilliant for her character. However, after one stupid plot-hole-filled scene, she becomes a vengeful warrior obsessed with getting the mcguffin of the piece, the dead man's comics.

This film deserves more attention than it gets; it's more enjoyable than a lot of the comedies out there even if one has no interest in the comic book aspect shown in the film. That can be looked at as a frame for the characters and an incidental device to move the plot along. The actors bring the characters to life in a believable fashion. The real surprise for me was Cary Elwes, who I generally think of in stick-up-his-wazoo, pretty-boy roles like in "Twister" or his turn on "The X-Files". Here, he manages to play a nasty two-bit, low-life punk with some edge, and I almost didn't recognize him. It's a low-budget, independent film, but a cast of names we recognize from other films give it some prestige. Robinson also makes a statement on the comic industry as it has gotten into through the 90's and into the new millennium. It is held together quite well by the narration of one of the main characters, and in spite of its title manages to hit more than one emotional note throughout. It deserves a much wider audience because of the fine character acting of the entire cast.

Overall rating: 7 out of 10.

Comic Book Villains was a delicious Dark Comedy. Well scripted and well acted by a really great cast. A delightfully likable and hateable cast of characters make up the story. I highly recommend it for anyone and everyone who has ever been into anything or known a person who is a little obsessed with something.

I found out about the movie by checking out the Nevermore Film Festival website where I first learned about Bubba Ho-Tep so it was right along the lines with that movie. I laughed out loud, I cringed and squirmed in my seat and shook my head in total astonishment. A great effort by everyone involved.

However I don't think I will ever get used to Cary Elwes with an American Accent.

I know Cary has been in bad movies, but I never thought he would sink as low as this. All this movie is some half baked director thinking he can take the styles of Tarantino and the Coen Brothers and come up with a happy medium.... well it sucked. No one waste your time on this horrible and worthless thing. All we seem to have nowadays are people trying to take the styles of other directors and find new ways to tell the same stories.

No on in their right might with any directing talent would even try to take a wretched screenplay like this and make it into a horrid movie like it was. Movies have to have purpose and directors need to start coming up with their own styles rather than do poor rip offs of others. I can't remember the last time I saw such an awful film.

Comic Book Villains tells the story of Archie (DJ Qualls) who works at his best friends comic book store. His best friend is Raymond McGillcuddy (Donal Logue) who's enemy's are rival comic book store owner's Norman and Judy Link(Micheal Rapaport & Natasha Lyonne). When both parties here of a recently deceased comic book fan's large collection of priceless comic book's both parties declare all out war. While the two parties are plotting against each other Archie Befriends the dead comic collector's Mum Mrs Cresswell (Eileen Brennan). When Mrs Cresswell refuses to budge about not selling the comics Raymond hires his old school bully Carter (Cary Elwes) to steal the comics. If you like low budget movies you'll love this. If you hate anything to do with comic book's you will surely hate this I will give an 8 for different to Hollywood dross.

For a little bit, I thought this was just a bad movie. After about half an hour though, it really revealed itself as an utterly horrible movie. The most glaring of its many problems was its incredibly weak screenplay, which falls victim to every cliche, pratfall, and cheesy coincidence that you can imagine. To be fair, there was maybe one good performance out of the bunch (of course its hard to act well when the lines you're supposed to say are so God-awful) and the direction is somewhat competent.

But usually, when I see a film that has been written and directed by the same person, I assume it's something that the writer/director really cares about and that it is going to escape the formulaic nonsense. Unfortunately, James Robinson seemed to have no such noble intentions with this film. Imagine someone taking your typical everyday comic book geeks who live at home with their mothers (and are not interesting people in the least) and trying to give them motivation to go on psychotic killing sprees and act like they're all suddenly trapped in a bad TV remake of Pulp Fiction -- And all to uncover the film's great theme of not getting too crazy over comic books. Are you serious?

Please, for the love of God and all that is holy, skip this one and save your money and 90 minutes of your life.

I admit that I rented this movie simply because I love comic books (and have been wanting to see it ever since I first learned it was being made); however, the movie really surprised me. It was a very entertaining tragicomedy, namely thanks to its premise of trying to get a 45-year-old comic book collection from an unrelenting mother.

Donal Logue put forth an excellent performance as the bankrupt and shabby local comic store owner, and Cary Elwes actually made a believable thug. Despite cliché hijinks from the Natasha Lyonne-Michael Rappaport team-up and unnecessary narration, the story makes good with incorporating capitalistic competition, laid-back criminals, and comic trivia. In short, anyone can really enjoy this movie, but it is a must-see for what Stan Lee calls "true believers."

As a comic book reader and fan, I had been meaning to see this film for sometime. I wouldn't have minded waiting a bit longer, because, to be brutally honest, it is rather boring. The basic premise is two rival comic store owners fighting to purchase a large and valuable collection from an elderly woman whose son has just died. While the two comic stores are rivals, they are both in the business for entirely different reasons - one is an actual fan, one is only in it for the money. This highlights two sides to actual comic collecting as well.

The cast are an odd mix, but like any good comic book, that is expected. Not that this is a comic, but it seems to play out as one. Donal Logue plays Raymond, the unpleasant know-it-all owner of one store, he is a genuine fan of comics (I suppose you could compare him to Comic Book Guy from "the Simpsons"). Michael Rappaport is terrific as the money-hungry Norman, owner of the second store. Natasha Lyonne is fantastic (isn't she always) in his bitchy wife, Judy. DJ Qualls impresses me for the first time ever as fan-boy (and narrator) Archie, and apart from Rappaport and Lyonne, is probably the best actor in this film. I'm in no way saying that the others are bad actors, just this film isn't their best. Cary Elwes seems a bit out of place as Carter, and the lovely Monet Mazur is very underused as his girlfriend Kiki (but then again, aren't most girlfriends in comics?) Danny Masterton is as annoying as ever as Conan, while Eileen Brennan adds a touch of class to the film.

Overall, I was expecting more. There aren't that many films around which focus on comics so "Comic Book Villains" does a good enough job. THe cast are great over all, and there are bits of comic trivia scattered throughout the film, and its fun trying to pick up all the names of characters and events from various comic book series. But at times, the film can be a bit boring. For fans of comics, I suggest you watch it, but for others, view with caution.

James Robinson started out with a pretty good idea although I was hoping for a character based more on the comic book guy from "The Simpsons". He had enough money to make a technically solid feature out of his material, and he did a fairly good job of casting (except for Cary Elwes). I won't bother to summarize the plot but will just address what went wrong. And enough is wrong to render this thing genuinely terrible.

It appears that Robinson was inspired to totally change his original ending late in the game, but was not inspired enough to rewrite the first half of his screenplay (very lazy). Which means there is a HUGE disconnection between the first and the second halves of the movie. This is not a good thing because in the first half Robinson provides film language elements (signs and syntax) that point in an entirely different direction from the way the film ends up going. This 180 degree change of direction can work if the writer/director plants subtle clues in the first half that only register with the viewer at the end of the film, or when thinking about it the next day. Robinson planted no such clues and did no foreshadowing.

The whole idea of film is to effectively tell a story; bottom line is that writers and directors who do this well are considered talented. Robinson should either learn his craft or find another profession.

As I was watching it I gave it more credit than it deserved. I was waiting for them to reveal that the mother and the robber had just set up the store-owners to teach them a lesson. After a point I had to abandon this idea and began to wonder if it was a parody without any humor. If that's the idea then someone should explain to Robinson that to be successful a parody should be funny.

There were some very good shots in this movie. Natasha Lyonne gave a particularly good performance even if it was a grown-up version of her "American Pie" character. So a lot of good work was totally wasted on something that doesn't work on any level which is very sad.

Comic Book Villains is a satirical black comedy about, you guessed it, comic books and the sometimes strange people that collect them. The movie is a little darker than expected so perhaps I would have enjoyed it more had I known what I was about to see. Still, it was a fun movie that pokes fun at the world of comic book collecting/collectors.

DJ Qualls plays Archie, an all around good guy and the narrator of the story as well. Qualls is perfect as the comic book geek type. His favorite place to hang out and buy/read comics is at Raymond McGillicudy's (Donal Logue) comic shop (the names of the shops escapes me). Raymond is into the comic book scene and has the shop because he loves dealing with comic books. Across town is Norman and Judy Link's (Michael Rapaport & Natasha Lyonne) comic shop. Norman and Judy are there strictly for the money. Archie loves Raymond's shop and his knowledge in comics plus he finds everything he likes there so he has never found a reason to visit the other shop. On the other hand, there is "Conan", played by Danny Masterson from That 70's Show. Conan claims he is a descendant of the creator of Conan The Barbarian comic books and is the instigator for the whole movie because he visits both shops regularly and provides information to both.

The movie takes it's dark turn after both shop owners discover there is a pristine collection of comic books that belonged to a deceased comic book collector who had a great collection. After that, the backstabbing, double-crossing, dirty tricks and much more begins the dark tone of the movie.

My favorite characters were Norman and Judy Link. Rapaport usually plays a tougher character and it was different to see him in more of a submissive position here, especially to his wife. Lyonne also did a great job as a "comic book villain" and certainly looked her best here as well. Also, Danny Masterson played a subtle instigator well, not unlike his character Hyde from That 70's Show. Overall, worth a look. 6.5/10

This movie made the growing list of "worst movies I've ever wasted my life seeing." Not only is the writing complete sh*t, but the acting is so ridiculously bad in 99.99% of the movie and, of course, there's the fact that it barely makes any sense, logical or otherwise. As a friend of mine stated while watching, what it really needed was for the director to have decided either "hey this is funny, lets make it more comedic" or "hey this is serious, lets make it more dramatic," because he definitely was not able to pull of a "dark comedy." If you're reading this and you haven't seen this mediocre sad bastard-fest, then consider yourself lucky, and treat me as a god for saving you from seeing it. It isn't even like bad/good or bad/funny like some movies are (Jason X comes to mind in the latter case). If you have seen this and you liked it, I never want to meet you so don't email me; and if you saw this and you liked it and you want to try and make movies for a living, please save us the future hassle and switch to applying for a manager's position at a Blockbuster Video.

Erik

The film is a darkly humorous look at obsession. Although the supposed focus of the obsession is comic books -- appreciating the comic-book aspects is not essential to enjoyment of the film. The main characters are really obsessed with money and fame and looking for something to magically change their lives. Some characters are absurd at times, but each has some depth that you may not expect. Recommended for those who like satirical films like "Rushmore."

The plot to Comic Book Villains is a comic book fans dream. Unfortunately its execution is a comic fans nightmare. James Robinson writes some of todays most interesting comic stories, sadly, his talent doesn't extend to writing interesting dialogue in movies. The story is the movies main flaw. The film is well put together and for the most part well acted its just boring. Two comic shops both want to get their hands on a comic collection. How they go about it is neither interesting or exciting. I had high hopes for Comic Book Villains, I thought it would be for comic fans that the Fast and the Furious was for car buffs. Comic fans should stick to Kevin Smith's films or Shyamalans Unbreakable. Although it has a couple of chuckles in it Comic Book Villains isn't worth the price of a 99 cent rental. Comic Book Villains rates a 2 out of 10.

This is a solid professionally made "B" movie. The biggest names are Eileen Brennan and Cary Elwes, but they are secondary, albeit pivotal characters. It's the story of rival comic book dealers trying to score the biggest ever haul in valuable, vintage comics, and how they deteriorate from nice people into thieves and murderers. It's also the story of a boy becoming a man and a man finding his maturity, even if it is a dark and vicious maturity. It could be called a black comedy if there was anything funny about it. As I said before, the actors are mostly lower rung, but solid professionals. The characterizations are layered and all too human. The writing is intelligent. What more can you ask from cheap entertainment?

Being a comic collector, I looked forward to seeing this movie. For the first 45 min. or so, I really enjoyed it. But, then it turns in directions that are simply too extreme and melodramatic, too unbelievable. It also bugs me (as a comic collector, and as someone who's always wanted to work in a comic shop) that the comic shop owners who're obsessed with comics (well, with their monetary value, admittedly) are portrayed as people who can quite easily develop into psychos and murderers. I realize that Robinson (the writer-director) is saying that it's the reading part of the comics industry, and not the money part, that's the real and true value of comics, and this is certainly correct. But even this message doesn't come through with any power, because the comics fans in the shop are also misrepresented. Robinson has them talk about which characters are having sex with each other, and which female characters the fans would like to have sex with. This is not the kind of thing that people who're seriously into the actual stories talk about. Instead, it's playing up to the existing prejudices about what comic book fans are like.

I feel that Robinson is spitting on people who consider comics their great passion. And this is just the kind of thing I'd expect someone like Robinson to do: Preach that one should never be a fanatic. People like that don't understand passion (Robinson should read Fantastic Four #285 to see it explained: people *live* through their passions, no matter what those passions are), nor the commitment to things greater than oneself. Robinson's prime comics work, Starman, chronicles a superhero who gives up being a hero so he can be a family man. That's exactly the wrong kind of priorities for a hero. Heroes help other people; they don't just care about their own lives. But then, British comics writers never really did understand what American superheroes are all about (giants like Alan Moore and Alan Davis frequently being exceptions, of course).

My rating: 5 out of 10. With less melodrama, this rating could have been considerably higher.

In a typical American town, wiry comic book fan DJ Qualls (as Archie Lake) favors buying comics at the store run by his portly, pontificating and pipe-smoking friend Donal Logue (as Raymond McGillicudy). They really enjoy reading and collecting comic books. Across town, another comic shop is operated by the more business-oriented husband and wife team Michael Rapaport and Natasha Lyonne (as Norman and Judy Link). Thanks to dastardly Danny Masterson (as Conan), a "switch hitter" who frequents both stores, both proprietors learn about a death in the comic collecting community...

After consuming "too many burgers," overweight comic book collector David Cresswell has died...

Naturally, the dead man still lived with his mother, Eileen Brennan (as Mrs. Cresswell). She inherits a roomful of valuable comic books. Both businesses visit Ms. Brennan, but she misses her son and doesn't want to sell his comic book collection. Since they are worth a fortune, the rival stores try to woo Brennan. Although he begins as an advocate for Mr. Logue, Mr. Qualls befriends the old woman. Logue also gets handsome Cary Elwes (as J.C. Carter), a former high school bully, to help...

When nothing seems to get Brennan to part with her son's old comics, the characters resort to drastic measures. They even become violent. This qualifies "Comic Book Villains" as a dark comedy. The plot sounds interesting, and the story was written and directed by James Robinson - an actual comic book creator. However, the film fails to be flattering or funny. The locations appear authentic and Joey Altruda's musical score is a plus. It is strange to see no "DC"-owned character depicted in a film about comic books.

**** Comic Book Villains (9/3/02) James Robinson ~ DJ Qualls, Donal Logue, Cary Elwes, Natasha Lyonne

The first hour of this movie is absolutely priceless and will have you giddy. All the performances without exception are perfect. Donal Logue really stands out as McGillicudy, the pipe smoking comic store owner. Just watching him on screen will have you laughing. Pretty much everyone in the film is down on their luck and looking for some success to make their lives a little better. When they finally see the chance for greatness, they all go too far.

The only false note is between the teenaged orphan and the old woman. Their friendship seems to come together a little too quickly, but really if they spent more time on this relationship it would not be an improvement since it's the most boring part of the story. It's a lose-lose situation. Later, when something bad happens to her the tears are a little too much considering they really hardly know each other.

I also thought the film got perhaps a little too dark. At first some of the confrontations between the competing parties were hysterical, such as when McGillicudy smashes one of his rivals garden gnomes and then runs away. But pretty soon we have a body count and it just seems like it doesn't fit with the rest of the movie. Still, it's a pretty good ending. Well worth seeing if you've ever visited a comic book shop.

Comic Book Villains

The semi-sociopath who reigns over the other similar souls in his comic book emporium has been worked enough to be a cliché. There is even such a chubby unkempt looser lovingly portrayed as part of the Simpsons repertoire. Other than displaying a life that many of us can look at condescendingly, can this be a lead character for a movie?

Opening in a vein of light hearted reminiscence of small town Americana, the drama builds with the discovery of the death of a "collector." This man had lived with his mom his entire fifty some years with only one love, collecting comics. Our Simpsonesque character is now in a contest with another store owner to see who can finagle the mother of the deceased into selling this bonanza.

A standard criticism of many films is that the characters devolve into cartoon figures. This film does quite the opposite. It starts with clichés and whimsy and slowly peels away this facade to expose a throbbing violent human conflict. When goaded by their true passion, love of comics and the wealth to transcend their limited horizons, greed rears it's transforming head. What is more amazing, the fim still manages to keep a sense of wit, but now with a mordant ironic tinge that is intrinsic to the human condition when raw passion transcends reason.

This is inspired filmmaking. Not a scene, not a line, not an expression was included that did not ring true. This movie was not well received by the voters of my internet site, so what you have just read it a minority report.

I found this to be one of the funniest dark comedies I have seen in a long time. To me the plot and the characters all rolled naturally and convincingly. It is an inevitable facet of black comedy that it tends to work off caricatures, movies like any of David Lynch's or things like Barton Fink, etc. The dynamic depends on showing up the subtle madness that we see around us every day. What made this movie work especially well for me was that the characters were all convincing, all in their way sympathetic. I could relate to all of them, which made the final descent into madness that much more fun. They didn't have to quite be caricatures to make the completely insane decisions they made convincing.