MAN OF IRON, LOGIC OF TISSUE

1. Iron Man 2/Paramount Wknd/$ 133.6 Total/$ 133.6

2. A Nightmare on Elm Street/WB Wknd/$ 9.2 Total/$ 48.5

3. How To Train Your Dragon/Para Wknd/$ 6.8 Total/$ 201.1

4. Date Night/Fox Wknd/$ 5.3 Total/$ 80.9

5. The Back Up Plan/CBS Wknd/$ 4.3 Total/$ 29.4

6. Furry Vengeance/ Wknd/$ 4.0 Total/$ 11.6

7. Clash of the Titans/Warner Wknd/$ 2.3 Total/$ 157.8

8. Death At A Funeral/ Wknd/$ 2.1 Total/$ 38.3

9. The Losers/Warner Wknd/$ 1.8 Total/$ 21.5

10.Babies/Focus Wknd/$ 1.6 Total/$ 1.6

IRON PLAN?

Iron Man 2 opens at number one and you know what I look for in action adventure movies based on comic books? Warring industrialists. Okay, no one looks for that, but I guess because it worked somewhat in the first Iron Man they decided to give it another shot. I mean, if you think about it, Iron Man was built around an attempted corporate coup. This is more of the same and that’s the flaw of it. Not to mention there’s some regression of the character of Tony Stark. In the first we had the clichéd, but effectively used device of the narcissist who discovers himself by literally losing his heart, but as this opens up his altruistic “leaf-turn” is only given lip service. We’re told he’s making the world a better place but never really shown how. In the first we saw him give up weapons making and intercede in a war, but we see nothing like that here. Is he fighting terrorism in the armor? Feeding the poor? Killing spammers? We don’t know, but what we do know is that he’s got a rival in seemingly equally eccentric, rich arms maker, Justin Hammer and in a perfect bit of irony, just as Tony Stark is pretty much a variation of every character Robert Downey Jr has played, Sam Rockwell, pretty much playing that same odd character he always plays as his rival (he even breaks out the dance he did in Charlie’s Angels). At least in the comics, Justin Hammer is an evil industrialist who finances super-villains in return for some of what they steal. Here he’s just incompetent competitor who doesn’t even want Tony Stark dead. What fun is that? Jeff Bridges actually engaged in illegal arms dealing, killed people and did try to wipe him out. The actual bad guy in this is Mickey Rourke (in a weird combination of Whiplash and The Titanium Man) who wants Tony Stark destroyed because his father once worked with Tony Stark’s father but got screwed over. Okay, maybe we’re still lacking a good bad guy after all, because this just makes him the jealous kid who lives next door. He’s got no plan of world domination, or revenge through the deaths of millions. He’s not even after money. As Tony Stark points out, he could have done well just by selling his version of what Iron Man has, but instead has this odd plan of making him look bad and then he’ll be destroyed by others? Um, so you didn’t mean to kill him by attacking with your electro-whips? That was a feint? Your real plan was to rot in a French prison while his stock prices went down? Basically the only people Iron Man is fighting in this one are people who just don’t like him personally, which is almost everyone at one point. Don’t feel bad, Terrence Howard, on being replaced by Don Cheadle. At the end of the day you were in the better movie.

AND MORE KATE WINSLET NAKED

A Nightmare on Elm Street is down to number two and isn’t this now a weird sequel to Little Children given that Jackie Earle Hurley played a child molester in that one too. I’d pay to see A Nightmare on Elm Street with that same narration: “Freddie decided he’d attack the children of all his victims in their sleep. He hoped they wouldn’t be staying up late to watch Letterman as he’d like to begin the slaughter early, having an important meeting the next morning.”

THE UNCANNY B-MEN

How To Train Your Dragon is down to number three, followed by Date Night at number four and The Back Up Plan at number five and the male star of this is Alex O’Loughlin, one of those B-list pretty boys you see regularly supporting A-list actresses. They’re tall, good looking and seemingly made to be leading men, but are either just a little bland or there’s already someone doing their shtick better, like Josh Lucas to Matthew McConughey or Dermot Mulroney who has always looked like a goofy version of Keanu Reeves. Despite his name, O’Loughlin is actually Australian and the tall, good-looking Australian of the moment is Hugh Jackman, who actually has some sex appeal. Even amongst bland, Australian leading men he’s outdone by Sam Worthington who at least looks like he’d try to fuck you on the first date, while Alex here is so lacking in sex appeal, he looks like he might set off your gaydar at least once during the evening.

SHOWS SO HORRIBLE THEY HAVE NO SYNDICATION LIFE

Furry Vengeance is down to number six and you can’t hate on Brooke Shields for being here. You’re actually just glad to see her working with one of the few men her age she doesn’t dwarf. Some of us are still trying to suppress the memory there as ever a sitcom called Suddenly Susan, which ran for four fucking years! What’s wrong with you people? I’ll bet it was you same muthafuckas who kept Caroline In The City on for five years.

THE CRUEL IRONY OF SPECIAL EFFECTS GENERATED FAME

Clash of the Titans is down to number seven despite being the star of this, Avatar and Terminator Salvation last year, you wouldn’t know Sam Worthington walking down the street. What’s the point of being in big movies if low self-esteem women don’t know they’re supposed to sleep with you? If you have to tell the skank wearing little more than a belt that you’re famous, then you really aren’t.

LOST BOY

Death At A Funeral is down to number eight followed by The Losers at number nine and also in this is Jason Patric, one of the big douchebag actors of the late 80’s early 90’s. You know, one of those fuckers who goes a little method and thinks he’s above things like promoting his film? Claims to prefer indie films to mainstream work, then does shit like Speed 2? Well, he’s gotten the career he deserved, playing the eccentric villain in a B-action movie. And it suits him because it requires very little acting. Aside from his professional douchebag status, he was best friends with Keifer Sutherland when Sutherland was engaged to Julia Roberts. When that broke off, he and Roberts took off to Europe together and started dating. Then the big gossip that year was that he did heroin and she joined him. Ah, the 90’s.

I DON’T EVEN SEE THE BABIES OF MY FRIENDS

Finally, Babies opens at number ten and yes, babies are cute and yes, that trailer is adorable, but ultimately it looks like a 90 minute home movie and I just don’t have the time.

WE ARE FAMILY/I GOT MY BABY SISTER WITH ME

My baby sister came to visit and before you say anything I don’t care if she’s 33, I changed her diapers, she’s my baby sister! Actually, she didn’t come to visit me as much see A-Ha on their farewell tour with a group of her friends. Yes, A-Ha still tours, but now it’s coming to an end. In fact she made it clear when she arrived on Wednesday that she didn’t expect to see me until Saturday night for dinner and drinks. I love my family. We leave each other the hell alone. We were supposed to meet at Death & Company, but it was a little to hip so we wound up two doors down at Cherry Tavern, where the employees St. Mark’s Comic go to drink. In fact, I have to go back there on Monday for one such gathering. Apparently my sister likes it on the divey side, as she had a great time the previous night at Eastern Bloc, a divey gay bar. Yes, my sister is a bit of a hag. One of the friends she was here with she describes as “My Gay Husband.” Well, The Cherry Tavern was just divey enough, thanks in no small part to the bartender who looked like an ex-porn star and to my delight and surprise, my sister also enjoys the game of watching people and making up a backstory for them. It was the first thing she and her friends did at dinner about the bartender, before moving onto the table filled with girls next to us. Eight of them looked like typical girls dressed up for a night out, while two at the end were, shall we say, “different.” While everyone else was long hair and dresses they were shorthaired and in jeans. Oh, and couldn’t stop groping one another. The theory was it was a sorority girl reunion with two of Tri Delts having made a little lifestyle change since graduation. As it turns out it was a birthday party, but the social isolation remained the same. Then the story they made up changed one girl being the birthday girl’s sister who showed up with her girlfriend kinda just to piss her sister off. This was somewhat substantiated by the fact the followers of sappho left early, before sing “Happy Birthday” at dessert. Because she’s my sister, after dinner and before a return to the bar, we stopped by St. Mark’s Comics where I was jointly berated for not feeding my sister’s geek habit. Forgive me for wanting her to be normal. We then returned to Cherry Tavern and their $5 Tecate-and-a-tequila shot special and continued the observation of humans, this time with the remnants of a bachelorette party meeting up with a birthday party. We quickly identified the Alphas of each group and the accompanying subordinates. With men in at least groups of threes it’s usually The Alpha, Second In Command and Dork. With women it’s Alpha, Prude and Slut. Now, these can obviously be combined and there’s room for others like Nice Guy/Girl. The Alpha can be both a Prude and Nice, but never a Slut or Dork, while you can also be a Second who’s Nice and Prude, but while you can be a Second-In-Command Slut, you can never be a Second-In-Command dork. And looks don’t matter as much as you think, as the Alpha Female was clearly the bride-to-be. The fact she was least attractive meant nothing. She was getting married, the rest were still out here looking. She was the winner and she knew it and didn’t pretend otherwise. The Prude and The Slut were all-too easily identified. The Prude never so much as loosened her checkered Burberry raincoat, while The Slut doffed hers immediately to reveal bare shoulders despite the fact they had the door open and it was cold on Saturday night. She was basically presenting herself like a red-ass baboon. The Alpha Male was a bit of jerk, but he also the tallest and had an apartment two blocks away, securing his dominant status. He would consult with the Second occasionally on their plans to get girls back there. It only became sadder as the night wore on, because there were only two girls to choose from, as the Alpha Girl was clearly taken and proud of it, while two other girls who also came but stood slightly apart were clearly somewhat of a couple. It was clear The Alpha would choose one while the others would have to duke it out for the remaining girl or share her. Sadly, The Slut was probably willing to be shared. Her low self-esteem was palpable to the point we almost wanted to step in and help her, but you can’t save people from themselves. As they were finally leaving, the bouncer stopped her to say something and we imagined even he felt badly and was trying to warn her off. After that we continued drinking and amused ourselves with the jukebox, eventually shutting the bar down at 4:00 am. I cannot remember the last time I did that and I can promise you it will be awhile before it happens again. This more than justifies my need to keep my sisters away from me.

JUST IN TIME FOR FROZEN MARGARITA SEASON

My blender died. Well, it didn’t die so much as go insane. Somewhere down the line it developed a short and would come on whenever the hell it felt like, so I go into the habit of filling it with whatever, then going about my business until it started. Unfortnately, this became very tiresome, very quickly so I had to get a new one. Fortunately, I found $20 in the street and then got a 20% off coupon from bed, bath & beyond. This resulted in my new Oyster blender only costing $12. It’s not as good as the free Black & Deck one which just died on me, but you can’t beat $12 for a quality name blender, especially one Consumer Reports ranked #3 out of 39 and the two above it cost $400. But if that’s $360 worth of noise suppression I can understand. This sucker ain’t quiet.