I Feel Fine

Snooki's spooky due date proves that the Mayans got it right: Run for yourlives!

Snooki
Maybe the Mayans are right.

Much ado has been made about the year 2012 and the Mayan calendar predicting the end of the world. While doomsday prophecies are as common as failed weddings from the Bachelorette, they are largely ignored by most sane people.

Remember Minister Harold Camping? He went out on limb, not just once, but twice (I think there was a rounding error on his first prediction), urging us to empty our 401(k)s and get ready for the big end. Sadly for him, he was proven wrong on both occasions.

I personally never held much stock in these predications until I learned that Snooki’s due date is Dec. 21, 2012; the exact end of the world date as predicted by the Mayans.

Other near-famous unsuccessful prophecies include . . .

Halley’s Comet 1910 . . . Stories abounded about a horrific gas cloud called Cyanogen that trailed the infamous comet (which incidentally was not named for an early rock ‘n' roll star, but for some astronomer). Fortunately cooler heads prevailed and years later we eventually were able to “Rock Around the Clock”.

Heaven’s Gate 1997 . . . It’s obvious that Comets play a big role in determining the end of the world. The Heaven’s Gate cult believed that an alien spacecraft was following the comet Hale-Bopp. Sadly, the members of the cult put their money where their mouth was and committed suicide fearing it was their only chance to survive before the Earth was "recycled”.

Y2K . . . Many feared computers would fail to understand the change from 1999 to 2000 causing massive blackouts, nuclear weapon launching and toilets to stop working. Thankfully, we were able to still flush in the new millennium.

I personally never held much stock in these predications until I learned of reports that Snooki’s due date is Dec. 21, 2012 — the exact end of the world date as predicted by the Mayans. Now I always considered Jersey Shore to be some kind of preview as to what the end of the world would look like, but I ask you: What are the odds?

You may think I’m being foolish, but I for one plan on cashing in my IRA and heading to Belize to party with the Mayans. If the world is going to end, I want to be with the folks who got it right.

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Movie Review

Action-packed Kraven the Hunter showcases gritty Marvel antihero

Photo by Jay Maidment

Aaron Taylor-Johnson in Kraven the Hunter.

One of the oddest things about the blockbuster era we live in is that while Disney owns the rights to the majority of Marvel comic book characters, Sony Pictures owns the rights to Spider-Man and any affiliated characters. Since they’re sharing Spider-Man himself with Disney, Sony has been trying to capitalize on those rights by making stand-alone films using niche characters that only comic book fanatics would know.

Having exhausted Venom and whiffed on attempts with Morbius and Madame Web, they’re trying again with Kraven the Hunter. Also known as Sergei Kravinoff, Kraven (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) is a self-styled vigilante who, as the film tells it, travels the world exacting vengeance on the truly bad people of the world. He’s the son of Nikolai (Russell Crowe), a hard-edged Russian oligarch, and brother to Dmitri (Fred Hechinger), who is relatively weak compared to the rest of his family.

The origin story has Kraven gaining his animal-like powers - including super-strength, speed, and jumping abilities - as a teenager from a mysterious serum given to him by a girl named Calypso (played as an adult by Ariana DeBose) after he was mauled by a lion. The two maintain a tenuous partnership as adults, with Calypso helping him hunt down other villains like Aleksei Sytsevich (Alessandro Nivola) and The Foreigner (Christopher Abbott).

Directed by J.C. Chandor and written by Richard Wenk, Art Marcum, and Matt Holloway, the film looks and feels enormously lazy, something made merely to hold on to potentially valuable intellectual property. Other than the tense family dynamic between the Kravinovs, little makes sense in the story. Kraven has an indecipherable moral code that has him going after poachers - because he’s part lion? - in addition to other high-powered criminals, with no clear goal except to … get back at his father?

The laziness extends to the action scenes, which feature Kraven being mostly impervious to any damage, whether it’s hand-to-hand combat, knives, or guns. The CGI-heavy scenes don’t even allow moviegoers to enjoy an R-rated bloody free-for-all, as all of the blood splatter is computer-generated, too. Since apparently one Spider-Man villain is not enough, three others make appearances with abilities that are under-explained and CGI that is poorly done.

That’s not even counting Calypso, another Spider-Man villain whose purpose in this film is nebulous at best. Her early connection with Kraven is so coincidental as to be laughable, and her continued reasons for helping him as an adult strain credulity as well. The only saving grace of her presence is that the filmmakers don’t try to shoehorn romance into the plot; perhaps they’re saving that for the (inevitable?) sequel.

Taylor-Johnson has had one of the most prolific-yet-anonymous careers in modern Hollywood, with appearances in big films like The Fall Guy, Bullet Train, and Tenet that have made very little impact. Even as the star here, he fails to hold your attention, with the story and visuals doing him no favors. DeBose has followed up her Oscar win for West Side Story with schlock like I.S.S., Argylle, and this, which doesn’t bode well for her career. At least Crowe gets to chew the scenery.

With a contractual inability to mention the name “Spider-Man,” movies like Kraven the Hunter exist in a weird area that forces filmmakers to make up stories for characters to which most people have no attachment. And just like Sony’s previous efforts, it is a very poor way to spend two hours in a movie theater; avoid at all costs.

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Kraven the Hunter opens in theaters on December 13.

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