I want to see a Kick-Ass with the strength of its convictions

Rating: Null/10 (14 October 2010)

For some reason this annoyed me greatly. As a movie it poses a lot and pretends smarts it hasn't earned for itself. The idea to elevate a comic-book fantasy above comic-book fantasy so it can poke fun at superhero conventions is a pretension, when all the "the mayor signals to us with a light the shape of a gigantic c-ck" cuteness is played out Kick-Ass shows us the best movie it knows to be. It pokes fun at the contrived trauma that creates a vigilante, Dave before a tombstone saying "I will avenge you mother", then gives us the same for Hit Girl and Big Daddy in a big slab of backstory thrown at the audience. It gives us a love interest so bland and worthless as to make Loys Lane seem like an intriguing character. I don't like the type of cutesy quirky film defined by smug irony but since someone bothered to make this I want to see it have the strength of its convictions.
I want to see a Kick-Ass with the balls to be what it needs to be. Play cute cheerie music over a scene where a little girl cuts up a bunch of thugs but don't give us a sirupy Big Daddy death. Don't give us b-llocks of realism about an ordinary guy who wears a wetsuit and plays the part of the superhero to dismal failure, then turn him into a jet pack flying cartoon by the end. It's all very half a##ed to me. "Shockingly" ironic when it needs to make fun of superhero clichés, then a superhero fantasy where justice is served and the good guy gets the girl to give us the vicarious fulfillment. Selectively poking fun at cliché then using it as a shorthand for character - there goes another awkward nerdy guy who can't get a girlfriend. Mainly I don't like this because it thinks it's smart enough to express itself through other peoples' work (I cringed when they randomly used Morricone) yet forgets to take a long hard look at its own mess.