Not so childish

Kick Ass (2010)

Matthew Vaughn directs this adaptation of Mark Millar's original comic which features a mainly young cast supported by Nicolas Cage. There are no super heroes but a teenage boy without any powers decides to give being a masked crime fighter a go as too many people allow crimes to be committed without helping the victims.

The first original comic from Millar that was adapted for the screen was Wanted (2008), while Millar has a really interesting and dark take on super heroes and the comic book genre the adaptation of Wanted was an adaptation in name only and the kind of thing that would drive Alan Moore up the wall. Thankfully this film does a massively better job of retaining the dark and cynical world view. Despite the dark elements the film is great fun and is very funny in places, over all it is a very polished effort.

I do have two problems with the film, the first is that the first half or so of the film does spend a little too long getting the plot set up before we get into the action packed finale third. The larger problem I have is with the main characters love interest who seems to have been changed to allow a happier ending and this in part is not really in keeping with the rest of the film but also makes her character fairly unbelievable.

4/5 a really entertaining film with a dark side.