tek's rating: meh and three quarters, maybe

Stan Lee's Mighty 7, on Hub Network
IMDb; official website; TV Tropes; Wikipedia

I guess this was originally a comic book. Wikipedia says three issues were printed, but I've never seen them, nor have I any interest in them. As for the movie, I can't say I liked it, but I didn't really dislike it. It looks like the story isn't over, and Wikipedia mentions plans for a movie trilogy, but I doubt that'll happen. Anyway, I've always had mixed feelings about Stan Lee; I kind of like him, and yet I kind of find him annoyingly corny. (I can like corny, but when he's involved in the writing, the corniness is just too over-the-top.) And there were some things in this movie that I thought were just too dumb for the suspension of disbelief. (For example, I can accept that aliens come to Earth and automatically speak English without any explanation. But if you do speak English, don't act as if some random word like "cave" requires a special explanation when none of the other words you're speaking do.)

Anyway, Stan Lee voices himself in the movie. I'm cool with him making cameo appearances in movies or whatever, but when he's a major character throughout the movie, it's just too much. Um... so he's out driving in the desert, trying to clear his head so he can come up with a new idea for a comic book. Meanwhile, there's an alien spaceship on which two Star Marshals are transporting five criminals they've apprehended to prison. But the criminals manage to escape, and the battle damages the ship, so it crash lands on Earth, right in front of Stan. Some Men In Black-type branch of the military monitors their landing, and sends a strike force out to capture the aliens. However, the aliens (good and bad alike) work together to fight them off, and Stan takes them to a beach house where he's staying, to hide them from the government. He gets the idea to write a reality comic book about them, and gives them all superhero names. Apparently, they're all from the same planet (the name of which I didn't catch), where everyone uses like 70 or 80 percent of their brain power, but they do so in different ways. So they each have what we'd call a super power, though the aliens don't see their abilities that way. And they certainly don't see themselves as super heroes, but they do what they have to do, as long as they're stranded on our planet.

The Star Marshals include a guy whom Stan dubs Strong Arm, because he's super strong; and a woman whom Stan calls Silver Skylark, who can apparently generate wings for flying, and bird feet with talons. But most of the time she just looks human. And I guess she's Strong Arm's fiancee, though she has a potential interest in one of the criminals, whom Stan calls Lazer Lord (because he can shoot energy blasts from his hands). Throughout the movie, we learn a bit about the back(sob)stories of each of the criminals. Lazer Lord was Strong Arm's best friend at Star Marshal academy, until Strong Arm supposedly witnessed him murdering a professor. Lazer Lord maintains he's innocent, but Skylark seems to think he may be telling the truth, though Strong Arm doesn't. The other criminals include teenage brothers, Micro (who shrinks) and Kid Kinergy (who uses telekinetic energy). They grew up in an orphanage together, and had no choice but to fight to survive, I guess. Though Micro really doesn't like fighting. And there's a woman called Lady Lightning (who has super speed). When she was younger, she'd been forced to become a thief, against her will. And finally, there's a guy called Roller Man, who can turn his body into a large ball, and use rollout attacks. He'd been in his world's military, but went AWOL, so he became a fugitive who couldn't get a job, and had to steal to survive.

Anyway... Lazer Lord discovers that there's a businessman on Earth who is actually Xanar, a member of a reptilian race called Taegons, who have enslaved many planets. They now have their sights set on Earth. And Lazer Lord has a personal reason to hate Xanar. So, the newly created super hero team the Mighty 7 make stopping the Taegons their first mission. They succeed, but Xanar escapes, so he could still be a threat. Plus there's still our government's military group, led by a guy named Mr. Cross, who see the Mighty 7 as potential threats, themselves.

Well, the movie was tolerable, and it had some interesting ideas, even if the writing is often kind of subpar. It has a good voice cast. And I dunno what else to tell you.


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