I've listened to a lot of episodes of the radio show and I've seen pretty much every episode of the show and I'll be honest, if you pressed me to describe Britt Reid or Kato's personalities, I dunno what I would tell you. Probably "brave", or "bold", or something.
I loved this movie because finally this franchise had something going for it besides the basic premise.
Besides, they weren't arguing over credit, they were arguing over respect. Which Reid was showing Kato none of. I dunno what on Earth gave you the impression that they wanted to take credit publicly for their actions.
Maybe you'd be less disappointed if you stopped expecting things to be Carmen Sandiego movies.
Also, just noticed—you mention that they're usually as equals, and on a character level that might be true. But the radio show and TV show are generally only concerned with Britt's life—the newspaper and so forth. We pretty much never see Kato off the job, and he's always there when Britt needs him, and asks pretty much nothing in return. The movie is the first adaptation—beyond maybe the comics, which I haven't read—that actually give a shit about Kato. He gets backstory. He has hobbies. And Britt treats him the same way the narrative treats him in the other two versions. It's a literalization of the trend, reworked to be grounded in character rather than advocated by the story.
Maybe you'd be less disappointed if you stopped expecting things to be Carmen Sandiego movies.Leave a Comment:
A complete and utter wasted opportunity
When it was announced that Seth Rogen of all people would be playing The Green Hornet, like most people I was very dubious. As a fan of the character since I was a child, I wanted to see the property treated with respect, and not turned into a big joke. Some reminded me that there were similar concerns about Michael Keaton when he was announced to play Batman, and that in the end he took the role seriously, and proved all his naysayers wrong. That was a fair point, and I decided to reserve judgement on Seth. In the end, however, he proved all his naysayers right.
Imagine instead of manning up and playing the role faithfully, Michael Keaton instead re-wrote Batman to be exactly like Beetlejuice. That will give you some idea of what a poor job Seth did playing the character, and what litle respect he shows the property. Before this film the character were always played straight and treated with respect. Britt Ried and Kato were friends and equal partners in their fight against evil, with Britt being the brains and Kato being the muscle. This is not to say there was no overlap, but that was clearly their strong suits. They never fought over credit, they never cared about credit. Afterall, the public thought they were criminals, and hated them. What sort of idiots would fight over that kind of credit? oh yeah, the idiots in the movie.
Instead of manning up, and showing the world what he was capable of, Seth played it safe, and just re-wrote the character to be the same idiot he always plays. You can imagine how well that would have gone over with Batman fans if Keaton had done the same thing, all those years ago. It's a shame, Seth had a real opportunity to prove everyone wrong if he had actually tried to do something different, and he blew it. I think one day he will look back and regret that.
In the end playing it safe didn't pay off for him, as the movie was a critical and commercial failure. Hilariously, the movies executive producer Neil Mortiz insisted in an interview that the movie wasn't a financial failure, it just didn't make enough at the B.O. to justify what was spent on it. That is the rough definition of a movie thats a financial failure, isnt it? The general public doesnt seem to even remember this movie. There's no real point of even talking about it anymore. So long everybody :)