Review - Kick-Ass

Kick-Ass (2010), R, 117 minutes - As some may know, Kick-Ass is based upon a comic book series (8 issues), written by Mark Millar and penciled by John Romita, Jr. Millar's name may sound familiar to some movie-goers even if they are not into comics. Another of his creations - Wanted - was a big summer flick a couple of years ago.

Just as he did with Wanted, Millar succeeds in telling an interesting story while being shockingly violent and/or profane at times. Trust me, parts of the trailer don't even begin to portray how violent and profane Kick-Ass can be. That being said, as long as you are not easily offended and don't mind a little (ok, alot) of actiony blood-splatter, you will be thoroughly entertained by this comic book movie.

Kick-Ass is the story of Dave Lizewski, your everyday nobody teenager. He wonders why no one has actually tried to be a costumed hero in real life. After having a comic book nerd debate about it with his close pals, he decides to order a costume off of the internet (a wet suit) and take things into his own hands. He quickly learns why no one had done it before as he's stabbed and brutally beaten in his first attempt to do good. This incident leads to his very own comic book-like origin story as he has multiple surgeries and multiple metal plates inserted into his skeleton as well has parts of his body losing most of their feeling. After he recovers, he continues pursuing his heroics as he finds it's the one thing that doesn't make him feel like a loser. He learns that there are in fact other heroes out there and more violence and language-spewing ensues.

Aaron Johnson does a good job bringing Dave Lisewski to life, Nicolas Cage is oddly entertaining as Big Daddy, and Mark Strong and Christopher Mintz-Plasse portray an oddly coupled mobster and mobster's son, but the spotlight is really stolen by Chloe Moretz as Hit Girl, an 11 year old who has been raised since birth to be the downfall of the local mob.

Kick-Ass is pretty faithful to the source material. The stories differ in just a couple of places. Having read the book and seen the movie, it is easy to tell why they made the small changes in the film. Millar likes to tell fairly self contained stories, and while he did leave Kick-Ass the comic open for another volume, the movie leaves much more open for the possibility of a sequel. Both versions of the story work, and both are quite entertaining.

Check out the book here