I got so angry I didn't even know how to structure that last sentence.

Human Bomb

@adam frucci I can tell you exactly what's going on in this trailer. Miller is taking a beloved, classic comic book created by famed cartoonist Will Eisner and revived by Darwyn Cooke and he's butchering it. He's taking everything about The Spirit that made it awesome: The unique style, the complex characters, the "action, adventure, mystery," and he's replacing with gritty black and white CG. A red tie? A black suit? WTF? The whole signature look of the comic revolved around how a guy in a rumpled blue suit he always wore adding a small domino mask made a ridiculously poor disguise; considering he was "dead."

Human Bomb

um it's not working? Tried it in Firefox and IE7. no go. whats goin on? is there a link so i can check out the clip elsewhere?

Technologic

I have a complete set of Eisner's Spirit and even I can hardly tell you WTF is going on in this trailer.
I have a distinct feeling it's going to make the Baby Jesus cry and Eisner do about 1800 RPM in his grave.

William Mize

Will Eisner wrote some good books. I hope they do this justice.

bandit

300 was the raddest music video ever.

grapejoos

@nutbastard: So wait... did we hate 300?

mcdonnr

everyone is hating on this property but I'm actually somewhat interested in checking it out.

rudeadly

@Rabid Penguin: My thoughts exactly. 300's action and style overcame any weaknesses in the writing, but I thought Sin City sucked. The dialog was painfully labored and the look got tiring after the first 20 minutes (of what, 3 hours?).

I think I'll sit this one out. I like the fact that the studios are trying new stuff, but it still has to be a good screenplay and well acted for me to get into it.

Drew Draws nothing of merit

@mildretard: That day may have already come for me... except I really did enjoy Iron man. Oh well, I guess not yet.

Also, am I the only one who thought that Sin City sucked? The writing was shit and the whole thing was over the top in the wrong direction (over the bottom?). Why do they think they can get away with making a movie that is nothing but an excuse to reduce a color pallette again? It was a tired device halfway through the last movie and its boring after three pages into every comic that does the same thing. Bah Humbug, says I!

ALT

@blackroseyagami:

Yes, false advertising.

OGHowie

it's fucking eye candy you whiners.

FIERCE. EYE. CANDY.

it's got everything I want in a movie. tits.

doofusgumby

@Rabid Penguin:

Im with you on this, 300 kicks much ass. I think sin city was good too, but give me a choice of either one and I'll pick 300.

moogoescow

Ok - so here's the basic plot synopsis...

The girl from the Imogen Heap video is eating someone...

+ Watch video

Then Zorro arrests/sleeps with a hooker Fergie-look-alike and then we watch AMC's Mad Men and some Tim Burton Batman scenes and then Pulp Fiction yells some crazy shit.

Seems like a ripoff of 101 Dalmations now that I write it out...

Hiphopopotamus

@Chiper
re-read my post with more emphasis on 'on a lighter note' thanks for looking out though.

Kaspir

Sin City on the other hand, though very stylized and looked cool, wasn't that great of a movie... The Spirit will probably suck too. Frank Miller should have given up writing for movies after Robocop 2.

Rabid Penguin

Wtf! i didn't understand any freaking part of the whole trailer what the hell is going on?!

Mike918

@nutbastard: 300 was an awesome, kick ass movie, and if you think otherwise then wait until your balls drop and go watch it again.

Sorry, it had to be said.

Rabid Penguin

When I first saw the trailer I honestly thought it was a parody; I thought "Oh great, Shitty Movie 9".

rcast1986

@Kaspir:
That's Michael Eisner...

Chiper

Is that Cumic Sans?

Kaveh

Thanks for the prompt fix btw Frucci

Kaspir

it worked that time...on a lighter note, it's good to see will eisner doing something other than Disney related works these days...heck of a change of pace for a guy.

Kaspir

"who wrote such famous books as 300 and Sin City, the latter of which he turned into a cool movie."

that's an awesome dis to 300, subtle but effective. Well played.

nutbastard

@Kaspir: Replaced with YouTube and will rip to our proprietary system now so it doesn't disappear again.

Adam Frucci

@collider: I made that in three seconds as a joke! :P And yes it's misspelled.

Jason Chen

Someday in the future when we're into subtlety and meaning and the sublime, we'll look back on this time of comic-booky movie fadishness and be ashamed. Just like with disco.

Assuming, of course, the asteroid doesn't strike us first.

mildretard

Nooo! The video is broken!

In all honesty, that seems like a pretty good reason to make a movie, especially with Eva Mendes and Scarlett.

Log1c

uh...

so u say naked chicks and we dont get them?

sad day it is, sad indeed

blackroseyagami

wow ... I wasn't too keen on the movie outside of Scarlett Johansson being in it, but now I think it looks pretty cool.

Dillenger69

Aren't there two m's in 'Cuumming'? Cuming reads like cumin to me. Nice graphic, Chen! :P

collider

Not that I'm interested in seeing any more of it, but I'm only seeing like the top left quadrant of the video, and its all stretched out of proportion.

collider

busted vid...'sniff'

Kaspir

Eva Mendes oh my

oxweeblexo

If this guy screws up The Spirit, him and me are going to throw down.
And I decree his punishment in advance: He will be sentenced to remake Howard The Duck... FOR ETERNITY!

jjdaddyo

@The Rage: He was searching Wikipedia?

mcdonnr

@Human Bomb: Correction. One of the things that made the stories so awesome was that Denny Colt was a MASSIVE SLUT who loved the ladies, and Eisner drew some pretty bad girls.

Human Bomb

Shit, ANOTHER Frank Miller movie?

PC+Mac Coexist

[en.wikipedia.org])

That's what Samuel Jackson is doing in The Spirit.

Didn't like the Trailer much.

(Also I bet Ebony White isn't in the Movie :( )

The Rage

Goddamn I love Eva Mendes. (but I still won't go see this)

Dancing Milkcarton

I saw all those seductive thingies pasted allover NYC.
Now I know that I definitely won't be watching this.

zmjjmz

WTF. It's not like the trailer for Sin City made any more sense. And that movie kicked ass.

lifterus

Do you think we could get our money back if we were dissatisfied?

:\

iomatic

What do you mean "more people would enjoy them"? There's just you. Just what we need, fanfics of great comic books. If that makes you happy, go ahead, we'll stay with the good stuff, thanks.

Although I may be unfair. Maybe the right side of your brain just isn't working right if you can't differentiate between a Frank Miller or a Jack Kirby or a John Byrne drawing. Yup, better stick to "regular books" like regular people.

Ragnaroknroll

@Rabid Penguin:

for the record, i haven't actually SEEN "300".

nutbastard

based on frank miller's previous work, i trust this moavie will not let me down

Kartune

Looks awful. But I never understood the fascination with comic books. Regular books were always so much more awesome to me. I mean, comic books usually have terrible dialog and even a veteran artist would be hard pressed to differentiate all the "unique" art styles of the various comic publishing houses and artists. Almost every comic I've picked up looks like it was drawn by the same person.

But wait, I'm not done . . . Comic book writers have crafted some amazing stories; i.e. Xmen, Iron Man, Transmetropolitan, Watchmen, The Preacher . . . etc. I just don't like their story telling vehicle.

Maybe I should start working on novel versions of good graphic novels, for comic-book-phobic people like myself who still enjoy good stories. They probably won't like that proposal much, will they? "Hey, I think comics suck and wouldn't it be great if I re-wrote your story in novel form so more people would enjoy them?" Then again, this is exactly what movie makers have told them.

alowishus

Sam Jackson took umbilical stem cells from Bokeem Woodbine and Sonny Chiba. He's now a younger faster highly stylized Nazi Samurai gun-toting Mace Windu.

MrSophistication

@Dancing Milkcarton: Yeah, I though Eva would be a clincher for me...now I think not.

And what the hell is Samuel L doing in almost EVERY movie out in recent memory!? I she just hard up for cash?

tamoko

Wow. Lots of Frank Miller hating going on here.

I happened to love Sin City. And 300. I thought they were both highly entertaining films. And really, what point does a movie have if not to entertain?

I also think The Spirit is going to be pretty fun to watch too. Watchmen as well.

Chromeo

yawn.

A bunch more whispering overly-made-up women acting slutty.

There are two types of appeal to overly immature males. Violence/guns and sex/women. This takes the latter to an absurd extreme, and to this almost 40 year old, snooze fest.

I guess I'm officially out of the demographic.

Amerikajin

@nutbastard: Hmm... That's almost just as bad as not liking it =D

Rabid Penguin

hmmmm...I might rent, but not paying 12.50 in a theatre.

Faslane66

@William Mize: Ditto, WTF is going on? Miller is usually pretty respectful of the greats, but this is a complete bastardization of Eisner's masterpiece.

Dear Frank Miller: Why couldn't you have just stuck with turning your own comic books into movies?

jibbly

I'm a huge fan of Will Eisner, and that visual style is Miller's, not his. I'm disappointed with the liberties taken.

Aaron Martin-Colby

Why is there a straight up MOVIE TRAILER on a gadget blog. Who is editing this? Is anyone else annoyed by this post that has no place here?

YouandWhoseArmy

@YouandWhoseArmy: HAH!

No.

doobiebros2two

@nutbastard: Or he means what he said, the latter of which HE turned into a great movie.

While Frank Miller had a hand in making Sin City with Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino [sorta], he had nothing to do with making the screen adaption for 300 other than writing the graphic novel and being Executive Producer which means he gets no creative credit other than the novel.

So Sin City remains unbashed and 300 had also better remain unbashed because it is in fact amazing.

FACT.

doobiebros2two

Am I wrong to still be bitter about the non-existent Unbreakable sequel?

DaveExile

Yeah... I REALLY want to get my movie news and advice from a gadget site. I REALLY do. Next I want to read Harry Potter because I want to learn about the current state of particle accelerators.
I REALLY do!

Its like lately this site has turned into digg without voting. If I had a vote, I'd vote for you guys to stop wasting my time with BS "content" that has ZERO to do with GIZMOS. What the hell are you doing posting this crap on the front page? If I wanted to read io9, I would've gone there myself. Meanwhile, the only device I could gleam from that was of the bad plot variety.

Stop dreaming of being Slashdot. You're not. You won't be. Thank God. Thats why I started coming to this site in the first place.

Gizmodo. So much in the closet about not believing in tech readership, its unbelievable.

I await my punishment. Please, not in the face.

Ghostbear

@moogoescow: ZackFuckingSnyder. THAT'S the difference.

rcast1986

@rcast1986: So true.

Watchmen=Best movie of '09.

Yes, before it even comes out.

doobiebros2two

There was a Tron reference in there somewhere!!

Barfolemew

@nutbastard: sucked ass anyway.

krom

"This...is...CENTRAL CITY!!!"

Nah, I don't really see it.

cschack

I don't get it, it looks just as terrible as the rest of his unwatchable movies, how is this in any way worse than the other cinematic abortions this guy squeezes out?

catfewd

@mcdonnr: Indeed.

(He's The Octopus.)

The Rage

Seeing the website for The Spirit, I checked out the EMA page. Don't know which of the bevy of babes that is, but what phone is it that she's holding? I can't see a brand on there.

CTRLled

@doobiebros2two:

ah, that makes more sense...

nutbastard

@Kaspir

I really hope you were kidding Will Eisner is the person who originaly wrote the Spirit. Your thinking of Micheal Eisner for all the disney stuff

n00nickn

when i first saw the trailer while watching the badassery that is The Dark Knight, i thought i was watching a trailer for Sin City 2...then I see it's...wait..."The Spirit?" They changed the name for "Sin City 2?" why is that font so familiar?? Sh*t...it's using the font from "300."

Frank Miller, I just hope you die right now. You've just nullified your greatness. You've become worse than my all-time-worst director: M. Night Shyamalan.

bubuli

FYI - The song playing in the background is from the Artist, Hybrid. The name is Choke. Album, I Choose Noise. Very cool album if your into trance/triphop stuff. Big departure from earlier work, but i digress.

Omadon

sin city was stylized but consistent with the graphic novel, same with 300..
from the looks of this trailer, the movie has gone beyond stylized to plain old tacky..
unlike 300 and sin city, i've never read the spirit so i have no idea if the story's any good.

now the watchmen.. that's a discussion for another day.

brodie123

@bubuli: FWIW, the word is that Miller gor into films to achieve the sole goal of one day making his "Spirit" movie. Not saying that makes it good or bad, just saying.

Killjoy

@DaveExile: I actually think Unbreakable is that much better for being a standalone. What could they do with a sequel that wouldn't cheapen the existing film?

Killjoy

wtf? seriously.

FinalValgas

the movie's full color, the suit was meant to be black in the comics but there was a printing issue so they made it blue, the marketing department for lionsgate is trying to push the hot actresses instead of the story which explains the posters and weird trailer, and the movie is going to be sweet.

twistfunk

Wait...was Samuel L Jackson in a Nazi uniform? He's got some crazy outfits and what's with the running mascara. Does he just agree to do any movie that comes across his desk? (i.e. Snake on a mutha-effin' Plane, Jumper, this one) I'd see it for the naked chicks but not much else.

goldfixe

This movie looks pretty BA to me.

ogremustcrush

My recap of a couple of prior Frank Miller flicks:

Sin City - what the hell was that Ferengi doing in the movie? Did they go down to the DS9 set and borrow the mask, or what? Jessica Alba is utterly gorgeous, but clothed. Wish I had my $9 back.

300 - If I wanted to see an oiled-up body builder impale another oiled-up body builder with his spear, I'd go down to the porno store. Really wish I had my $12 back (I caught every homo-erotic inch of it on IMAX).

Odds are this sucks, too.