John Carter is a story of a man out of place. Transported to the planet Mars by an alien artefact, John Carter’s situation in the story inspired by author Edgar Rice Burroughs, is something of a controversial idea back in the 1930s. The planned film of the pulp fiction series was scrapped due to concerns that the movie-going audience would not be appreciative of the idea of people living on Mars, much less the idea of a Confederate soldier from Virginia teleported to the planet across thousands and thousands of miles of empty space. In that time, an orphaned baby raised by apes made more sense, which was likely why John Carter faded from pop culture. Unlike Tarzan who stayed “grounded,” John Carter got stranded somewhere where no one had solid reference to.

Now, more than 70 years later, John Carter is making a comeback—finally, on the silver screen. But unlike in the 1930s when audiences were more down to earth, people today are less inclined to be awed by such out-of-this-world stories if the ideas involve concepts proven by science with hardly any reasonable doubt, to be not true or far from plausible. In the John Carter series, the planet Mars is portrayed as inhabited by various cultures and nations—warring people who call their home planet Barsoom. Of course, we all know that Mars isn’t inhabited and there aren’t even traces of ancient civilization from the data sent back by orbiting satellites, landers, and rovers on the ground. What we know now about the Red Planet thus makes the idea of John Carter on Mars much less science fiction that it was in the 1930s. It’s more of a fantasy of the past.

Nevertheless, what’s old can still be new if it still entertains. It’s akin to the arena of gladiators where good people have seen warriors kill and get killed, again and again. But like what actor Russell Crowe so memorably declared, “Are you not entertained?” Embarrassing as it is, we have to admit that even if we’re already jaded by all the fantastic things fed to us by science-fiction films, we’re still entertained. We’re guaranteed to be entertained if the story is formulaic and the scenes packaged. If it’s action, you expect action; if it’s horror, you expect horror; if it’s romance, you expect love. John Carter is about John Carter on Mars. What you see is what you get, and in this kind of movie, you simply dive into the experience even if you can’t suspend the belief that it’s all not real.

John Carter is directed by Andrew Stanton (remember Walll-E?) and starring Taylor Kitsch and Lynn Collins. Sure, it’s reminiscent of movies like the classic Conan the Barbarian, He-Man, and Yor, but a good story is still a good story, and if John Carter has the sci-fi cowboy action to boot and the 3-D goodies to delight, then it will get an audience, like those sci-fi fans who like Burroughs.

How long has it been since the first Alien movie with director Ridley Scott at the helm? It depends on when you are in time, but it’s really been a while as of this writing.

The first Alien movie was and still is an experience unlike any other, even at a time when there were no computer graphic effects. Ridley’s treatment of Alien was like Edgar Allan Poe’s writing—you actually feel the environment in the scenes which enhanced the believability of the film. It was serious entertainment without any pretensions.

The appeal of Aliens is all about the adrenaline-releasing horrific experience of being at the mercy of an environment where monsters are out to get you. It’s about surviving against all the odds. The movie Prometheus, originally envisioned to be a prequel to the Alien series, had evolved into something else entirely but still within the universe of the Alien franchise. It retains the look and feel of the original Alien movie with designs from Alien artist, H.R. Giger, who is famous for his dark and visceral art we now associate with all Alien movies.

Prometheus recalls the events in the first Alien movie. But it’s more about the race of the dead alien encountered in the first movie which is linked to secrets that concern the origins of the human race. As the movie trailer says, “They went looking for our beginning; what they found could be our end.” It’s a terrifying thought, but Prometheus is not exactly the kind of horror film like Alien. This is more science fiction than anything else which is designed to appeal to the old fans of the original movie. It even has a female character similar to Ripley in the first one, who starts out as a bit naïve but ends up as a fighting woman.

Those in their teens when Alien came out will surely enjoy Prometheus, especially with Ridley Scott directing again. After many ideas on the production of the prequel movie to Alien came out and didn’t make it—there was even one where James Cameron was supposed to participate in—it’s inevitable that Ridley Scott come back for a new science fiction film from that universe. It’s likely that in time, this one will also end up as one of the great classics to be enjoyed for generations and perhaps even when real aliens have been discovered.

Given the predominance of Hollywood movies, it would be easy to think that European characters aren’t as popular as those made in the USA; well, okay, maybe except for Harry Potter and Sherlock Holmes, both of which are British.

In terms of historical past, however, there has also been another European character who has achieved a certain degree of popularity: a young Belgian newspaper reporter named Tintin.

Granted, the character of Tintin might not be as well known as Harry Potter or have existed as long as Sherlock Holmes. Moreover, as a literary character he doesn’t have the street credibility that the other two characters have, as his medium is comics, the barely tolerated stepchild of Western literature.

That said, Tintin’s adventures are just as vibrant as those of any character in literature, ranging from diving into the depths of the ocean to traveling the heights of the Tibetan plateau and its mountains. While his early adventures were influenced by the cultural European myopia of the early 1930’s, when the comic book began, those written from the mid-1930’s onwards were culturally more evenhanded.

Give credit to Hergé, Tintin’s creator. After Cigars of the Pharaoh, Tintin’s creator, Belgian artist Georges Rémi, began using research and photographic references to fully develop the lands that Tintin traveled through from the mid-1930’s onwards, a method which future storytellers adapted. His ligne claire (“clear line”) style of drawing influenced such artists as Andy Warhol, who even made some paintings in this style.

Give credit, too, to Steven Spielberg, who’s bringing Tintin into the 21st century. The movie is based on the plotline of three Tintin books – The Crab with the Golden Claws, Red Rackham’s Treasure and The Secret of the Unicorn – and it will be presented, in the latest fashion, as a motion capture 3-D movie.

As a long time fan of the character, I can’t wait to see how well his adventures translate to the big screens of the 21st century.

Horror fans should already be familiar with the Final Destination series. They’ve come to expect the unexpected when it’s about death by the unknown. But now, the makers of Final Destination have come up with a movie where the cause of death is certain—by the jaws of a shark!

Shark Night 3D is all about a group of young people trapped in an island with a hungry shark that seems bent on tormenting the group and getting a bite or two out of the naughty kids. Yep, it’s always the naughty ones who get to die first in this kind of horror movie, and they have a whole lake house for themselves for the weekend. The shark on the other hand, has them all for itself. The group starts out as seven, but this number is fast whittled away and the group ends up with much less.

The Producers of the cult hit movie, 300, has come up with a new ancient period film that uses the same slick and dreamy movie experience that fans have come to expect from them.

What’s not to like about a crazy superhero that doesn’t even have super powers? In the movie Super, the story is all about a man whose hit rock bottom, and, in what may be the worst case of mid-life crisis, turns himself into a super hero out to get his life back by beating a drug lord who’s taken his wife away from him.

Why would Mars need moms? Well, you can ask comic book artist and writer Berkeley Breathed, who wrote the picture book titled “Mars Needs Moms.” If you haven’t read the book, you can always watch the movie adaptation directed by Adam Wells and produced by Robert Zemeckis, the guy who brought us The Polar Express.

Captain America is one superhero who’s had a number of movies and also appeared on television, but none of these appearances seems to have stuck in the consciousness of people like Spider-Man did. For some vague reason, Captain America seems not the kind of superhero that people would like to watch over and over again on the big screen. At least that was then. Now there’s a new movie with all the convincing effects and realistic circumstances surrounding the origin of the first Avenger. Will this movie finally give Marvel’s Captain America the attention it deserves?