Jonah Hex…

Updated on June 7, 2010 By Ken Begg 43 Comments

Is it just me, or does the upcoming Jonah Hex movie look awful…like, Van Helsing awful?  When the commercials featuring (in theory) the best one liners and action shots of the movie totally suck, you’re in trouble, right?  And what’s with all the supernatural crap?!  And…horse-mounted Gatling guns?! Is that supposed to be ‘cool’?  (Again, like Van Helsing’s limitless ammo automatic dart pistols?)  Because that might well be the single most retarded thing I’ve ever seen in my life.  And whereas I would usually make that statement with awe and joy, here, not so much.

Or maybe not.  What do you guys think?

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  • Joe11

    Totally agree with you Ken.

    I only know of Jonah Hex from that one episode of Batman TAS back in the 90’s & thought he was pretty cool bad@$$ character with a unique look. The commercials do nothing for me & it looks like Megan Fox has almost used up her 15 minutes of fame.

  • Ha, exactly! When Fox appeared in the commercial and I heard her deliver one of her incredibly lame quips, I literally starting thinking, “…tick, tick, tick…”

    Still, I’m sure her absence will be the downfall of the Transformers franchise.

    *cough*

  • Ericb

    When I first saw the commercial I thought it was an awful remake of Django (they didn’t give the title of the film until the end).

  • Reed

    I saw a bizarre Japanese Django movie on cable the other day. I thought it was kind of nasty and very mean spirited, but due to the fact that it was a Japanese Django movie I just sat through the whole thing going, “Huh.”

    I have no opinion on Jonah Hex. I’m much more of a Marvel guy than a DC guy; I’ve never read an issue of the comic and know nothing about the character. With a name like Jonah Hex, though, I’m amazed that the comic doesn’t have a ton of supernatural stuff. Ken’s comments would lead me to believe that is the case, though.

  • Krinn

    Re: Jonah Hex and the supernatural, in the comics he did deal with the strange (Joe R. Lansdale wrote some Jonah Hex stories for Vertigo, with such bits as a (possibly) undead gunslinger, giant worms, and talking bear children), plus in the series Hex, he got sent into a post-apocalyptic future. So Jonah Hex dealing with the weird and unknown isn’t too much of a stretch.

    Shame the movie looks like it sucks, though.

  • Daniel

    I’ve only seen the one commercial, but I’m wondering what the hell is wrong with everyone’s faces? With the exception of Ms. perfect, everyone looks like they got between Mike Tyson at an all-you-can-eat buffet.

  • Krinn — Yeah, the thing about comics is that if a character has been around long enough, he or she is likely to have had some really, really weird stretch that people either don’t know about or would like to forget: Spider-Man is a clone, the Punisher died and became a supernatural avenger, or a Frankenstein Monster (those both happened), etc.

    Even so, is that the *essence* of the character? I remember the Mad Max Jonah Hex, but really, if you were doing a movie or a TV show, would it center on that particular incarnation of the character? I guess my point is, that the supernatural Jonah Hex is so far removed from the common conception of the character that using that version makes no sense, as opposed to just doing a supernatural cowboy movie and just calling the guy something else.

  • Per Reed’s comment, I don’t think you need to know who Jonah Hex is to think the movie looks awful, just as (again) Van Helsing was awful. It’s just that if you do know of the character, it’s another layer of ?????????.

  • P Stroud

    CGI special effects have nearly ruined horror and scifi. Who needs plotting or acting or a good scary story? Nah. Just have more spaceships blow up loudly in space. And stick a bunch of ugly shapes together and make a phony CGI demon. Yeah that’s the ticket. An even better idea is a horse mounted gatling gun. I can hardly wait.

    One longs for the considered logic and careful scripting of an Ed Wood movie.

  • Daniel — The weird thing is, they don’t make Hex look bad enough. Hex really, really looks awful; enlarged, dead-looking eye, etc. This Hex actually looks comparatively prettified.

  • BeckoningChasm

    I know who Jonah Hex is, but more from his appearances in the Timmverse (where he was handled with excellence)than in the comics. That said, the trailer looks like a typical summer action thing–full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

  • BeckoningChasm

    if you were doing a movie or a TV show, would it center on that particular incarnation of the character?

    See: 20th Century Fox using the “cloud of locusts” Galactus instead of the one everyone knows (and loves).

  • Foywonder

    They test screened the movie about two months ago. It did not go well. According to reports, even the studio execs got up and left during the screening. Pretty much looked upon as being a known dud which is why the studio did so little to promote it up until the last minute.

  • I’ve seen the ads on TV for ‘Jonah Hex’ and I could barely make out what anyone was saying. What is it with actors mumbling their lines? It didn’t help that there were loud guitar riffs and explosions over the dialouge too.

  • Ericb

    “I saw a bizarre Japanese Django movie on cable the other day”

    Did it have the same plot? Were all the roles played by Japanese actors?

  • Rock Baker

    Pop’s a big Jonah Hex fan and he’s keeping his fingers crossed. Not expecting a good movie, but a fun movie maybe. Big screen westerns are so rare these days, one seems worth a look when it happens along. Considering the rumors of armies of the walking dead and the like, the previews actually look pretty grounded. I’m not expecting 3:10 to Yuma, but we MIGHT get a decent drive-in horse opera.

    On Hex’s Face. The original version of the character resembled Clint Eastwood’s Man With No Name with a hole in his cheek. How damaged his face is depends on whoever is drawing him. Sometimes half his face is melted off, sometimes he looks like the movie version. The movie did get some good will from Pop when he saw that they didn’t go crazy with his face and made it closer resemble the original character.

    They did go screwing around with his origin, but that’s to be expected since Hex’s backstory was more in line with Hondo (1953) than Batman (1989), where Burton established that any movie superhero’s origin story must directly connect to the heavy.

  • Plissken79

    I am with you, Ken, Jonah Hex looks simply dreadful, even worse than Wild Wild West. Of course, I am not familiar with the Hex comic books, so I cannot say how loyal this version looks. Still, judging from the trailers, I would rather sit through Marmaduke five times than John Hex once.. of course, the fact I own two dogs may have something to do with that.

  • Petoht

    I’m more looking forward to the upcoming Solomon Kane flick.

  • alex

    Yes, the trailer does make the film look awful. And one of the producer of Jonah Hex is Akiva Goldsman. Yes folks, THAT Akiva Goldsman. How Warner allows this man anywhere near any of their Superhero movies after the cinematic abortion of Batman And Robin is beyond me. Seriously this guy must have some really good connections to keep getting work. He and Michael Bay should team up and make a movie with nothing but explosions and one liners.

  • rockrocky77

    Akiva Goldsman has done some very good episodes of “Fringe” (I have heard havent really watched the show) but yeah the Trailers and TV spots are giving me a “Wild Wild West” vibe and that’s not good.

  • Rob

    Just watched the trailer (I didn’t even know about this thing till now). I saw there were explosions — just like in every stinking “action” movie in the last couple of decades. It just looks like fifty other movies.

    Rob

  • Tork_110

    He sounds like McGarnagle.

  • Luke Blanchard

    I’ve only read a handful of Jonah Hex stories. To me the trailer suggests the film will prove decently made and nothing too special or new. The flippant element in the trailer is odds with its portrayal of Jonah as a dark, haunted hero. The film’s action movie and supernatural elements will probably mean it doesn’t have the downbeat realism feel of those few stories I’ve seen.

  • me

    I don’t see how anyone who writes about and cherishes b-movies could have a problem with horse mounted gatling guns. If they showed up in an Italian weirdo movie in the 60s it would be praised.

  • Because I hold cheesy, zero budget b-flicks to a different standard than decamillion dollar budgeted Hollywood fare. The monumental effort of hundreds if not thousands of professionals and the vast sums of money used to create this soulless trash makes me weep. Watching half that trailer made me feel ten years older.

  • Daniel

    If that makes you weep, Ken, consider this:

    There are obviously demographics that this over-auteur effort is playing to. These hundreds and thousands of professionals wouldn’t be making the decisions they’re making if there wasn’t a target audience.

    I feel embarrassed not just for the crew throwing together this headache, but for the people who no doubt cry for the dreck to continue.

  • Daniel — Look, I’m not naive enough to say that good movies make money, and bad movies lose money. But my theory is, making a good movie never hurts. Its not like Van Helsing made money. Maybe this will. But what happened to the days when you could make spectacular movies that were also really good films? Yes, there was Dark Knight, but man, that was a rare occurrence. It’s not that this looks dumb and retarded, because A-Team looks dumb and retarded, but it also looks fun to me. This one…again, watching the trailer just made me weary.

  • Daniel

    True true… Not that I should be making any observations on film quality. For one thing, there are a number of movies that I thought were really good that my wife and all of my friends thought were stupid (i.e. Cloverfield). For two, I’m commenting on Jabootu.net, a fairly good sign that my tastes of what constitutes ‘good’ might be slightly scarred.

  • Rock Baker

    There have been those rare films that looked horrible, and then turned out to be pretty good. At this point, pretty much everyone -even Pop- is counting on this one being a colossal turkey. If anyone goes to see it, there’s a chance they might get a better film than advertised. It happens, but I wouldn’t place good odds on it. As for me, I’ll be staying home and maybe watching a Randolph Scott movie instead.

    I’m still giving the film some points for not getting carried away with Jonah’s scar, though. On those sadly rare occasions where they do get something right it needs to be acknowledged.

  • PB210

    “They did go screwing around with his origin, but that’s to be expected since Hex’s backstory was more in line with Hondo (1953) than Batman (1989), where Burton established that any movie superhero’s origin story must directly connect to the heavy”.

    I think Wes Craven deserves status as originator of that trend, as 1982’s The Swamp Thing may have been the first film to put the hero’s main villain in his origin. In the original comics, Arcane was not responsible for Holland becoming the Swamp Thing (or rather his memories being imprinted on vegetable matter…..) or for the death of Linda Holland. In the original stories, a white collar conspirator named Nathan Ellery and his coterie the Conclave sought the formula and caused these events. However, the 1982 film made Arcane responsible.

    To give Wes Craven some leeway, he did not have a huge budget from the producer (the same producer, who, oddly enough, also funded the 1989 Tim Burton film-they used the money from Swamp Thing to generate some quick funds before they could get funding for a big film). So, I can understand why he decided to simplify the story. In the original tales, Arcane comes out of “left field”, a sort of stereotypical mad scientist/sorcerer out of Berni Wrightson’s playbook in a generic Transylvania.

    Also in 1982, Conan the Barbarian had Thulsa Doom as the slayer of Conan’s parents, something unheard of before that point. However, Conan did not start in comic books, so that may not count.

  • Rock Baker

    I stand corrected. I knew it was likely an earlier film had used this plot device, but apparently not one I’d seen recently enough to still be in my memory. (I wonder if one could argue the Star Wars saga had a hand in this, what with the sudden connection between Luke and Vader)

  • Grumpy

    Re: Batman

    I recall an interview with Warren Skaaren where he said he added the Joker to Batman’s origin at the last minute because he was looking for a Jungian shadow-double angle.

  • John Nowak

    It’s a heck of a tough call.

    First, movies are a lot lighter in material than comics are, so there’s less room for plot points to pop up. Heck, Tigra waited a good thirty years before investigating the murder of her husband.

    That tends to argue in favor of tying the heroes and villains together. If you put too much into the story it gets confusing.

    FLASH: I was just given speed powers by a lightning bolt!
    GRODD: I am an exile from a secret civilization of hyper-intelligent gorillas!
    FLASH: Let’s fight!

    It just seems more organic somehow if there’s one Weird Event everything’s tied to:

    DYING ALIEN: I am an alien police officer, sent here to keep a fugitive named Sinestro from killing your planet. But I’m dying — your world’s only hope is for you to take my ring and carry out my mission.
    JORDAN: Wowsers!

    On the other hand, “The Joker Killed Waynes’ Parents” is painfully lame, unnecessary, and counter-productive. The whole point of Batman is that he can never find peace.

  • Dan Coyle

    Jonah Hex, the original series, as created by John Albano and Tony DeZuniga and later written by Michael Fleisher, was pretty much a straight up western. In 1985 the character was thrown into an apocalyptic future by Fleisher because sales were cratering. That was… well, the first gig Keith Giffen could get after the Munoz scandal was the last few issues of Hex. That’s how well that series did.

    Supernatural elements didn’t come into play until Joe R. Lansdale and Timothy Truman did their brilliant 1993 miniseries Two-Gun Mojo and two other miniseries.

    The supernatural powers thing and the whole family/revenge origin were never part of the character, and aren’t part of the character now in the ongoing that’s been rolling for the past four and a half years by Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray. Palmiotti and Gray did an origin of the character (Complete with gratuitous “he ran with the Indians” bit), but… it wasn’t very good IMO. Their series is incredibly hit and miss, to say the least.

    This Jonah Hex looks like, well, yet another property given elements that screenwriters and execs will think will “appeal” but don’t. See also the awful Solomon Kane movie.

  • Rock Baker

    -On the other hand, “The Joker Killed Waynes’ Parents” is painfully lame, unnecessary, and counter-productive. The whole point of Batman is that he can never find peace.-

    True, Wayne’s war is against crime itself. I think it has much more impact if Bruce’s parents were killed by some nameless, small-time mugger. It drives home the futility, and the heroic nature, of Batman’s fight.

  • Exactly! Even in the comics, the whole Joe Chill thing was completely stupid, and at least he was just an ordinary thug.

  • John Nowak

    I suppose the problem also varies with how off-beat the origin story is. Ken pointed out that the Punisher’s origin just isn’t something you really need to base half your film on.

    Neither, I would argue, is “Ex-Confederate gunslinger with facial injury.”

    Black Widow in [I]Iron Man 2[/I] didn’t need an origin tied into Tony Stark, and they didn’t give her one. A super-spy agency was established, and she’s a super-agent. They did it right.

    Doom in the [I]Fantastic Four[/I] movie having his origin tied in with the heroes … I dunno. Ignoring the fact the film wasn’t very good, that might have worked. I’ve got to admit I’m sort of fond of the notion that the characters matched the five traditional elements of China.

  • BeckoningChasm

    Here’s the thing:

    Imagine the Warner Execs sitting around the conference table. “Okay, we’re making a movie about Jonah Hex. We want to make sure we do this right, so that the Jonah Hex fans get a film they can be proud of!”

    “I agree completely!”

    “Me too!”

    “Yes, let’s do this right!”

    “By the way, how many fans does Jonah Hex have?”

    “Oh, I dunno. A few thousand. Maybe a million. I’m not sure. But just think, each of those million will love the film, and tell both of their friends! We’re guaranteed to clear at least 30, maybe 40 million!”

    (Long silence.)

    “Uh, maybe we can broaden the appeal of this film, by putting in a few…refinements.”

    I’m not defending the making of terrible movies, not by any stretch. But unless they made this film super-cheap (money wise), they can’t really count on an Iron Man.

  • sandra

    Almost everything Hollywood makes these days sucks, and as a general rule, the bigger the budget, the worse it is. I’d be surprised if JONAH HEX is an exception.

  • BeckoningChasm

    Looks like the box office agrees with everyone–Jonah Hex got slammed. Unless word of mouth is incredibly strong, something that hasn’t happened for years, the film is DOA.

  • Eric Hinkle

    I doubt this will be answered after all this time, but — what was the Munoz Scandal?

  • Curiosity led me to Wikipedia, where I learned Keith Giffen was at one point accused of swiping (basically copying figures) from the work of artist Muñoz. More can be found at the Giffen entry.

  • Eric Hinkle

    Thanks. Seems like that’s become a common accusation to make in comics circles these days.