Once More With Geekery: Battleship

Stars: Tim Riggins!, Liam Neeson, Alexander Skaaaarrrrssssgaaarrrdd, and Andy Roddick's wife

I find myself not having the energy to write about yet another movie. I’m pretty sure we all knew that Battleship was going to be bad. It was obvious from the trailer. It was obvious when it was announced that someone (who had totally lost their marbles) decided to make a movie out of a board game like Battleship. Well it wasn’t great. It wasn’t awful either but there were some big issues.

The story. Oh, the story. So there are these naval exercises that include the US, Japan and some other countries that quickly become irrelevant. Oh and apparently it's worth noting that NASA sent out a signal to some planet that was discovered to have similar properties to earth. The aliens from said planet decide to invade because they want to take part in the naval exercises. Then it’s up to the good folks on Oahu to save the world.

So that’s the story but how about the plot? Please don’t make me discuss the plot. There were holes in it big enough to steer a battleship through (sorry, had to do it). There’s one in particular that I’d actually watch the movie one more time to see if I’m right about it. If you saw the movie let me know because I need help with this one huge problem.

HOWEVER, there was a lot of pretty great nods to the military both active and retired and that was fine with me. It was nice to have such a big movie pay huge respect to the men and women fighting not only for our country but apparently the world. Plus the big battle that put the USS Missouri to use was a cute part of the story and I’ll forgive it.

Poor Taylor Kitsch. They really keep trying to make him into a movie star and it’s just not clicking. I think he needs to try his hand at some smaller indies before jumping into another leading role in a doomed, big-screen, bigger budget, movie. I think there’s potential in him but I’m afraid it’s more of the FNL-sized potential and not huge, action movie potential. He needs to have a talk with whoever (whomever?) is giving him career advice. He wasn’t bad in this. He wasn’t bad in John Carter either. He just doesn’t have whatever that spark is that leading actors have.

Skaaaarrrrsssgaaaarrrrdd! I think he's doing Blue Steel, which is appropriate since he was in Zoolander

The rest of the cast was fine. Rhianna, though on-screen for much of the movie, didn’t have a ton of actual lines. Liam Neeson was criminally underused and actually forgotten about for a good chunk of the second half of the movie. Then we come to my dear Alexander Skaaaarrrsssgaaaarrrd. Mmmm. He was cute and sweet in this but I could have done with a lot more screen time with him. I should probably also mention Brooklyn "The Body" Decker. Sweet girl who could have been worse.

What was good you ask? Besides showing the love to the armed forces, it was a fun movie. That is, if you can get past the plot problems. There was lots of humor, cool effects, and slightly interesting aliens. It wasn’t much worse than something like Armageddon. So if you enjoy mindless, destruction movies then this one is for you.