Stan Lee’s Lightspeed
Picture:
C+ Sound: B- Extras: D Main Program: C
Stan Lee
is known as one of the founders of the wildly successful Marvel Comics and even
recently worked for longtime friendly-rival DC Comics, though he was
responsible for some great crossover comic releases between the two companies
going way back. In more recent years, he
has been striking out on his own with various superhero productions and Stan Lee’s Lightspeed (2005) is one of
them.
Jason
Connery is government “ghost squad” agent Daniel Leight, severely injured in a
building collapse caused by uber-terrorist Python (Daniel Goddard) in a
near-fatal encounter. Just when he is
being treated for injuries and in the trusted care of his own, someone
purposely alters special radiation treatments to kill him. Instead, he becomes the title character, able
to move and run faster than just about anything.
Once
again, as in the Marvel Universe, radiation does not kill, but mutates causing
another hero or villain. Marvel never
did create their total answer to DC’s The Flash, but this is a little better
than the horrid TV series version of that character. Unfortunately, this is also as lame as most
of the Marvel TV and feature film productions (pre-Blade) they co-produced. Too
bad, because maybe this could have worked somehow. Lee Majors (The Six Million Dollar Man, still not on DVD in the U.S. and barely
anywhere else) is one of the few highlights here otherwise and his character is
not developed or on screen enough to boot.
Some may
enjoy this retro piece, but otherwise, the experience of watching Stan Lee’s Lightspeed will likely leave
you as quickly as the title suggests.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image is soft and obviously shot on digital
High Definition video. It is adequate at
best, but nothing to write home about.
The Dolby Digital 5.1 mix has enough surrounds to seem like a current
production, but they are nothing extraordinary.
There are no extras.
- Nicholas Sheffo
