Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D

Before this review gets going, I suggest you watch this to set the mood...go ahead and watch, I'll wait.

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Do you feel that? That odd feeling of being inexplicably drawn to David Hasselhoff's many TV exploits and even more odd actually enjoying some of his work? This feeling is also described as "being German". Well, Nick Fury: Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D (comic book geeks re: this is the last time I punctuate that shitty acronym properly) will take that feeling and crash land a helicarrier on it.

Now, Nick Fury the comic character is pretty cool on paper. Your basic grizzled war veteran, who is now basically running all aspects of espionage for the USA (and he has a friggin' eye patch!) He has made appearances in basically every major Marvel Comic since his inception, but never could support a title on his own (comic book geeks re: I have not read the new MAX series that was recently commissioned, but I suspect that it tanked).

For whatever reason in the late 1990's Fox decided to poorly invest in comic books. They spear headed the comic book movie/tv resurgence with a Generation X TV movie that was putrid, as well as a Nick Fury TV movie starring DAVID HASSELHOFF. The movie as everyone would have suspected was an abomination. It literally looked like a TROMA film...put together by high school comic geeks in their backyard. The script was terrible. The acting was amazingly atrocious. The special FX made the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers look like it was done by ILM.

I could run down the ridiculous plot, but some brave soul has already done a pretty extensive summary of the TV movie here.

So, basically I will give you some of the highlights (for lack of a better term) of this new age classic. My comments will be in red.

Just to catch everyone up, Baron Von Strucker (former head of HYDRA) is dead, but for whatever reason his body is frozen and HYDRA agents have stolen it. So, now SHIELD needs some help...

" Later in the Yukon, a SHIELD transport arrives with Agent Alexander Goodwin Pierce and the Contessa Valentina DeAllegra Fountaine (played by Lisa Rinna, and YES THAT IS HER ACTUAL NAME IN THE MOVIE) to reenlist the retired and secluded Nick Fury, former public director of the agency, by presidential decree. Fury is updated on the attempts by Von Strucker's children, Andrea and Werner to reunite HYDRA using the Death's Head virus as a super bio-weapon."

At this point, its clearly been established that Nick Fury is old and grizzled and is being poorly portrayed by our man 'hoff. I'll give the man credit for one thing, he sure can walk pretty straight with an eye patch on.

" In Berlin, Fury and team arrive to collect Armin Zola (another z-grade Marvel villain involved with Nazi shit) from a SHIELD safe house. They first must meet with Gail Runciter, an agent with INTERPOL who captured Zola and insists on being there when Neville reads his mind (WTF??!?). HYDRA agents ambush them, but Fury loses them through a holographic wall (I hate when that happens!). After a harrowing brain scan, Neville is nearly killed in the link with Zola and they learn someone has already been inside his head. Afterward, Runciter tries to seduce Fury and reveals herself as Andrea Von Strucker (Bro's before ho's Fury...always remember that), calling herself Viper, and poisons him with a slow-working toxin.

Back at the helicarrier, Gabe confirms Fury only has hours to live and recommends he remain in the infirmary but Fury opts instead to follow a long shot; obtaining a sample of the Viper's blood to create an anti-serum (let me remind you, this was years before 24...methinks the creators of 24 were inspired by the quality of this TV movie..that wasn't a joke)."

"Viper has the strike team (SHIELD sent some dudes to stop the virus and yadda yadda yadda) captured and reveals to Fury that she intends to detonate the bomb regardless if she gets the money or not (she asked for a ransom, typical supervillainy). The team is locked into a freezer where thanks to its low temperature, Fury can now think better [giving him some relief from the toxin induced fever] (rookie mistake viper!!!)."

"Fury uses his fake eye as an explosive (for all you future supervillains...after frisking down your enemies, ALWAYS check behind the eyepatch) and the team break out of their prison and despite his worsening condition leads a raid on the HYDRA command room."

"Fury breaks into the command room and faces down Viper and Armin Zola. Zola is killed while firing Fury's pistol which is programmed to electrocute anyone who uses it aside from Fury (NEVER pick up the good guy's gun/sword). Viper engages Fury in combat and kills him, only to find Fury alive behind her [thanks to his hologram device] (again with the holograms? "You think this is the real Quaid?...IT IS")."

"Neville scans Viper's mind for the sequence to stop the detonation of the bomb while HYDRA agents try to break into the room from the outside. Neville endures the anger of Viper's mind (she must be one pissed off lady) and Neville offers up a sequence, unsure whether the last number is 6 or 9 (interesting choice in numbers, was this written by 16 year olds?...oh, it was). Fury chooses 6 and the countdown stops. The helicarrier arrives just in time and Gabe comes down to extract blood from Viper for a serum. The countdown begins again and the SHIELD team scramble to stop it. The countdown is a hoax and the diversion allows for Viper to slip away an escape hatch with her father's frozen body (sunuva bitch!!! guys, never trust girls in a 6-9 situation)."

"At an unnamed HYDRA base, Viper witnesses her father's resurrection and Baron Von Strucker vows revenge against Nick Fury.... (umm...don't think so pal.)"

And with that, the insanity comes to a close. Thanks for reading, those of you who made it all the way through.