Steel

THE STORY: Who was the first superhero to wear a suit of powered armor? If you say Steel then you're wrong. Its Iron Man, created by Stan Lee in the sixties. Iron Man has always been one of my favorite heroes and I'd love to see a movie about him. Unfortunately there ain't one so I had to rent Steel.

Steel was created by DC comics back in the early nineties when Superman died. In the comics a bunch of wannabes tried to take up the mantel of Superman and one of them was John Henry Irons. I'm not sure what his story was in the comic books but I can tell you about this movie. There ain't no Superman in it.

John Henry Irons, his friend Susan Sparks (Sparky) and Nathaniel Burke are army lieutenants that design super weapons for the military. While on a test range Burke, unauthorized turns up the power to maximum on a sonic gun. The discharge shatters the wall of the building they're in. This kills a visiting Senator and badly injures Lt. Sparks. Her spine gets crushed and she'll never walk again. Devastated by his friend's injury John Henry resigns his commission after the Burke's court martial. Burke actually gets off rather easy. Instead of being sent to Leavenworth to make little rocks out of big ones he's discharged. Man, I guess there must be another set of laws in the UCMJ (Uniform Code of Military Justice) for officers. I've seen guys sent to prison for far less than manslaughter and reckless endangerment.

John returns home to LA and lives with his grandmother, Odessa and younger brother, Martin. He takes a job at a local steel mill (in LA? Well, I don't know....) Burke also arrives in LA and visits an old friend, Big Willy. Willy poses as a legitimate business man but is really a dealer in illegal weapons. Burke proposes to make super weapons to sell if Willy will front the money. He does, and pretty soon Burke has a gang of hooligans he hired off the streets robbing banks with the sonic guns he's built. Of course John Henry, Martin and a policewoman friend of theirs just happen upon the scene of the first heist. But the crooks sonic weapons are too much. The policewoman is injured (women get hurt around this guy a lot) and the bad guys get away. John Henry almost catches one of them but is shot in the back by another bad guy with a sonic weapon. (This doesn't kill him, but knocks him out. Hmmmm....a bullet would have killed him. Maybe these weapons ain't so super)

With Burke's gang running amok and making the city unsafe, John Henry calls his former commander, Colonel David and asks how these top secret weapons got on the street. Col. David doesn't know (but you'd think they'd put two and two together and figure out it was Burke). John Henry decides to stop the gang and get to the bottom of things. For this he tries to get in touch with Sparky. He finds that she's moved to a VA hospital in Oklahoma City. There he finds her wasting away in depression and basically kidnaps her. She doesn't want to do more than stay in the hospital and feel sorry for herself but John Henry carries her out. He gets her together with Uncle Joe, a kindly junkyard owner and the three of them create a secret high tech lab in there. In this lab they labor on building a suit of super powered armor so John Henry can find and stop the crooks. Once the armor is done John Henry puts it on and becomes Steel, the man of...er, steel! Steel also carries around a big [unwrite]ing hammer that has all kinds of high tech stuff in it. Get it? His name is John Henry and he has a hammer....if you don't get it do a search on the net for "John Henry".

Steel has a few run ins with common thugs (in the obligatory "Tell your friends about me! I'm Steel" scene that happens in most superhero movies.) and a showdown with Burke's gang. The gang escapes Steel and Steel himself must flee from the police when they arrive. Burke on the other hand seems to have figured out what no one else can...that the seven foot tall Steel must be the seven foot tall Sha---I mean John Henry Irons. He has John Henry set up so the police think he's behind the superweapons on the street. But Sparky, ever a computer genius, and Uncle Joe outwit the cops with a voice synthesizer and a fax machine. The cops free John Henry. Sparky has learned that Burke is offering his weapons on the Internet. (I guess at We_supplycrooks.com) While Uncle Joe and Steel go look for Burke, Burke has zeroed in on Sparky's radio transmissions and located her. He has his thugs pick her up. Burke has also been posing as an arcade owner and has hired Martin. He has him picked up as well.

Steel finds the location for Burke's auction and sends Uncle Joe to call Col. David. But Steel is discovered and before he can do anything Burke threatens to kill the captive Sparky. Steel has a plan though. Its the old "The villain is so dumb" plan. He tells Burke that the big [unwrite]ing hammer he carries around is a more powerful weapon than Burke could ever build. He pretty much dares Burke to press the red switch. Being the arrogant villain Burke does. This activates the electromagnet in Steel's armor, which of course sends the hammer flying back to him. In the confusion that follows Sparky activates a few gadgets she built into her wheelchair. All of a sudden various sonic guns pop out of it and she begins firing on the assembled criminals. Steel tells her to get out of there and he begins mopping up the thugs that are left. Burke then threatens to kill Martin, but Uncle Joe arrives and fires at Burke. (and misses, but it allows Martin a chance to escape.) Steel and Martin both escape death when a grenade takes about 25 freakin' seconds to explode. Burke aims a sonic cannon at them and fires, but Steel's armor reflects the blast and sends it back at him. Burke is hit by it and destroyed. Meanwhile, Colonel David and a bunch of soldiers capture the fleeing criminals that came to Burke's auction.

With the bad guys beaten, John Henry, Sparky, Uncle Joe and Martin relax at Odessa's newly opened restaurant. Its been a running gag through the whole movie that Odessa was trying to concoct new dishes with a mixture of "soul food" and French cooking so her restaurant is called "Black and Bleu"....(I said it was a running gag, not a good one!)

You'll get what you pay for with Steel if you remember these things...its made for kids. It stars Shaquille O'Neal (as Steel and John Henry) I don't have any problems with Shaq. I'm not a basketball fan though and Shaq really can't act. But you have to expect that. If you're looking for a grittier movie rent Batman. (only the first one! The others were a bit silly to downright bad) Uncle Joe was actor Richard Roundtree...you know...Shaft! (My man Shaft is one bad mothe--shut yo mouth!) Burke was played by Judd Nelson.

Best Lines: "Man, his brother got more  time than a clock!"- Martin tells about a friend that's in jail.

1.) Why take a job in a steel mill? John Henry is obviously a technological genius! Even if he doesn't want to make weapons for the government anymore he could get a high paying job almost anywhere. Now there's nothing wrong with taking an honest job in a steel mill, but, if you had the technical skill and know how to create futuristic weapons not to mention a suit of super powered armor, would you take a job doing manual labor or a cushy desk job at IBM making buttloads of cash? Hmmmmm?

2.) Just because I always pick a few holes into the mistakes movies make about military uniforms I'll add this. The army BDU's shown in the movie seem pretty good....except for the rank. The officers have their rank insignia and corps insignia on the wrong sides. Other than that, though it was nicely done.

3.) I don't understand why Sparky is letting herself waste away in the VA hospital where Irons finds her. After all, she's a techno-genius herself! Yeah, I know she's bummed out because she'll never walk again, but she could still probably get a high paying job at a big corporation! Plus Sparky never said she wouldn't design weapons anymore! It may be small consolation for losing the use of one's legs, but a few hundred thousand dollar a year paychecks makes for a damn good placebo!

4.) If the cops found a super duper sonic gun (that must have been planted there) in John's house I don't see how the cops could release him. I know Sparky fooled them into doing it, but that seems like pretty good evidence. Its not like there's a lot of those weapons on the street. If he has one that's seems like a good reason to hold him. Besides can the Assistant district attorney just have someone released from jail with a phone call and a fax? Those things can be faked. (and they were!)

5.) Why doesn't Steel have a full face mask? Not only to protect his identity, but his freaking life! If I was a criminal I'd aim right at his mouth. I always wondered why crooks didn't do that when shooting at Robocop too.

NUDITY AND SEX: None.

HUH?: Let me get this straight....Burke is selling his illegal superweapons on the Internet? And the cops and the Army need Steel's help to fond them? Huh? Any nincompoop with a freaking Dell can find them! Geez....just log on to AOL and type in a search for "illegal mega-weapons auctions". The criminals are on freaking Geocities!

Burke shoots his benefactor, Big Willy and the hit kills him. When Slats gets shot it doesn't kill him, just stuns him. Are these Federation Phasers? Why does Slats live and Big Willy doesn't? (I know, I know, its in the script!)

John keeps his transceiver in his mouth when the cops arrest him. Don't the police search people for things in their mouths?

The grenade that gets thrown at Martin and Steel must be one of them long fuse grenades that you see in the movies. Not only do they have time to toss it through a little hole in the wall they have time to [unwrite]ing talk about it! That grenade took about five times longer to explode than it should have. With as much time as it took Steel could have knitted a sweater then took his own sweet time picking the lock of the room they were in with a safety pin before it blew up!

THE TALLY: Now, I could slam dunk this movie....its little more than a vehicle for Shaq...but I have to admit the Inferno kind of enjoyed it. Its no mega hit, but it wasn't bad and its suitable for kids. I just wish kids would stop worshipping sports stars and look up to some real heroes (like policeman, fireman, teachers...Soldiers!) Oh well, I'll never get my picture on a wheaties box...too damned ugly.