“Not my favorite of late.
Overall, not too bad. The thing is, imagine throwing Clint Eastwood from Gran Torino into Ocean’s 11. Which actually sounds really awesome. There would be some really awkward moments during the planning phase when he kept saying, “So we put the chink in the box, and then…”
But actually, it was mostly a story of an old man getting revenge, but not regular revenge, revenge on top of revenge. Revengeance?
The two things I really didn’t like were two things that don’t seem to bother other people, so you may still dig this book.
One, I don’t like when they have this hard-assed old man, and they have to show that he still has a soft spot, some humanity left in there. Which can work, but it didn’t. I mean, there’s a subplot where he’s sort of reconnecting with his son, who is 30 by now. A hollow, empty old man who just wants to kill has no business and no reason to connect with his grown son. And a guy who really, deep down just wants to connect with his son has no business shooting a bunch of mob guys in a casino. The rigidity of the character is what makes it fun to me, and when you start bending him I just don’t enjoy it as much.
Two, I really hate 90% of heist-y shit. I think the Darwyn Cooke Parker comics are awesome, and the original Richard Stark novels they came from are also top notch. But overall, I get very bored watching a plan come together like this. And it bothers me as a viewer because the storytellers do this weird thing where they hide some stuff from the audience while putting some of it on display. So I don’t get the surprise of a guy having his casino robbed and not knowing what’s going on, but I also don’t get to be in on the plan and fully watch it unfold. It’s a weird halfway involvement that doesn’t sit right with me.
If those things don’t bother you…I don’t know. If you’re really into Gran Torino, why not?
Oh yeah. That reminds me of the one other thing that bothered me. This could have been WAY more racist with the simple addition of a lost Chinese boy. Just sayin.”