Well this is excrement. It's supposedly about the Marvel Comics character Man-Thing but, in reality, it's a cheap little TV-quality grade-Z horror movie that has very little in common with the comics. Even then, there could be some value in this if it had even the slightest bit of talent behind it. But it doesn't and it sucks. The writing, acting, directing, special effects, music, and pretty much every single other thing you could think of is generic and cheap. The basic plot is that there's a creature in the swamp killing horny teenagers so the town's new sheriff investigates. This guy's the clichéd "big city cop turned country sheriff" character that has appeared in about ten thousand movies. He looks like a cross between Ed Westwick and a young Peter Deluise, so you can imagine what a commanding presence he has. He shows up in the bayou wearing a leather jacket and shades while toothless yokels say things like "You city boys shore are funny." Please. Honestly, just don't with this. It's garbage in every way. If you enjoy shitty made-for-TV/DVD horror movies then go right ahead and poison yourself with this stuff. I'd rather find something more productive to do with my time, like staring at the sun. Oh and Rachael Taylor's in this. Because it was made in Australia. Because that looks just like Louisiana. Because we're all idiots.

In case you ever find yourself in that position, or you hear someone else, thinking that the Marvel Cinematic Universe films are weak or under-par or just simply *bad*, I encourage you to check out Man-Thing. Actually I don't because this would almost come across as a recommendation, and it's not that. It's about perspective: you can watch things like Thor 2 or one of the Amazing Spider-Man movies (and yes, Spider-Man 3 if you don't care for it), and realize 'yeah, well, at least it's not Man-Thing.' This is such a waste of time, and more than that a waste of potential - yes, potential - that it's barely on-par for the sludge that passes for Syfy channel movies of the week.Everything is stock here, everything. Stock opening with the horny teens having sex in the swamp and one of them getting killed (lots of blood, to be sure, but not a single f*** given to suspense); stock villain with his 'you Yankee Sheriff don't understand get outta my way' twang; stock lead who barely makes a different facial expression except constipated consternation; stock friend deputy who we know may not last long; stock backwoods "good ol' boy" yokels where the closest thing to a joke involves taking a s*** in the swamp at night (and then, ::GASP:: one of them falls in to what looks like other s***); laughably stock Indian guide who patiently exclaims over a montage about how the "Man Thing" came to be due to corporate man's interference with oil rigs and who knows what; and stock love interest who really becomes a love interest because it's about that time for the hero man to kiss the hero girl and for them to almost have sex at an importune time.Did I mention this movie is quite poor, because it is. And I think that it could have had potential as a) if it embraced it's dumbass B-movie roots and went for broader, or at least were more sincere in some other way, like with a script that went for crazier ideas or stakes, or b) if, I assume, they stuck closer to what Man-Thing actually is in the comics (I'd assume from what I've read from others reactions, I haven't yet read it though it comes from Steve Gerber who created Howard the Duck, that it's not close at all). Or maybe a stronger director with a better grasp on horror or comedy or horror-comedy. The best that Brett Leonard is able to muster for anything 'creative' or out of the box comes in super-fastly-whiplash-style editing to transition from, uh, one scene to another whenever it's time to get EDGY in that way that is terribly dated a decade on (though it was likely dated in 2005).The acting is equally stock as the actors, though as one thing to give the movie credit the actor playing the bat-s*** photographer who keeps popping up in the 'Dark Water' of the swamp was fairly entertaining. But aside from that no one is memorable, certainly no one who can inject some madness or life into the thing. It's trying to play it too straight and be too serious-minded, but it the director and crew don't have the skills (or budget) to give anything close to some actual terror or properly mounting suspense. It's all a lot of people wandering in dark swamps and then BOOM then comes the CGI 'Man-Thing'. Indeed the best thing about the movie is the title, which I'm sure at the time Marvel patted itself on the back and handed out giant cigars for the whole staff for the fact that they got a comic called Man-Thing.And it's not like I went into this wanting to hate it, at least not to this point (I suspected, given it was never released to theaters, to lower my expectations, but not to the point of bottom of the barrel). I want more raw, hard-R rated flicks from the likes of Marvel - the first two Blades and Punisher: War Zone embraced their B-movie roots and had good-to-decent directors behind them - but there needs to be a strong vision or something new to the table. Practically everything in Man-Thing, from the Indian environmental "messages" that feel somewhat coopted from *Swamp Thing* (and I'm sure with the comic that was intentional) to the small-town folk who are given the blandest, most generic 'Southern-good-ol'-f***-yeah' dialog, is telegraphed, rote, like things picked up off the dirty, un-vacuumed-for-15-years floor of a hack screen writing pig-pen floor. Even when we see the Man-Thing itself it feels disappointing, with the only thrill coming when it does something especially gory but that too isn't unexpected.Only for the most die-hard horror-gore-comic-book fans. Or if you want to get that perspective I mentioned earlier. Or if you like a villain with the last name "Schist". Get it? It sounded like it's called s***!

A new horror about a lake monster, done with no less than a monster movie-making ! The lead, (Matthew Le Nevez), is bad. "Acting" is something he has never heard of. "Character" is something the scriptwriter has never heard of either ! You'll never know : was the lead having problems? Was he smart? Was he angry? What I know now for sure is that the scriptwriter has problems, one of them is that he's stupid, and that made me angry !The girl ? Grrrrrr ! I bet they wanted to insert any girl anyway into the movie's events, while forgetting giving her a character too. Her being here is absurd comedy. She falls in love with the lead, kissing him now and then, then and now, for no obvious reason but providing the movie with kissing. She's with him at the last scene, so the poster may have her with him…wet !The rest of the movie is at rest as creative or even workable. In the start there is a scene that copies the first scene of (Jaws). After that there is a "monster in the lake", how many movies had that before? Then, a slasher movie where everybody is killed, misshapen and torn apart, a man who wanted to have the land for himself, a Red Indian voodoo, and snore, snore, snorrrrr.. sorry, that was me in front of this ! In brief : What's new ? And in terms of making that old movie, or movies, what's not bad?The editing is primarily good, trying to make a surprising dark character for the movie, however loses every power it has during the lost and incredibly boring second act, in which nothing happens but some guys go into the lake, talk to each others, then get murdered brutally (At one moment I hoped that the creature may eat the lead, that should have made me happy, and changed the mood a bit !). The cinematography doesn't get out a chronic case of green for the lake scenes and yellow for the rest, so with the movie's unoriginality and emptiness I felt discontent; maybe that's a point for the sake of the movie's atmosphere ! And the direction has its moments, but what a scary vacuum it plays in for all the time, and it's shameful enough working with a script like that ! It pulls off one matter though, which is hiding the creature's features for almost all the time. It's a smart trick yes, based on the good horror works to inflame the expectation and generate some fear, but the thing is when we got to see it at the end, it looked so primitive and poor to feel frustration and regret. Here's a movie that doesn't want to complete anything good at all !"Let him dig, dig, and dig.. his grave" is a line I liked. Though, between you and me, was anything in this movie better than it ? Well, this movie digs its grave by its own hands ! (Man Thing) is a movie thing. It's supposed to be a B pastime product, however ended up as the movie shown on video in (The Ring); just series of hardly related dark images that do nothing but curse you. Heck, I should have been warned when the movie's title, at the movie's start, looked like a green vomit !P.S : How come that (Stan Lee)'s name is on this ? The man is a master of beautiful crap. Why he went on to produce pure crap this round ?!

4.1 Is Extremely Low For This Film It Is Better Than Most Horror Films Like Summers Blood (2009) Or Cloverfield (2008) Where Its Pointless & Stupid. It Takes A Lot To Scare Me & This Movie Had My Heart Pumping At 200 Times A Minute. I Love The Comics But I Am Not An Ordinary Comic Book Fan. I Am A Comic Book Fan That Can Accept Changes. The Plot Is That People Who Live In A Town With A Swamp Are Disappearing & Returning As Carcasuses & The New Sheriff Kyle Williams Investigates. An Old Native American Man Tells Him That The Swamp Has A Guardian That Is Angry At The New Oil Station Being Built & Is Seeking Retribution. A School Teacher Tells Him That The Suspect That They Have Is Innocent. There Is Nothing Wrong With The Visual Effects In This Movie. This Is A Dark Comic Book Movie I Have Been Waiting To See This For 1 Year & I Have Been Looking Ever Since I Heard There Was A Movie & I Was NOT Disappointed. This Is My 2nd Favourite Horror Film (1st Is Ghost Rider). This Movie Is Also Amazing Because I Am Australian & This Was Filmed In Australia & I Couldn't Recognise Any Of The Outdoor Scenery. This Film Reintroduces The Alfred Hitchcock Horror Of Not Knowing What Could Happen. This Film Is Well Worth Anyone's Time.Rating: 10/10P.S. There Is A Secret Joke In This Film Steve Gerber & Mike Ploog Did Some Man-Thing Issues & They Were Characters In This Film.