Trolling #51: Jonah Hex RULES!

Welcome back to CraveOnline’s Trolling, my dearest contrarians, the series devoted to tearing apart all that is beloved, and vaunting and protecting all that is despised. This week, it is time to dive to the rescue of the largely hated and critically panned 2010 comic book film Jonah Hex.

When Jimmy Hayward’s supernatural western Jonah Hex was released in theaters in the summer of 2010, it was immediately and passionately rejected by mainstream audiences. Based on an edgy cult comic book, Jonah Hex starred Josh Brolin as a drifting bounty hunter with a scar on his face who is enlisted by the military to stop an evil bad guy with dark plans involving super-weapons. According to fans of the character, Jonah Hex was frustratingly inaccurate to the comics. According to critics, it was stiff, sloppy, and dumb; it enjoys a unenviable 12% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Anything that is that unpopular has to be – in the eyes of Trolling – worth something. That which is hated gets out sympathy gland active. And after a special look over, we have come to a new conclusion. Let us posit the following: Jonah Hex RULES! Let’s look at a few reasons why.

The plot is all over the place, the general tone never finds a foothold, and I cannot come up with any sort of cogent defense of the dreamscape fistfights (is that what they were?) between Brolin and Malkovich. Plus, at a mere 81 minutes, the stakes never get a chance to be raised to truly exciting levels – and this is coming from a critic who typically prefers brief films to longer ones. But what we do have is an earnest, tough, metal-edged fantasy western that is – at the end of the day – pretty entertaining.

Until next week, let the hate mail flow.  


 Witney Seibold is a commentator at Nerdist, a contributor to the CraveOnline Film Channel, and co-host of The B-Movies Podcast. You can read his weekly Trolling articles here on Crave, and follow him on “Twitter” at @WitneySeibold, where he is slowly losing his mind.

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