ALL SUPERHEROES MUST DIE (AKA VS.)

Stars: Jason Trost, Lucas Till, James Remar, Sophie Merkley, Lee Valmassy, Sean Whalen, Nick Principle and Brian Taylor.
Writer/Director: Jason Trost

Rating: 2.5/5

Constantly struggling to match the promise of its premise, writer/director/star Jason Trost becomes mired in his own cyclical construct in the offbeat but underwhelming All Superheroes Must Die.

Straining to employ the same sort of square-jawed silliness that made his 2011 debut feature The FP an underground hit, Trost opens with some intriguing images but soon settles into a Watchmen-meets-Saw mash-up that can’t be sustained (even over the scant 77 minute running time).

In an abandoned small town, four superheroes awake to find themselves robbed of their powers, the result of an injection that has left bloody wounds on their wrists. Senior among them is strongman Charge (Trost, costumed to recalled Aaron Johnson’s Kick-Ass character), who has retained some of his muscle; Cutthroat (Lucas Till, clearly inspired by Matthew Goode’s Ozymandias in Zack Snyder’s epic), Shadow (Sophie Merkely) and The Wall (Lee Valmassy) are all entirely mere mortals.

Having found each other, they are confronted by the image of arch-enemy Rickshaw (a scenery-chewing James Remar) who, via video monitors he has positioned all over the enclave, sets in motion a devious plot that pits the heroes against each other, often making them choose between their own lives and those of innocent townsfolk. Along the way, soap-operatic backstories reveal an awkward alliance between the four exists, though these scenes add little to the drama.

It is perhaps too much to ask that such a micro-budgeted effort (which, admittedly, looks very polished at times) should delve too deeply into the psychological implications of super-hero types forced into an immoral life, but that is exactly where Trost’s film needed to go to have any resonance. As it stands, it is far too episodic in nature, merely nudging the dwindling number of heroes into same-same situations until a seen-it-before payoff.

Logic is not this project’s strong suit (How does Rickshaw take a whole town hostage? And wire it with explosives and all-seeing CCTV? How long must the heroes have been out for this to all happen? The list goes on…) but that is not the biggest problem with All Superheroes Must Die. Trost’s film is just too one-note; having contextualized his conceit, he has nowhere of particular interest to take the narrative. In the absence of irony or satire, or a grand setpiece to enliven proceedings, this small-scale graphic-novel brought to life is admirably earnest but, ultimately, rather dull.