The temptation to scold Edgar Wright

Rightly or wrongly, a director who leaves a movie before its completion can assume a certain "holier than thou" aspect. Sometimes directors get kicked off movies, which is no fault of their own. However, sometimes they cite the ever-popular "creative differences" and depart a movie on their own terms, and rightly or wrongly, this opens them up to scorn.

Warning: The following argument comes dangerously close to taking the side of The Man. But hear me out.

Certainly, you'd think that if Edgar Wright left Ant-Man, it was because Marvel Studios wanted to control him and fit him into a tiny artistic box that he didn't want to occupy. He had sprawling, rambling ideas that consisted of a type of genius that didn't jibe with their conception of the movie. Fine. Leave the movie, Peyton Reed will finish what you started with something halfway watchable (but pretty bland compared to what you would have done), the movie will be reasonably warmly received and everyone will go their merry way.

But I'd be lying if a small part of me didn't say "What, too good for Ant-Man, Edgar Wright?" Rightly or wrongly.

Because it's a bit inevitable to perceive someone who leaves a movie -- leaves, not gets fired from -- as having a bit of an inflated sense of their own self worth. Some would argue that this is a very reasonable estimation of their own worth, as any person should stand up for themselves and not just accept being the puppet of some studio. But there's a certain element of standing up for yourself that seems like rocking the boat. Movies are made by people who become inextricably linked with one another despite inevitable compromises in how they imagined things going, and if you're a good soldier you just grin and bear it.

Wright wasn't a good solder, and some people would celebrate him for that.

I did, sort of, while also wondering what terrific use of his talents he was saving himself for. What thing would be worth not sullying his name or reputation by having a credit on an imperfect realization of his vision for Ant-Man.

The answer is: He was saving himself for Baby Driver.

Which makes it all the more disappointing.

I don't dislike Baby Driver, but let's say that in just 24 hours since I finished watching it, I have already rounded my 3.5-star rating down to three stars and am thinking of going lower. The movie doesn't stand up to even a little bit of scrutiny, and it's not even all that great when you don't scrutinize it.

But I don't want to litigate the strengths and weaknesses of Baby Driver in this post, though I could go on at length with nits to pick and parts that annoyed me, especially in the last 30 minutes. (And for a guy who prizes his own vision for a film, he felt awfully like he was channeling Quentin Tarantino in this movie, didn't he?)

Instead I'd like to concentrate on how Baby Driver is burdened by being an alternative choice to Ant-Man, though in reality, it likely would have been his next movie with or without the MCU film in his filmography.

If Baby Driver had just followed on the heels of The World's End, the 2013 Wright movie that I like even less than Baby Driver, it might have concerned me as a sign that a once-sharp filmmaker who made at least two bracingly original films (Shaun of the Dead and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World) was on a wayward path. But as is, it's what he's offering the world as proof of what he's capable of -- when someone isn't trying to pull his strings. With Baby Driver, Wright says to the world, "My shackles are off. Now watch me fly."

Or maybe, crash land.

In Wright's defense, he has established himself -- through no fault of his own, or to put it another way, "rightly or wrongly" -- as a creative talent from whom a lot is expected. He has a passionate cult of followers who worship his films. There's a lot of pressure on a person like that, a pressure to continually outdo yourself and be greater than you were last time. Even if only two of his now five features have actually earned him that kind of devotion.

So my under-appreciation of Baby Driver could just be a manifestation of my own frustrated expectations for the man's next work.

But I don't think so. I think I have had a love-hate relationship with Edgar Wright that is equally happy to be pushed in either direction. I look forward to his next film either because it will confirm he's great or confirm he's a hack, and I kind of don't care which. I can argue either narrative. (If you're wondering where the one film I haven't mentioned, Hot Fuzz, falls on the love-hate spectrum -- which is really a spectrum of "love" to "don't love that much" -- it's pretty much in the middle. I like it, but not overly.)

And I guess something about the Ant-Man debacle has kind of rubbed me the wrong way. Am I an apologist for a gigantic movie studio like Marvel, or to step out one level greater, like Disney? I don't think I am, but if I generally trust the things a company does -- and that's the case with Disney -- I do extend them a certain loyalty. I do think that someone should think of it sort of as an honor to be entrusted with a Disney product, and if they don't properly appreciate that opportunity, it's a them problem.

But still, had Baby Driver seemed like the inevitable next chapter in the cinematic universe inside Edgar Wright's brain, I would have been happy to argue his genius.

Instead, I'm yielding to that temptation to scold him.

The Spaced team faces its toughest challenge

Before they were the team of collaborators that brought us Shaun of the Dead, one of the most beloved zombie movies of all time, Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost collaborated on a little British TV show called Spaced. It was about a guy (Pegg) who'd been dumped by his girlfriend, who moves in with a different girl (Jessica Hynes) -- merely platonically, or so it starts. It's the story of their lives and the lives of their goofy neighbors and friends -- and it was funny as hell. My wife and I watched both seasons a couple years ago.

Of course, after Spaced and Shaun of the Dead, the trio collaborated on Hot Fuzz in 2007, again coming away with a decent-sized hit -- even though it runs on arguably a half-hour too long.

Their fourth collaboration -- or fifth, if you want to include Frost and Pegg participating in Wright's Grindhouse trailer, Don't -- comes out today. It's Paul, and it's one of those movies some of us tell people we want to see, even though we're not really sure we actually do want to see it.

As you probably know, Paul is a movie about an alien with the speech mannerisms of Seth Rogen -- because it's Seth Rogen doing the voice -- and the two dimwits who hook up with him, played by Pegg and Frost. If anyone else's names were on this movie other than Pegg, Frost and Wright, we'd be running from it at full speed. However, since it's them, we're willing to give it a shot.

I should say that Wright is only the executive producer of this film -- one of five -- and not its director. And here's where a big warning flag goes up for me. Paul is directed by Greg Mottola, who directed Superbad. For most people, this is a good thing -- in fact, the ad campaign focuses almost exclusively on the Superbad connection, not on anything the Spaced team has done. For me, however, I found Superbad overrated -- perhaps grossly overrated. I don't give it a thumbs down, but I'm pretty wary of it. I'm even more wary of the film Mottola made in between Superbad and Paul, which is Adventureland. It had some of the same tonal problems I detected in Superbad, only it made them a lot meaner. I do like Mottola's first film, The Daytrippers, but that was a lifetime ago, back in 1996.

However, I will say that the best part of Superbad was the cops behaving badly with their sidekick, McLovin (Christopher Mintz-Plasse). One of those cops was played by Rogen, who does the voice of the title character here. But I think Rogen is on the downswing of his likability as a performer right now. He'd be there even if The Green Hornet hadn't been a disaster, but it was -- and probably the worst thing about it was how unlikable he was. Now, I liked Rogen voicing a monster in Monsters vs. Aliens. I just don't know if I'll like Rogen voicing an alien in Paul.

There's an X factor here that throws out of whack our ability to forecast the movie's quality. The fact that it was written by Pegg is not such a surprise -- he's been credited as a writer on all of his collaborations with Frost and Wright (he and Wright created Spaced together). However, this time Frost is also credited as a writer -- his first writing credit on a feature. My guess is that Pegg did most of the heavy lifting and threw his buddy a bone, but it's hard to say for sure. I'd be inclined to view their involvement with the script as a positive, but it's not quite so cut-and-dried as that. After all, Pegg also wrote the screenplay for Run Fat Boy Run, which I thought was loathsome. Maybe we can blame Michael Ian Black, who has the "story by" credit as well as a co-screenwriter credit, for that one.

Anyway you slice it, a movie about two stoners hanging out with a refugee from Area 51 is a tough sell -- or could be, anyway. You're relying on "smart stoners" to watch it -- intellectuals who like a good laugh (and like to toke up), who were really the ones who gave Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz their large cult followings. The problem with "smart stoners" is that they tend to call bullshit at a certain point. Whether Paul is an instance of that or not remains to be seen.

But not seen by me -- at least, not this weekend. I should be honest and say that I plan to devote much of my free time to watching college basketball this weekend. But even if I didn't, I'd see Limitless, not Paul.

So, why didn't I write about Limitless today? Simple: Couldn't think of anything to say. Sometimes, that's all that goes into it.