Watching this two-part TV movie, one might honestly wonder what all the fuss was about and how this oldest of comic book superheroes has endured. This Phantom is not the Phantom of the comics and bears absolutely no relation to previous Phantom movies from the 1940s and 1990s. Even using the Phantom's name for the character in this telemovie is disgraceful and dishonest. A young man turns out to be a descendant of the original Phantom and is whisked off to a foreign land for training. Instead of sporting the familiar purple and blue spandex outfit, he wears what appears to be a Rastafarian knit cap with a dark plastic pulldown visor. And his costume is evidently bulletproof. As bad as the X-MEN movie costumes were, this one is far worse, light years worse. In many scenes, the kid walks around with that Rastafarian chapeau on, which makes him look like the doofus he truly is. Most of the movie is people standing around and talking. I could not make it to the end of this two-parter, so I am not sure if the kid ever got his familiar white stallion and police dog, but I somehow doubt it. Skip this abomination and catch either the Tom Tyler or Billy Zane versions. The Phantom's real costume may look a bit silly and even fruity in this day and age, but it is a sight better than the indescribably bad outfit worn by the Phantom is this 2009 telemovie.
Review of The Phantom
