Coming off of Pineapple Express, I think the last thing people would’ve expected Seth Rogen and writing partner Evan Goldberg to do would be to drop everything and make a superhero movie. And if you thought that was an unlikely scenario, probably no one could’ve predicted that it would’ve been helmed by the mise en scéne master, Michel Gondry. So, what do we have here? A stoner/comedy writing team, guided by a French surrealist master, tackling a much lesser-known superhero story, The Green Hornet. Check your expectations at the door.

For those who don’t know, The Green Hornet is a character that was created way back in the 1930s, originally for a radio program, so he’s actually one of the earliest superheroes. His name is Britt Reid, and he’s a “debonair newspaper publisher by day, crime-fighting masked hero at night.” Rogen and Gondry took the character in a bit of a different direction. Their Britt Reid is a party-boy heir set to inherit his father’s media empire, until his father abruptly perishes from an allergy to a bee sting. Shaken and confused, Britt tries to piece his life back together. After firing a bunch of people, he notices that his once amazing coffee now sucks. In attempting to rectify this, he discovers that he got rid of his father’s ex-chauffeur and coffee maker, an Asian fella named Kato. After realizing how they’ve wasted their potential, they decide to bring justice to the streets, disguised as criminals themselves. In the process, they discover that one man, Chudnofsky, has consolidated all crime in the city into one sort of “super-mafia,” where of course, he’s the boss.

As I said before, Rogen and co. took the character in a bit of a different direction. Rogen’s Reid is sort of a bumbling joker who ultimately has little clue what he’s doing in general, let alone as far as crime fighting goes. This is where Rogen and Goldberg’s writing styles really come into play. They specialize in writing roles where the main character is an ostensibly incompetent average joe who, through a combination of absurd and unbelievable occurrences, manages to come out on top. This writing style is what really sets The Green Hornet apart from most of the rest of the genre. Rogen and Goldberg are so good at writing characters that are just fools, and have no clue what they’re doing, and that really makes for an interesting take on one man’s quest to clean up his act and his city’s streets. The self-deprecating sense of humor, the pop-culture comparisons, improvised dialogue, and more, it’s all here. He doesn’t stray too far from his affable personality.

In this version of The Green Hornet, Kato pulls a lot more of the weight than he originally did. He’s the brains as well as the muscle, leaving Britt Reid to be… the heart? Kato’s really the only reason that anything gets done. He’s portrayed by Jay Chou, the “Asian Justin Timberlake.” He’s witty and sharp, and the fact that his English isn’t perfect only makes the film more quirky and fun to watch. Kato’s fight scenes are probably the highlight of the action in the film, which is where Gondry’s surreal nature gets the most exposure.

Chudnofsky, the villain portrayed by Inglourious Basterds‘ Christoph Waltz, was a bit of a letdown for me. His character had a few funny moments revolving around how he’s less intimidating and scary than he believes he is, but overall, aside from those and a cool scene at the beginning of the film, the character was very lackluster. He was boring to watch. I know a ton of people will disagree because Waltz is still flying high off his phenomenal character in Inglourious, but his performance did not keep me captivated at all. However, Chudnofsky was originally to be portrayed by Nicholas Cage, so at that point I’d take anyone else. Oh yeah, Cameron Diaz has a role in the film as Reid’s new secretary and love interest, but she’s largely forgettable and expendable, as usual.

Honestly, I went into this film expecting much more out of Michel Gondry’s directing than I got. Perhaps he just toned his flair down a bit in order to focus more on the story, but it didn’t reach anywhere near the strangeness I was expecting. As previously stated, most of the Gondry highlights came in the form of Kato, whether it was a fight scene, “Kato Vision,” where Kato can predict what’s going to happen based on placement and positioning of enemies, or any of Kato’s inventions. Overall, Gondry and Rogen came up with an interesting and creative backstory for one of the oldest superheroes in fiction. Making Britt Reid an incompetent playboy who basically flails through any given situation until Kato comes and saves his ass. It doesn’t mess with the epic heights of Nolan’s Batman series, the moral crises of Watchmen, the cheesy, dramatic conquests of Raimi’s Spiderman, or the slickness of Favreau’s Iron Man. Instead, Rogen and Gondry pave their own path, tweaking an aged character and his story to their own specialties and strengths, and I think the superhero film genre is better off for it. If you don’t mind your crime fighting with doses of Seth Rogen and surreality, then this is one for you.