Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog

(This image is from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Horrible%27s_Sing-Along_Blog)

I recently watched Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog on Netflix. I heard a lot of really good hype about this three part internet series from my kind of crowd, so I decided to finally check it out. I was really glad I did!

WARNING! This blog may contain spoilers.

This movie was written and directed by Joss Wheadon, the man behind the "Buffy" and "Angel" TV series as well as "The Avengers" movie, along with his brothers Zack, who is a television writer, and Jed, who is a composer.

It stars Neil Patrick Harris who plays Dr. Horrible, an aspiring super-villain with a video blog series. Along with him we have his arch nemesis Captain Hammer, played by Nathan Fillion. There's also Penny, played by Felicia Day, who is the shared love interest between the villain and hero. There's also Dr. Horrible's henchman/friend/roommate Moist, played by Simon Helberg, who dampens everything.

From the looks of the production quality, I thought this entire musical was just going to be a comedy. Sure there are some good, memorable songs in this musical, but I still thought it was primarily going to be a comedy. I was a bit surprised to find out I was wrong.

I could tell that there was definably going to be a point at which Penny discovers Dr. Horrible's secret of being a super-villain and that things would become sad between them. It was funny to see Dr. Horrible claim to be an evil mastermind, but got nervous and shy around this cute, innocent girl who is dedicated to helping people. The part of him that made him a villain would have been expected to make Penny stay away from him. It was not a surprise to see that Dr. Horrible couldn't follow through with killing Captain Hammer in order to join Bad Horse and the Evil League of Evil. He was struggling with the fact that the Evil League of Evil requested him to kill someone in order for him to be accepted. He only truly wanted to kill Captain Hammer because he was a complete bastard who was only using Penny sexually and to make Dr. Horrible jealous. Dr. Horrible ended up hesitating because he had some good in him.

Seeing Dr. Horrible's Freeze Ray malfunction and release Captain Hammer from being frozen in time was not much of a surprise, as his luck against Captain Hammer was never that good and it was funny. Seeing Dr. Horrible's Death Ray explode as Captain Hammer almost killed him with it and seeing the hero run away when he experienced physical pain for the first time was also no surprise as for the reasons stated before.

What I found surprising was that when the Death Ray exploded, it ended up killing Penny with a fragment, leaving her to give Dr. Horrible one last heart filled statement before she died. Though in the end it makes sense. Dr. Horrible ended up gaining almost everything he was striving for. He got fear from everyone in the city, he maintained a victory over Captain Hammer who was emotionally crippled, and he was accepted into the Evil League of Evil, finally getting the recognition that he was a super-villain. But in the end, the cost was far too great, for now he has an empty victory.

That is a lesson in life that is worth hearing. Just because you strive towards your goal and you might finally achieve it one day, doesn't mean you will be happy. Sometimes, you end up giving up something you couldn't live without. That is why I really enjoyed this musical.