The Best and Worst of Thomas Haden Church

“The Best and Worst of” series chronicles the career highlights and lowlights of an actor starring in one of the week's new theatrical releases. This week, I take a look at the filmography of “Hellboy” star Thomas Haden Church.

Films starring Thomas Haden Church that I've seen:
Tombstone
George of the Jungle
Rolling Kansas
Sideways
Idiocracy
Spider-Man 3
Easy A
We Bought a Zoo
John Carter
Daddy's Home

Best Performance: Sideways (2004)
Like the fine wines that nearly every character here takes great pride in drinking, Sideways is too highbrow for my trash bag tastes. The one thing in Alexander Payne's sophisticated buddy dramedy that kept me somewhat engaged were the two protagonists (Paul Giamatti, Haden Church). Haden Church flawlessly captures the blasé attitude and recklessness of a selfish guy who wants to fill his final days as a non-married man with as much pleasure as possible.

Worst Performance: Spider-Man 3 (2007)
Emo Spider-Man has understandably gone down as the symbol of Spider-Man 3's failure. As a result of this notoriously bad section of the film, Haden Church has gotten a pass for his role in soiling the final entry in Sam Rami's quietly influential trilogy. To be fair, The Sandman isn't exactly the most imposing or interesting villain in the world, but the sheer passiveness Haden Church displays in his portrayal ensures that he's one of the dullest antagonists to ever appear in a superhero movie.

Best Film: Easy A (2010)
Hot take: Easy A is a better movie than Mean Girls. This modern version of The Scarlet Letter is a hilarious, clever and sweet teen comedy that remains one of the finest showcases of Emma Stone's limitless talent.

Worst Film: John Carter (2012)
Disney's biggest financial L of this decade also happens to be the worst movie they've released during that time period (I'm confident enough that a stinker of this magnitude isn't present in the rest of their 2019 slate to make this statement eight months before the 2010's come to a close). John Carter is the type of gross universal failure that I believe is truly hard to come by in Hollywood. The story has the coherency of a Dennis Rodman interview, every single actor that shows up on screen is stuck in a charisma black hole and to top off this shit sandwich, its pacing is brutally slow.  


Thank you for reading this week's edition of “The Best and Worst of”. The next victim of my praise and ire will be “The Curse of La Llorona” star Linda Cardellini.