069 – 300: Rise of an Empire (2014)

Besides a little age on the returning actors, not much has changed in the 300 universe since 2006. And even the ravages of time are negligible, thanks to either make-up or digital effects. 300: Rise of an Empire (which I consistently mis-type as “Rose of an Empire” – smells so good) depicts events before, during, and after what we saw in 300. It is The Pacific to 300‘s Band of Brothers, the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead to 300‘s Hamlet, The Lion King 1 1/2 to 300‘s The Lion King. Yeah, those are perfect analogies.

064 – 300 (2006)

THESE! ARE! ABS!

Eight years ago director Zack Snyder had a coming out party in the form of 300, based on Frank Miller’s comic. The swords-and-sandals actioner starred a then-relatively-unknown Gerard Butler as Leonidas, the king of the Spartans, whose country is risking siege at the hands of the Persian Empire.