Well, well, well, what do we have here? Yes, Mallrats is another Kevin Smith movie that died a death at the box-office and faced a critical drubbing. Poor Kev. Mallrats was his second film, written and released only a year after Clerks. It starred Jason London, Shannen Doherty and Claire Forlani, none of whom went on to work with Smith again regularly. They aren't very good in the film, to be fair. What Mallrats does have going for it is Jason Lee as Brodie, the comic book obsessed and foul mouthed best friend of London's character T.S. It's hard to believe that Lee had no acting experience before Mallrats; rather, he was a professional skateboarder. His undeniable comic chops led to him becoming a Smith regular and sitcom legend as Earl Hickey in My Name Is Earl. Mallrats has a certain lackadaisical appeal and has since developed a decent following on video and DVD. The opening credits and much of Lee's dialogue exist as an open love letter to comics and the film also features a cameo from Marvel uber-legend Stan Lee, pictured above sporting a snazzy beard. This pretty much ensured that the film will always have a place in the hearts of comic book fans the world over, if nothing else.
