Took a bloody long while, as these bastards tend to do, but here we are at that oh-so-glorious year of 2004! In order of theatrical release:

Hidalgo - ***

If you want some rousing, entertaining Western adventure music, then boy do we have…two or three great cues for you! The opening and final two tracks on this album are a lot of fun – the rest, man, I dunno. Way too much blah underscore and a ton of Middle Eastern-flavoured music that sounded like a rejected score from The Four Feathers. It’s aight.

Hellboy - ***1/2

Yet another “Pointless Riley Story”. So I go to A&B Sound, see this score for 20 bucks, and think “hell yeah, that guy did Blade II, I’m totally getting this”. And the fucking thing had weird skippy noises throughout. Annoyed, I take it back a couple weeks later, get a refund, buy it again – and the same thing happens. This was not exactly pre-internet, sure, but it was early enough that I hadn’t even thought to research this issue, and find out that the original album pressing had shit loads of glitches, so I wasn’t alone. Just pissed. Anyhoo, the music’s damn good – for my money, the best Hellboy music we’ve had so far. A lot of the action is downright freaky, the cue Fireproof being a great example, and others go more operatic and melodramatic than you’d expect from a movie where Ron Perlman wears a hundred pounds of red prosthetics and chomps cigars.

The Alamo - *

Carter Burwell has a lot of staunch defenders on this site. Mostly Tristan. So I apologize, Tristan, for hating this score so much. I can’t remember the last time I heard something so lifeless and boring. NOTHING FARKIN’ HAPPENS!!!

The Punisher - ****

Copy and pasted from my Non-MCU Score series last year:

Another one of my first score purchases, this one took me by complete surprise at the time. For me, back then especially, “action scores” meant “Zimmer”. Anything that didn't sound like Media Ventures was foreign to me, and this decidedly old-fashioned, very orchestral score by Carlo Silotto, which sounds plucked right out of the 1970s, was an odd duck. Yet I still listened to it all the time, rapidly falling in love with it (I’m just gonna say the primary theme for The Punisher, epic and melancholy at the same time, is a Top 5 all time theme for the genre). I was going to give this 4.5/5, then I rewatched the movie for the first time in a decade last night, and…y’know what, it doesn’t quite work in context. It is often too over the top, too cheesy at times – hell, even the lead actor Thomas Jane complained about the score after loving the nearly music-less rough cut and then seeing this at the premiere, thinking it was far too melodramatic for the material. He might be right. I don’t care much though. Still awesome.

Man on Fire - ***

I mean…it’s a Harry Gregson Williams score for a Tony Scott action/thriller. They all, more or less, sounded the same – some lovely cues, often featuring Lisa Gerrard or someone similar, a bunch of electronic action zipping all over the place your ears get twitchy, and a bunch of bland underscore. I honestly don’t know how to rank or rate these scores, because they all do the job supporting the ADHD-inflicted filmmaking Scott had at the time, but they’re also so schizophrenic it’s hard to enjoy any of them on album.

Van Helsing - ****1/2

2004 was my Alan Silvestri year. He’s never been one of my fave composers (of main themes, oh my yes, but for overall scores…not so much). But then in this glorious year, he rocked my bullocks with both Van Helsing and The Polar Express, which I maintain is his greatest all time score. Despite Pol-Ex being a Christmas family film, it’s similar to Van Helsing in that it contains the best action writing of his career – I listen to the energy and power and creativity in Helsing (that guitar in Journey to Transylvania, oh my gawwwwd) and then think back on his Avengers scores and I dunno…for me, it’s night and day. Van Helsing is 50 minutes of slam-bang adventure writing with the occasional splash of horror and romance, befitting the highly goofy yet highly enjoyable movie. Plus, THAT GUITAR IN JOURNEY TO TRANSYLVANIA!

Troy - ***1/2

One of my favourite behind-the-scenes disaster stories has been the Gabriel Yared/James Horner debacle over Troy. It just kept going and going – I remember being flabbergasted when Yared posted a couple cues of his rejected score online before they got taken down. I don’t even know if at the time, I understood what a “rejected score” was, and yet here were a couple action cues that blew my absolute socks off, and then I went and listened to Horner’s last-minute slap-dash replacement and went “…huh”. So here’s the thing – the two scores just aren’t comparable. Yared’s is a masterpiece, Horner’s is a rush job so filled with Hornerisms that if you made it a drinking game and took a shot with every danger motif you’ll have liver failure by the end of its 75 minutes. But it still is a solid, effective action/drama score, the kind of music I would kill to have more of today. One of those things you take the good with the bad (or you just ignore Horner's, pop in Yared's, and get nothing but good).

The Day After Tomorrow - ***1/2

Way back in junior high, I spent two months’ worth of allowances on two new scores, both composed by the same guys, Harald Kloser and Thomas Wander, with Day After Tomorrow and Alien Vs. Predator. Today, I remembered very little about either one, other than that I found them more entertaining action scores than reviews at the time said, though relistening to DAT this morning made me realize it doesn’t have a ton of action, and the action it does have is kinda flat. What this score does deliver, though, is a splendid main theme that’s kind of like a slower, sadder mix of Independence Day and Journey to the Line. The titular cue and President’s Speech are fantastic – the rest is fine.

The Chronicles of Riddick - **1/2

I listened to this right when it came out, downloading every dang track from Kazaa, and thought “Meh”. 21 years later I give it another spin and think…”Meh”. It’s functional. It’s fine. Some of it is more epic than usual for Revell…other stuff is exactly what was least interesting about Revell. On the plus side, there’s a cue called Pop the Cock, so there you go Kuhni – if you want to set up a German indie band, there’s your name.

Spider-Man 2 - ****1/2

Another copy and paste from my previous series:

Rarely are sequel scores better than the first, but Elfman’s Spidey 2 managed it – shocking considering how badly things went in post-production behind the scenes (the use of the Hellraiser music now that I’m a Hellraiser fan is hilariously distracting). The heroism is more highlighted and epic, the dramatic and romantic stuff more touching, and the action among the best of any Spidey flick. Also, unlike the first Spider-Man score, this one has a fantastic villain theme. So why do I give it the same 4.5/5 star rating? I dunno. This isn’t an exact science. It’s all slightly better while both not quite being masterpiece levels (if this seems cranky, remember that I have probably only given a full 5/5 stars to maaaaaaybe 50 scores). Anyways, it’s an awesome work, even with Chris Young (and John Debney too) having to pitch in to the whims of the director losing his marbles.

King Arthur - *****

Most of the scores for this journey I relisten to before writing about (hence why each entry takes a fuckin month to complete). I didn’t bother relistening to King Arthur, because I could probably recite every single note from memory as I sit here typing. Zimmer’s King Arthur may not be often mentioned among his greats (hell, our own Obi Wan, Craig, hates it if memory serves). But for me, it’s not only his best score, it’s been in my Top 20 all-time scores since it came out. It’s everything I want in an action/adventure score – big bold themes played repeatedly, a shit load of heroism, epic as balls action that rattles my cages and smashes my innards, moments of beauty and haunting melancholy instead of droning “braaaawm thump thump waaaamps”, and all of this in a neat and tidy hour-long package. Hell, I even love the Enya-esque song plopped in here too. If you haven’t revisited this one in a while, please do so. When I put on my cranky pants – and it’s often – by saying “Hollywood scores don’t sound like they used to”, this is exactly what I mean. Same composer, same kind of movie, yet COMPLETELY different tones, sounds, melodies, and entertainment value than what we’re getting from the Zim’s (and all his many many copycats) today.

I, Robot – ***1/2

Marco did some quirk work with this sucker. Alex Proyas wanted to collab with Trevor Jones again for his new Will Smith bot-battling flick, but Jones had to pull out at the last minute, leaving Marco Beltrami 17 days to write and record the entire score. Considering the incredibly short time he had, it’s amazing the score turned out as good as it did – in fact it’s easily the Beltrami album I’ve listened to the most over the years, spinning it quite a few times in high school. The action is solid though a bit too choppy for my tastes (an issue I have with all Beltrami’s action writing), and there’s some mundane suspense underscore that won’t light anyone’s butt on fire. However, I Robot remains a damn fine album because Beltrami conjured up a fantastic main theme, one he uses throughout that comes across more mysterious and haunting than you’d expect.

The Bourne Supremacy - ****1/2

In the last entry, I was surprised at how so much of The Bourne Identity, on relisten, kinda sucked. Today, I’m surprised at how much Bourne Supremacy completely blew away every single aspect of Powell’s original entry. Talk about overachieving – dude could’ve just repeated what came before, considering Identity was an inexplicably successful and popular score, and instead he said “hold my beer” and did everything the same, just a thousand times better. Therefore, it still feels innately Bourne – the mood and design didn’t really change, making everything fit cohesively in the trilogy. It’s just that the energy, the excitement, the action, the badassedry – all of it got cranked to 11. And despite all this, my favourite cue of the entire score might not even be one of the big action moments, but Funeral Pyre, which mixes emotion with classic Powell percussion in such a beguiling way.

Catwoman – *1/2

I mean…it’s not like Klaus Badelt was given a lot to work with.

Collateral - ****

What a musical mess this wonderful Michael Mann action/thriller was. If memory serves – James Newton Howard was hired to write the score. He scored I think the majority of the movie, but Mann being Mann, he then replaced about 80% of it, some with music by Antonio Pinto (including the wonderful final cue, something so good even JNH admitted it was better than his own work) and one of the producers, Tom Rothrock. Plus, Mann jammed in a ton of songs to go with it, which ranged from Mexican ballads to pulsating techno to an Audioslave song that blew my friggin mind (and introduced me to them as well). All of this chaos should be a negative, yet…I think the musical landscape of Collateral is awesome. The songs are wicked, Rothrock’s contributions very entertaining, Pinto delivers the best music of the movie for the finale, and JNH’s stuff (including the chase music at the end which was almost completely omitted from the OST much to my chagrin) is damn solid too.

Aliens vs. Predator – ***

It’s fine. The horror is decent, the action kinda fun, the lack of any memorable themes an issue, and within, like, 35 minutes it’s over. I can see why I dug it as a teen but rarely returned to it.

Paparazzi – **1/2

This one is also just fine. Brian Tyler before he was really Brian Tyler doing an action/thriller in a Brian Tyler style before Brian Tyler Style was really stylish. So yeah, it’s…fine, I guess.

Cellular – ??

I dunno guys…it’s not on Spotify and it’s not on YouTube and it’s the only one I haven’t written about. I just wanna post this thing and get er done. Eff it!

Resident Evil: Apocalypse - ***

Of all the composers you may have thought scored a Resident Evil movie…I bet Jeff Danna isn’t high on your expectation list. I really have no clue how he got associated with this one (to compare, the first movie had Marco Beltrami, and the third had Charlie Clouser). But I’m glad he did, because this was the only Resident Evil score I ever owned, and dare I say the only one that’s actually listenable on it’s own. To be fair, it runs out of steam halfway through and never recovers, but the first half is quite a bit of early 00’s hard rock action mixed with early 00’s horror. Nothing earth shaking, but considering I’ve never heard Danna in this mode before or since, it’s worth listening to.

Sky Captain – ****

Another year, another painful reminder how good Edward Shearmur was, and how awesome life was in the early 00’s when the guy got hired on so many big projects. Sky Captain and The World of Tomorrow (if we’re gonna be picky and fully spell out the entire title) is an extreeeeemely dated movie, it’s “fully in a computer” special effects now looking as special as an Instagram filter made by my four year old, but at least it allowed Shearmur to harken back to the Korngold days of old-school, old-fashioned heroism and derring-do. I find the score almost a little exhausting as a straight-through listen, because it just keeps coming at you with so much signature classic 1940s Hollywood action sounding stuff, but that’s a good problem to have.

Team America – ****

One of the best satires and funniest movies of all time, Team America also gave us one of the best and funniest satires of modern film scoring. Harry Gregson Williams, taking scoring duties over from Marc Shaiman after some creative differences (luckily Shaiman’s hilarious songs stayed in) understood the assignment to a T. Whereas most cranky critics at the time were too pissed at the movie’s politics and too-soon approach to terrorism, those of us who hated Michael Bay/Jerry Bruckheimer action movies knew exactly what the movie was actually spoofing, and HGW delivered a perfectly straight-faced Media Ventures score that would’ve fit like a glove in any Bay/Bruckheimer crapfest. The action, the overly serious moments, and especially the power anthem – he nailed it all, so well.

National Treasure – ***1/2

One of the great disappointments in recent years that didn’t involve politics in America was Trevor Rabin’s long-awaited return to big-budget action scoring with the National Treasure Disney+ show. It was, alas, pretty mediocre – apparently almost every action scene used a needle drop, so he didn't have much to play with, and we were stuck with a lot of music I like to describe as “Aggressive Walking And Talking To Move The Plot Forward”. But y’know, in all fairness…the first two National Treasure scores had a lot of the same. They really aren’t among his best – even the action cues, while fun, lack what I loved most about Rabin in that he usually hinged his action around a simplistic, memorable main theme. National Treasure didn’t really do that, so while it’s not all Aggressive Walking and Talking music, it still isn’t the most thrilling stuff in the world.

Alexander - *****

Since Day One of this score existing (and I mean literally, cause I bought it the day it came out) this has been an all-time fave for me. Since we’re here to talk about action, let’s get one big stickler out of the way – the album only has one real barn burner action cue on it, Drums of Gaugamela. And its so goddamn perfect it makes up for a lack of great (or even any action at all) on the rest of the breezy and beautiful 60 minute album. The choral chanting, the majesty, the synths that actually work really well somehow, and oh yeah, THE THEMES, OH GOD THESE THEMES, INJECT THEM DIRECTLY TO MY SOUL. Love love love this score, by far the best work Vangelis ever did.

Next Up: Desplat emerges, Badelt overachieves, Horner has a blast, and Zimmer delivers an awesome score that essentially changes Hollywood music for the worse, forever.