I saw this a few hours ago. I was curious, though cautious, because two reviews, Roger Ebert's and Pajiba's, said that the film takes an odd turn an hour of the way through, regarding Hancock's origin. While Roger Ebert gave the film three out of four stars, and said that out of all the superhero origins he knows of, which tend to underwhelm him, Hancock's origin is one of the most "arbitrary", Pajiba's review of the film was far more scathing. Pajiba writer Phillip Stevens, who thought that the first hour of the film was a good sendup of the superhero genre, said this of the Big Plot Twist:

[The plot twist, which] would make Shyamalan vomit in horror, is just plain awful. Terrible. And I mean…********** retarded. If director Peter Berg and writers Vince Gilligan and Vincent Ngo started with a fun if flippant action-comedy, they end with a ******* farce, veering the story from character study into My Super Ex-Girlfriend and then something out of Piers Anthony. The plot becomes unwieldy, nonsensical, asinine and completely at odds with the tone and logic of the first hour, turning Hancock from pointless, enjoyable ride to sloppy incoherence in an effort to explain Hancock’s origins in the dumbest way possible. The film sputters and flops across the finish line like a dead fish.

But since it was matinee price, I went to see it. And you know what? It's not half-bad! The Big Plot Reveal is not as bad as Steven's says, and is no more outlandish than any other superhero's origin. I even noticed that Ebert made some assertions about the last forty minutes of the film that were just plain untrue.

I will say, however, that the manner in which the reveal was made was awful. It was completely contrived and forced, and made no sense in terms of the characters. But it was a relatively minor point, and easy to get over. The rest of the film was pretty good, and for five bucks, it was an okay way to spend ninety minutes. I recommend it.

---NITS & NOTES:
In the beginning of the film, Ray shows Hancock some comic book covers of characters made up just for the film. The last one, which features a blond male character in a blue costume, immediately looked to me like it was based on J. Scott Campbell’s cover of Amazing Spider-Man #34. I couldn’t get enough of a glance at it to examine the style to see if Campbell himself drew it, nor notice his familiar signature (though I tend to think Campbell would not have reused an old cover of his, and that an in-studio artist might’ve copied it).

I thought having the neighborhood bully be a kid with a French name and French accent was an odd creative choice. Usually American movies and TV shows are quite Americentric, especially with incidental elements like this. It's not a nit or anything, because it's not implausible that a French immigrant would live near the Embrey's, I just thought it an odd choice. It was also a bit confusing, because when Aaron said the kid bullying him was named "Michel", I thought he said "Michelle", and that it was intended as a joke at the expense of Aaron's small size that he was being bullied by a girl. When Mary then mentioned that Michel was a boy, I did a cognitive double-take.

This happens a lot with superhero stories, and it doesn't have to. I wish this movie had avoided it too. Hancock tosses Michel thousands of feet into the air, and then catches him on the ground. This would've killed him. Couldn't the creators have just had him fly back up to grab him from above, in order to reduce his descent, and prevent this? I hate it when I see unnecessary stuff like this.

Spoiler Nit
As aforementioned, the moment when Mary reveals that she's like Hancock, by throwing him (and her fridge) out of her house, and down the street, was just plain dumb. This is a woman who has managed to keep her cover, and restrain from using her powers, for at least 80 years. But instead of just pushing Hancock away, she destroys a wall of her home, and threatens to blow her cover to her husband and the entire neighborhood?

The morning after Ray and Mary's dinner with Hancock, Mary goes out into the street, where she casually gets some breakfast ingredients from her fridge, which is lodged in a car, as a result of a Hancock incident. Since it was there all night without electricity, wouldn't those ingredients have gone bad?

Spoiler Nit
Okay, so after Mary's cover is blown, she goes to Hancock's trailer to talk to him. She doesn't want him in his life. So why does she glam herself up with dark eyeliner and such a low-cut costume? In that getup she looks like...well, she looks like a superhero! Doesn't make much sense if she's trying to keep the identity of a housewife and mother who's trying to discourage romantic feelings in Hancock, does it?

Spoiler Nit
The manner in which Hancock and Mary’s powers fluctuate in the latter 30 or 40 minutes of the film makes about as much logical sense as one of their 50-car L.A. freeway pileups. Mary says their powers (IIRC) gradually disappear the more they’re around each other, until they become mortal. She also says that he’s much stronger than her. Yet there’s nothing “gradual” about how they disappear. His powers, for example, do not suffer any noticeable reduction long after he begins spending time with her and her family. And when he tries to kiss him, she smacks and her fridge clear through her living room wall and down the street. Their powers continue unabated as she visits his trailer, and later gives chase and fights him in the middle of an L.A. street after he threatens to tell Ray the truth about her. Only during that convenience store holdup does his invulnerability seem to completely disappear. The only problem is, he just got done using his super strength to toss the two thugs around like a couple of hackeysacks. Now it’s possible that invulnerability is the first power to go, and strength follows. It’s also possible that the process is indeed gradual, and manifests itself at some point after the two gods have been interacting for some time, and that for the powers to return requires them to spend a similar amount of time. But the events that follow this scene do not bear this out. For one thing, after Hancock neutralizes the bank robber amputee and his accomplice, and Mary clinically dies, Hancock wakes up, and decides to fly out a window in order to put some distance between them in order to restore her. The only power of his that seems compromises is his flight, whereas his invulnerability appears to be just about entirely restored, because he falls to the ground, hitting a bus and another vehicle on the way down, damaging the asphalt of the street, but is able to immediately get up, unharmed. He then makes a couple of attempts to fly, and after one or two attempts, is able to fly away. This all happens within a minute or so.

Spoiler Nit
I was a bit disappointed that we weren’t told what Hancock and Mary’s original names were. I was hoping that the creators would reveal to us that they were the name of specific, famous gods, much as Peter David did at the end of The Woad to Wuin. In fact, when that storm began during their fight in L.A., I wondered if it was Mary who was causing it, which reminded me of how he used Hecate in Wuin.

SPOILERS!

LN: She also says that he’s much stronger than her.
I believe she said she was stronger than him.

I liked this movie, but I was also a bit confused about how their abilities faded, which was quite inconsistant. So it was the two fighting each other that caused that storm? Also, why was she always radiating so much body heat when the two were near each other? Neither of those two things made much sense to me.

People on the news kept saying that Handcock was not above the law. Well, if you can't enforce those laws or fine him unless he allows it doesn't that make him above the law? Did those guys in prison think that because Handcock was there that his powers were gone? I'm sure some kind of announcement was made before he arrived that he was coming there, and there's also that press conference.

I don't think it was mentioned which one but apparently John and Mary were gods from a three thousand year-old civilization. This is just out of curiousity, and my sincere apologies if this sounds racist, but what civilation from that era has a black god?

Since Mary is immortal, I would think Ray would eventually figure something is up when he gets older and she doesn't.

When people say that no one is above the law, they're making a prescriptive statement, not a descriptive one. They're not denying his evasion of the law; they're complaining that he shouldn't be able to.

I was also flabbergasted by the inmates behavior, but then figured that maybe yeah, they weren't aware that he voluntarily turned himself in. Maybe they don't watch the news, or didn't get all the facts and details of his incarceration. Thus, maybe they did figure that his powers were gone.

Spoiler Response
So people flying around and tossing cars left and right you can handle, but a black god causes you to go, "Whoa, whoa, C'mon!"?

Also, how was it that Aaron wasn't woken from the incident with Hancock and the fridge?

LN: When people say that no one is above the law, they're making a prescriptive statement, not a descriptive one.
Oh I know, I just found that a little annoying because on the unlikely event Hancock was watching I highly doubt that effected him; and no he doesn't have the right to do what he does and get away with it but unless he allows it all they can do is complain, so why not try a different approach like Ray did?