Tanya Batson-Savage, Freelance Writer

Ryan Newman (left), Tim Allen (second left), Michael Cassidy (centre), Spencer Breslin (second right)and Kate Mara in the film 'Zoom'. - Contributed

Movies that spoof the superhero genre have grown increasingly popular, often rivalling the exploits of 'real' superheroes for dominion over the box office. Zoom joins the list of superhero spoofs, although it crosses the line between parodying superheroes and being a story about superheroes.

Alas the movie is devoid of zoom and instead goes biff, bang, thud!

Directed by Peter Hewitt, the flick is based on the novel Zoom Academy, with a screenplay by Adam Rifkin and David Berenbaum. The flick lands squarely in the realm of kiddie flicks, mindless movies with as much substance as a three-card trick. The plot is weak, the characters are uninteresting and the graphics mediocre. As such, Zoom falls among the lesser of the superhero parodies.

Zoom stars Tim Allen as a former (or rather the last) superhero, Jack Shepherd a.k.a Zoom, who is supposedly faster than lightning. This flick might well be Allen's cry for help, because even though he does have charisma, Zoom must be quite a low mark on his career - the kind of indicator one uses to mark rock-bottom.

Shepherd is called out of retirement when his brother, who became the evil Concussion, is returning to earth. The reluctant superhero is asked to train a new team made up off Cindy Collins (a six-year-old with super strength), Summer Jones (a 16-year-old with telepathic powers), Dylan West (a 17-year-old with the gift of invisibility) and Tucker Williams, who has more girth than most and the power to direct it.

Misfits, outcasts, weirdos

Courtney Cox co-stars as Marsha Halloway, the scientist in charge of helping to train and bring out the talents of the "misfits, outcasts and weirdos" who were selected to form a new team, Zenith. Indeed, superheroes are nothing more than weirdos who find a clique, or a mission in life.

The group of misfits is on their way to save the world, which is what superheroes do, often between intrepid bouts of journalism (as they write stories or take photographs exploring their own exploits). As such they will, of course, need names and costumes, which, is the most interesting part of this flick.

Cindy seems to be the most keen on the costumes, though her grasp on the concept may be a little twisted. Of course, one could argue that a pink tutu or bunny pajamas is no more questionable than wearing a pair of blue briefs over red tights.

Zoom works with the ideas of superheroes perfected in the 1980s, and so it uses a cute insignia motif to inter-cut scenes, which is a cute reminder of the flicks and television shows that it spoofs.

Unfortunately, at the end of it all, this flick cannot take off as it has neither the super strength nor super speed to be even a joke about superheroes.

Instead, it falls thud.