In the brief and brand-new featurette “Physical Media Kicks Ass,” writer/director Matthew Vaughn (Layer Cake; Kingsman series) discusses his longtime love of physical media, referring to it at one point as “romantic,” the context being that owning a physical version of a film you love enables you to maintain that affection through the gratification that comes from having something a cinephile can put their hands on. In a time when it’s becoming more apparent that digital editions of anything — books, music, art (re: NFTs), video games — are only licensed out to you until a server dies, the act of owning a physical copy feels like rebellion. It should then come as no surprise that, to honor the 15th anniversary of Vaughn’s third film, comic book adaptation Kick-Ass (2010), Lionsgate has released a special edition steelbook through their Lionsgate Limited boutique line. In addition to case design by Tracie Ching and a plastic slipcover that alters the visual design upon removal, this release includes over 50 minutes of brand-new behind-the-scenes materials, plus the legacy featurettes. Is it time to shut up and kick ass with this new edition or is what you already have enough?
Let’s get into it.
Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Dave Lizewski in KICK-ASS. Photo courtesy of Lionsgate. © 2009 KA Films LP. All Rights Reserved.
Dave Lizewski (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) always wondered why no one ever dressed up like a superhero and took to the streets to reduce crime. Part of this comes from his love of comics while another part comes from the frequency by which he and his friends tend to get mugged while walking home from the comic store. After mulling it around, Dave decides to give it a shot, his appetite for heroism greater than his common sense. Pulling on a green and yellow scuba suit, he starts to patrol the streets, unaware of just how far he’s about to go and how far out of his depth he’s about to be when he stumbles into a vendetta between the local D’Amico crime family and vigilantes Big Daddy and Hit Girl (Nicolas Cage and Chloë Grace Moretz, respectively). As blood flows and bodies drop, Dave’s going to have to dig deep if he’s going to survive.
Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Dave Lizewski in KICK-ASS. Photo courtesy of Lionsgate. © 2009 KA Films LP. All Rights Reserved.
A lot of anniversary re-releases tend to either go the first-time 4K UHD route or steelbook route and Kick-Ass has already done this. In fact, the steelbook design for this new edition is slightly recycled with the external image of Kick-Ass, Hit Girl, and Big Daddy on the front and Christopher Mintz-Plasse’s Red Mist on the back placed on a black background instead of the white used in the November 2020 steelbook. Another difference appears to be that the 2020 edition included four character cards, a Blu-ray, and a viewing style called “Ass-Kicking BonusView Mode” in which you can watch the film with making-of materials shown in a corner of the screen while the movie plays. None of these are included with this edition. The internal art, however, which depicts Kick-Ass flying away using Big Daddy’s jetpack in the 2020 edition is reused here. What is new appears to be the slipcover design of clear plastic that allows the art of the steelbook to remain visible when on, but with a twist; when the slipcover is removed, the masks for the three front cover heroes stay with the slip, revealing the faces of the heroes underneath. In the 2020 edition, the masks were part of the cover art and stayed put.
KICK-ASS 4K UHD Lionsgate Limited steelbook packshot. Photo courtesy of Lionsgate. © 2009 KA Films LP. All Rights Reserved.
While the packaging is more of the same, the 15th anniversary edition does include four new featurettes which really do dig into the making of Kick-Ass and its legacy. The first is a 20-minute overarching exploration titled “Pure Cinematic Fun” which features Vaughn and comic co-creator Mark Millar (Wanted; Kingsman series) talking about the origin point for the film (Millar’s then young daughter asked him to write something she could read (whoops)); the process of getting the film greenlit when superhero films, let alone subversive ones, weren’t popular; how the film almost got postponed because they couldn’t find the right actor to play Dave until Taylor-Johnson came along; and more. A fun tidbit is learning that the folks behind Deadpool (2016) told these filmmakers that without Kick-Ass it would’ve been even harder to get their film made, which makes sense when you think of the combination of humor, violence, and pop music that’s utilized in both. The second featurette, the 19-minute “Still Kicking Ass,” drills into the stunt work of the film, including: shining a light on the late Bradley Allan’s (Gorgeous; Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) work as stunt coordinator; how Allan’s work as part of the Jackie Chan Stunt Team led to Kick-Ass using a lot of Hong Kong-style inspired action that was unusual at that time; the use of Hong Kong-style shooting to capture the action; Greg Townley’s (Spider-Man: No Way Home; Argylle) experience doubling for Grace Moretz; learning how the hallway fight toward the end of the film may be the first time stunt work utilized pre-visualization in scene development (far more common in modern action); and a great deal more. The third new featurette, the 13-minute “The Work of Art,” delves into the costuming and overall look of the film. It’s a tricky business to make a film look good while not leaning too hard into the comic book of it all, meaning that they had to develop ways to make Kick-Ass’s suit look like a cheap scuba suit someone like Dave could afford while also making it cinematic. Finally, the aforementioned “Physical Media Kicks Ass,” clocking in at less than two-minutes in which Vaughn talks about his love of physical formats dating back to childhood and how modern consumption of media through TikTok, for instance, is not too dissimilar from what he used to do as a kid with VHS.
KICK-ASS 4K UHD Lionsgate Limited steelbook packshot (interior). Photo courtesy of Lionsgate. © 2009 KA Films LP. All Rights Reserved.
The film itself is an interesting thing to look back on. As with any filmmaker, one can see in the early works tests for things to come. The mixing of violence and pop music, while not created in Kick-Ass, frequently comes into play in the action of the Kingsman series from the opening sequence of The Secret Service (2014), the fantastic church scene, and the explosion of minds in the film’s climax. Of course, the Kingsman films are co-written with Millar and Dave Gibbons (Watchmen), so a certain crossover from one project to another is likely given the sensibilities of Millar for the profane, but, looking backward, Vaughn’s prior titles, Layer Cake (2004) and Stardust (2007), didn’t include the same vulgar tone, grounding, or approach to violence. In this way, Kick-Ass was clearly the place where Vaughn started to figure out what was worth playing with and what might be worth leaving behind as he developed Kingsman and Argylle (2024), a title revealed to exist within the Kinsgman universe. Take a look at the opening of Kick-Ass and The Secret Service and you’ll note the playful use of transition (one through clouds before introducing the first caped hero; one pulling outward from a boombox to reveal an armed assault taking place, the exploded pieces of a building forming the production credits); the kinetic action of Hit-Girl quite like Sofia Boutella’s assassin Gazelle; and a myriad of other aspects from the crude language to the hyperrealistic bloodletting and the arc from one to the other is a short, straight line. Even as other elements of the narrative don’t shine so brightly, such as the use of homophobic slurs and the “boy pretends to be gay so the girl he likes will hang out with him” trope which remain gross and in support of an unrealistic toxic masculine fantasy, one cannot deny the significance of this film on both Vaughn’s career and all the superhero films (subversive or not) that followed.
L-R: Stuntperson Greg Townley, actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and screenwriter Jane Goldman on the set of KICK-ASS. Photo courtesy of Lionsgate. © 2009 KA Films LP. All Rights Reserved.
Admittedly, back in 2010 ,when two to three MCU films weren’t hitting theaters each year, something like Kick-Ass felt revelatory. It may not still hold the same luster, but it’s still a good time carried by a brilliant Adam West-inspired performance from Cage, an unhinged Grace Moretz, and a necessary vulnerability from Taylor-Johnson. These three make the film worth revisiting from time to time, regardless of how you access it. That said, if you don’t already own the 4K UHD edition and you want the full gamut of bonus features, this edition will satisfy. If you already have the 4K UHD edition (in regular or the 2020 steelbook), that choice is going to be much harder and, frankly, the 15th anniversary steelbook would be hard to recommend since it’s not really a first-time anything to bump up the enticement factor.
Kick-Ass Lionsgate Limited Special Features:
- 15th Anniversary 4K edition presented in Dolby Vision® HDR
- SteelBook® art by Tracie Ching
- Pure Cinematic Fun (20:04)
- Still Kicking Ass (19:23)
- The Work of Art (13:08)
- Physical Media Kicks Ass (1:41)
- Teaser Trailer
Kick-Ass Legacy Special Features:
- Audio Commentary with Writer-Director Matthew Vaughn
- A New Kind of Superhero: The Making of Kick-Ass
- Itʼs On! The Comic Book Origin of Kick-Ass
- Official Trailer
- “Hit Girl” Official Red Band Trailer
Available on 4K UHD Blu-ray steelbook limited edition May 13th, 2025.
For more information, head to the official Lionsgate Limited Kick-Ass webpage.
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Categories: Home Release, Recommendation
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