Hit-Girl isn't made of sugar and spice and everything nice (AP Photo/Dan Smith)

I saw ‘The Dark Knight’ the day it opened, pretty much as soon as I could. And for a good twenty minutes after the credits rolled, I was convinced that I wanted to become a crime fighting desperado, a real-life Bruce Wayne/Batman. Thank goodness that reality set in soon after I emerged from the theater into the bright summer afternoon.

Because unlike Bruce Wayne, my family is not ridiculously wealthy. Instead of the Batmobile I’d be stuck driving my mom’s decidedly less stealthy Yukon XL. And unlike Bruce Wayne, I’m pretty clumsy. I frequently misjudge the distance between myself and walls, which means I’m usually walking into them; professional superheroes, I’m told, can avoid this. Most importantly, unlike Bruce Wayne, I’m only 5′1″ and would have had a hard time intimidating the cretins of Seattle.

If I had taken up a life of masked heroism, I likely would have experienced a similar fate as the poor Armenian man featured in the first few seconds of ‘Kick Ass’s trailer.

(Minor Spoilers contained below!)

Given that becoming a superhero once consumed me for twenty whole minutes, ‘Kick Ass’ sounded like it would a movie after my own heart.

Basically, a particularly average high schooler named Dave (Aaron Johnson) decides, after being the victim of one too many muggings, to don a green wetsuit and fight the hooligans in his neighborhood. Along the way he encounters other “real life” superheroes, like the father-daughter team Big Daddy (Nicholas Cage) and Hit-Girl (Chloe Moretz). Dave’s masked persona, Kick Ass, becomes an instant phenomenon, and he unintentionally incurs the wrath of the local kingpin (played by Mark Strong).

‘Kick Ass’ hit theaters last Friday, and once again I was determined to take in the latest superhero movie. Going in, I knew that I’d be treated to a fair amount of violence, a decent body count and a good deal of profanity. After all, the Motion Picture Association of America bestowed ‘Kick Ass’ with an R rating.

What threw me for a loop was the fact that the most violent, most profane character in ‘Kick Ass’ was also the youngest. Hit-Girl, an 11-year-old knife wielding, gun slinging prodigy trained by her own father, slices her way through thugs with a calmness that borders on sociopathic. Understandably, some movie critics (the most famous being Robert Ebert) were put off by Hit-Girl’s familiarity with hand-to-hand combat and her casual utterance of the C-word. Ebert went so far as to declare that ‘Kick Ass’s treatment of Hit-Girl was “morally reprehensible.”

To a certain extent, I agree with Ebert. I’m not familiar with many 11-year-olds these days, but if I did know some, I’d be disturbed if they behaved like Hit-Girl. From a parent’s perspective, if I had adolescent children of my own, I’d worry that they’d imitate Hit-Girl, especially her tendency to toss knives around. And yes, there’s no denying that Big Daddy is a terrible father for forcing his daughter to fight his personal vendettas alongside him.

The problem is, Hit-Girl is one of the most enjoyable parts of ‘Kick Ass.’

Chloe Moretz, 13, is a talented actress and a wonderful fit for the role. She has no trouble playing a convincingly dangerous preteen, and whatever comes out of her mouth, no matter how blasphemous or dirty, sounds oddly natural. Her fight scenes are often the most intricate and the coolest to watch. As a nice bonus, she has good father-daughter chemistry with Nicholas Cage.

And beyond the Hit-Girl controversy, ‘Kick Ass’ is a fantastically fun movie to watch, one of the best I’ve seen this year. It’s not for the faint of heart, but besides offering a realistic portrayal of what would happen if, say, someone like me became a superhero, ‘Kick Ass’ can also be the starting point for some interesting conversations. For example, do real superheroes kill their foes? (Bruce Wayne would be sorely disappointed to discover that his imitator, Big Daddy, does.) And if you’re a real fan of superhero movies, you’ll enjoy the way ‘Kick Ass’ treats different genre stereotypes. (“With no power comes no responsibility,” laments Dave at one point.)

So, in summary, I would make an awful superhero. Luckily for viewing audiences, the opposite can be said for the masked vigilantes in ‘Kick Ass’.