Journalism 101
Professor Vicki Vale

It is important for a reporter to always keep their eyes open for stories. Even the smallest detail can be a clue that could provide the key to a big scoop! Intense focus is necessary for any investigative journalist: find a story and sink your teeth into it with the tenacity of a terrier. Let nothing distract your from your story!

Say, just for a random example, that you're following a string of red herrings related to the idea that a noted billionaire playboy industrialist is also a globe-trotting vigilante. Even though you've already amassed material evidence that said playboy is said vigilante, and even if you've also gone so far as to track down the "secret identities" of a number of his known vigilante associates, well, you just can't run that story until you're absolutely, positively sure that you've exhausted every possible source. Just because Drudge or Gawker or the Huffington Post or the Daily Beast or Fox News or the Post would run a huge story without "Woodward & Bernstein" levels of corroborating evidence doesn't mean that a downrent tabloid reporter who somehow nevertheless manages to support herself for long periods of time working on what are essentially unpaid freelance assignments can't hold herself to higher standards. It's all about ethics and integrity!

SIR

Thor #616

The story goes that Milton Berle never actually pulled the entire length of his penis out of his pants. He only used just as much as was necessary to prove that he was longer than whomever had challenged him to a (literal) dick-measuring contest. This is an interesting idea because it points to a seemingly contradictory exercise of restraint in relation to something that is, in the most basic terms possible, the ultimate assertion of masculinity. Ultimately, it's about confidence: Berle only pulled out as much as he needed because he had no desire to do anything other than prove his supremacy - he was already secure in his position as the biggest wang in Hollywood and needed no conspicuous display in order to solidify his reputation in the matter.

Been Caught Stealin'



Well, folks, what I feared would would come to pass has finally occurred: I got a C&D courtesy of the DMCA in regards to one of my podcast. To which I say, boo-urns. I'm no lawyer and I have no desire to poke the beast, so the offending post is gone.

I am left with the question of what exactly to do. I really enjoy doing these podcasts! I slipped out the preview of this week's podcast on the Twitter feed two days back, and was just sitting down to code the "official" release when I saw last week's podcast had been Disappeared. If you want it, it's still up, but I don't know if I'll ever put another one up again since the Dime Got Dropped. So . . . don't know. Have to mull. I'd like to continue doing them, but I don't want the hassle.

The Importance of Milieu

It is one of the great creative ironies in superhero comics that those characters with the most distinctive and colorful individual milieus are often less popular than characters with more generalized, which is not to say generic contexts. Superman has Metropolis and Batman has Gotham, but these are both just cross-eyed approximations of New York City; Spider-Man lives in the real New York City. These are all colorful backdrops but they're still situated securely enough in recognizable reality (or its spandex approximation) that the characters themselves can go in many directions. I would even go so far as to say that these characters are more modular as a direct consequence of their open-ended milieus, and this modularity gives them room enough that they can reasonably expand to fill an almost infinite variety of storytelling spaces. All of these characters have in the past anchored long-running team-up anthology books, and their respective popularity has dictated their status as utility players, able to be plugged into almost any different story type or genre simply by virtue of their ubiquity.

My God Swings A Metal Hammer

A Conversation On Pavement



Recorded the night of 19 September, immediately following the Boston stop of their reunion tour.