Because you've all been so good, I give you, courtesy of Corporal Plocostimus, the greatest music video in the history of the world. Look upon these works, ye mighty, and despair.
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
I think someone should hire me to be a network television executive. I've got a great idea for a television program called "The Hunter".
"The Hunter" would be a weekly show slightly in the vein of the The Fugitive or The Hulk, or perhaps The Pretender (if anyone remembers that), but without any overarching story elements. Basically, we follow our lead character, the titular, unnamed "Hunter" as he travels all across America, coming to a different town and meeting a whole new cast of characters every episode. And killing someone.
Who's it going to be this week? The story possibilities are nearly endless. One week it'll be the kindly old widower who helps the neighborhood children make box kites. The next week, it'll be a lonely, slightly neurotic schoolteacher who lives by herself. The next, a happy-go-lucky mentally challenged man who gofers down at the local garage. Ever week, The Hunter comes to town, insinuates himself into the lives of his prey, and then hatches intricate, infinitely cruel plots to kill them.
I'm envisioning this as a great spotlight for modern day character actors. Every week you need a new victim, so you could conceivably snag some of the best actors in show business to do episodes. The concept is such that, if it was a success, it could last for years and years. And if the actor playing the Hunter ever got tired, well, then they could do a "Very Special Episode" where the Hunter becomes the Hunted, and the mantle is passed to a new actor, sort of like how they get a new Doctor Who every few years.
I think it'd be brilliant.
Why are they cancelling Justice League Unlimited? Is it just because I like it? I suspect so.
Look, people, it's pretty simple: I haven't bought a Justice League comic in years and years, but I never miss the Justice League on TV. They do the superhero action better than most of the people who do the characters for the actual comics. The show has never been less than thoroughly enjoyable. It's almost tempting to say that these are quite possibly the best Justice League stories that have ever been told. They've made the Shining freakin' Knight cool again -- which is something even Grant Morrison was unable to accomplish.
I don't understand the economics of childrens' programming. In normal network television, if a show is popular, it continues to be produced for as long as it continues to be profitable. While sitcoms and actor-specific series are retired when the actors get tired or grow old, ensemble shows can continue for decades with a shifting cast. Last I checked ER was still on the air, and that's been on for, what, ten years? Fifteen? Something like that. I'm assuming people still watch it because they still make it.
So why don't they treat cartoons the same way? They don't even have to worry about actors getting older or getting tired. They can replace writers and artists at will to keep the show fresh (ideally, that is). So why do most childrens' shows, even the popular ones, have finite lives? Now it's true that some evergreen properties, like Scooby Doo and the Transformers, have been around in one form or another for decades, but it's not quite the same thing. Why do they have to mess with success?
Is it just because they're pushing that new Batman cartoon on saturday mornings? I don't know how Warner Brothers makes their decisions, but if they paid any attention to how Marvel does things, they would see that having multiple iterations of Spider-Man and Wolverine in the public eye hardly damages those characters' appeal. All I know is that the show used to be a mainstay of the Cartoon Network's schedule and now it keeps getting shifted around and pre-empted for specialty programs, pretty much the classic network code for trying to get rid of something. Do the toys not sell? Are the ratings tanking (which might just be happening with the shifting schedule)? I'm honestly curious, because as rare as it is that I really, really like a show like Justice League, it's a shame to see it go the way of the dodo. It's a much better superhero vehicle than 99% of the books on the shelves today. With the right approach, it could conceivably run for many years to come, focusing on all the different characters introduced over the last couple seasons.
Ah well. Such is life. I'll get over it, I'm sure.
For a long time now, man has debated the existence of the theoretical Most Nerdy Object Ever. Mike has long championed the scale-model Han Solo in Carbonite, which is a hard choice with which to disagree. Despite the fact that I have received independent corroboration that someone I actually know (most certainly not a pimple-faced virgin, either) possesses one of these monstrosities (no, 'tis not my secret to tell), I still must concur that this is a hard candidate to beat.
My own personal nominee was the Composite Superman action figure -- a choice I still think holds considerable merit. True, it's nowhere near as expensive as the Han Solo, but the relative cheapness of a small piece of plastic compared to a giant movie prop is part of the charm. I mean, let's be honest, Han Solo costs, what, four or five thousand dollars? You're not going to be able to drop that kind of money on a movie prop unless you've found some modicum of success in life, or are perhaps independently wealthy. Having that kind of money lying around mitigates the sting of extreme nerdishness a wee bit. I mean, sure, Bill Gates is so painfully nerdy he probably designs Venn Diagrams with which to categorize Neil Peart's live drum drum solos since 1978, but last I checked he was the richest man on earth and also married to a fairly hot chick. There's a definite argument to be made that success mitigates nerdishness, at least in part.
But the Composite Superman? Less than twenty dollars. You can have one of those easily. Anyone living in their dank, dreary, Cheetos-stained, grape soda-stinking basement apartment with soiled Jeri Ryan as "Seven of Nine" posters covering every available wall surface can look to the Composite Superman figure as the ultimate apotheosis of their feeble existence, and gain some sort of spiritual succor from this totem as they wake in the morning to begin another day of pulling double shifts as assistant manager down at the local Kinko's. That, to me, is sadder still than the Han Solo, because you know that anyone dropping five grand on a movie prop might conceivably at some point in time have slept with an actual lady, even if they had to pay for it.
Anyway, all this is simply means of introducing a new challenger to the title. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the Weaponeer of Quard.
If you doubt the nerd provenance of this humble figure, I ask you to simply imagine explaining the Weaponeer of Quard's basic premise to an interested bystander and not sounding like a raving psychotic. There's an even chance that even a disinterested normal person might recognize the Han Solo in Carbonite, but the Weaponeer, in addition to being rather freaky to look at, is almost comically obscure. All of which only adds to the tragedy.
Incidentally, just so no one thinks I'm trying to peremptorily elevate myself from the nerdy masses, let me just point out for the record that I had to go through the preceding passage to ensure that I had spelled carbonite correctly, instead of accidentally typing carbomite, which would have been a rather unusual crossover.
Also, did anyone catch this last weekend's Robot Chicken? During a rather unfunny skit that featured Goku (from DragonBall Z) fighting an Akira-fied Phyllis Diller, there was a brief appearance by a character called the "Composite Santa Claus" -- half-Santa, half Frosty the Snowman, split right down the middle. Is there a more obscure nerd reference possible for a television program seen by millions of people across the planet to make? I seriously, seriously doubt it.
Why does everyone discussing the Pixies' Doolittle feel obliged to point out that they hate "Silver"? I swear, I've run across that idea in every article or blogpost I've seen about the album in months. Am I the only one who not only likes "Silver" but thinks it one of the album's highlights? Hello? Anyone? Is this thing on?
Scanning over July's DC covers, it occurs to me that Dorian must be overjoyed to see Wildcat appearing prominently in so many places. It's like he's the new Wolverine, only slightly less homoerotic.
Anyway, I was happy to see this cover, as it features yet another homage to my favorite weird Golden Age cover -- All-Star #3, AKA the Everyone Is Jerking Off Under the Table Except for Hawkman, Because He Likes to Watch cover. They just keep using it, and I laugh every single time.
Gotta give Perez the credit though, he can actually draw characters who look younger or older, depending on their actual age, instead of just slapping a few wrinkles on a stock facial expression. Not that I think the presence of Real Live Old People is probably much in the way of a commercial draw for the prospective buyer, but hey. Who would have thought that a bunch of superheroes pleasuring themselves under the table would prove such an enduring motif?
Monday, April 17, 2006
I have never warmed to Paul Pope's art. Whereas almost everyone else seems to think he's the bee's knees, I actively dislike everything of his that I've seen. I couldn't tell you why, it's not like this is a fully formed opinion or anything -- there's just something about his linework that puts me off. Looking at a page of his, for some reason my eyes are drawn away from the art, off the page, anywhere else but actually on the art itself. Without fail. His compositions seem forced and his people always look like big mouth bass. And his linework -- gah! -- how twee. If Belle & Sebastian ever decided to draw a comic book (and not just license their lyrics for an Image anthology), I imagine it would look like a Paul Pope comic book, all fey and curvilinear.
I found myself laughing way more than I probably should have at this week's Twenty Questions over at The Great Curve. The revolving door of death in superhero comics long ago ceased to be in any way effective or convincing, and really, it's not even funny anymore. Now whenever someone dies, I don't think there's a single reader who can possibly react with anything other than a cynical chuckle: no character, regardless of how well-written or convincing their death may be, will ever stay dead. If they brought back God-damned Bucky, they certainly won't hesitate to bring back Superboy or whomever. Hell, they brought back The Ringer. (So why no Justice League of Detroit? I'm not the only one who likes Vibe, so why the fuck not?)
But anyway, I had another passing thought on the subject that might be of interest to those who care about such things. If you're going to bring a character back from the dead -- and I guess this goes for any kind of serialized fiction, not just superhero books -- the operative phrase is Keep It Simple, Stupid. However a given character died, find the single easiest way to bring him or her back. Attempting any number of elaborate storytelling contortions just threatens to undermine the whole thing by pointing out how silly the process actually is.
For instance -- the way they brought back Nick Fury was perfect. (As an aside, I remember him getting killed by the Punisher -- I enjoyed buying the $5 chromium covered abomination where he buys the farm straight out of the quarter box -- but I don't recall when he got resurrected. He just showed up again.) Apparently the Punisher just killed a really special LMD that provided a convincing corpse. Sure, it may seem like a cop-out to some, but essentially all resurrections are cop-outs. At least the "special LMD" idea wouldn't take more than, say, two or three panels to properly explain. Best just to get it over with and not dwell on the circumstances.
However, some characters call for more complex resurrections than others simply by nature of their deaths. Doctor Octopus doesn't have a history or using robot doubles, and if I recall the issue where Kaine (>shudder<) killed him, it was pretty explicit in establishing that Doc Ock was very, very dead. So, based on that and the fact that he never had any kind of healing factor or magical associations that could explain a comeback, having the Hand resurrect him made as much sense as anything. We know that the Hand does that, we've seen it before, so seeing it again doesn't strain credulity.
It's a variation on Occam's Razor for superhero stories: the least complex explanation possible is the one that works best. As much as we mocked the whole Hal Jordan resurrection business, putting out a huge story where every single element of Hal Jordan's long and chaotic death and afterlife was brought up, explained away and dismissed was probably necessary if they wanted to restore the character to the previous status quo. They had simply been too thorough, not only showing him going insane, but showing him turn into a mass-murdering cosmic super-villain, killing him and then bringing him back as the Spectre, which is as close to a conclusive death as you can possibly get in comics. So they had their work cut out for them, and I guess it's to their credit that it worked out as well as it apparently did.
But then something like Kevin Smith's resurrection of Green Arrow is just galling. I remember reading the issues where Oliver Queen died -- they had some of Jim Aparo's best late-career work, even if the stories were just so-so. In any event, the mechanism for his resurrection was pretty well sketched out: there was a plane crash. Green Arrow was trapped in the plane. Superman tried to save him but had to abandon the plane for some reason or another before the crash. They never found the body. The simple way to do it would just have Green Arrow showing up alive again, with the explanation that Hal Jordan, then Parralex, saved him in the split second before the plane crash. Instant resurrection, no muss, no fuss. Chuck Dixon, who wrote the issues in question, obviously had little doubt that the character would eventually be brought back, and provided whomever was going to end up doing it with a simple, quick and effective way of doing it. They went to great trouble to ensure that Hal Jordan wouldn't be coming back (which ultimately just made more work for the people who brought him back), but there was little doubt that Oliver Queen was going to return someday.
But then Smith came in and wrote an incredibly convoluted story wherein the scab of the rotating comic book death thing gets picked until it bleeds. Not only does he spend a lot of time needlessly reiterating the problem, but he even sends the heroes of the story to Heaven -- not a metaphorical substitute, but real, honest-to-God Heaven. Which is just stupid. He spent the first ten issues of his fifteen issue run constructing the comic book plot equivalent of a Rube Goldberg machine that had the implicit purpose of calling attention to how stupid comic book resurrections are in the first place, when it could have easily been explained away in five pages. Then they could have moved on to telling a story that wasn't just a conscious rebuttal to a previous story, which is about as nerdy and superfluous as comics get.
Speaking of which, I know this has been mentioned before, but damn, how stupid is it that they established a Judeo-Christian afterlife in the DC Universe? It's OK if they have it in Sandman or Swamp Thing -- even if the characters interact with the regular DCU, it's only intermittent and easily overlooked -- but when you've got Batman going to Heaven and getting proof positive that his parents are relaxing behind the pearly gates, well, you've essentially annihilated your most popular character's raison d'etre in one fell swoop.
I mean, honestly, if Batman knew that Thomas and Martha Wayne had gone to Heaven and were chilling with Jesus, why would he continue to dress like a bat and beat the snot out of criminals? Wouldn't it make more sense for him to hang up his cape and devote the Wayne fortune to evangelizing?
Unless... there is the chance that Batman's paranoia is more deep-seated than anyone has ever suspected. It's an established fact that Batman once concocted contingency plans to help him defeat his fellow Justice Leaguers -- what if Batman actually has a contingency plan to defeat God, should God get out of hand? I imagine if Batman knew God existed, he'd probably be skeptical that God would stay on the side of righteousness forever. He'd probably have a plan, at least if Grant Morrison were writing him. Even if it meant demolishing the entire universe just to get at God, Batman would win, because comic book logic dictates that Batman > God.
Going back a few more years to the Marvel vs. DC thing, it never made sense to me that they didn't have Batman fight Wolverine in their fan-polled bout. In hindsight, all the battles were fairly predictable, and that's probably exactly how the companies wanted it (I remember being mildly surprised that Storm beat Wonder Woman, but that was the only surprise to be had). But still, Wolverine vs. Batman in a straight vote across the fanboy community -- it would have been interesting, had the internet existed then as it does now, to see the fanboys tie themselves into knots trying to figure that one out. Seeing who would win in a straight popularity contest would also have been revealing, even if it would have been a source of apoplexy for the companies involved . . .
Since we're on the subject of Iron Man covers, here's a couple fun ones no one else has highlighted yet:
Shell-Head fights Santa Claus. Of course, that's not exactly what happens in the story, but still, we can dream, right?
Despite the fact that the second Armor Wars was one of the single most depressing stories I've ever read in a comic -- I remember actually quitting the story mid-stream because it was just unrelentingly unpleasant -- it had some great JR Jr art, of which this cover is a great example. There's a reason he gets paid the proverbial big bucks -- don't you just want to open up the book and see why the hell iron Man is carrying another Iron Man in his arms? That's what a good cover should do.
Paul Ryan may be one of the least flashy artists in comic book history, but he's also one of the most unsung craftsmen in recent years. Especially when everyone and their brother was trying to ape the Image guys (with horrible results), his work stood out for its unfailing commitment to the basics of craft and storytelling. Nothing flashy or visionary, but compared to most of the crap that was on the stands at the time, pretty damn good. He also knew how to craft a pretty striking cover. I still can't figure out if Fin Fang Foom's alien origin was good or bad, but having Iron Man fight a giant green dragon is pretty much a recipe for fun regardless of the circumstances.
Iron Man is the only superhero besides the Wasp who has an actual good reason to be changing his costume all the time. Although he kept his initial red and gold armor for many years, it's always been fun to see him change it periodically, especially back when the writers used to, you know, put some effort into thinking up good reasons why he needed a new set of duds. If I recall correctly (the stories weren't particularly memorable in and of themselves) he had a similarly good reason for building the extremely imposing War Machine armor. The armor itself is striking, with its black and silver color scheme, and even if the story inside wasn't that good (which it wasn't) the cover itself would stick in your memory.
And no look at Iron Man would be complete without a representative cover from the most popular, most well-received, best written and brilliantly conceived Iron Man story of the last twenty years -- Teen Tony. The story so popular that it only took seven issues before it was written out of continuity forever. Here's a great example of my previous thoughts on character resurrection: when they decided they had to bring back the regular Tony Stark, they didn't write some complex tale about his return. They basically just did it, sneaking the character back in during the whole "Heroes Reborn / Return" nonsense and letting it go at that. Like, whoops, he's alive again, let's just get on with the show, shall we? If they had still had No Prizes at the time, Classic Tony's resurrection would have been a great opportunity for them to elicit a fan-made solution. I seem to recall Busiek ended up concocting some jury-rigged retroactive solution in an Annual back-up or something like that, but essentially the how was unimportant. All that mattered was that the character was back, and once he was back they could move on to telling the real stories that people wanted to see without spending all their time poking the wound and calling attention to the original mistake.
Anyway, I'm sure whoever painted this cover (there's no credit on the GCD listing) is a wonderful person, but the last thing the world needed was an over-rendered neo-Impressionist portrait of Teen Tony. Talk about bringing a gun to a knife fight . . .
Thursday, April 13, 2006
And can't think of anything better to post. And there's at least three people who might be intersted.
Random Shuffle Playlist for 04-13-06
(Driving to work and around Worcester)
1. Wilco - How To Fight Loneliness
2. Interpol - Public Pervert (Carlos D Remix)
3. Duran Duran - The Reflex (7" Version)
4. The Doves - Ambition
5. David Bowie - Future Legends
6. Orbital - Old Style
7. A Guy Called Gerald - Final Call
8. Sleater-Kinney - Buy Her Candy
9. Pavement - Two States
10. Sleater-Kinney - The Fox
11. The Chemical Brothers - If You Kling To Me, I'll Klong To You
12. Pulp - Bar Italia
13. Speedy J - Pure Energy (Remix)
14. CAN - Soul Desert
15. Spiritualized - Cop Shoot Cop
16. Ladytron - The Reason Why
17. The Replacement - I Will Dare
18. Gorillaz - O Green World
19. R.E.M. - Wendell Gee
20. Sons & Daughters - La Lune
21. Pavement - Summer Babe (7"Version)
22. Annie - Always Too Late
23. Daft Punk - High Fidelity
24. Meat Puppets - Walking Boss
25. David Bowie - Moonage Daydream (Live fromDavid Live)
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
What the hell was up with the Ghostbusters cartoon from the 80s? Not the Real Ghostbusters, the one that came out first and made the other one have to be the "Real" deal. It was, like, Abbot & Costello and a monkey, and they had a car that travelled through time. Or something like that, I'm not really sure exactly how it went.
Why is Wolverine so popular? I mean, he's got the ugliest costume in comics history. At least when John Romita Sr. sketched it out originally, all the markings had sort of a basis in design: the black streaks were clawmarks, his ear-thingies sort of looked like ear thingies a real wolverine might have. But through the years it's just become this abstract thing with black shapes on a yellow field. And the weirdo buccaneer boots and the Batman ears - it's all just so weird and stylized, like a Mexican wrestler uniform crossed with a hyper-defined Kabuki costume. If someone wore it in the real world, they would look unmistakably ... fey, I guess. But in comics bright blue buccaneer boots and skintight leotards are the absolute epitome of masculinity. I'd pop some old chestnut about nerds being at the vanguard of sexual virility, but really, I think we all know that old song and dance by now...
Wolvie sad. Wolvie also looks like a Tom of Finland drawing.
Speaking of which, that reminds me of a rather amusing story.
Back when I was still married, I remember I was looking at something -- probably a web page or maybe a book -- that had a picture of the old-school Mr. Terrific in it. Well, of course my wife zeroed in on that pic while looking over my shoulder, and immediately quipped: "He's gay." Which she didn't mean at all in the pejorative, merely that, anyone who would wear that costume must, by definition, be gay. She's hung out around gay people a lot, I guess you get a feel for these things.
But really, is it true? I mean, outside of the Pride Parades most gay people dress, well, maybe a little bit more natty than us hetero schlubs, but not like Broadway performers at any rate. In this day and age, I think you can safely say that wearing a costume like Mister Terrific doesn't make you gay, it merely makes you a moron.
Once Upon A Time In The West : Westerns ::
2001: A Space Odyssey : Science-fiction
Discuss.
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