NRAMA: Fair enough. Back on the subject of your work on Blackest Night, is there a character you’re writing that you’re liking more than you expected?

GJ: A bunch. The biggest surprise is how easy it is to write when Hal and Barry are together. These two know each other so well, and there’s such a strong tie to them…it’s like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. And something happens to Hal when he’s with Barry. It happens to me when I hang out with my friend, Matt. He’s so organized and punctual that a little part of my brain shuts off. I don’t need to worry about the time or where we’re going. I feel like that happens to Hal when he’s around Barry. Hal goes with the flow a little more, while Barry’s taking up the slack of figuring out where to go. I have more Barry and Hal scenes written down because they just keep writing themselves. Introvert and extrovert. Saint and sinner. Time and space.

And then there’s a character that’s really surprised me. I don’t want to give it away but she’s one of the strongest and most recognizable characters in the DC Universe, and yet she hasn’t been in the spotlight for a very long time. But she will be now. For quite some time to come.

NRAMA: OK, then which character will people get to know better in Blackest Night than they’ve ever known before?

GJ: Same character. She’s been around since the ’60s.

-Geoff Johns, from an interview with Vaneta Rogers. Newsarama is currently throwing up malware warnings in my browser, and there’s really no reason to click through anyway, but if you do, browser beware.

Let’s take a brief look at a few high-profile moves in Geoff Johns’s post-Flash career:
1. Brought back Hal Jordan
2. Brought back Barry Allen
3. Brought back Professor Zoom
4. Brought back Ronnie Raymond
5. Introduced a bunch of lame-os in JSA
6. Wrote Blackest Night
7. Explained various minutiae, including Power Girl’s boob window, Barry Allen’s bowtie, and why love is actually a bunch of creepo stalker chicks who don’t wear clothes and love to brainwash people
8. Called Aquaman’s wife “one of the strongest and most recognizable characters in the DC Universe”

Honest question: why’s Geoff Johns seem to like the boringest parts of comics?

Today is that annual day when websites like to toss in jokes about how they’re closing or now owned by _____ or how they’re going to make a sequel to your favorite videogame. All that shit. Personally, I’m not in the mood.

But on the subject of jokes, I think of the latest issue of Prelude to Deadpool Corps. For those of you who haven’t been able to keep Deadpool’s multiple titles straight, Prelude is Victor Gischler’s concurrent follow-up to the canceled on-going Deadpool: Merc with a Mouth, which will end in several months. It’s been a weekly, five-issue romp as Deadpool goes from universe to universe to put together a team of his female self, his hungry and decaying head from the Marvel Zombies universe, a kid version of him from a world where he’s a student at Xavier’s school, and a gross dog with regenerative powers. Each issue has a different artist and the quality ranges from good (Paco Medina) to Rob Liefeld.

I made the mistake of picking up #5 without even flipping through it. After all, it features the art of Kyle Baker. I mean, Kyle Baker is awesome! Didn’t you read Plastic Man? That series was brilliant! Okay, sure, the middle issues were a bit uninspired, but the rest of it was tops! He’d be absolutely perfect for a Deadpool comic. But it’s weird, I strictly remember that Baker’s done Deadpool work before. Something about Deadpool #900 and a segment of Merc with a Mouth when Wade went through different universes. For some reason I made myself forget about those issues. Why would I do that? Kyle Baker is an awesome artist.

I look through this issue and… oh, yeah.

Sweet Jesus! This comic has more lens flare than it does yellow word bubbles! Kidpool (not to be confused with the infinitely better, yet forgotten Kid Deadpool) complains about the lack of fries even though there’s two orders of them laying on the table! The Grandmaster and the Contemplator look like unfinished action figures! The textures are eye-rape! Everyone looks like rejects from that Avengers in Galactic Storm arcade game that nobody’s heard of!

There’s more that I’m not showing you. A lot of the time you can barely tell the difference between Deadpool and Lady Deadpool. Horrible filters and color schemes are rampant. When Dogpool crawls out of a crater after an explosive ship crash, his physical damage is portrayed by making random parts of him transparent. A subplot involves the Deadpool Corps opposing an army of Carebear knockoffs, but it doesn’t work. The whole point of the gag is that these guys are fighting and slaughtering a bunch of bloodthirsty space pirates who happen to be cute, but how do you portray that when everything about the comic is so goddamn ugly?

So, yes, April Fools Day is all about jokes. And yes, we get it, Mr. Baker. It’s a funny prank you’ve been playing on us for the past few months, but it’s getting old. You can go back to drawing GOOD art now. Any time, now. Please?

Wonder-Con is tomorrow!

The booths!  The people!  The smell of storm-trooper armor.  Me, skulking around the DC area hoping that someone will say something spoilerish like they did at Comic-Con.  Me staring at Gail Simone like a creepy fangirl who can’t manage a conversation – which I kind of am.  Oh well!

The panel that David and I and the theyFanboys are hosting on Saturday, 12:30, in room 220.

Already I’m thinking about the regrettable purchases I am going to make, the awkward questions I am going to pose, and the possibility of running into Kevin Smith in the halls.

Oh, it is going to be fantastic.

And seriously, I thought Birds of Prey was gone forever.  It was cancelled, people.  Cancelled and the characters parcelled out to to other books.  It was sold for scrap.

Well, ba BAM!

They are back in May, and they are back written by Simone.  With two new characters.  That’s like seeing the dog that ‘went to live on a farm upstate’ returned to you with a litter of puppies. 

And if they include Creote and Savant?  And Helena keeps up her weird-ass thing with Catman?

Hell, even if she doesn’t, and they don’t, I am a happy, happy person.

So some of you might be wondering about the Wrestlemania Countdown and how I never got around to posting the top 3. I really wanted to get that done in time, but 11 straight days of writing plus coming down with a cold led to some nasty fatigue and I lost my writing momentum. I’ll get to it, but sometime in the next few days, albeit when nobody cares because Wrestlemania 26 already happened.

In other news, I stumbled across this the other day. It’s a well-known fact that the videogame Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time has one of the all-time greatest soundtracks. A guy by the name of MasDaMind decided to merge the tracks from that game with other pieces of music to create Teenage Mashup Ninja Turtles IV: Turtles In Time Tribute.

Some work better than others, but I personally dig “Got Yourself Sewer Surfin'”.

I realize that I am staking a lot of my happiness on the Return of Bruce Wayne series, but I just can’t seem to care.  Here are some scans from the first issue, via the DCU Source.

It would almost be worth it to be a cave person, even one of those pervy Clan of the Cave Bear cave people, if you got to see Batman take his utility belt to the stone age. 

And?  And?

Read the rest of this entry �

Last week, I wondered aloud about the skin tone of a character in Jonathan Hickman and Dustin Weaver’s upcoming time-spanning SHIELD. In short, Imhotep, Egyptian doctor and Agent of SHIELD (Officer of SHIELD?), was modern-day white, rather than ancient Egypt brown.

I emailed Dustin Weaver with a link to the post, and he wrote back pretty quickly. I’m paraphrasing, but essentially, it was a mistake in the production process. He’s done a lot of research on the book to try and make sure things make sense, and that’s something that slipped through the cracks when doing color tests. He’s gonna try to get them fixed in the trade, if Marvel’s amenable to it. He’s a pretty cool guy.

Just an update!

edit: I asked Dustin to quote a bit of his email and he agreed. In his own words:

Oh, man, you’re right! I’m embarrassed and shocked that I didn’t catch this mistake before it was finished. I’m surprised nobody caught this mistake.
The 2 page spread of the Egyptians fighting the Brood was the very first thing that got colored for this book and it was the testing page for the style of this whole series. I think it went through 4 different versions before we got something we liked. I think with all this back and forth with the style of the thing we missed the fact that they were white. I feel pretty stupid. I seriously did a lot of research to get a lot of the details right. To miss something so blatant is embarrassing.

Why is this example of a monkey and a robot making out stuck under a sad line from “Today?” It doesn’t make sense! After all, this panel from Doom Patrol #34 has everything. Action, adventure, someone being a jerk, and it’s all in a title that is epic, overwhelming silliness. Also, as I said before, a monkey and a robot making out.

Why, because it’s DC, of course!

Marvel, it’s about time you had some “crazy, reprogrammed robot” on “talking, violent monkey” characters blatantly made for rampant and gratuitous fan service. Vision and Gorilla Man, separately and together, are half-way there already. And they’re good guys! Get on that! I have faith in you!

Why is this example of chickkissing stuck under one of the sad lines from “Yesterday”? It doesn’t make sense! After all, this panel from Incredible Hercules #141 has everything. Action, adventure, someone being a jerk, and it’s all in a title that is epic, overwhelming silliness. Also, as I said before, chickkissing.

Why, because it’s Marvel, of course!

When I told Gavok about Venus, Aphrodite’s freaky siren copycat who had mind-control love powers that she used on everyone, I did not entirely believe myself. Now I see that it’s true. Too bad he’s such a psychotic jerk (by that I mean Gavok. Gavok is a jerk).

DC, it’s about time you had some crazy, love-power-having bisexual characters blatantly made for rampant and gratuitous fanboy service. Karen and Helena, separately and together, are half-way there already. And they’re good guys! Get on that! I have faith in you!

Why is this example of dudekissing stuck under the only sad line from ‘Tomorrow’?  It doesn’t make sense!  After all, this panel from Dark Wolverine #84 has everything.  Action, adventure, someone being a jerk, and it’s all in a title that is epic, overwhelming silliness.  Also, as I said before, dudekissing.

Why, because it’s Marvel, of course!

When David told me about Daken, Wolverine’s freaky son/clone who had mind-control sex powers that he used on everyone, I did not entirely believe him.  Now I see that it’s true.  Too bad he’s such a psychotic jerk (Daken, not David.  David is nice.).

DC, it’s about time you had some crazy, love-power-having bisexual characters blatantly made for rampant and gratuitous fangirl service.  Dick and Roy, separately and together, are half-way there already.  And they’re good guys!  Get on that!  I have faith in you!