Watchmen will be coming out in March and, no doubt, the first few screenings will be almost entirely packed with comic book fans. The book, to comics fans, has a status somewhere between The Catcher in the Rye and the moon landing. It not only changed their lives, it marked a turning point for comics in general, taking a more critical and nuanced look not only at superhero characters, but at the concept of superheroes in general. Alan Moore presented a deeply cynical vision at the way the world would look if it had to interact with a group of dangerously powerful people with big egos and flexible morals. The book made every fan who ever fantasized about the fourth wall dissolving consider that it might turn the world darker and more dangerous rather than more exciting and fun. Watchmen wasn’t a book, it was an event, and so I’m guessing that the first few screenings will alternate between awed silence and wild cheering.

What about the screening after that? If the movie had come out a year or two after the novel’s publication, it would have knocked the socks off of people whose standard for superhero movies was Superman IV: The Quest for Peace, but will today’s audiences be aware of it as anything more than another film that is ‘based on a graphic novel?’

The color scheme is from The Dark Knight and 300. The sense of the alienation of powerful beings from everyday people is from Superman Returns. The idea of a superhero as something the public is afraid of is in movies from Hancock to The Hulk.

As for the public being right to fear superheroes, even Peter Parker turned to the dark side for a while, and he was played by Tobey Maguire. From outright immoral supers, like the ones in Wanted, to the heroes of Sin City, who had the welfare of the downtrodden at heart, but whose skills tended towards being able to quickly dispose of bodies, to the neurotics of superheroes being milked for comedic value in My Super Ex-Girlfriend, to Batman, one of the most straight laced of superheroes, being tangentially involved in the deaths of super villains, it’s more difficult to find a superhero movie in which the superheroes are unquestionably good than it is to find one that looks at them through more jaundiced eyes.

I’m not saying that Watchmen shouldn’t be made or that it has nothing to contribute. That would be like arguing against the filming of an Elmore Leonard story because the world already has enough heist movies. If anything Watchmen deserves more acclaim for originality, since it was one of the books that pioneered the more skeptical view of superheroes that has become the standard.

However, there is no denying that that view has become the standard. It’s odd that the innovation and influence of Watchmen in the medium of comics will probably lessen its impact when it becomes a film. Success has a price.

“When I speak, respond with the first word you think of. One.”
“Two.”
“Life.”
“Two.”
“Death.”
“Two.”
“Murder.”
“Happens.”
— Dr. Bruce Wayne and Two-Face from Elseworlds: The Batman of Arkham

For the past month, graphic novels have been doing quite well at the Barnes and Noble where I work. Sure, the Iron Man, Hulk and Hellboy stuff were doing fairly well over the course of the summer, but once Dark Knight arrived, everything flew off the shelves. I was put in charge of ordering in just about anything Batman-related that would sell. I mainly went with anything Joker and/or Two-Face themed. Surprisingly, Dark Knight Returns sold out early to the point that all of the warehouses were out of it. Great foresight there, guys.

Joker stuff sells like crazy, especially Killing Joke. Even the hastily scrapped-together biography we got on Heath Ledger has been taking off. Two-Face stuff, on the other hand, has been eating it. Nobody cares about Harvey, sad to say.

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Esther is a real life friend of mine who I regularly talk comics with. I’ve been bugging her to write something for me, ’cause I think she has a great POV, and I finally have proof that peer pressure and pestering works! She sent over a list of five things she likes about comics. Read on, and hopefully she’ll be back for more.
-djdb

1. Rafael Albuquerque
The most recent example of Albuquerque’s art is in Superman/Batman #51. It’s an appropriate book for him, because Albuquerque is one of those always-underappreciated artists who can differentiate between Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent without going directly for the glasses and the spit curl. Clark Kent has a sunny expression, a chin that could only work on Superman or John Travolta, and the thick neck of a guy who is always the most muscular person in the room. Bruce Wayne has a scowl that blots out daylight and permanent lines of concentration over his eyes. Albuquerque has a talent for using subtle differences in facial features and musculature to give each character a different face and a different body. Too often, in comics, the reader is unable to tell characters apart until the colorist gets to them. It’s something special to be able to make two of DC’s most similar looking heroes unique.

2. Kevin Maguire
No one can finish a book drawn by Kevin Maguire without checking the cover to find out who the artist is. No one who has read one book drawn by Kevin Maguire can fail to recognize his style if they see it again, even if it were only a doodle on a cocktail napkin. I can’t think of another artist who is that skilled and that willing to be so gloriously silly. Kevin Maguire’s characters have faces made out of putty with the kind of expressions you might see if you hit the pause button during a Jim Carrey movie or an old Warner Brothers cartoon. Take any mildly funny scene and Kevin Maguire’s art will put it over the top. What’s more, instead of limiting Maguire to comedy, this style makes tragic moments even more poignant, because character’s face twist with recognizable pain instead being stuck in a stock pose. A lot of people think Maguire’s style isn’t pretty, and often they’re right, but I’m glad there is an artist who will sacrifice prettiness in order to let the characters express as much emotion as they are supposed to feel.

3. Roger Robinson
Which isn’t to say that I can’t appreciate prettiness. Have you seen Robinson’s work in Gotham Knights? The man draws cheekbones that can cut glass. And I haven’t seen that many moodily lit abdominal muscles since the movie 300. All that, and he doesn’t sacrifice expression or context. His subjects are beautiful, but they are subjects in a story, not objects in a pin-up. That’s impressive.

4. Amanda Connor
The Green Arrow and Black Canary Wedding Special really played to Amanda Conner’s strength, and not because of the subject matter. Playing to Amanda Conner’s strength means giving her a huge panel, the bigger the better, and filling it with people. Conner’s style is clean enough to keep the page from looking cluttered and she plans well enough to place little visual jokes that lead the reader from one part of the page to the next. Every character is looking, talking, or reacting to at least one other character. As a result, huge group scenes stop looking like a flat jumble of bodies and faces and become a number of little action panels, depending on which part of the page the reader is focusing on.

5. J.H. Williams III
A lot of artists have a style. J.H. Williams III has every style, including his own. In Batman #667-669 Williams draws a large group of characters, each of them penciled and shaded differently. And he’s not shy about throwing in pages that show a massive black fist superimposed over an exploding plane, or pages in which the panels form a huge pair of bat wings. Instead of distracting from the story, William’s art makes the arc into something both surreal and self-contained. It’s a beautiful piece of work, and something that should be shown to anyone who doesn’t consider comics ‘art.’

Other than being one of my favorite recording artists, Erykah Badu gives good interview. Blender interviewed her here, on a piece calledWho Does Erykah Badu Think She Is? What’s it got to do with comics?

Who is your fantasy man?
Batman. He’d let me drive that fast car. We’d go to Whole Foods and hold hands and take a shot of wheatgrass together. We’d go up to the counter, and he’d pay. I’d have an invisible jet, so we’d fly away -leave the car there, let Robin take care of it-and kiss in midair. We wouldn’t care who sees us.

I also laughed at this:

Have you ever doubted your sexual orientation?
Never. I’ve had a boyfriend since I was 5. His name was Benny, and he could make gun noises by crushing a milk carton with his foot. The first person I ever kissed was Huber Miles, in third grade. Then I asked him for money. (laughs) I thought it was appropriate.

What does a kiss cost now?
You have to change gods and wear crochet pants. You haven’t heard about me?

Whattup Andre and Common.

The Hembeck Challenge, which I found via blake-reitz.livejournal.com. I think that ADD and some others did this a few years back, too, only those had panels. Here’s mine. Just for fun, each group has a theme. Some are obvious, others are not. Guess them and win a no-prize.

1.) Harley Quinn
2.) Isabel “Dizzy” Cordova
3.) Brubaker/Stewart/Cooke-era Catwoman
4.) 355
5.) Mary Jane Watson
6.) Misty Knight
7.) Colleen Wing
8.) JLA/Superman-era Natasha Irons
9.) Aunt May
10.) Cassandra Cain/Batgirl

11.) Moses Magnum
12.) Brother Voodoo
13.) Princess Zanda
14.) Blade
15.) Glory Grant
16.) Shades & Comanche
17.) Hannibal King
18.) DW Griffifth

19.) Luke Cage
20.) Spider-Man
21.) Black Panther
22.) Hawkeye
23.) Captain America

24.) Captain Marvel
25.) Captan Marvel
26.) Captan Marvel
27.) Mary Marvel
28.) Quasar

29.) Jubilee
30.) Cyclops
31.) Wolverine
32.) Beast
33.) Rogue
34.) Gambit
35.) Psylocke

36.) John Blaze
37.) X-Man
38.) David Banner
39.) Tony Stark

40.) Nat Turner
41.) Percy Carey

42.) Ed Brubaker
43.) Brian Michael Bendis
44.) Frank Miller
45.) Ann Nocenti

46.) Thinkin’ Lincoln
47.) Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
48.) Dr. McNinja
49.) Dinosaur Comics
50.) Kate Beaton

I usually don’t rock comics clothes. It just isn’t my thing and I just feel uncomfortable in wearing like a Punisher t-shirt. All of the comics shirts I actually wear are at least a little subtle, you know? Anyway, I saw this on Bossip (which is like a constant stream of player hation mixed with occasionally positive posts) and wow, that’s a hot shirt.

I don’t know if it’s the design of Batgirl or the faded look on the baby tee or what, but I dig this. It’s a great bit of design.

Michelle Williams is the chick in Destiny’s Child who wasn’t Beyonce, Kelly Rowland, or the other one. I’ve gotta confess that I haven’t heard a single song of hers since DC broke up, but she’s probably worth at least a casual listen. My R&B game has just been terrible for the last, oh, eight years.

Did anyone out there watch The Batman? The only ep I’ve seen was the Harley Quinn one and it was decent enough. Was the rest of the series worth checking for?

Hey, there. I didn’t have time to post about my trip in time, but at the moment, I’m kicking it in Arizona for a few days. I should be back Friday or so, but in the meantime, hermanos has the slack and that’s fine with me.

Just three things of note from my trip so far:

1) On the plane flight, I sat next to none other than former WWF Intercontinental and Tag Champion Tito Santana! God, that was awesome. We talked for a while about many things, but that guy was a complete class act. Totally friendly, good natured and still looks great. At first I didn’t want to say anything because I thought he was too young to be Tito.

2) The IMAX theater around here isn’t playing Dark Knight. Instead, they just have a series of educational films that will not make them money. How dense and/or retarded are they for not picking up on the goddamn Batman? It boggles the mind.

3) While at the local mall, I stepped into a KB Toys for the sake of looking at some action figures. Now, this store looks like they just get a series of figures, sell the ones worth selling and keep a never-ending supply of the ones nobody wants for years. For instance, for the Marvel Legends figures, I found about 15 Longshots and maybe 2 Lady Deathstrikes. Then I discovered a bargain bin of Rocky Balboa figures. At first I was excited. Rocky figures? That means I could pick up a sweet figure of Clubber Lang or Drago for cheap. Maybe if I’m lucky there will be an Apollo Creed in there.

Instead, I just found a huge pile of figures for the announcers and commentators. Not just for Rocky Balboa, but for the old movies as well. Who would want this? I’m serious. Who would ever want one of these? No kid, that’s for sure. I don’t think there are any fans of the movies who are licking their lips over this. I can’t comprehend how someone thought those would be a good idea.

That’s all for now. Be back in a couple days.

Usually, whenever a big comic book movie comes out, I’m there with a little article about comparing the film to the novelization. After all, the novelizations are based on earlier scripts of the movie and shed some light on what was taken out. Sometimes things are for the better. Sometimes they’re for the worse.

There’s a reason I’m so late with the Dennis O’Neil adaptation of Dark Knight. While the books for Marvel movies come out about a month or so before release, it was decided, for spoiler purposes likely, that Dark Knight would be released as a strict-on-sale title. It came out the same day as the movie, but my Barnes and Noble didn’t receive it until days later. As a fun aside, O’Neil himself came to the store, wondering if we had it yet.

At first I wasn’t even going to bother. Reading the book after seeing the movie didn’t sound like as much fun. That decision changed after seeing what I have to call the best movie of the summer. I picked up a copy and spent the next week or so reading it.

I should point out that this is going to be spoiler-heavy, but this is a comic site and you are a person reading a comic site. If you haven’t seen Dark Knight by now and haven’t at least been spoiled about the scene where David Allen Grier appears as Oswald Cobblepot, then there’s probably something wrong with you.

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A couple weeks back, Johns and Katz finished off their spectacular run of Booster Gold, bringing us some closure, while opening several new plot threads. A lot happened in there that I enjoyed, including the scene with Booster and Batman. Yes, sure, you can complain about how Batman remained completely silent about finding photos of a beaten and tortured Booster when he found Joker’s camera circa Killing Joke, but I dug it. Not only because Batman, the big superhero cynic, was giving Booster the well-deserved props, but because it went both ways.

Fact is, Booster hated Batman more than any other superhero. That’s a damn lot. What’s that you say? Hal Jordan? No, Hal Jordan didn’t really hate Batman. He was more submissive to what Batman had to say against him and was at most irritated. Superman? More disappointed than anything else. Red Hood? Just confused in a frustrated way. Booster Gold, on the other hand, outright tried to MURDER Batman!

I still remember when Countdown to Infinite Crisis happened and people were frothing at the mouth to see how Booster would react towards Batman. Ah, that was a fun scene.

So anyway, the new issue of Booster Gold finally had Booster and Batman bury the hatchet. That’s cool.

But another big moment involved Rip Hunter’s reveal that he brought back Booster’s sister Goldstar. Now, I understand that only a handful of comic readers have read anything with Booster in it outside his Justice League/Blue Beetle team-up stuff, so I’m sure there’s quite a few of you wondering who this is. It’s a logical thing to wonder, since other than an earlier flashback, she hasn’t been seen for about twenty years.

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Months back, a picture was released of the upcoming animated series Batman: The Brave and The Bold. The image showed Batman in a more 1950’s style, appearing in front of a clean-shaven Green Arrow and the current version of Blue Beetle. While I wasn’t exactly ecstatic about it, it at least interested me more than The Batman. Even disregarding the “fuck the fanboys” interview that preceded that series, I just couldn’t get into it.

But Brave and the Bold already had two things going for it. One, it had a good concept. One of the things that made Justice League Unlimited so cool was the idea of a random superhero you may have never heard of showing up in an episode alongside someone you have heard of. Hell, that’s how I was ultimately introduced to Booster Gold. Here, it’s simplified with the original JL roster being replaced with just Batman, holding the series together in a looser continuity, while teaming up with a different guy in each episode. It’s not so much a Batman cartoon as it’s another DC Universe cartoon. That’s cool. I can get into that.

The other thing that it has going for it is Blue Beetle. I’m not just saying this as a fan of Jaime Reyes. There are two things I ultimately felt were missing from Justice League Unlimited: Plastic Man and Blue Beetle. For some reason they didn’t have the broadcasting rights to either character over the course of the show and the most we got was Elongated Man bitching about Plastic Man without us ever seeing him. Granted, it isn’t Ted Kord in this series, but I’ll take what I can get.

Say, I just noticed that Ted Kord is sort of Spider-Man-like while his successor Jaime is Venom-like. Huh.

I forgot about this series, until the recent release of the trailer. Gentlemen! Behold!

That’s… pretty awesome. Plastic Man’s there too! There’s another thing going for it! Yeah! I wonder if Tom Kenny will be voicing him again. For those out of the loop, he played Plas in a failed cartoon pilot a year or so ago.

According to Wiki, Booster Gold and Skeets will get their own episode too. This thing just keeps getting better and better. Not to mention Green Lantern Corps and Red Tornado. And on the villain side, not only do they have Gentleman Ghost, but they have Black Manta in there… and they’re allowed to call him Black Manta this time!

Consider me stoked. I’m in the mood for a lighter Batman right about now.