As many of you are aware, the latest Entertainment Weekly features shots and info of Iron Man 2. A lot of the stuff is already known, though it did give us some very nice Black Widow pics. The one thing I find interesting about this whole deal is Mickey Rourke’s role.

Rourke is set to play Whiplash. In actuality, the information we know about him shifts him closer to being the Crimson Dynamo. They even use the name of Ivan Vanko – the first Crimson Dynamo – rather than Mark Scarlotti. So why name him “Whiplash”? For one, there’s the whip-based gimmick in his arsenal they’ve been hyping. Second, I think it’s more of a realism thing.

I’m telling you right now that “Crimson Dynamo” is one of the finest names to ever come out of comics. It’s such a cool collaboration between two cool words. Thing is, someone who looks like Mickey Rourke would never call themselves that on purpose. It doesn’t fit him. It’s too… theatrical, I guess is the word I’m thinking of. It brings too much color and hype for a Russian criminal who fashions his own costume to escape prison and then acts like a terrorist. “Crimson Dynamo” goes well with the propaganda aspect of the character, which is likely missing in this incarnation.

It’s the very idea that they’re going with the identity of Ivan Vanko that adds to my optimism. Ivan Vanko is one of the most overlooked comic characters, especially from the early days of Marvel. I would barely even remember him if it wasn’t for the recent Iron Man: Enter the Mandarin miniseries reminding me that he was around for just a little while.

Vanko created the Crimson Dynamo armor to make himself the Russian answer to Iron Man. He had pride and a sense of style based on his robotic identity, which annoyed his Soviet superiors, but they sent him against Iron Man nonetheless. Iron Man dealt with Vanko in one of the first major “Tony Stark is a total dick moments”.

During a fight, Iron Man played a fake recording he made of Vanko’s superiors planning to have him killed the moment he would return to Russia, whether or not he had succeeded in defeating Iron Man. This fake recording horrified Vanko and he defected to America. He started working as a major scientist at Stark Industries.

Even though we discovered that Vanko’s boss really was going to kill him off after all, that was an extremely fucked up thing for Stark to do.

Vanko remained loyal to Stark, but only lasted until the next year. A Russian spy Boris, alongside the comic book newcomer Black Widow, broke into Stark Industries and stole the Crimson Dynamo armor. Vanko sacrificed himself for Stark and destroyed this second Crimson Dynamo at the cost of his own life.

Since then, the Crimson Dynamo has become almost a running gag, as there are a near dozen men to have taken the mantle. But while I don’t know them all too well, I’m sure few show the potential of Ivan Vanko, a man who was certainly cut down before he could make a bigger impact in Marvel history.

Not saying I want the guy brought back from the dead, but a flashback miniseries or even a What If issue in light of the movie would be ideal. If you think about it, if Ivan had survived, he probably would have taken the second-stringer role that made Jim Rhodes into War Machine.

If they adapt anything from Vanko’s short history for the movie, it can only be positive. Just replace his Russian benefactors with Justin Hammer and we’ve got something.

Killer Mike’s I Pledge Allegiance to the Grind II was one of my favorite albums last year. I don’t know that it was 100% good, but I dig it. It was an album with a strong message, and one I can support. The Grind that Mike pledges allegiance to is Getting Rich INDependently. A goofy acronym, but an important one. If you’re working for someone else’s dream, you probably aren’t working toward your own. “If you have a boss, maybe you should fire your boss” is a profound statement. It’s full of arrogance, but it’s also very apt. It’s about getting off your butt and working for you, for something you believe in, rather than someone else’s money machine. The most important statement on the album, for mer personally, is at the end of “If I Can’t Eat Right.” “If you knew how much you were worth, you would ask for more than you get.”

Larry Leong is a friend of mine, and I’d like to think that he subscribes to a similar mentality. He’s been doing stunt work and acting in Hollywood for the past few years, and working on his baby, Yeah Sure Okay. YSO is a martial arts film, but it’s also a response to a lot of trends Larry saw that he wasn’t too fond of. Jump-cut, MTV-style editing, and a general lackluster sense of creativity. He wrote and directed a martial arts movie with no dialogue, no names, and a ton of action, and it ended up pretty entertaining.

The story is simple. There are two friends. One wears a blue shirt, the other a red one. There is a girl, whose face is never seen, that they both fall in love with. There are also several other guys, and all of them want the girl. As these things go, these guys are skilled in various kinds of martial arts, and our heroes end up in the middle of a city-wide battle for love.

YSO isn’t all action. There are moments of personal reflection in the occasional downtime and a couple of flashbacks. Blue has recently broken up with his girlfriend and is in a funk because of it. Neither Blue nor Red have luck with dating. You get the point pretty quickly, and it helps that the story is so familiar. It gives Larry a chance to string along a series of clever and inventive fights while keeping your interest up.

The fights are definitely the highlight. The Zero Gravity team came out and represented well. All of the fights are pretty good, and feature some pretty impressive stunts. They aren’t just the fast-paced, Bourne-style, bone-breaking stuff that most movies have. There’s a real sense of flow, style, and most of all, comedy. Some of the fights have laugh out loud funny moments, which keeps YSO from being an unbearably serious movie.

The fights having their own personality is vital to the film, as well. It makes each fight into an event, rather than a hurdle to be passed before getting to the big end fight. It’s not just “Oh yeah, Blue vs Purple!” when describing it to friends. You recall specific moves, like a guy straightening the creases in his jeans, the scowl on a man’s face, or a classic twin jump kick.

YSO isn’t an unqualified success. There are issues with the lighting, and I’m not too keen on the pacing. It’s a little more stop and go than I’d like, and a tighter editing hand may have helped out with that. I’d also have liked to hear a dual commentary track, though geography apparently prevented that. Larry’s solo commentary is interesting, but I think that the best commentaries happen when a couple of people get a chance to talk over their decisions over the course of making the film.

Overall, though, it’s a fun movie to watch. The complete lack of dialogue has novelty value, but it also helps to show how storytelling can work. If anything, it reminds me of old Tom & Jerry pictures, where the acting was the action. It makes the movie more visually interesting than a lot of films, and well worth a watch. You can pick it up for ten bucks, plus shipping.

The Black SuperHero Blog has a post up on “Superhero,” a short film about a young boy who finds an amnesiac dressed as a superhero. Here’s the summary from National Film and Video Foundation South Africa:

A white amnesiac finds himself stranded in the middle of an arid landscape dressed as a superhero. He’s assisted and spurred on by a young black boy who wholeheartedly believes that he is a superhero. But as the man’s memory returns he discovers that he’s been anything but a hero.

It’s a short film, and I’m definitely interested in seeing more of it. Hopefully it’ll get an online release or something soon.

This came out a couple weeks ago, and I actually saw it when I saw Terminator Salvation, but here’s a link to the trailer for The Surrogates, an adaptation of the graphic novel by Robert Venditti and Brett Weldele, courtesy of Top Shelf Productions. If you don’t want to click (lazy!), you can press play on the video below. I can’t decide if this trailer or the trailer for the movie that had Mike Tyson singing (what was that called?) was the best part of Terminator: Salvation (ka-zing!).

Maybe it’s the result of being in a huge room and watching the movie with hundreds of other people, but the battle scenes in this movie make you want to stand up and cheer.  That is, when they don’t make you want to turn your head away and wince.  Director Lauren Montgomery said that the first cut of this movie earned an R rating, and it doesn’t surprise me one bit.  I cut my teeth on the kid-friendly Batman: The Animated Series, and am therefore not accustomed to see that many bodies on the ground in a kid’s animated movie.  Still, the violence is done with style, giving the battles energy and weight, rather than just gore for the sake of gore.

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Any hint of a comic book movie coming out provokes a flurry of posts on all the message boards suggesting actors to fill the role of superheroes.  It’s a fun and frustrating experience, squeezing real-life people into comic book personas.  There are always a few surprises.  (I, after considering the matter, think that someone should cast George Clooney as Batman one more time, but not yet.  Wait ten-ish years and then make him play Batman in Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns.  Not only do I think it would work but it would make for a fantastic piece of meta; his work in Batman And Robin approximating the Batman comics of the sixties while he plays a more modern, dark Batman in DKR.)

Keeping in mind that the movies are probably never going to be made, I’m going to give my picks for Wonder Woman and Green Arrow.  Or,  ahem.  Excuse me.  Supermax. 

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That’s what it is according to the images of the toys for Wolverine: Origins. So far there’s a Superhero Squad figure and this guy:

“So who is this Deadpool guy?”
“He looks like Freddy Krueger and has Wolverine’s healing, but no claws.”
“We’re going to give him claws because it’s a Wolverine movie.”
“But, sir! If he has claws, that makes him too similar to Freddy Krueger!”
“Then we won’t make him look like Freddy Krueger anymore! Make him look like Zartan or something. What, do I have to think of everything?”

I seem to hate this design considerably less when I remember that Alex Hayden existed.

I was planning to see Watchmen when it came out in theaters, but I wasn’t particularly excited about it.  As I’ve said before, it follows the extra dark trend of superhero movies.  For me, an extra dark superhero movie is like extra dark chocolate.  Yes, it’s trendy these days, and everyone agrees that it’s classier, but most of the fun has gone out of it. 

However, then I learned that Fox started legal proceedings against Warner Brothers and the movie would be delayed, or perhaps even, (gasp), never released.

So of course then, I wanted to see it, needed to see it, started concocting I Love Lucy type schemes in order to get to see it, like unearthing one of those suits that I bought when I thought going to work meant wearing suits when in actuality going to work means advancing far enough that you don’t need to wear suits anymore, and pretending to be a lawyer (I would also probably need a briefcase) and saying that I represented one side or the other in order to get to see it.  Or perhaps I would find someone on the internet to whom it had been leaked, and beg it off of them, and transfer it to others using the netname Rorschach/Owlman4evah.

And now, the legal issues have been settled, and the movie is out in March, and I’m thinking, ‘Okay.  I’ll see it.  If it’s playing at that theater where they let you pump your own butter on to the popcorn.’

It’s sad when you’re a grown woman and you realize that you would be easily tricked into helping Tom Sawyer whitewash a fence.

If a child ever asks about the logic holes that come from the proposed existence of Santa Claus — such as how he can carry all those presents and travel around the world in one night, breaking into homes with no chimneys and devouring all the milk and cookies without anyone noticing — you just need to tell them one thing:

Santa Claus has both the Power Cosmic and the Speed Force. Problem solved.

Marvel needs to reveal that Santa is really the secret herald of Uatu the Watcher. He’s been watching everyone and knows who’s been naughty and who’s been nice, and while he cannot interfere directly, he has his jolly herald reward their behavior.

Also, just saw Punisher: War Zone. It’s like Blade in the way that the beginning and end are awesome, but there’s a lot of dullness throughout the middle. It’s like X-Men 3 in the way that characters are named after comic counterparts who barely have much to do with them. But it’s also like the last Rambo movie in being an over-the-top crazy killfest. So if that’s what you want, buy your ticket and enjoy.

Well, here it is! The last day.

In the penultimate installment, Quicksilver sacrificed himself for his father by taking an arrow to the chest. The irony is that he would have been able to run in there in time to catch the arrow with his hands if he didn’t have that limp from being shot in the knees by Magneto back in Ultimate War! Good going, Master of Magnetism.

Here’s the rest.

And that does it. My eternal thanks to ManiacClown for writing this with me from issue #1. Thanks to hermanos for the site to showcase this and his never ending support. Thanks to the MightyGodKing himself, Christopher Bird, for his guidance. Thanks to Jeph Loeb, the Joel Schumacher of comics, for giving us such an easy target.

And especially thanks to all of you readers out there who enjoyed it. Even those of you who didn’t enjoy it. You gave it a shot anyway, so I can’t argue.

Now, will there be some kind of Ultimatum Edit in the near future? Hm… we’ll see.

BUT! I can do you one better. I’m sure many of you have heard of Rifftrax, the website second coming of Mystery Science Theater 3000, headed by Mike Nelson and the rest. Some of you may have heard of iRiffs, the new feature on the site. Now any moron with a microphone and time on his hands can put together his own Rifftrax selections for the public to purchase and enjoy.

I am one of these morons.

That’s right. Me, Nick “ManiacClown” Zachariasen and my old friend James Howard will be making fun of things video/audio-style. Here we’re just starting off with Japoteurs, a somewhat racist Superman cartoon from the 40’s. But we have a lot more in the works, so stay tuned once the iRiffs section is up and running.

Tomorrow or so, I’ll probably have some kind of annotations thing for Ultimate Edit up. So if you’re into that kind of stuff, check it out.

Again, thanks for reading, folks. It’s been a blast.