It’s been too long since I’ve done anything truly stupid. Wait, not true. The other day I bought that handheld Guitar Hero game out of morbid curiosity. Yeah. That was mildly amusing for about four minutes. But it has been too long since I’ve done anything truly stupid in relation to this site. I set out to fix that.

Everybody knows that Pink Floyd’s album Dark Side of the Moon syncs up with the classic movie Wizard of Oz. I’ve tried it once and it really works. The whole concept made me realize how we don’t see any other movie/music pairings like this. That got me thinking…

If such a great movie syncs up so well with such a great album, then surely the best superhero movie would HAVE to sync up with the best album ever. That’s right. I decided to watch Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker while listening to Beck’s Odelay.

Keep in mind, this is the good version of the movie, with all the torture and violence.

Hey, worst case scenario: I waste 50 minutes of my time listening to good music while watching most of a kickass movie.

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“There’s no such thing as bad characters, just bad writers.” – Unknown

It’s the truth. Especially in a medium where characters rarely have one set writer, sometimes not even one at a time, the quality of a character is largely decided by how they’re written. But sometimes a character needs a little more effort to work; characters with no set goal or motivation, a lack of personality or simply an outdated concept. Tigra is one of those characters. She never struck me as interesting in anything I’ve read featuring her; She was either just kind of a generic urban vigilante with a cat theme or caught up in the plights of some society of cat people with a convoluted history that I couldn’t care less about. But recently Marvel seems to have been making people more aware of the character, by making her the one who betrayed Captain America in Civil War, the person the Hood beat the crap out of to set an example in New Avengers and as one of the characters in the House of M: Avengers miniseries. So if you’re going to bring her to the readers’ attention, the least you can do is make her compelling. That scene in New Avengers was the first time I’d felt any sort of emotion towards the character, but it hasn’t been followed up on so far and it’s unclear if it will be (although I’m still holding out since Bendis tends to write stories with a slow burn). So here are some things I would like to see happening with the character to make me interested in reading about her:

– Politely ignore the cat people stuff. It’s unnecessary baggage and too goofy to take seriously in this day and age. There was a Tigra mini a couple of years back by Christina Z and Mike Deodato Jr. that did exactly this. It wasn’t very good because the writing was too cheesy, but at least it tried to do something new with the character and give her a place in the universe. Oh yeah, she became a cop at the end of that mini. That was sorta interesting. Whatever happened to that?

– Change the name while you’re at it. “Tigra” makes it sound like she should a member of the Thundercats. Either go for the Luke Cage angle and get rid of the name altogether (“Greer Grant” has a nice enough ring to it), or change it back to the more generic yet elegantly simple “The Cat”.

– Change the outfit. It makes her look silly. Yeah, I know, she’s confident about her sexuality, blablabla. Lots of people (real and fictional) are confident about their sexuality, yet they generally don’t walk around in a bikini all the time. Besides, we all know the real reason she’s dressed like that. It’s not even a practical outfit, since very rarely is it drawn as giving any sort of support. The only thing it’s good for is removing the impact from dramatic scenes. She doesn’t need a superhero outfit anyway, much in the same way Wolverine doesn’t need one. She has no secret identity anymore and her look is distinctive enough to not warrant a flashy costume. Like I mentioned, she’s supposed to be a police officer now, so put her in a police uniform.

– Yeah, she’s a police officer! That’s one of the things that always appealed to me about Savage Dragon, that he was a cop who got super powers but chose to stay a cop in favor of becoming a generic superhero. Focus on that idea and it’d both give her a unique role in the universe and be the perfect opportunity to show the Initiative in action; Superheroes actively working together with the police force. And, hey, holy crap, guess who’s the new top dog in Marvel’s criminal underworld? The Hood. The guy she’d have a very personal reason for going after. This stuff practically writes itself.

In fact, this can all be brought back to simply remembering that she’s a cop. That one story element from a five year old miniseries suddenly makes the character relevant again. This really isn’t that hard.

There is a great interview up at CBR featuring Grant Morrison, Tim Kring, Mike Mignola, and Johnathan Lethem. Go check it out.

Morrison said superheroes are representative of certain qualities and as such they need to be allegorical of other concepts in order to appeal to more adult readers. As an example, Morrison explained that when he was young he liked The Flash as drawn by Carmine Infantino simply because his bright yellow boots looked so cool due to their “awesome huge treads.” Now that Morrison is older, boot design isn’t enough to make the character appeal to him. Now Morrison likes The Flash because he feels he is representative of urban living and urban culture due to his speed. Morrison explained that lives of superheroes are huge cosmic version of the way human beings live, and that if they were not based in the lives of ordinary humans, they may not have an appeal.

I love that man so much.

Has he totally lost it, or has he, like Alan Moore, looked upon the legacy of his ’80s work and run screaming in the other direction?

Alan Moore has spent the past 15 years reinventing himself to be Grant Morrison. Has Miller spent the past few years doing something similar?

Bear these two quotes in mind when you answer:

I’ve seen all these characters of my childhood fall into disarray. They’ve become neither fish nor fowl. Those of us who wanted to test the boundaries of what a superhero comic book could do, unfortunately broke those boundaries and the results have not all been very good. We pushed against the old walls, and they fell-but nothing much has been built to replace them. And now the roof is leaking and the sewer’s backing up. So I’m taking this romp through the material again and showing just how spiffy this stuff is. I’m doing it without cynicism and giving my best. I’m also having a very good time.

What I want to bring back to superheroes with this project is a sense of play. Things have gotten so dreary. The heroes have gotten so ugly that even their muscles have muscles. The elegance of Gil Kane is gone. You don’t see the sheer joy of Green Lantern’s power ring. The magic of somebody like the Flash-somebody who’s able to move so fast that you can’t see him move-is gone. There’s no sense of the basic wish that any of these characters have.

I think anyone who’s working on a superhero comic should be obliged to write down in one sentence what the central wish is of the character. Every story has to play to that theme. “Adolescent power fantasies” isn’t just a tired cliché; it’s too broad, too crude. There’s more than that to these characters, the good ones, anyway. As it is, I don’t know who these characters are anymore. I don’t know why they do what they do. Why Green Lantern became a drunk driver when he can fly always loses me. And I’m told they turned him into a mass murderer as well. The fun’s gone out of it. I want to try my hand at bringing it back.

I really like comics. Sequential art is possibly my favorite medium. But unfortunately not all comics are good and sometimes it’s necessary to show some tough love. Occasionally one must criticize books that fail at their intended goal and examine what precisely went wrong, for the sake of comics, because comics should be good. The recently completed White Tiger, written by Tamora Pierce and Timothy Liebe and drawn by Phil Briones and later Al Rio and Ronaldo Silva, happens to be one of those books.

Although it’s a niche book, I feel it deserves closer examination for a variety of reasons. It’s a spinoff of Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev’s fantastic definitive run on Daredevil. It’s a comic about a legacy character. It’s a comic about a female character. It’s a comic about an ethnic character. It’s a comic by a popular novelist (and her husband) doing their first comics work. It’s also a comic that, so far, has done very badly in sales, dropping from 24,663 copies for issue #1 to 13,621 copies for issue #5.

Although stellar sales figures shouldn’t be expected from a niche book by an unproven creative team, the fact that the book shedded over ten thousand readers in the course of issues 1 to 5 means people just plain aren’t liking it. In an industry where new characters, even legacy characters, are hard to push and both ethnic and female characters are rare, it’s sad to see a book about a new ethnic superheroine fail so badly. But why did the book fail? After reading it, I have come to a conclusion: It’s a bad comic book, in just about every way. Let’s review. Bear with me: This will be long. Read the rest of this entry �

I’m in the middle of a huge project at work, so posting from me may be sparse this week! I want to post every day, but we see how that’s gonna go…

Anyway, I’ve got another Pre-Crisis 4l post for you, this time over one of my favorite stories. Hunter Zolomon, Zoom, is easily Geoff Johns’s best idea and this covers his origin.

This was originally published 05/03/05, back when I was still using Blogger (yuck). It’s actually shorter than I expected! Edits only made for spelling and to take out the word “pervert suit” because I hate it now and I was high on Warren Ellis back then.

Flash’s villains are probably the best DC has to offer. They just make more sense than a lot of DC’s other villains, seems like.

Even if one of them is a talking Gorilla.

Flash’s supporting cast is pretty cool, too. From left to right are Joan Garrick, Iris Allen, Bart (Impulse) Allen, and Jay (Flash) Garrick. It’s kind of cool how four Flash generations are represented in the book. In the foreground are Linda Park-West and Wally West. Not pictured are Morillo and Chyre, who are a couple of cops. It’s worth noting that Chyre is basically Marv from Sin City.

Another member of his supporting cast is Hunter Zolomon. He was what they call a “rogue profiler.” Think of him as a serial killer profiler for super villains. If Flash needed some info on a rogue, Hunter had it. He was very good at his job.

They became fast friends and both respected the other equally. Wally respected Hunter because he was very reminiscent of Barry Allen (Barry was in forensics, Hunter is more into the mental disciplines, but both work toward the same goal) and Hunter respected Wally because Wally was a true blue hero. Then, Gorilla Grodd crippled Hunter Zolomon and everything changed.
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I took a long break from these babies to do the Wrestlecrap articles, but now I’m back with quite a collection of characters. Some are a bit topical, too.

CROSSBONES

Captain America #360 (1989)

The story of the issue is part of an arc called the Bloodstone Hunt. It involves Captain America and Diamondback taking on Baron Zemo, Batroc, Zaron and Machete over some gem. That part isn’t really important.

Though I will say that Diamondback’s appearance is sort of off-putting here. Her outfit is pink spandex with a series of black diamonds over her front and back. Considering she’s in the water for most of the comic, she hangs around some people in bathing suits, and the way the pink is colored here, it looks like she’s wearing a black thong that doesn’t cover her chest. That’s all well and good, but her costume is torn in places, so now it looks like she has some nasty-ass skin disease.

Anyhow, she and Cap get away with the prize. As they leave, we see that they’re being watched.

Crossbones is so cool.

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Not that Carnage.

Before I get into it, though, I’ve got half of an idea in my head. Boxing, the NBA, and the NFL are mostly black (except for quarterbacks :doom:). What if you had a series of superteams, like say one in each of the 50 states, that were run like a sports team? Try outs, scandals, all stars, cocky all-stars fresh out of high school… There’s something there, but I can’t quite grab it yet. Any Given Sunday in a comic book universe.

First is Tom Foss‘s five questions:
1. You’re given the keys to the Marvel Universe, and your only order is to take one “What If” storyline from the entirety of the series and make it canon, along with whatever alterations occur to the universe as a result. Which story do you choose?

Geez. I’d probably pick Gavok’s #1, What If Iron Man Sold Out. It was an awesome story, one of the few What Ifs I owned as a kid, and had great art. It hit all my buttons– it was set just pre-apocalypse, semi-fascist, and had heroes coming back to be true heroes.

Actually, yeah, that’s it for sure. What If Spider-Man Kept the Power Cosmic was another great one, but it kind of takes my favorite superhero out of the runnings for further stories, so no dice. What If the Avengers Lost Operation Galactic Storm was great and I’d like to see that one. It was practically Annihilation III in terms of scope.

2. Who watches the Watchers?

The police. Peeping tom perverts always get theirs.

3. What five Marvel characters do you think are most likely to actually be Skrulls?

Sentry’s wife, the secret masters behind SHIELD, the secret masters behind HYDRA, and I don’t know. I haven’t really given specific Skrulls much thought. I’ll have to post my theory on why Nick Fury went underground, though.

4. Who are your top three, back-of-the-OHOTMU, favorite guilty pleasure Marvel characters?
1. Jubilee (who remains the only character I have a continuity nerd story pitch for)
2. Darkhawk
3. Terror, Inc.

Ugh, I was so impressionable as a kid.

5. Which Avengers base is/was the best?

I couldn’t pick if I tried! I only recently became an Avengers fan. So… I figure Stark/Sentry Tower? I don’t know. The mansion is just kinda blah.

Spencer Carnage is up next.
– I have to post these rules before I start.
– I have to tell you eight facts about myself.
– I have to tag eight people to participate.
– I’m supposed to leave a comment telling them they’re tagged and to read my blog.
– And the tagees need to write their own blog post, telling us eight things and posting the rules.

Ugh, eight things. Okay. Deep breath and
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With all this talk about various TV properties going to comics, I’ve thought of something that desperately needs to be an maxiseries, preferably with art by maybe Scott McDaniel, Adam Warren, or even better, David Aja of Iron Fist fame. Someone good at action and flashy.

The Last Dragon.

Don’t act like you wouldn’t watch it. You would. This movie was “The Warriors” for a new generation. The only movie I watched more often than this was Transformers, or I guess maybe Ninja Scroll, but I’m not 100% on that.

Well, well, well. If it isn’t the serious, elusive Leroy Green. I’ve been waiting a long time for this, Leroy. I am sick and tired of hearing these bullshit Superman stories about the wassa legendary Bruce Leroy catching bullets with his teeth. Catches bullets with his teeth? Nigga please.
–Sho’nuff, the Shogun of Harlem

Sho’nuff is the meanest, the prettiest, the baddest mofo low down around this town. It’s just too bad that Leroy Green has got the glow.

Sho nuff.

But, you know what? They really ain’t that bad, either! Onward!

It’s those kids. That’s what’s different. He’s got sidekicks. Maybe if I get a couple of punk kids. Picked ’em up off the street and taught them what I know. Mothboy or Lepidoptera Lad or…
–Killer Moth, Batgirl: Year One

You reading any good comics right now? What’s that? You’re reading comics you don’t like? Pfft and *smh*. Read good comics, okay? Treat the problem, not the symptom.

Good Desktops

Playing with a new format today. First up, some desktops. I can’t promise that these are properly formatted, but they are a few of the 221 desktops in my DocumentsDesktops folder so they’re appropriate. Two are related, the others are just cool. We’ve got art from Marcos Martin, Michael Lark, Darwyn Cooke, and Talent Caldwell.

These desktops are Good.

Good Comics

These comics are good.
Mighty Skullboy Army (by Jacob Chabot)
I was sent this one by a buddy who knows the author, so I guess this is my first comp copy of a comic! Sweet! Of course, I received the book in Aprilish, so this is way late and I’ve got no excuse really! Sorry Kevin.

And what a comic it is! Did anyone out there ever watch Dexter’s Lab? I used to love it dearly. Mighty Skullboy Army reminds me a lot of Dexter’s Lab, not in content, but in tone. It’s got that same kind of slick sense of humor that both kids and adults can appreciate. The art is very sharp, too. It’s very cartoony, but a lot of fun to look at. The scenes involving the monkey are, in my ever so humble opinion, some of the best in the book.

MSA is, essentially, about a young supervillain (Skullboy) who is in way over his head. You see, he’s a young fella… and he’s got to go to school. You can’t very well conquer the city, nay, the world, from a school desk. He’s got a few assistants in the form of a monkey, a robot, and an intern. One problem: they’re all imbeciles and/or too flighty.

Mighty Skullboy Army is whimsical, but in a good way. It’s a respite from the super serious, or faux serious, stuff I usually read. I hate to invoke the name of the almighty Calvin & Hobbes, which is the Greatest Newspaper Strip of All Time To Which There Are No Contenders, but it is fun like C&H is fun. If you like good comics, MSA is up your alley.

Batgirl: Year One (words by Chuck Dixon and Scott Beatty, art by Marcos Martin and Alvaro Lopez)
I got my copy for 17.99, it’s 19.99 on Amazon pre-discount. Weird.
Anyway, DC was, at one point, running the Year One concept into the ground. Hard. They whooshed hard on what Year One stories should be and pumped out some pap. And then, Chuck Dixon and Scott Beatty come along and get it right, not once, but twice. Robin Year One, which I believe was drawn by Javier Pulido, and Batgirl: Year One, by Marcos Martin/Alvaro Lopez, hearken back to the noir asthetic of Batman Year One in art.

Batgirl: Year One isn’t quite perfect. Dixon and Beatty seem to love tossing in little knowing nods to DC continuity, including a few too many references to Cassandra the Oracle, and a scene where someone tells Batgirl that heroes tend to end up crippled and stuff like that. It ends up being too cute by half and distracting.

On the other hand, the art and overall story are nearly flawless. It tells the tale of a young Barbara Gordon, a young lady who has just begun to pull on the tights. There are a lot of little character touches that are great. Babs Gordon is short for her age, thin, and not particularly chesty (cf. her current portrayal which is a bit busty and statuesque, ugh). She’s headstrong, impetuous, and very teenaged. She makes a lot of dumb decisions, despite being very smart. It’s practically a Marvel story, to be honest. Babs is flawed, and her flaw is her pride. She’s got to prove she’s better than everyone else expects her to be.

I just kind of realized that Babs Gordon, as written in Batgirl: Year One, is a slightly more responsible version of Veronica Mars. No wonder I like this book so much! Not to mention that it isn’t afraid to be silly.

More tomorrow. I’m trying to get back into the swing of things!