Burnt out. Shitty day. Four hours sleep. Forty hanging over me like an imminent kick to the balls.
Went downtown after work and picked up some comics: Adventures of Superman (not enough Captain Marvel, but Lois Lane looks both hot and slightly wrong in a babydoll T-shirt and underwear),Day of Judgment (I haven't been fond of Willingham's work on Robin, but I really really really liked this), and Flash (which I haven't opened yet. Save the best and all that.)
But here's the good news: Peter David will be writing Spider-Man later this summer. Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man, by one of the most dependable writers in comics. Maybe he lacks the flash of a Grant Morrison or the current fan boy adulation of Geoff Johns, but David never lets you feel like you've wasted your money. Sure, sometimes he gets a little too smarmy, but I can handle that, knowing that the writer loves the characters s much as I do, and that he's there for the long haul. He did Hulk for over ten years, remember. It has never been as good since.
Still, must go and lick wounds. The day took its toll, but I have news to keep me warm. Oh, and Lois Lane in her underwear. Mustn't forget that.
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
Saturday, April 23, 2005
Batgirl: The Next Big Thing?
More of what I've read lately....you've been warned!!
BATGIRL #62
Okay, ignore the cover. BEYOND THE REALMS OF DEATH, indeed. I wasn't aware there were more than just the one realm. I thought you died, and then you went to the Realm of Death. I didn't realize you had a choice. I'll take the Realm of Death with free coffee and in flight movie, please!
Now, Batgirl is one of those characters who shouldn't be as good as she is. From her first appearance back in the bloated No Man's Land storyline, she seemed just a rough sketch of an idea that no one really thought would fly. Since the original Batgirl is now confined to a wheelchair courtesy of the Joker's bullet, there was a perceived need for another hero to don the cape and yellow bat emblem. So why not make her an Asian? And the daughter of a second rate assassin? And...make her mute! Because her father never spoke to her or taught her to read, making her only able to express herself (and understand others) through body language. The perfect way to make an assassin: someone whose only language is the body itself.
Okay, kinda cool. And when she inevitably got her own book, (who doesn't these days?) it seemed it would only last a year or two. Novelty character, initial burst of interest, cancel.
It's lasted over five years so far. And Batgirl is slowly becoming the most interesting character in the entire Batman universe.
This issue, under the revitalizing touch of writer Anderson Gabrych, just continues the love. Here, Batgirl--or Cassandra Caine, if we're going to be all real names and stuff--is drowning, courtesy of a beating from the usually laughable Brotherhood of Fucking Evil. (Okay, the 'fucking' part is mine. I just hate them. A giant gorilla who speaks with a French accent and a brain in a box...on wheels. Honestly.) Apparently, while Cassie can read any human's body language, she's not so hot with gorillas. Which is why she got clocked, and thrown in the Bludhaven River.
Here, she meets the ghost of Spoiler. Ah, Spoiler. She died back in War Games, the most recent bloated Bat-epic. Don't get me started on Spoiler. Too late--Okay, so Spoiler was Robin's girlfriend, and was even Robin for awhile when Tim Drake decided to be a pussy and do what his dad said. (Not that that's a problem now. Thank you Captain Boomerang!) Her time with Batman was refreshing, and fun. She made a good Robin. But because a Bat-epic isn't a Bat-epic unless there's a body count, Spoiler ended up dying courtesy of a beating from Black Mask. Which made no sense at the time, and still doesn't. What's even more pissable is that Black Mask seems to have gotten away with it, since no one is taking him down for it. Not Robin, not Batman. He beats a girl to death, and her alleged friends just weep at the funeral and look the other way. Stupid stupid stupid.
Okay, back to Batgirl. Rage gone. So, Cassie meets the ghost of Spoiler, who gives her the big speech about fighting, etc. Expected stuff. What wasn't expected was seeing Spoiler looking like you would after a few weeks in the grave. Gabrych also uses this paranormal meeting to re-examine Cassie's origins--and here's where it gets interesting: it seems that maybe, just maybe, Lady Shiva is her mother. Shiva is the best martial artist in the DC Comics Universe--or second best, since Cassie kicked her ass awhile back. This was cool to geeks like me, because while I may not have achieved much in this world, I do know who can kick whose ass in the DCU.
Of course, Cassie survives. Some nice scenes follow, with Cassie going to a local coffee shop, looking like she's the victim of abuse. (That's how the coffee shop owner perceives it.) We also see that Cassie can't even order off a menu, because she's only started to learn how to read. More nice scenes with Cassie studying old tapes of the JLA fighting the Brotherhood, working out with holographic representations, and finally--of course--beating them soundly. Nice quiet moments that really sold the comic, and make the reader love Cassie all the more.
If Gabrych stays, this book could become a quiet sleeper. Batgirl is just a small treasure: a book that is far better than it has any right to be.
BATGIRL #62
Okay, ignore the cover. BEYOND THE REALMS OF DEATH, indeed. I wasn't aware there were more than just the one realm. I thought you died, and then you went to the Realm of Death. I didn't realize you had a choice. I'll take the Realm of Death with free coffee and in flight movie, please!
Now, Batgirl is one of those characters who shouldn't be as good as she is. From her first appearance back in the bloated No Man's Land storyline, she seemed just a rough sketch of an idea that no one really thought would fly. Since the original Batgirl is now confined to a wheelchair courtesy of the Joker's bullet, there was a perceived need for another hero to don the cape and yellow bat emblem. So why not make her an Asian? And the daughter of a second rate assassin? And...make her mute! Because her father never spoke to her or taught her to read, making her only able to express herself (and understand others) through body language. The perfect way to make an assassin: someone whose only language is the body itself.
Okay, kinda cool. And when she inevitably got her own book, (who doesn't these days?) it seemed it would only last a year or two. Novelty character, initial burst of interest, cancel.
It's lasted over five years so far. And Batgirl is slowly becoming the most interesting character in the entire Batman universe.
This issue, under the revitalizing touch of writer Anderson Gabrych, just continues the love. Here, Batgirl--or Cassandra Caine, if we're going to be all real names and stuff--is drowning, courtesy of a beating from the usually laughable Brotherhood of Fucking Evil. (Okay, the 'fucking' part is mine. I just hate them. A giant gorilla who speaks with a French accent and a brain in a box...on wheels. Honestly.) Apparently, while Cassie can read any human's body language, she's not so hot with gorillas. Which is why she got clocked, and thrown in the Bludhaven River.
Here, she meets the ghost of Spoiler. Ah, Spoiler. She died back in War Games, the most recent bloated Bat-epic. Don't get me started on Spoiler. Too late--Okay, so Spoiler was Robin's girlfriend, and was even Robin for awhile when Tim Drake decided to be a pussy and do what his dad said. (Not that that's a problem now. Thank you Captain Boomerang!) Her time with Batman was refreshing, and fun. She made a good Robin. But because a Bat-epic isn't a Bat-epic unless there's a body count, Spoiler ended up dying courtesy of a beating from Black Mask. Which made no sense at the time, and still doesn't. What's even more pissable is that Black Mask seems to have gotten away with it, since no one is taking him down for it. Not Robin, not Batman. He beats a girl to death, and her alleged friends just weep at the funeral and look the other way. Stupid stupid stupid.
Okay, back to Batgirl. Rage gone. So, Cassie meets the ghost of Spoiler, who gives her the big speech about fighting, etc. Expected stuff. What wasn't expected was seeing Spoiler looking like you would after a few weeks in the grave. Gabrych also uses this paranormal meeting to re-examine Cassie's origins--and here's where it gets interesting: it seems that maybe, just maybe, Lady Shiva is her mother. Shiva is the best martial artist in the DC Comics Universe--or second best, since Cassie kicked her ass awhile back. This was cool to geeks like me, because while I may not have achieved much in this world, I do know who can kick whose ass in the DCU.
Of course, Cassie survives. Some nice scenes follow, with Cassie going to a local coffee shop, looking like she's the victim of abuse. (That's how the coffee shop owner perceives it.) We also see that Cassie can't even order off a menu, because she's only started to learn how to read. More nice scenes with Cassie studying old tapes of the JLA fighting the Brotherhood, working out with holographic representations, and finally--of course--beating them soundly. Nice quiet moments that really sold the comic, and make the reader love Cassie all the more.
If Gabrych stays, this book could become a quiet sleeper. Batgirl is just a small treasure: a book that is far better than it has any right to be.
Thursday, April 21, 2005
Comic Reviews April 22, 2005
Fucking comics. The more I try to quit, the more I seem to buy....
YOUNG AVENGERS 3
I completely disdained this title when I first saw it. "Another cheap Marvel rip off, slapped together with a shelf life of six months," I thought. Then my friend Southwell recommended it, and I wondered if he'd had a recent head injury. Still, he was right about Green Arrow, so I gave it a try.
It has an interesting set up. Apparently, after the Scarlet Witch went apeshit and killed Ant-Man, Hawkeye and Vision, and the Avengers came to a crashing end, the Vision had a fallback plan to activate reserve Avengers. Sadly, no one told these young kids why they were being called to be Avengers, other than some history or tenous connection to the team.
The writing is clever, with natural dialogue, reminiscent of Judd Winnick's work on Outsiders. Since these new young'un 'Vengers are teens, the book comes across as Marvel's answer to the DC's very successful Teen Titans relaunch. And it's definitely cut from the same cloth. It's a pleasant read, and even a bit brave: the major villian here is none other than Kang, the time travelling warlord who wears a carpet on his face from the Far Flung Future. This is a Major A badass, who actually whupped the Avengers for a year during Kurt Busiek's interminable Kang War storyline that ran a few years back.
I guess when one of the Young Avengers is actually Kang before he becomes evil kind of explains that. His name is Iron Lad, and he's teamed up with the Patriot (grandson of the first Captain America), Hulkling ( a teen Hulk with no real rage or known origin), Asgardian ( kind of a teen Thor wannabee), and Ant-Man's daughter Cassie (who can grow to giant size, much to her surprise). Captain America and Iron Man also co-star, determined to shut these brats down before they end up killing themselves or others.
A pleasant surprise. Now that'll be three Marvel books I read: Bendis' superb New Avengers, and Joss Whedon's erratically shipped Astonishing X-Men. It's a renaissance!
YOUNG AVENGERS 3
I completely disdained this title when I first saw it. "Another cheap Marvel rip off, slapped together with a shelf life of six months," I thought. Then my friend Southwell recommended it, and I wondered if he'd had a recent head injury. Still, he was right about Green Arrow, so I gave it a try.
It has an interesting set up. Apparently, after the Scarlet Witch went apeshit and killed Ant-Man, Hawkeye and Vision, and the Avengers came to a crashing end, the Vision had a fallback plan to activate reserve Avengers. Sadly, no one told these young kids why they were being called to be Avengers, other than some history or tenous connection to the team.
The writing is clever, with natural dialogue, reminiscent of Judd Winnick's work on Outsiders. Since these new young'un 'Vengers are teens, the book comes across as Marvel's answer to the DC's very successful Teen Titans relaunch. And it's definitely cut from the same cloth. It's a pleasant read, and even a bit brave: the major villian here is none other than Kang, the time travelling warlord who wears a carpet on his face from the Far Flung Future. This is a Major A badass, who actually whupped the Avengers for a year during Kurt Busiek's interminable Kang War storyline that ran a few years back.
I guess when one of the Young Avengers is actually Kang before he becomes evil kind of explains that. His name is Iron Lad, and he's teamed up with the Patriot (grandson of the first Captain America), Hulkling ( a teen Hulk with no real rage or known origin), Asgardian ( kind of a teen Thor wannabee), and Ant-Man's daughter Cassie (who can grow to giant size, much to her surprise). Captain America and Iron Man also co-star, determined to shut these brats down before they end up killing themselves or others.
A pleasant surprise. Now that'll be three Marvel books I read: Bendis' superb New Avengers, and Joss Whedon's erratically shipped Astonishing X-Men. It's a renaissance!
Tuesday, April 19, 2005
The Unquiet Zombie Dead
Three episodes in, and 'Who' still rocks. This is a good thing. I also think I'm in love with Billie Piper. I'm sure if we got all the men on Earth who feel the same way, we could become a superpower. Billie Piper Nation! Represent!
Going to be forty soon. It's weighing on my mind, and I'm so aware of what a cliche that is. We spend so much of our lives in fear--losing our jobs, our health, that we don't really think that much about getting old. Or 'older'. But I guess I'm at the point where the fantasies of dreams coming true, of having the life I thought I'd have, are beginning to look just like that: fantasies.
Ah well. Fuck it. If I wanted to be whine and feel sorry for myself, I'd have become a teacher.
I did want a novel written by now, though. And I did want to get drunk with Billie Piper in a small Welsh cottage. There's still hope...
Going to be forty soon. It's weighing on my mind, and I'm so aware of what a cliche that is. We spend so much of our lives in fear--losing our jobs, our health, that we don't really think that much about getting old. Or 'older'. But I guess I'm at the point where the fantasies of dreams coming true, of having the life I thought I'd have, are beginning to look just like that: fantasies.
Ah well. Fuck it. If I wanted to be whine and feel sorry for myself, I'd have become a teacher.
I did want a novel written by now, though. And I did want to get drunk with Billie Piper in a small Welsh cottage. There's still hope...
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