Post Break

Today, I'm taking a break from posting. But I'll leave you with this thought.

Spock's Time Ship would be a great, if lawsuit-courting, name of a band.

God help me, I really am starting to look forward to this movie. :-)

My Avatar's a girl, damnit.

For a short week, this one has been REMARKABLY tiring. I've been working on a paper of reasonable importance and that's eaten up a lot of non-work time.

On the other hand, I did manage to replay a bit Ultima VII, one of my favorite games ever, before the paper started consuming my soul. I dig cartoony ritualistic killings and unsubtle scientology parodies like nothing you can imagine.

I wonder if they've ever made a comic book of that series. The long, spidery, convoluted and often contradictory continuity would seem inclined to suit it. Obviously they couldn't NOW, but it seems like a missed opportunity.

Then again, they'd probably just make the Avatar a male character, and that would annoy me same as it did when Pagan and Ascension didn't let one choose a female character. I get that the game resources wouldn't allow two alternate figures.

But then why not make the one figure female? (or for that matter non-blond/non-white considering those options were finally available in serpent's isle! It was such an irritating step backwards1) Make the geek boys play girls for once. Some of them would probably like it!

It reminds me of things like the Baldur's Gate novelization. I mean, I get that it's rough to take a character that the player can pretty much customize ad nauseum and write a book for it. You have to pretty much design your own version and write about that.

But it just irks me that ALWAYS in a game in which you have the options to make a character male or female, white, black, and so on, once it's ever narrowed down to any "official" depiction (a.la in illustrations, novelizations, or as in the case of Ultima, when the graphic resources only allow one), it's always back to the white male character. I guess because that's considered "the default". Bah.

The whole thing annoys me especially because I tend to fancy the notion of taking one character concept through all of the games. And since, I prefer playing girls in Ultima, it's annoying. I'll have to name it something vaguely androgynous and then tell myself that the Guardian switched her gender while transporting her to Pagan just to fuck with her.

...which would be pretty funny. I'd totally do that if I were an obscenely powerful malevolent creature.

But I still resent the fact that I have to. Just once I'd like to see a series of games start with any and all options have a black woman as their official-type depiction. As a player, it would make me very happy.

Witchblade thoughts, an epilogue

I was thinking about my reaction to the Witchblade poster and why as simpering and irritatingly T&A it is, it doesn't bother me again. And I think I wasn't entirely honest in my last post.

It is true that I give more leeway to series that are established from the start as T&A and I judge them by different standards. I'm not going to hold Tarot, for example, up to the standards that I hold Wonder Woman or Power Girl.

But honestly, that's secondary to the much less reasonable reason. Which is ultimately that I accidently ended up reading an issue of the Witchblade manga. And...well...

It. Can. Always. Get. Worse.

After that, one silly poster is really hard to get worked up about. Egads. (I've heard the anime is somewhat better, but egads.) The sad thing is that Witchblade is one of those concepts that I would have thought would be perfectly compatible with Manga genre stylings. I wasn't expecting THAT though.

I should have learned my lesson when Mallet posted that horrible juicer excerpt.

But anyway, it can't be worse than that. And god willing, since they're courting the comic fans with this, Sara will at least get to be ass kicking. For all that I avoid Witchblade myself because of the T&A, I have to say that I've never heard anything to suggest that Sara Pezzini wasn't appropriately badass.

But yeah, sometimes, it helps to see something that is an abomination against nature to appreciate things that are only mildly annoying. :-)

Witchblade plus a Wolverine-esque tangent

So anyway, Blog@'s got a teaser poster for Witchblade.

I have to say, I'm not surprised but I am dreadfully disappointed by it. I mean, to be fair, it's a perfectly understandable marketing/design direction. Witchblade, for all that it's story is good as far as I know, is a T&A comic. Thus having a picture of a pretty girl, posed with quite prominent rear assets shall we say, looking coquettish toward the camera is fitting.

But as someone who adored the television version and Yancy Butler in her hot-yet-fully-clothed-and certainly not coquettish-badassery utterly spoiled me for every other version. (Also, tangentially, their Ian Nottingham was hot. Even though by the end of the first season I was really confused as to whether he could be considered her potential love interest, brother, son, or some other bizarrely pseudo-incestuous relationship. I was about to type that I trusted the comic version was must less convoluted and more comprehensible, but then I remembered that, DUH, comics. Comics are never less convoluted and more comprehensible, I think. It goes against their inner nature, or something like that. I'd imagine the backstory/interrelationship is quite different regardless.)

--Hmm, after reading the wikipedia entry I have to ask, what in the world is comic book's obsession with having all the dark too-cool loner types end up in Japan and falling in love with the culture. I myself fell in love with Japan enough to choose Japanese language and culture as my undergraduate major and spent the requisite year abroad, et cetera, but it seems a tad overused. I admit, it makes somewhat more sense for Nottingham as he's described than it does for, say, Wolverine. -Sorry, I know it's a huge part of his character, but if there's ever been a personality LESS suited for Japanese culture and society than Wolverine as he's generally characterized, I'm hard pressed to think of one.

Well, actually that's not true. I do think that Wolverine at his best does have a sort of Toshiro Mifune-esque quality that would suit perhaps the Sengoku or Edo periods. Samurai code and all that. Weird then that they established his birth as being so close to the Meiji Restoration period. By the time he's an adult, they'd be well into the rapid modernization/industrialization/growing nationalistic point of Japanese history, which I really don't see appealing to Wolverine at ALL. He's really not, I think, suited for modern Japan. Too bad they didn't set his birthdate a couple decades earlier, then he might have had the chance to slip in during the tail end of the bakufu days. It probably would have suited him more.

At least in Nottingham's case, from what I understand about the character, it does seem like modern Japan would suit his tastes and temperament fairly well. It still seems awfully overused though. I think I'd really like to see one of the badass types fall in love with a different culture for once. Like...I dunno. Chinese culture, or maybe Tibetan or Filipino. Or maybe not even Asian at all. Maybe Egyptian or South African or something like that. Or even French?

But I've digressed far enough, so I'll go back to the original topic. I'm not ready to dismiss the movie based on one crappy (to my taste) poster, but I'm not terribly enthusiastic either. I know pretty much already that given my biases, I'm doomed to disappointment as it will NOT be the version I love, but it could still be fun. I just hope they let Sara be appropriately ass-kicking, with or without the cheesecake. Also, that they cast someone hot as Nottingham. I'm shallow. :-)

More Miscellaneous Cap Thoughts

While thinking about thieves in D&D and chatting about comics with the usual suspect, I had a random thought (which I then proceeded to share with quite a few other people on AIM, so if you're one of those people, don't read. Heh.)

I think, between Steve and Bucky, that Steve would actually be better at certain skills such as pick-pocketing or lock-picking and the like.

I mean considering their individual backstories, Bucky growing up on an army base definitely would have had a lot of experience with conniving, cadging, supplying and conning, but it doesn't seem like there would be a lot of opportunity to exercise something like picking pockets.

Steve on the otherhand grew up in the New York tenaments with a mother who died when he was what? Fourteenish? Which allows for six years before getting super-serumed or so. Personally, I doubt that painting street murals would manage to keep a growing boy fed that long without some kind of "supplemental income". (Of course, he'd feel just awful about it!)

Heck, he probably would have taught Bucky how to pick locks, considering the latter's capacity for being held hostage and the like. I like to imagine a hypothetical scene taking place maybe sometime during Avengers/Invaders, or maybe just when Steve's back to life where they end up in a cell somewhere with some of the modern Avengers. Bucky's trying to pick the lock, Steve offers advice (much to everyone else's surprise), and finally goes "Do you want me to do it?" And when Bucky says "YES." He'd grin and fondly call Bucky an amateur. :-)

It's a really cute scene in my imagination, at least. :-)

Seriously though, I think there IS an interesting unexplored dynamic there. WWII-era Steve is much more innocent than WWII-era Bucky in a lot of ways, but given his upbringing, probably wouldn't be as innocent in certain others. He'd have a lot more understanding and experience with people in desparate need and the kinds of acts they might end up resorting to just to survive. And considering the climate of wartorn Europe, the clash in perspectives and experience would be quite relevant. Bucky's got more training and experience, but Steve's the one who would understand the people they meet in the way that only someone who's also been hungry, scared and desparate could.

I think it would be interesting to see a WWII-set story explore this dynamic a little. At least *I* would enjoy it. :-)

(Edited clarification: this is not to say I think Steve would be a D&D thief. He's a paladin, all the way. Duh. :-P)

You Tube is my Friend!

Okay, so I was looking up that guy that I mentioned in the previous post as a possible Cap-Candidate. Mostly because I don't think it's fair to judge someone's acting ability without having seen them try to act.

That's when I found out about World's Finest, wherein we get to see this fellow play Superman.



To be fair, it's only three minutes. So we can't really gauge his acting abilities. But I actually thought he was surprisingly decent. There were some moments where his line readings made me twitch a bit. But I like his expression work. I think a good director would be able to work with him and get something very good out of it.

I think expressions are underrated in their importance for an actor. Especially in a character like Cap or Superman who isn't particularly outwardly demonstrative. Iron Man or Batman can give the dramatic monologue, but Cap or Superman really can't. Instead, you need to be able to say as much with a wry smile, a tilt of the head, a somber frown and slouch of the shoulders.

That's also why I think in the end, certain roles require actors and certain roles don't necessarily. You need an actor to give a soliloquy. But I think when it comes to expression and body language, you just need someone experienced with expressing things through their bodies. And if you think about wrestling, modeling, or even crap like American Gladiators, a lot of these people have to do that sort of thing every day.

And he manages to wear the costume naturally, which actually is fairly important. A good performance can be derailed if the actor looks uncomfortable or awkward in the suit.

Your mileage may vary, but this makes me actually fairly optimistic that he could do a good job playing Captain America. He's already a better actor than Matthew McConaughey, in my opinion. :-P

Tangentially, I really like their Lois and Jimmy and would totally watch that movie if it existed.

Though the less said about their Batman, the better. :-)

Thoughts on Cap, Gladiators and Actors in Comic Movies

You know, when I was wracking my brain for people appropriately big and pretty enough, I kept trying to think of wrestlers but I totally forgot that with American Gladiators back on the air, there's a whole new generation of impossibly pretty muscular people back in the spotlight! (I don't think it's necessarily enough

And clearly someone remembers that.

That...looks like a really good casting choice to me. Admittedly, I have no idea how well he can act, but I'm not really sure that Cap is a role that really requires a lot of acting talent. Tony, sure, because Tony's got all those flaws and unconventional appeal, but Steve's a sweet-tempered earnest fellow who's thrust into situations that are brand new and unfamiliar to him (be it the war or modern day). I think as long as an actor has the capacity to play earnest, open and genuine, he'll probably do fine.

That guy's got the right coloring, build and is very nice to look at (Especially on his IMDB page. I don't even tend to LIKE over-muscular men, but WOW!). He looks like he could fill out a Cap costume well, and well, even if it does look silly, it can't look sillier than some of the crap I remember people wearing on the old American Gladiators. (I haven't seen the new one, but I'm guessing it's much the same.) So he should be able to carry a goofy costume off without being too "I'm wearing a goofy costume" about it.

As long as he doesn't completely suck in the acting department, he should be a good choice. And even if it goes to someone else, it does at least seem to indicate they're taking the right tack.

I think I disagree with the first commenter on the newsarama post:

I think the more successful comic book adaptations have proved that it’s better to get a real actor and hire them a personal trainer, than get a bodybuilder and hire them an acting coach.

You know, I see what he's saying, but... when it comes down to it I think all we have to do is look at Halle Berry, Jennifer Garner, Ioan Gruffudd, Jessica Alba, Eric Bana, Ben Affleck, George Clooney, David Hasselhoff, Matt Salinger, Nicolas Cage, and so on and so forth to realize that there are plenty of comic book adaptations that sucked even with a "real actor" in the role.

Lynda Carter was more beauty queen than actress and I don't think there'll ever be a more iconic Wonder Woman (heh, Cathy Lee Crosby was more the actress, and look how THAT turned out.) All the sequels seem to indicate that Arnold Schwarzenegger was a fairly decent Conan. Brigitte Nielsen had never acted at all before Red Sonja.

Actually, thinking about it. I think there's a fairly good argument that on average the non-actor comic book movies tend to have better decent performance/movie : sucktastic performance/movie ratio. That's funny!

This isn't to say I think characters like Wolverine or Tony Stark could be pulled off by non-actors. But Cap? I think Cap could swing it.

Also, honestly, I think there's no way that even the fittest actor with the best personal trainer ever would seriously be able to pull off a serum-enhanced perfect physique. It's not happening. You need someone who's sculpted and used those muscles every day of their life and looks it. You really do need a Mr. Universe.

Besides, worst case scenario, Gladiator-guy does suck, then he spends the majority of the Avengers movie looking pretty in ice, posing, or chucking a shield at things while the good actors do the talking. It'll work. :-)

(Disclaimer: I very much enjoyed Nick Fury Agent of Shield, both Fantastic Four movies, Ghost Rider, and even Daredevil. But I won't delude myself into thinking they're not awful, regardless. :-))

An Open Letter to WFA Readers:

Dear readers of When Fangirls Attack who might also frequent my blog:

Look, we appreciate that you come to WFA to get links about particular topics. And we understand how frustrating it is to not find what you're looking for. Especially when you know that a) a significant feminist-issue-type event happened in this week's comics and you know that b) lots of people have written good things about it. Especially when c) WFA hasn't had a superhero comic related post for nearly two weeks.

Yes. That's frustrating. We apologize. Shit happens.

But kindly do NOT whine at the one blogger on WFA who is actually pulling her weight right now. Tangognat was kind enough to sign on to help us expand our manga coverage. She's never taken on any sort of responsibility regarding superhero comics. Bitching at her about the lack of superhero comic coverage is like bitching at the Sci-Fi channel for not showing more Spaghetti Westerns. And while I don't want to put words in anyone else's mouth, I know that if I were in that similar position, I would feel awfully unappreciated.

I'm sure no one was trying to slight Tangognat's contribution while complaining, but you know what? If you want to complain about the very inconvenient lull in superhero coverage, feel free to drop a line to me or Ragnell. You can even drop us links to posts you think we've forgotten and really don't want to see overlooked. We'd actually be very appreciative.

But kindly target the people actually at fault, thank you.

-Melissa Krause/Kalinara

Miscellaneous Thoughts

Using time management games as a form of procrastination strikes me as a little ironic.

But anyway, Sand got to do stuff in comics this week! Yay! And Lava Sand is kind of hot. :-)

err, pun unintended. Still, this is TWO MONTHS IN A ROW where my favorite character got to actually do stuff! And hey, (an) Obsidian got to do stuff too!

I actually managed to get a WFA post up! I hadn't realized I'd let myself fall behind so far. I blame my fairly extreme schedule shift. :-) I love my internship though. I got to write a subpoena the other day! I feel useful!

I have however just realized I totally forgot to get a pair of green boots for the costume I may not finish. Eek. Well, I've got some time still.

I'm still totally indifferent about Spoiler, but I'm thrilled that Leslie Thompkins is officially redeemed now. I want her and Alfred to date! (Though I still also want Alfred and Ma Hunkel to date. Eek. I'm torn. Then again, there's always polygamy?)

Anyway, I think I'm mostly adjusted to the schedule now, so I should be able to actually pull my weight at WFA again. *crosses fingers* On the plus side, I get memorial day off. <3 I intend to sleep, write, and maybe dress my green barbie doll up as Batgirl again if I can get that flipping cowl on right.

Oh, and I think I forgot to mention this on the blog. <3 Oh well. Now I did. :-)

Cap Movie News and Opinions

Interesting that they've decided to set the Cap movie in the past. That'll be fun. Superhero period piece. :-)

I'm guessing then that the Avengers movie will involve them finding/unfreezing Cap. Since the timing'll work out fairly nicely. I have to admit, I would really like to see Movie!Tony and Captain America interact. I wonder if they'll age Cap up a bit, or if he'll correspond to the comics and be in his early twenties. It WOULD be interesting to see how the Iron Man/Captain America friendship works out with a greater age difference between them. Would it end up more mentorly? Heh, considering that no version of Tony that I've ever seen could remotely be described as mature, probably not.

I hope they cast someone attractive. :-) Steve Rogers should be big, sure, but he should also be pretty. :-) I want eye candy darnit.

I'm kind of torn though about whether I would want the Red Skull as the villain or not. I love the Red Skull, honestly. I think he's appropriately scary and iconic and devious. But...how the hell is he going to look anything but ridiculous on the silver screen.

Though to be fair, it's not like Cap would look anything but ridiculous either. I think it can work though. But I truly believe that for Cap to work, they HAVE to avoid the temptation to make him snarky or try to badass up the costume or anything like that. That never works. Be it metallic or cloth, wings on the side of the face or not, that costume will ALWAYS be a little cheesy/silly/ridiculous. They ought to embrace it.

I'm looking forward to the movie. It should be fun. Or stupid. But then I need something to bitch about. :-)

DC/MK thoughts

I still don't quite know what to make of the idea of a Mortal Kombat/DC game. It just seems incompatible to me. I mean on one side, you have superheroes that aren't particularly inclined to lethal force and many are specifically against, and on the other side, you have a game where the best part was always the fatalities.

And to be honest, much as he is awesome, I do think Batman is particularly ill-suited to this kind of fight to the death situation. I mean, sure, he's got nifty toys, and is good at cheating but in the end...

Then again, he totally could take out Johnny Cage. I always thought Johnny was pretty much useless. Fucking movie star.

It does look pretty though. But it's still a really bizarre idea.

Actually, as fighting games go, I always thought Soul Calibur, or maybe Guilty Gear, would make a better mesh up with DC. They always seemed more about the story than the fatality if that makes sense. This of course has nothing to do with the fact that the Soul Calibur games are the only fighting games I've ever been able to learn to play.*

* It totally has to do with the fact that Soul Calibur's the only fighting game I ever remotely learned to play. My technique consists of using Cassandra/Sophia and poking people with the sword. It's actually kind of funny to watch me play Soul Calibur 3 with my ex-roommate. She uses the original character creation and learns all the awesome fancy moves since she rocks the strategic campaign and I pick Cassandra or Sophitia and poke her to death. It's all:

Her: *fancy move*
Me: *overhand chest poke move*
Her: *another fancy move*
Me: *same overhand chest poke*
Her: "Don't you know any other moves?" *new fancy move*
Me: "No actually." *poke* *poke* *poke*
Her: "Stop it!" *fancy move*
Me: *POKEPOKEPOKEPOKE*

"Cassandra wins!"

Her: "...I hate you."

I do think a Cassandra, Sophitia, and Diana team up would be awesome though. And watching the soul edge try to corrupt Batman would be nifty.

((For the record, I will rescind all complaints if Kyle Rayner is in this game and his fatality involves dropping a fridge on someone. Because then, I will laugh very very hard. Heh))

A couple of cover reactions.

You know, I'm usually totally oblivious to art, and to be honest, half the time I barely remember to look at the covers of the comics when I'm reading the solicits. But I totally have to second SallyP: The August GLC cover looks amazing.

I wonder how long it'll take for some folk to complain that they don't appear to be eunuched. :-) Crotch-fussing amuses me.

Now if only the other covers could be so nice. Like JLA. Which is another cover I didn't really notice until Willow posted. I'm embarrassed about that. I ought to be more observant, because this is a serious WTF.

Seriously, what is this, like the third cover in a row that forgets that Vixen is actually black? Would it kill someone to draw Vixen with her actual skin color? Why even put her ON the cover if the artist doesn't feel like drawing her right? A red tint doesn't hide/excuse the fact that the last few covers have all seemed to make a deliberate effort to excise any visual indicator of Vixen's race. They've long lost the benefit of the doubt here.

It's gone way past ridiculous now. Even if we assume that the artist(s) is/are totally oblivious, shouldn't the editors be catching this? Whoever's got the power to veto these covers ought to step in. If they can shrink Power Girl's breasts when Michael Turner gets carried away, they ought to damn well be able to make sure a minority character is not suddenly a white woman. Please, whoever's supposed to be vetoing this sort of thing, do your fucking job.

Solicits!

Yay! Solicits!

Lots of interesting things coming out in August, it looks like. I'm particularly looking forward to a new Warriors! I missed that bar!

Aside from that, I think I'm most looking forward to seeing Crispus Allen and Renee Montoya team up again. I kind of thought Allen got the shaft a bit as replacement heroes go. I really wanted to see more of his Spectre and the team-up should be fun!

Last Will and Testament looks pretty good. I don't really dislike Meltzer's work. I just think he's ill-suited to an action comic like JLA (I still hold a grudge for Roy's stupid capture the flag game getting panel time while a Batman and Karate Kid fight happened off panel) but I'm one of the few that enjoyed Identity Crisis (Deathstroke issues aside). I think he does a good job with quiet character moments, mood and emotion. So this sounds like it could be good for him.

I know some folks who ought to be happy about Hawkman getting a special. :-)

I don't much care for Bruce Jones, but I may have to start looking into "The War that Time Forgot." It's a nifty title. And if "Carson" is Cave Carson I'm pretty sold already.

Seeing Manhunter on the solicit list makes me smile involuntarily. It's about damn time. <3

Looks like a good haul in August!

Monks in Fishnets

The conversation between Aheyweh and me on this post reminded me of something I always wished would happen in comics that I might have mentioned before.

I'd really like to see Connor Hawke follow in Black Canary's footsteps rather than Green Arrow's.

Mostly, I think it'd be neat. We rarely see boys follow in girls' footsteps and I've always thought Connor tended to be characterized as a better standard martial artist than he is an archer. It seemed like it would suit his personality and temperament more than following in Ollie's footsteps.

Also, while I don't personally buy the whole "redundancy" argument, this would nip that in the bud. Roy, as Red Arrow, gets to be Ollie's legacy/inheritor. Connor would get to be Dinah's sidekick/legacy. It's not like there are any other candidates for the role except possibly Sin, and she's too young. It'd stagger it nicely.

Of course, this might just be an excuse to stick Connor Hawke in fishnets. You decide. :-)

Last Minute Thing!

This is a bit last minute, but check out Johanna's contest. Nifty contributions to a "Men in the DCU" contest. She'll announce the winner tomorrow!

Civil War Meanderings

I had a weird thought about the end of Civil War the other day.

Now, I've made no bones about the fact that I don't like the end of Civil War. I think it was poorly done and just served to make Cap look like an utter tool. (Tony was already irredeemable as of the storyline to me and had been since that one battle where he pressed that button and there was screaming and writhing on Cap's end and to be honest, I don't actually remember the context at all, but I do remember thinking "NO! Good guys don't do that to their friends!")

At the same time, it does occur to me that for Civil War to end, Cap pretty much had to surrender. Because, honestly, as far as the Marvel Universe goes, most of those idiots will end up fighting into eternity and never ever EVER admitting they might be wrong. Cap himself is fairly good at mediating a compromise when he's on the outside, but being involved instead, meant that if the war was going to end, he was going to have to be the bigger man and give in for the sake of the world.

And there is no way Iron Man, even in his normal not-CW-level-dick characterization, would ever end up characterized as "the bigger man" with regards to Captain America. It's just not going to happen.

I just wish they put a little more effort in the whole set-up as to WHY Cap would surrender though. Because as it is, it really didn't work for me.

Some Disjointed Thoughts about Jesse Quick

Rich's post here about Hourman got me thinking.

I don't get Hourman (well, Rex and Rick) either, really, but that's not what I'm thinking about.

I was thinking that I much prefer her as Liberty Belle than as Jesse Quick. It's a bit hard to explain.

A part of it is just that my first real exposure to the character was in Flash, where she seemed doomed to the role of "Speedster who is not as good as the others". It wasn't that she wasn't competent or anything and I liked her personality, but, well...she simply didn't seem to measure up. It might just have been a bad arc for her in the Flash, but that's what stuck with me.

But I really like her with Liberty Belle powers and identity. She's not a half-assed speedster, she's a Liberty Belle with speed on top. That's a whole other ball game. As Jesse Quick, she was her father's legacy. But as Liberty Belle she's actually BOTH.

It's kind of like how I'm the only person in the world who liked the idea of giving Jade plant powers. We know Jade never quite measures up to Alan and never really will, but the added plant power thing, if incorporated right, could have taken her in a brand new direction. It could even have ended up synthesized somehow with the Starheart powers. Instead of making her yet another Green Lantern, perhaps they could have emphasized her powers' connection with lifeforce and living things.

More though, I think the legacy of the mother tends to get obscured a lot of the time in superhero comics. I don't think it's intentional really. It's just that most superhero creators are men and I think the emphasis on paternal legacy is tied into that. It's not a bad thing really, but I like seeing more maternal influence as well. Especially in characters like Jesse and Jade who, at least in terms of superheroic identity and powers, seem cut whole from their fathers' cloths.

It always seemed like a missed opportunity to me because I always thought the best part of having a child of two heroes or a hero and a villain would be exploring how the elements of both parents combine to make this brand new character.

Interesting link...

This link is pretty interesting, even though, I think, honestly, I don't find it as entertaining as a lot of folks seem to.

I mean, okay, there is something at least somewhat amusing about heroes in less than their usual forms (personally, I've always enjoyed gender-swap type stuff. Seeing girl-Superman and boy-Wonder Woman, et al, I'm like that though).

Certainly they're well drawn but...

I don't really get a sense of the characters from them, if that makes sense at all. I mean, take the Aquaman picture on Blog@. Sure it's a funny concept. But I can't help but think of how funny Aquaman is as a character sometime. Like when he has to kiss Diana in the fairytale-enacting story of JLA, or when Guy Gardner doesn't even seem to notice the hook and goes "What the hell's up with the hair?"

These scenes are funny because of Aquaman's character traits. Because of that arrogance and regality and dignity. Kind of like Hal Jordan's funny because he's a self-absorbed twit, or Batman's funny because the man can do anything to an extent bordering on ridiculous.

I guess...there's nothing about those pictures that really evoke the superheroes for me aside from the costume. So to me, it's less like these are humorous depictions of elderly superheroes as they are random people playing dress-up.

It's weird, but I do think there's a difference. The best jokes and parodies are the ones that bear the closest resemblance to their source material. These, sadly, don't quite deliver for me.

Oh well. His blog is still pretty neat even if I can't read Italian. (I think that's Italian, right?) And his other art looks pretty nifty.

And for all my complaints, the Doc Octopus one does make me giggle in spite of myself. Hee.

Personal Update

So...personal update. My internship rocks. Seriously, it's awesome. Most of the time I have no idea what I'm doing or how to do it, I'm pretty sure I'm annoying the hell out of the supervising attorneys with all my questions and things like that, and I'm learning a ton.

Mostly how useless most of my law classes actually were. :-P

Well, that's not fair. Property and contracts have actually been somewhat useful, at least for providing a nice bit of set language to type into Westlaw. :-)

But really, no idea what I'm doing. It's a blast. :-)

On the downside, it's taking quite a bit more out of me than I thought to readjust my mostly nocturnal dwelling ass to a mostly-diurnal, working 9-5 schedule. That's why my blogging's been sucking lately.

That and I've got ahold of episodes of Star Trek Deep Space Nine. <3

I never saw the entire series, but it was still my favorite Trek ever. All it takes is hearing that themesong and I'm ten years old again, sitting scrunched up next to the tiny black and white television in pitch blackness with the volume almost muted, straining to hear and hoping my parents wouldn't notice I was up past my bedtime to watch.

I remember really really wanting Odo and Kira to get together. I heard they did after I stopped watching. This makes me unaccountably happy. :-)

Shut up. I'm all for love stories between a girl and her puddle.

But yeah, eventually I'll adjust enough to actually post something of interest here. Maybe. Heh. :-)

Egads!!!

You know, it never fails. The day after I complain that some movie or other looks wretched, I find out there's always something worse.

Egads, how I do not like Goodkind's books. That's going to make for one wretched miniseries, if you ask me. (Though I know a few people who'll be happy about it.)

Though I admit, I do like seeing more fantasy books made into tv movies and the like. We can do such fun things with CGI after all. Maybe if this one does well, there'll be more. Ones that aren't based on books that make me twitch.

So I wish it well in theory, but I'm probably not going to watch.

...unless they cast someone really hot. In which case I totally will. I'm shallow.

Yeah, I'm thinking that one's gonna suck...

Heh, this makes me laugh a bit.

It's reassuring to know that no matter how ridiculous a superhero comic movie can look, live action manga continues to look sillier.

Admittedly, I'm not being fair. There are quite a few manga I can think of that would make perfectly good (or at least entertaining) movies. But Dragonball?!

I suppose on the plus side, they won't be able to indulge in the multi-episode long fight scenes Dragonball Z used to favor.

Still. Compressed Dragonball...it feels like a sign of the apocalypse.

...at least the guy playing Goku's kind of cute.

"Guano-Sweeper" would be a good name for an advice columnist...

Is it weird that I would kind of like to see Ma Hunkel and Alfred go on a date? I mean, admittedly, she's probably a bit old for him (though I think she's got the same Karkull-shadow-handwave excuse for not being as old as she ought to be.) But I think it'd be cute.

It's kind of how when I watched the sixties version of Batman, I always thought Aunt Harriet and Alfred were a cute couple.

Only Ma Hunkel is cooler and wields a mean frying pan.

Besides they could exchange horror stories about housekeeping for superheroes. Or maybe run an anonymous advice column in Better Homes and Gardens. If anyone can tell you how to get cream soda stains off of your top secret supercomputer, it's them.

Not looking forward to this one...

I FINALLY got to see one of the commercials for the new Get Smart movie. And...

I don't know.

Steve Carrell's very funny but I don't know if he can really pull off Don Adams. And he certainly doesn't manage that particular Maxwell Smart voice. Still, the commercial was pretty funny.

Anne Hathaway is no Barbara Feldon. Sorry. Just no. My inner eight year old who religiously watched Nick at Nite is crying at the comparison. She's very pretty but...no.

And isn't the age difference between Carrell and Hathaway a bit much? According to IMDB, there's a full 20 age difference! Maybe it's just that I remember her from Princess Diaries a bit too much, but holy hell, I don't want to think of Maxwell Smart as a ephebophile thank you!

Okay, that's probably something of an overreaction. And really, at least it doesn't have Andy Dick.

My Wizard of Oz rant

I have a confession to make. I'm not actually a huge fan of the Wizard of Oz movie. In fact, I'm reasonably sure I don't like it.

Or rather, I like it while I'm watching and seeing the colors and hearing the songs, but then when I stop to think about it...

It makes no sense!

Okay, so the ruby slippers can take Dorothy home. But instead of telling her that, the "Good Witch" makes sure she goes off to the Wizard, who's just some dick in a balloon, who decides to send her on what amounts to an assassination mission against an opponent who seriously outmatches her and in all likelihood will kill her.

And these are the good guys. "Yeah, you could go home all the time, but instead, I'm going to turn you into my pet assassin!"

As for the Witch, how do we even know she was evil? Okay, she was green and cranky and threatened the dog.

But her sister got crushed by a house and those callous munchkins were celebrating. And even if the death itself was an accident, the little brat that killed her stole her prized possession!. Which, probably, assuming the East Witch died intestate, legally ought to belong to the Wicked Witch anyway.

I'd be pissed too!

But really, the only real evidence we have to her evil is 1) what the munchkins say, which is awfully one-sided and they cheer when someone is crushed to death in front of them. 2) She's got winged monkeys and a seekrit hideout. As opposed to some carnival guy who lives in an Emerald castle with weird underlings inclined to give people makeovers who he rules via trickery with giant machines. 3) She attacked her sister's killer, which okay, really isn't kosher, but obviously given the ruling people of Oz, she wasn't going to get any sort of justice. And 4) She's ugly.

Whereas, in the movie, Glinda and the Wizard convinced a young girl that the only way she could go home was to KILL SOMEONE. When she had the way home all the time.

To be fair, if I recall the book correctly (I haven't read it since I was a proto-Kalinara) the Witch of the North wasn't the same woman who came at the end to tell her that the shoes could take her home. But in the movie? Definitely questionable.

Personally, I'd like to think the Witch faked her death. Because otherwise a) she's a moron for keeping a bucket of the one thing that can kill her in her hideout (and seriously, what was she using it for? Ever splashed someone with a bucket? You get fucking wet. Even at the age of eight I knew that that was the stupidest means of crisis resolution ever next to the genius evolutionary device that allows a bee to sting its captor and DIE) and b) the Good Witch and Wizard are too fucking incompetent to be able to kill someone so stupid that she keeps a bucket of the one thing that can kill her in her house!!!

I think in the end, this is why I don't have any interest in Wicked. I mean, it's an interesting story (from what I've been told), but ultimately, I tend to think there's more than enough support for a pro-Wicked Witch, re-viewing the movie at least, without changing or adding a lot of things out of nowhere.

The Wizard is skeevy enough without making him a rapist And why the heck does the Wicked Witch of the East have to be without arms to be sympathetic? I mean, all we really know of her is that she's possibly the bitchy woman on the bike (if that's not the Wicked Witch of the West), and she gets squished by a house. And of all the things to make "Elphaba" sympathetic, including a dead sister, a thieving killer and no hope for justice, they went with animal rights?!

That just strikes me as lazy. I usually love the idea of revisiting fairy tales and the like for sympathy for the villains. (Especially since class struggles and the like tend to feature so heavily, with any attempted change in status quo treated as evil. Call me crazy, but I don't actually have a lot of sympathy with the princess who gets bossed around by the servant girl despite her loftier birth.) But if you're not going to use things that are already there, why bother?

Meh, I still love my waaay too pretty green Wicked Witch doll though. <3 (My witch totally faked her death until the idiot Wizard went away in the balloon and the stupid girl went home. Then she went and zapped that bubble-head Glinda something good. Hmph.)

More Stupid Questions

So tomorrow morning, I begin my internship leading to a very brief temporary attempt at diurnality (Is that a word? Oh well, it is now) which I'm very displeased about.

It does look like it'll be interesting. I'm working in Elder Law and it actually sounds like I'll be able to actually help people. Which is kind of a cool and scary thought.

Anyway, it got me thinking some more silly age-related thoughts in comics.

How do age related membership groups and legal things work in the DCU? I mean, between the speed force, starheart, careless mentor experiments and Ian Karkull it does seem like there are a lot of folks considerably younger than their chronological ages running around.

I suppose that's not a big deal for Jay, who appears in his fifties, or even Alan, who's age seems to fluctuate with artist's whim and presumably his own mood. But is Sanderson Hawkins eligable for the AARP?

Does it effect social security benefits or insurance premiums (which I'd imagine are high anyway for the superhero types...)

(tangentially: can a superhero with a secret identity be denied coverage after a hero related accident for misrepresentation?)

I wonder if they card for senior discounts.

I wonder how they measure age at all in the DCU. A chronological basis only doesn't really make a whole lot of sense, especially with characters from the future or hyperaged characters. (For that matter, would a time traveler's age be measured from birth or from how long they lived?) Do they use a physical test of some sort? That'd seem more practical, but also, thanks to Karkull and others, prone to some odd sudden status changes. (And it'd suck for the immortal type characters. Imagine being eternally two years shy of being able to legally buy alcohol.) Also, it'd kind of suck for some of the immortal type characters. Do they have a telepath scan for mental/emotional maturity?

Carbon dating?

No Post Here

Done with Finals! Lived! Yay!

Now I'm going to sleep for a week.

Or at least until the summer internship at the Elder Law center starts on Friday.

...well, at least I get a day off! :-)

Hoo boy.

This is...yeah. There really aren't words.

Actually there are lots of words, most of which aren't fit for polite company. The nicest of which being: "How the hell did he think that was an appropriate question?!"

Egads.

Things I Thought At the Toy Store

Back when I used to work at the toy store, I used to be bombarded by many images from various Barbie movies and the like. Now, since I actually don't mind Barbie much, have fond memories of childhood games, and even now take a remarkably immature delight in dressing my green barbie in various wonderful things like Captain Kirk's Uniform, this never bothered me much.

Though it did wear me down to the point where I broke down and rented one. (It was Fairytopia, by the by. It was awful, but there were some parts that were unexpectedly amusing to me.)

I've always kind of wondered what all the other fairies, or for that matter, all of Genevieve's sisters in 12 Dancing Princesses (Except the token little blond one played by Kelly who got to save the dad's life with magic water or whatever the hell it was...yeah, I spoiled it. Deal. :-P), or all that sort thought about their roles in the universe.

I would then imagine them sitting around with their small mundane wings fluttering (or straightening their pretty but not remarkably sparkly or poofy skirts) and wonder, "If this were a movie, which of us would be the main character?"*

And then as one they all look over to Elina/Genevieve/Annaliese/Rosella/Mariposa/whoever the heck Barbie's playing this time, with the long flowy blond hair, blue eyes, general sparkliness and big poofy dress and/or HUGE ASS SPARKLY WINGS OF DOOM and go "Gee, I wonder."

The villainesses had the best outfits anyway.

*I have these conversations with friends, general concensus is that I'm the comic relief/smartass sidekick.

This Is The Sound of My Brain Melting

For the record, I really want to slap whoever decided to stretch my finals period over three fucking weeks. I was relatively good humored about it before, but now it's getting damn tedious!

I really really want to read something mindless. Something preferably with no sense of chronological basis, i.e. that has humans and dinosaurs running about at the same time.

Ooo, maybe something involving people riding pterodactils. I've always liked pterodactils, though I admit, I've always assumed they were feathered. I have no actual basis for this belief except for how most people's illustrations look like plucked chickens to me.

Explosions are good too, or at the very least people getting impaled on pointy metal things. I can deal with that. Bonus points if the pterodactils eat someone. (Totally makes up for the plucked-chicken thing if it eats someone.)

I have no idea if Pterodactils CAN eat a live human, but I totally don't care. It's not like this is a terribly realistic scenario to start with.

Oh well, back to work.

Miscellaneous Captain America Thought

I had an epiphany today as to why Ultimate Captain America does nothing for me, even though the 616 one is one of my favorite Marvel characters.

Ultimate Captain America's a hardened soldier and something of an ass and it seems to make sense with his back story, so I'm not really complaining about that.

But I think he really has lost something that 616 Cap's always had. Because at heart, 616's Captain America is, I think, still a dreamy artist in the body of a greek god.

Essentially, he should be a lot more Kyle Rayner than Hal Jordan.

Okay, admittedly, he's much MUCH smarter than Kyle and much less flighty, and certainly seems to have more of an attention span. But something of that dreamy idealism's still there. Even years at war shouldn't have gotten rid of it completely.

I like Brubaker's Cap, since he seems like a fairly natural progression of the cute somewhat naive sixties Cap after having spent "ten years" in the present day. (Or however many the Marvel timeline allows.) The darker sort-of-bitterness makes sense. But Millar's Ultimate Cap doesn't seem like he could have ever been this guy and that just makes me sad.

(Also, tangentially, I'm filled with seething jealousy for all of you who've managed to see Iron Man. Seething. Jealousy. Hmph.)

Meme!

Oooh, got tagged!

1) What was the first comic you remember reading?


2) What was the first comic that made you realize that you might be in this for the long haul?


3) If you had to make a snap decision to take one comic or one comic run to a desert island, what would it be? Don't think too hard!

---

1) Well, the very first comic I remember reading was probably Nightcat which I knew was wretched even at the age of nine. But it had a brunette woman in leather kicking people in the face, with ill-defined powers, and a lot of cat puns.

I loved that comic though, perhaps understandably, it didn't open the door to superhero comics for me at the time.

2) Hmm, depends on if we're talking manga or superhero comics for me. I think the first manga I really got into was some online scanlations of the Kall-Su/Dark Schneider fight in Bastard when I was about 13/14 ish. (I'd been more of an anime geek before that and honestly, at the time, it wasn't easy to find manga.) I thought it was awesome.

Especially when the slightly effeminate villain was actually WINNING against the somewhat more masculine, if longer haired, and possibly more evil hero. Then there was self-impalement and death/resurrection/spontaneous transformation into a monster and I was sold.

At the time there was no official release of it, so I decided to buy some Japanese dictionaries, study, and see if I could take some classes. At my first convention, at 16, I finally had the chance to buy my first manga in Japanese. Totally bought that story arc. <3 Best fight ever.

Heh, if you've read Bastard though, you'll probably understand why I was never exactly in the "manga is MUCH LESS sexist and objectifying than superhero comics!" camp. Sure there are plenty that are better than your average superhero comic, but there are just as many, if not more, that are MUCH WORSE. And whenever I see that argument I seriously have to think that the person has not read enough. (Or, to be fair, might just lack the cultural knowledge to recognize Japanese sexist tropes instead of American ones. But I digress. :-))

For superhero comics, I think it was when I read the Trade Paperback of A Lonely Place of Dying back in January 2005. I was tickled by the way Tim Drake just kind of invaded the batclan all "I figured out your identities because I have half a brain" and the way he ultimately ends up putting on Jason's suit and fighting. I thought it was a great origin story and I knew I wanted to read more.

3) As for what comic/comic run I'd take on a desert island...either Beau Smith's Warrior or the Goyer-Johns run of the JSA. I can't choose between them and you can't make me!

Bleh

Final number three in the morning. No content today. Wish me luck!

Oh, and for whoever came here based on this search term:

"i want to know about late british princess diana and also want to see her pretty snaps"

...I'm just going to assume "snaps" is one of those slang terms that I do NOT want to know the meaning of. I do love so very precise search terminology though.

On the other hand whoever came here looking for cartoon robot horses, rock on!

Miscellaneous.

You know what the most annoying thing about finals is? Having to turn down an invite to see Ironman. I hope I get the chance to see it eventually, but my next final's on Friday. :-(

It's probably for the best it wasn't Dark Knight or something like Captain America. I'm not a big Tony Stark fan, and there isn't as much screaming at me "come see" as Dark Knight, so I don't feel THAT bad about missing it for a while.

If it WERE Dark Knight, I probably wouldn't have gone either, but I'd have been more crushed about it. :-)

Oh, and happy birthday to Ami! I hope your new year is filled with bunnies and supergirls for all!

(I swear, someday I'll have some actual content for this blog again. Promise!)