Halloween Scene: Creature Features (2000)

Since I'm cutting it close to the midnight marker tonight and I don't think I'll have time to get full reviews of either Student Bodies or the first season of Dexter, which I finished today, I'm gonna have to finally talk about about my old reliable book Creature Features. I've mentioned the book probably a dozen or so times on the blog, but haven't really gotten into the nitty gritty details about it. After I had really gotten into horror movies, I was desperately looking for some kind list of what I should and shouldn't watch. I printed out a few lists from various websites, but it wasn't until 2000 when I came across the updated version of John Stanley's Creature Features that I had my new bible.

The book was probably out of date well before I ever bought it, but who cares? As I mentioned when it came to rock and roll, it already felt like I was way behind on everything horror even by the time I started watching, so it was all catch-up time. Instead of becoming my guide to "should I or shouldn't I watch this?" Creature Features has become equal parts checklist (I put a dot or an X next to every entry, dots mean I've watched most of the movie and Xs mean I tried and just couldn't get through it) and guide to my horror memory. It's hard to keep track of all the horror movies I've seen, especially considering my crappy memory, so keeping Creature Features around with its myriad of pencil dots and Xs take the place of my dying brain cells.


Even though the book is almost 10 years old at this point and Stanley has stated on his website that he won't be updating it, it's still my horror bible. I check it and read the entry for every horror movie I watch and will even watch an older horror movie over a newer one if I know I can cross it off in my book. I'm just a little weird that way I guess. I've even taken to writing the names of horror movies I've seen that aren't in the book on the front and now back covers for completest sake. I'm sure I've missed a ton, but I feel like I need to keep track somewhere (this blog is now the spot I guess).

I believe the book is still available on Amazon and in some bookstores and I highly recommend it even though, like I said, it's missing the last 9 years of horror movies. It's just good stuff.

[post does not go on]
Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: The Pile

Hey Gang, seeing as how I've got a lot of time on my hands now, I've been tearing through some movies and trades. I haven't done posts yet, but you can be on the lookout for more of those down the road. These trades are actually from last week and the week before. As usual, I'll run down the pile top to bottom.



CAPTAIN AMERICA BATTLES BARON BLOOD (Marvel Illustrated Books) Written & drawn by Roger Stern and John Byrne
This little number was quite the oddity. I thought it was going to be one of those novels-based-on-comics things. I read a ton of the ones that came out in the 90s back then. I guess I should have noticed the "Illustrated" portion of the title. So, what you've got here is a strange book that collects (according to this site) collects Captain America 250, 253 and 254 which covers those issues where Captain America fights Baron Blood and meets the new Union Jack (as well as the newer Baron Blood) along with the issue where Cap says "no" to running for president. The interesting thing, which you can see in the below pic, is that they cut these comics into panels (black and white ones) and pieced them together on pages the size of the average Pocket Book. Weird right? The stories were good, though kind of slow and I would much rather read them in color. Roger Stern is the man, by the way, he's definitely one of the most unsung writers in the history of comics.


DC UNIVERSE SPECIAL: JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #1 (DC) Written by Len Wein, Gerry Conway & Jack Miller, drawn by Dick Dillin & Joe Certa
Though technically not a trade, there were two reasons I included this issue in this post. One, it collects Justice League of America #111 ("Balance of Power!"), 166-168 ("The League That Defeated Itself") and Detective Comics #274 ("The Human Flame"). These are all stories that hold some relevance to Final Crisis and Infinite Crisis, though they're not really hyping the IC connection. You get Human Flame and Libra's first appearances, which make sense, and then the story in which the bad guys get inside the heroes' heads and find out all about them, this leads to Zatana doing mind wipes and on and on. So, these are pretty integral issues that a lot of later stories hinge on. That being said, I found them to be boring and mostly skimmed through them. The second reason is that these reprints should have been reprinted again in the Final Crisis Companion, which I will get to shortly. That just makes sense, though, right? Might as well make that companion as much of a companion as possible and the first appearances of the two biggest new characters in the story should have their stories told. But, hey, it's a rad cover, isn't it? That Ryan Sook dude knows how to DRAW!


MOME VOL. 14 SPRING 2009 (Fantagraphics) Written and drawn by a ton of talented folks
One of the many perks of working at Wizard for a dyed in the wool superhero fan like myself was getting exposed to some of the more alternative sides of comics. Between going through the library and borrowing books from friends who are way more knowledgeable about these things than I am, I feel like I've just barely started to uncover the tip of the indie iceberg. So, as you might imagine, I've heard a lot about Mome, the indie comics anthology that Fanta puts out (those guys are amazing), but I've never read one until Vol. 14 and I definitely liked it. I will be completely honest, I don't think I understood a lot of these stories, but I kind of like that. It's like watching an experimental film, but with cool art. By far my favorite strip was called Kool-Aid Comic by Jon Vermilyea. I like the simplicity of it, the subject and the art. It all comes together in a fun little comic, of which you can peep a page or two of below. Fun stuff and I'll definitely be on the lookout for future Momes.


SANDMAN MYSTERY THEATRE VOL. 7: THE MIST & THE PHANTOM OF THE FAIR (Vertigo) Written by Matt Wagner & Steven T. Seagle, drawn by Guy Davis
I've talked about my love of SMT before, but since then I've read the volumes I was missing and have come to like this series even more. For those of you not willing to click the link, SMT follows the Golden Age Sandman as he romps through pre-WWII NYC, fighting bad guys, evading the cops, being a genius, sometimes interacting with other Golden Age heroes (or soon-to-be ones) and sharing his life--both in and out of the gas mask--with his girlfriend Dian Belmont. What I love most about this book, aside from the NYC setting and my love of Golden Age DC characters, is the relationship between Dian and Wesley (Sandman's real name). I think they're my favorite couple in all of comics, mostly because they did away with the "keeping the secret identity from the girlfriend" thing. You also get to watch Dian evolve from a spoiled socialite to someone really trying to help the world. But, aside from all that, this volume gives us glimpses of a young, pre-Starman Ted Night and "The Phantom Of The Fair" which is the story that I remember reading about as being one helluva one back in the day from Wizard (they were right). I think you'd be okay if you jumped in here to read this much beloved story, but I highly recommend going back to the beginning. Here's hoping that Vertigo continues their plans to collect this whole series.

FINAL CRISIS COMPANION (DC) Written by Grant Morrison, Len Wein, Peter Tomasi, Greg Rucka & Eric Trautmann, drawn by JG Jones, Tony Shasteen, Doug Mahnke, Ryan Sook & Marco Rudy
So, this is kind of a weird book. The actual Final Crisis collection is amazing. It's got everything written by Grant Morrison in one place, while this one has the rest of the stuff that isn't a regular series tie-in and the FC Director's Cut which is the first issue without color or word balloons followed by the script. Then you've got Final Crisis Secret Files, Requiem and Resist. All these issues are cool on there own, but I do wish this volume was a big more robust. In addition to the reprints I mentioned above, I'd also like to see some of the JLoA and Teen Titan tie-ins included, just to have everything in one place. Ah well, it'll still get a place on my bookshelf.

NIGHTWING: THE GREAT LEAP (DC) Written by Peter Tomasi, drawn by Don Kramer, Rags Morales, Doug Mahnke, Shawn Moll &
Joe Bennett
I dug Tomasi's previous Nightwing volume, so I'm not surprised that I dug this second volume. The only problem with it is that it got awkwardly swept up in the Batman: RIP story. Now, don't get me wrong, I loved Morrison's Batman run, but the tie-ins lost me for the most part, including Nightwing. So, I hadn't actually read most of these issues when they came out, but I did like the whole story, most of which involves Nightwing's weird relationship with Two-Face, which is being carried over into todays Batman stories written by Winick. Interesting for sure.

TRINITY 1 (DC) Written by Kurt Busiek & Fabian Nicieza, drawn by Mark Bagley, Scott McDaniel, Tom Derenick & MIke Norton
Trinity got a lot of flack, but I think it's because it wasn't what people were thinking it should be. 52 was an amazing look at some smaller characters, giving them new life and making them important again in the DCU, Countdown tried way too hard to be the backbone of the DCU and Trinity turned into this crazy, out-there story featuring all kinds of heroes the casual fan has never heard of. This is just the first series, collecting #1-17 and I will warn you, it's definitely for big time DC fans and not the feint of heart.

SECRET INVASION: INCREDIBLE HERCULES (Marvel) Written by Greg Pak & Fred Van Lente, drawn by Rafa Sandoval
Incredible Herc was one of those books that everyone loves but I missed out on in single issues. By the time I read the first trade, the issues were already into the third or fourth arc, but this, the second (collecting 116-120) collects the Secret Invasion issues. I wasn't a big fan of SI, especially the ending, but I really liked how Pak and Van Lente flipped the script and looked at the Skrull invasion from a different angle. This time we see it from a religious viewpoint, with Herc and some other gods from regular and Marvel mythologies trying their best to kill the god of the skrulls. It's a cool story, one filled with plenty of sci-fi goodness, but also some fun nods to mythology of all kinds that make this a really fun and well rounded book.

COUNTDOWN ARENA Written by Keith Champagne, drawn by Scott McDaniel
I've loved McDaniel's art since his Nightwing days. There's a short arc where NW fights Scarecrow early on that is just amazing and I highly recommend it. So, when I heard the news that DC was going to be putting out a book called Arena, drawn by McDaniel that would pit various versions of heroes against each other to see who would win, I was sold. Turns out this story didn't have a lot of bearing on the actual Countdown story (as I noted here to some extent), but it remains one of the better looks at the multiverse that's just been sitting around. I know that there's been word that they're waiting for Morrison to get in there and really dig deep on the multiverse at some point, but I'm getting tired of waiting. What's the point of having it if you're not going to do anything with it? Also, one quick thing that bothered me about many of the Earths they revealed was that they just took Elseworld books and extrapolated that into an entire universe. There's an entire universe out there based on the idea that Batman was a vampire. And, hey, I like that original story as much as the next guy, but that doens't mean it should necesarily get it's own universe. Does that mean those Elseworlds annuals they put out each have their own universe? The one where Steel was around in the Civil War, Batman was actually Two Face or Superman was straight out the jungle book? It's just a bummer because it feels like they just copied the original multiverse and added this other ones with haste, which wouldn't have been a huge deal if they hadn't limited themselves to just 52. Ah well. This book is definitely only for die-hards. Or maybe just me.

THE NEW TEEN TITANS ARCHIVES VOL. 1 Written by Marv Wolfman, drawn by George Perez
This might be comic book heresy, but I couldn't even get through this book, which collects DC COmics Presents #26 and New Teen titans 1-8. I think what ruined the book for me is the fact that every Teen Titans writer since has mined this territory so, SO much. The only aspect of this story that was surprising for me was the mystical way in which the team first came together. Beyond that? I've seen the Deathstroke stuff and the Trigon stuff before. Several times. Geoff Johns did it and it seems like it's been done a thousand times since then. And that's coming from someone who loves Geoff's Titans. Like, a lot. It's an amazing book. I just think it's about time for the Titans to move beyond their 80s roots and maybe make some new villains and get some new characters into the mix. Maybe I'll put this one back in my "to read" pile and give it another shot somewhere down the line, but I'm not sure yet. For me, it's just too "been there done that" for me. But man, Perez sure knows how to draw and I stand by my claim that he's one of the few artists who's actually gotten better with age. I'll read any new stuff that guy puts out.
Oh, DO go on.

Tim Burton Is Awesome

Over the past two days I've had the pleasure of watching two Tim Burton movies on the train and realizing how much I like his directing. Monday I watched childhood favorite Beetlejuice (1988) and yesterday I checked out Mars Attacks (1996) for the first time. I also recently realized that Burton is probably the first director I was a fan of before I even realized what a director did. I remember watching Frankenweenie on the Disney Channel, I liked Batman, but Batman Returns was my favorite superhero movie for years and I have memories of Pee Wee's Big Adventure like anyone else my age, but wasn't too obsessed with it. In fact, Burton was probably the first director whose work I did recognize. And, perusing his credits on IMDb and realizing I've really enjoyed most of what I've seen, I've decided to give him the "... Is Awesome" tag, I'm sure he's super excited.

Before jumping into the movie reviews, I do want to note that I still haven't seen Edward Scissorhands or Sleepy Hollow, but I have seen all of his other big movies. I didn't really like Sweeney Todd (apparently, I have a fear of razors against throats, who knew?) and I'm not particularly partial to Nightmare Before Christmas (which he didn't direct, but produced) or Corpse Bride, but I think that's because I resented paying full New York prices for a 76 minute movie. Anyway, not liking three movies and not seeing two movies puts him in that rare category of directors with a lot of movies which I have seen and liked. It's easy to say I like Tarantino or Kevin Smith, but they don't have all that many movies.

So, now onto Beetlejuice and Mars Attacks specifically. When I say I was a Beetlejuice fan as a kid, I'm talking full-on. I had the movie on tape of course, watched the cartoon, got as many of the toys as I could (I'll take pictures of what I have and do a separate post soon) and even dressed up as him for Halloween one year (Mom made the suit and we bought the official Beetlejuice toy mask with pop-out snakes!). And, the craziest thing about all this is that I was a fan even though I saw something on TV about Beetlejuice that scared me so much I had nightmares.

I've been searching YouTube and the internet for any reference to this, but can't find it. Around the time the movie came out, I saw this talk show aimed at kids either on Nickelodeon or Disney Channel where they interviewed some of the ghosts and monsters from the movie. I think the shrunken head hunter was on there, but I definitely remember the file clerk who got run over by a truck. There were a few others but I can't remember them. I also don't remember the details, but it scared me so bad I had nightmares for a while. Also note that this was well before I even entertained the idea of watching horror movies. Just the previews scared me. Ah, how far I've come.

It's been probably 10 years since I watched Beetlejuice all the way through (I picked the DVD up on the cheap sometime in the past year, but hadn't watched it). I still really dig this movie. It's got a great mix of comedy, action and horror, plus great performances by everyone involved from Michael Keaton as the Ghost With the Most down to Jane, the annoying real estate woman.

The only part that doesn't hold up is the special effects, which, according to the internet, Burton did on purpose as a reference to older sci-fi and horror movies (hence the stop motion animation of the sculptures and sandworms). But, other effects still look great, and mostly because they're practical. I love the ghastly faces Barbara (Geena Davis) and Adam (Alec Baldwin, he looks so young and thin!) put on to scare Lydia (Winona Ryder, also super young).

A couple of funny things I realized while watching this movie before Mars Attacks. First off, this is the second movie in two weeks I've watched where rich New Yorkers move away from the city to a quiet place somewhere north of the city. At least in Beetlejuice, they eventually tell you they're in Connecticut so I wasn't driving around trying to find the school house. Also, I realized while watching that Catherine O'Hara and Jeffrey Jones will always be "the people from Beetlejuice" in my head. I remember when O'Hara lated played the mom in Home Alone, I was psyched. And, while Jones will always be Ed Rooney to most, he's the dad from this movie and the bad guy from Who's Harry Crumb and that's the way it is.

Which brings me to Mars Attacks, which doesn't have single character/actor who I haven't seen in something else. Hell, even Jack Black's in this bad boy and he looks only a little less svelte than he did in Airborne. Heck even the kid from Solarbabies is in it, but to me he's still the whiny kid from that movie (though he's way more awesome and less girly now).

I can't think of a recent movie that has brought together so many famous actors in one flick (check out the full roster here). Sure, you could argue that some people like Sarah Jessica Parker or Lisa Marie weren't really all that famous at the time, but you've got Jack Nicholson, Glenn Close, Pierce Brosnan, Danny DeVito, Natalie Portman (also probably not super famous at the time) and Pam Grier! For the record, that's also the Joker, Cruella de Vil, James Bond, Penguin, Amidala AND Foxy Brown. That's a pretty epic team-up. (Any artists out there want to draw that up? It'd be rad?) Anyway, what I liked most about this star studded cast is the fact that so many of these big time starts got killed in really great and kind of gruesome ways. You really don't see THAT nowadays.

I know I'm late to the game by 13 years on this one. I'm not sure why I didn't see it when it came out or why it took so long for me to finally see it, but I'm really glad I did. It was very slow going at first and I kept wondering how all these different characters were going to fit together and really just wanted to get to the aliens blowing shit up, but I see why it all works. It's a satire on movies like it, but also society. Parker's character could be taken out of this movie and put on the NYC streets I walk everyday to get to work (I might have seen her last week actually, she just has a Blackberry now). That Burton fella's ahead of the curve methinks. Plus, the effects are cool and it's damn funny.

And dammitall if those aren't the cutest little aliens blasting the crap out of humanity. I loved their "ack ack ACK" dialogue and loved it even more when their heads exploded. Watching the second half of the movie really made me want to play whatever the latest Destroy All Humans game is. It also made me want to check out the original card series that the movie is based on (huh, basing a movie on a card set seems just as crazy as basing one on a board game, no?), which brought me to Zelda's Mars Attacks site, check it out!

Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: This Week's Pile 7-17-09

I read a lot of trades in a week. In addition to the bursting-at-the-seems shelf of things I've read at least once, I also have two long boxes full of books I need to work my way through, plus things I borrow from other people and work. It's a lot to get through, but with my train ride and nightly reading, I'm at least putting a dent in those boxes.

So far this week I've finished two books I started reading a while ago, read three complete books, started and quit one and and halfway through two others. That's a total of 8 trades this week on top of Gulliver's Travels which I'm slowly getting through. Anyway, here's a few brief (I promise) thoughts on these books).


NORTH WORLD VOL. 2 (Oni) by Lars Brown
I haven't read the first volume of this book, but I enjoyed this one enough to go back and read te original. The idea is that the main character used to be a fighter in the vein of World of Warcraft or something and has since settled down to do taxes with his dad. I've heard the first volume gets a bit mired in the MMORPG in-jokes, but Volume 2 doesn't have those pitfalls. There are definitely aspects of the story I wasn't very clear on, but I'll chalk that up to me coming in part-way through the story and not as a fault of the author for now. Aside from entertaining me on the train ride home, I also used Brown's book as a reference for how to draw cartoony figures and had some success. Figuring out how he drew his main character lead directly to the creation of the nameless party guy I drew yesterday.

THE BIG BOOK OF BARRY WEEN, BOY GENIUS (Oni) by Judd Winick
I hate to double link to the same post, but I mentioned yesterday that I've been reading this brand new collection of all things Barry Ween from Oni for the past few days. I'm about halfway through and I'm loving the foul mouthed adventures of the smartest kid (person, really) on earth, his friend Jeremy and his love interest Sarah. If you liked Dexter and have no problem with a deluge of profanity and pop culture references (some of which have gone completely over my head), then you should definitely check this book out. I haven't enjoyed a reading experience this much in a long time.

LIGHT BRIGADE (DC) written by Pete Tomasi, drawn by Peter Snejbjerg
AS anyone who read my review of the Nightwing Freefall trade knows, I really enjoy Pete Tomasi's writing. So, when I was offered someone's copy of his first(?) comics work Light Brigade I jumped at the chance. I'm also a big fan of Peter Snejbjerg because he was involved with the second half of James Robinson's excellent Starman run (and the artist behind two pieces of original art I have from that last issue). The story focuses on a group of soldiers during World War II who get mixed up in the war between the renegade angels and God. I've seen a lot of stories like this (try and find a Hellboy comic that doesn't mention deities and Nazis), but I liked the yarn Tomasi wove here, especially the character who's a fan of DC comics of the time, going so far as to give their group a team name and make them shirts with a logo. Definitely worth checking out if anything above sounds even remotely interesting. Also, this is the best I've ever seen Snejbjerg. The colors really seem to leap off the page. Good stuff.

HELLBLAZER: THE FEAR MACHINE (Vertigo) Written by Jamie Delano, drawn by Mark Buckingham, Richard Piers Rayner, Mike Hoffman, Alfredo Alcala
I first got interested in Hellblazer back when Brian Azzarello started writing the title. At that point I was heavily into 100 Bullets and would read pretty much anything with his name on it. Those were good comics, but I had trouble getting a grasp on exactly what John Constantine could do. I knew he had some kind of magical powers, but beyond that? No clue. I'm still not really sure about the dude's powers even after reading this arc which comes from his earliest adventures (Hellblazer #14-22), but I still really like this enigmatic character. The funny thing about jumping into any Constantine story is that you have no idea if the old friends/acquaintances/enemies/lovers he runs into have been established in previous comics or just made up by the author. This story surprised me because of how far away from the John Constantine rubric it runs. You've got John joining up with some hippies, liking it, trying to find a missing girl and sporting (get this) a BLACK trench coat and even sunglasses, instead of a tan one. Remember how angry people were when Keanu wore the black coat in the movie?



Apparently it has precedence.



The story is very deep and involved and it took me quite a while to get through it because of waning interest and the absolute literariness of the whole thing, but by the end I had a great time and really enjoyed this seemingly atypical Hellblazer adventure. I've got one more Delano trade I'm interested to burn through now (PUNS!). I also want to get my hands on the Ennis/Dillon books.

GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY (Marvel) By Jim Valentino
If you're like me, you've been enjoying the hell out of Guardians of the Galaxy which spun out of Annihilation Conquest's Star-Lord miniseries. That got me curious about the previous incarnation of the Guardians of the Galaxy, so when it popped up on someone's Sequential Swap list, I swapped for it. And man, there's no more 90s story than this one, which collects the first 6 issues of the series. The idea is that this is set in an alternate future where War of the Worlds happened on the 616 and wipes out all the heroes. This is way in the future and the Guardians end up fighting a group called The Stark who, through means I care not to spoil, evolved with full-on Tony Stark technology. I liked the "what happened to THIS character" feel of the story and would definitely read an Essential volume or two to see where the full story went, but, like I said, it's very 90s. In addition to briefly explaining every team member's origin, powers and home planet with almost the exact same wording every issue and coming in that same weird size as the Armor Wars trade I read, there's also Taserface:


Nuff said.

CLASSIC G.I. JOE VOL. 1 (IDW/Marvel) Written by Lara Hama (mostly), drawn by Herb Trimpe (mostly)
I really, really wanted to love this book, but just couldn't. The book collects the first 10 issues of the series originally done by Marvel, but IDW put out the particular volume I read. These aren't bad stories, they're just not all that interesting, which goes for both Hama's stories and Trimpe's art. Maybe it's that I've seen so many spy/military-based stories that almost anything feels been-there-done-that. I had high expectations because I know a lot of people who sing the praises of this comic, including Kiel, so hopefully they'll jump on to let me know what it gets really good.

BAT LASH: GUNS & ROSES (DC) Written by Sergio Argones, drawn by Peter Brandvold
I got interested in this book after reading the latest issue of Jonah HEx which features a very well spoken Bat Lash. Unfortunately, this mini doesn't really pick up on any of those themes and just came off kind of boring to me. How cool would it have been if Sergio drew this bad boy though? That being said, I still really liked Bradvold's art, though I'm not familiar with him at all. This is the book I didn't get all the way through.

TOR: A PREHISTORIC ODYSSEY (DC) by Joe Kubert
This is the other book I haven't finished yet. That's because the entire story is told in text boxes instead of dialogue balloons. It fits the story just fine, it just takes me longer to read. Tor's a prehistoric character who got kicked out of his tribe for being smart and awesome and is having crazy adventures in parts unknown. So far I really like this book, it's a great showcase of the senior Kubert's style, which is one of the most recognizable in comics (I bet he could draw a stick figure and you'd still know it's him). He definitely hasn't lost his touch.

Anyone else read any of these books? Thoughts? If not, what are you reading and digging right now?


Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: Creature Tech and Wormwood: It Only Hurts When I Pee

I don't want you guys thinking I'm slacking off and not reading trades just because I'm not posting them. In fact, I've got a huge pile of trades next to my desk here just waiting for reviews, but I've been slacking off when it comes to posting about them. That's a little better right? Anyway, as I mentioned in my post about the new SyFy (ick) show Warehouse 13, I recently read Doug TenNapel's Creature Tech from Top Shelf and it reminded me a lot of that show. I've also recently read Wormwood Gentlemen Corpse Volume 2: It Only Hurts When I Pee by Ben Templesmith for IDW. They're both in the sci-fi and fantasy genre so I figured they'd go well together.

CREATURE TECH (Top Shelf)
Written and drawn by Doug TenNapel
My bossman Justin Aclin recommended this book to me and I didn't really know anything about it. It wasn't until after I looked TenNapel up on Wiki that I discovered he was the brain behind the Earthwork Jim games, which I loved even though the first one is still crazy hard.

The story's about Michael Ong, a scientist who gets relegated to the Research Technical Institute (dubbed Creature Tech by the locals) by the US government. His former pastor, current man of religion dad lives in town as well, but they've got their problems. The black and white graphic novel (which, as far as I'm concerned, means an original work created specifically for the larger page count provided for by a trade, not just any collection of sequential art, that's pretentious) focuses on Michael dealing with the Shroud of Turin, a reincarnated ghost scientist, a giant bug lab assistant, falling in love with a girl and an alien, multi armed chest plate. It's kind of like the current Blue Beetle with some of the quirkiness of Gail Simone's All New Atom thrown in (loved her run on that book).

I really dug TenNapel's art style (you can really see the Earthworm Jim style in there) and the story was quirky without getting too extreme in that column. Ong is a fun, reluctant hero who has some obvious personal problems that he seems to be dealing with (he definitely has an arc, which is nice). Oh, plus, there's giant space eels and other cool looking aliens. I highly recommend checking this book out and I wonder if TenNapel's got plans for any future installments? Maybe I should read that Wikipedia page I linked too above...

But instead, on to the next review!

WORMWOOD GENTLEMAN CORPSE VOLUME 2: IT ONLY HURTS WHEN I PEE (IDW)
Written and drawn by Ben Templesmith
Like most other people I first heard about Ben Templesmith because he drew/painted the original 30 Days of Night along with some of the other follow-up minis. I'm not a big fan of that book, but it's definitely one of those slap-yourself-in-the-forehead, why-didn't-I-think-of-that moments. A few years back Templesmith started up his own creation called Wormwood Gentleman Corpse, which is a little worm dude who inhabits corpses. The funny thing is that I didn't even realize he was the worm and not the corpse until halfway through the first series. I can be a bit dense sometimes. He's got a few sidekicks in the form of a robot man (Pendulum) and a stripper girl with tattoos that come to life (I can't find her name after looking for one whole minute). I was a big fan of the take no prisoners craziness of the original mini-series, but lost track of the story in the following minis and issues. Luckily, I was able to pick up the second and third volumes and started reading through them.

This volume finds Wormwood cursed and needing the blessing of the leprechaun queen. In this mythology leprechauns are crude, gibberish-speaking little people with a penchant for violence and humping robots. In the process of trying to get the blessing to get rid of the sickness/curse, Wormwood runs into some squid-like invaders who he had a run-in with in a previous adventure. There's also a story about the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse who are being kept satiated in a hotel with a steady supply of prostitutes, food and drugs.

What I like about Templesmith's writing is that he doesn't shy away from things, while still not going too over the top in a bad way. There's plenty of over-the-topness, like when Wormwood shows his companions his "suit chamber" which is, of course, a room full of preserved corpses, including Jesus' (he decides on a little girl's). There's also a running gag about the genitalia Wormwood built for Pendulum. Good clean fun, you know? It's kind of like Hellboy, but if Hellboy was an ass who had been around a lot longer, hopped dimensions and made a lot more enemies than a demon from hell.

Oh, also, Templesmith's art is sick. Thanks to the supplemental material in the back (bonus points for the bonus material, as always), we can see the steps he takes in creating his art. It seems to be a combination of penciling, painting and then digital painting. It's a super cool and unique style that a few others have tried to copy, but can't quite get. Whether you like Templesmith or not, you can't argue that he's one of the more original artists out there. And, while we're talking about his style, I really liked how the 30 Days of Night movie captures his style, while still keeping the realism of actual people. I can't wait to read the other trade and track down the first one.


Oh, DO go on.

Conan The Boring

Netflix is a funny thing. I have no idea why I put Conan The Destroyer (1984) on my queue, though it's probably because I had never seen it before. Even more mysterious is why it was at the very top of said queue. Anyway, I got it in the mail right before we left for Disney World (I'll probably do a post with some pics later in the week) and actually thought it was the first one (Conan The Barbarian). But, hey, it's an 80s action movie starring Arnold Schwarzenegger (even though I copied his name from IMDb, it's creepy how good I'm getting at spelling his name) with swords, so how bad can it be right? Well, pretty bad.

Unfortunately, Destroyer is just a boring movie. Maybe I've been spoiled by ridiculously fast paced action sequences like those in Crank or Dark Knight, but I was astonished at how slow Arnold attacked some of his foes. It was like the squared off against each other, circled a time or two and then leisurely swung swords. Sure there are some cool decapitations, but overall the action just felt kind of stale.

Another problem I had with the story is that they give away the double cross in the beginning of the movie. You see, this witch lady tricks Conan into helping a young girl get her hands on a gem that will allow her to get a horn that will bring a god to life. She tells Conan that he can bring his dead lady (I'm assuming she's from the first movie, which I haven't seen in a long, long time) back to be his queen. Conan agrees to help the girl find the gem and then, right after that, the witch tells the girl's bodyguard (played by crazy-tall sex machine Wilt Chamberlain) that, once the girl has the horn, he can kill Conan. That's about 15 minutes into the movie. Didn't they have spoiler warnings back in 1984? I think simply cutting that scene and revealing the double cross later would have been a lot more dramatic.

One more problem I saw was the huge cast. In addition to the girl and Wilt, Conan's hanging out with the annoying thief who also acts as comic relief (though he's nowhere near as annoying as Chris Tucker in Fifth Element), freed bandit Grace Jones and a magician dude who mostly seems to just put his hands together in odd configurations and chant (he voiced Uncle Iroh in the incredible awesome Avatar cartoon). I got excited after the team was assembled because I figured they would start tearing shit up, instead, most of them just stand around pointlessly. Why couldn't you have combined the non-character of the magician with the comedy relief? It's called economy of story folks (I may have just made that up, but it makes sense in my head).

Overall, I can't say that Destroyer is a bad movie because, even though it's slow and boring, it delivers what you'd expect: super-buff Arnold killing all kinds of people/stuff/glass monsters (don't even get me started on how a monster made of reflections shouldn't turn to glass when it dies), Grace Jones and Wilt Chamberlain doing their own thing (you know, being scary and being tall respectively). Seriously, seeing Wilt standing next to his charge is hilarious at certain times as she only comes up to his waste. All that being said, I also can't say it's a good movie. So, if you're already a Conan fan, like Jim Gibbons , this might be right up your alley. Or it could be kinda boring.

Oh, one last thing I wanted to point out for my comic book fan readers. You may have noticed that I included the Comic Movie label for this post. That's because Conan comic writers (who also happen to be big time comic writers all around) Roy Thomas and Gerry Conway got credited for the story, but apparently disliked the finished script so much that they turned their script into a graphic novel called Conan: The Horn of Azoth through Marvel and just changed some names. Cool huh? Maybe I'll check that out, I bet it's rad.

Oh, DO go on.

Live Blogging Mannequin (1987)

I'm not even sure if I'm doing this right, but what the hell? I've started taking notes while watching movies to then use for posting on the site, but sometimes a movie isn't good enough to rank a full-on post. Well, I know you ravenous readers can't get enough of my content, so I figured I'd "live blog" some flicks. First up on the list? The 1987 epic fantasy (I guess) flick starring Andrew McCarthy, Porky's star Kim Cattrall, Estelle Getty and James Spader.

So, the basic idea of the movie is that Kim was an Egyptian (yes EGYPTIAN) princess back in ancient times. Somehow she ended up not dying when she should have and has appeared to different people throughout history, kind of like a muse. So, who does she pick in the late 80s? Hard on his luck Andrew McCarthy who ends up becoming an inspired window display designer for Estelle Getty's NYC store after he saves her life from a falling sign. It turns out that Kim's spirit is inside of a mannequin that only comes to life when no one else is looking (in theory). Andrew's displays really get people excited and business is booming, which makes the rival store angry. The rival store employs James Spader as a buttoned-up 80s business guy and the mean sergenat from the Police Academy movies plays a paranoid security guard who knows something's up. Meshach Taylor also plays an artsy over-the-top gay fellow window designer. I think. He's Andrew's friend. It's a weird movie to say the least. Anyway, here's my notes:

*Haha, white Egyptians.

*Animated opening![kind of like Grease.]

*Kim Cattrall, Estelle Getty AND James Spader? SOLD!

*Wow, that is a YOUNG Spader. [I mistook McCarthy for Spader for the first 10-15 minutes as you'll see in a few more notes.]

*This dude [McCarthy] has it ROUGH. Yet, this is still less heavy handed than Spider-Man 2. [Yeah, I'm the one guy who doesn't like Spidey 2]

*Wow, Estelle Getty looks young too.

*That's a hell of a way to get a job, catching a sign.

*Haha, woops, THAT is Spader. The main guy is Andrew McCarthy, makes sense.

*Lamar Burton, interesting. [Lamar Burton had nothing to do with this movie, I thought Meshach Taylor was Reading Rainbow's Burton.]

*Felix Maxwell looks and sounds familiar.

*Hey, he's from Ohio!

*Oh wow, this was shot in Boscov's, I'd never heard of them before moving out here. [And now I can't even remember where the Boscov around here is. Nanuet maybe?]

*Estelle looks like a younger version of the rappin granny from Wedding Singer.

*I think Felix is from the Police Academy movies. [I got this one right.]

*Hahaha, she says "Where do they hide all the musicians?" just before they music really kicks in. [I have no idea what this refers to.]

*Dress up dance number! It would take a really long time to actually do this. [Kim and Andrew are hanging out in the store after hours when no one is around and doing this huge dance number with tons of costume changes reflecting different eras. It's both kind of impressive and ridiculous.]

*Haha, can you imagine being one of these people so excited about a window display? OMG, they're f**king riding f**king bikes!!! ahhh!!!! [I know people like the window displays at Christmas, but you'd think Andrew had Whitesnake AND Poison in these displays.]

*Rambo the bulldog is super cute.

*"Tonight we nail that little fart blossom."

*Haha, hang gliding inside! [Yup, in the store. Happened.]

*I'm not sure if it's a good idea for your co workers to think you're banging a mannequin. [Andrew keeps carrying this mannequin around and his coworkers are starting to think he's weird. I guess they're right, actually.]

*Can other people hear her? [This isn't really addressed in the movie. There's a scene where Andrew takes mannequin Kim behind closed doors and they apparently have sex. So, can they hear her? I'm not sure. Either way, let's hope Andrew isn't too loud when in the throws of passion.]

*"You know I would never bother you when you're getting a piece of wood" - Lamar [Still didn't realize it's really Meshach Taylor.]

*Sure creepy foreign guy, I'll have sex with you. Hahaha he can't get it up. [Andrew has this ex who works at the evil store. While she's tasked with figuring out the secret to his window success, she's teamed with this sleazy guy with a generic accent who keeps trying to have sex with her. Eventually, she sees Andrew with someone (I think Kim in mannequin form) and decides to finally do the accent guy. It doesn't go as planned.]

*They're passing dozens of people who could be looking at her, yet she's still human. [Andrew's got Kim riding on the back of his motorcycle. When one of the other main characters sees them, she looks like a mannequin, but when they're just driving down the street she's alive. SO, you're trying to tell me that NO ONE is looking out their windows and seeing her? Plot hole!]

*What would happen if they were having sex and someone walked in? [Consider this my Brody moment while watching this crazy movie and drinking mojitos.]

*I love that they think they can ruin an essential nobody by showing pictures of him rolling around with a mannequin even though it clearly looks like he just fell on her, if it was Tom Cruise I could understand, but it's just some dude.

*Woah, awesome slide move by McCarthy, it's like calculator bowling. [Andrew's getting chased by the bad guy's goons and slides right into one of them on his knees.]

*How did this movie get made? [And I don't mean the special effects.]

*Why is there a conveyor belt for mannequin destruction leading to a wood chipper? More importantly, why can't he lift a freaking mannequin out of the shredder? [Sorry, I'm trying to think logically. And, hey, maybe department stores do have these kinds of things, I have no idea.]

*Holy shit, that guy saw her! She's human around other people!!!! [Yeah, I was excited that it finally happened, I'm a sucker for happy endings.]

*Hahahahaha, they got married?! [They've only known each other for a few months at best. Oh and she's magic.]

*"We can build this dream together..." love that song "Nothing's gonna stop us nowwwwwwww!" [I looked it up, it's called, unsurprisingly "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now" by Starship. As a bonus, here's the video, with Mannequin footage!]

Oh, DO go on.

My Top 5 TV Shows Right Now

2009-03-13
8:35:13 pm

When the new season began I said a few words about the shows I'd been watching. Well, now the season's been on it's merry way for a while now and I figured I'd lay out my top five shows right now. They're in no particular order except #1, but they're rocking my world right now.

5. How I Met Your Mother

4. Big Bang Theory

3. 30 Rock

2. Real World

1. LOST

Unfortunately, HIMYM and BBT weren't new for a while, which has been a huge bummer as we don't really watch anything else on Mondays. I still really enjoy both shows and can't wait to see where the further new episodes take me. After watching the first season of 30 Rock all the way through I gained an all new appreciation for 30 Rock and they haven't been disappointing this year (though it is interesting to see how the dynamics have shifted by now). I don't think I laugh harder at anything more than 30 Rock. The Real World: Brooklyn has been surprising this year. I think the producers thought that, by combining a transgender woman, a gay guy, a Mormon, a girl who used to date girls but now dates guys, an Iraq War veteran, a girl who's kinda engaged, a body builder and a hip hop dancer they'd have LOADS of conflict. Instead, we're treated to the most thought provoking, yet still fun season since Las Vegas (SO MANY pranks!). And finally, Lost. I freaking love this show. I've actually found that Lost gives me something to really look forward to (my new catchphrase of late has been "Life is better with Lost"). I was close to devastated when I walked into work Wednesday morning and Justin told me it wasn't new this week. If you're not watching you should be and if you don't like it, you're crazy.

Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: Thor & Dark Phoenix Saga

2009-02-13
4:45:30 pm

Today we've got a pair of Marvel trade reviews for your reading pleasure:

THOR VOL. 1 (Marvel)

Written J. Michael Straczynski & drawn by Oliver Coipel

On paper, I didn't think I'd like JMS's Thor. I've never been a big fan of the character and JMS disappointed me with Rising Stars after which I kind of stopped reading his stuff (also because I'm not a big FF or Spidey fan, though his Midnight Nation is rad). Also, I remember reading in Wizard a bunch of years back (I think right before I got my job) that Mark Millar and Steve McNiven were going to work on a Thor book where all these different Asgardian weapons started falling to Earth and new people were picking them up and becoming Don Blake/Thor-like pairings. That sounded pretty rad, but it never happened. Then that Thor clone thing happened in Civil War, so I was pretty much done with the idea of Thor.

Even with all that, I still started reading Thor when it came out and I was shocked to realize that I really liked it. I can't even really describe why I like it so much. I think it's the basic simplicity of a character that's been around for decades. Even though Thor's trying to find his fellow Asgardians in human form, it doesn't feel too bogged down in continuity. I also really like how he just decided to set up shop in Oklahoma as a floating castle-city. It's a really cool visual which is made all the cooler by Coipel's slick art. I can't remember if I've read any books he's drawn before, but I'd definitely make a point from here on out.

Unfortunately, I missed one issue in the first six and got off the story, which is a bummer because now I'll either have to find all the issues in the Wizard library (a veritable wasteland) or just read the trades as they come out which will take a while. Oh well, I'm still down with the book and from what I hear it's still doing well, so hopefully it'll be around for a while.

X-MEN: THE DARK PHOENIX SAGA (Marvel)

Written by Chris Claremont, co-plotted and drawn by John Byrne

I've talked a lot of X-Men trash over the years. Partly it's because I'm a dyed in the wool DC fan. Part of it is that I'm not a big Chris Claremont fan because of his run on Gen 13 (I was a HUGE fan of that book back in the day). And partly because I'm kind of sick of people saying how great it is.

But, all that being said, I figured I should at least give it a shot and see how it is so I can make an educated argument as to why I don't like the book (if in fact I don't). Well, I was surprised that I didn't hate the book. I don't think it's anywhere near the level of Dark Knight or Watchmen, books that I've heard it compared to before, but it's pretty good for a comic from 1979-1980.

Part of the problem is that I knew exactly what was going to happen and there were very few if any surprises. I guess I can thank my beloved X-Men animated series and reading various reviews and write-ups in Wizard for that. Anyway, sometimes you know how something's going to end, but the ride is still fun. Unfortunately, I kept getting let down by moments that I've heard were supposed to be awesome. The one that really sticks out in my mind is the couple of issues in which Wolverine gets knocked through the floor of the Hellfire Club and then comes back and kicks ass to save his teammates. Sure there are a couple of cool moments, but most of the issue is spent watching a Revolutionary War era Cyclops fighting in mind space or something. The final fight with the Imperial Guard is kind of boring as well. Plus John Byrne's very pretty art is often covered with dialogue that explains exactly what you're seeing the characters do on the page.

Like I said the story's not bad, especially if you haven't had nearly every beat of the story ruined for you and also if you have a predilection for Silver Age-type stories, but it doesn't really make me want to read the rest of this era of X-Men, though X-fanatic and Wizard World guru Brett White suggested I read From the Ashes which is on my list. We shall see I guess.

Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: Marvel Mania

2009-02-02
5:46:11 am

Time for some merry musings about a myriad of Marvel's most moving...comics. Wow, that's harder than it looks. Stan Lee should write an alliterative dictionary. Anyway, I've been catching up on some recent Marvel stuff that I missed out on the first time around, so here goes:

GHOST RIDER: HELL BEND & HEAVEN BOUND (Marvel)

Written by Jason Aaron and drawn by Roland Boschi & Tan Eng Huat

I've been hearing about how awesome Jason Aaron's Ghost Rider run has been, that it kind of takes a grindhouse approach to a character whose book wasn't exactly setting the world, ahem, aflame. Maybe it's because it's been hyped up so much, but I didn't find this volume, which collects Ghost Rider #20-25, all that awesome. Sure it was cool seeing Ghost Rider get mixed up with some ghosts on a highway and crazy nurses, but for me it never went beyond being just cool. I also couldn't help but feel like these were all Hellblazer stories bounced to another universe and used on Ghost Rider. That's probably not a fair comparison, but I do like the general approach to the character. Hey, I wouldn't be reading the book otherwise.

Also, I'm generally not a fan of the art, but I think it works in a book like this. It's kind of like how I wouldn't normally like some of the artists who do BPRD or Hellboy minis, but in the context of that kind of book the art really works well. It's pretty much the same thing here. All this being said, I will give the next volume a read, just to see how it goes, hopefully I'll be surprised.

THE INCREDIBLE HERCULES: AGAINST THE WORLD (Marvel)

Written by Greg Pak & Fred Van Lente and drawn by Koi Pham and others

Man, this is a good book. I loved Planet Hulk as it was happening but wasn't all that thrilled with World War Hulk (I'm not a fan of Romita Jr.'s). After all that I was kind of mad that Jeph Loeb was writing a Hulk book while Greg Pak, the guy who made Hulk awesome again got relegated to a Hercules book. I later found out that this was how Pak wanted to do things and heard good things about Herc, so I'm giving it a shot and unlike Ghost Rider, I'm 100% sold on Incredible Herc.

The book is great. Hercules is a pretty fascinating character, not just the wine swilling rogue we've seen in issues of Avengers past, but a really complicated dude who's lived an amazingly long life. The writers really dig deep, but don't pile things on too heavily and bury the fun. And there's plenty of fun.

Herc's chum in all this is Amadeus Cho, the seventh smartest person (first smartest kid) on Earth (I'd like to see the list in ranked order), a character I've grown to like in his few appearances leading up to and including WWH. Cho's obsessed with shutting S.H.I.E.L.D. down because of how they treated Hulk, but Herc doesn't want to destroy the good with the bad. Meanwhile, Ares is attacking Herc a lot, trying to put his arrogant, famous brother down.

My one complaint about Incredible Herc is that I'm not a big fan of Ares' characterization. I really really liked Michael Avon Oeming's Ares miniseries from a few years ago, but I feel like the character he set up there hasn't really been used as much beyond "big huge bad ass" in later appearances. Here he's a crazy, jealous dude who just wants to put Herc down. It's kind of strange and maybe that's how his character has been developed in books I haven't read, but it just feels a little off to me and took me a bit out of the story.

I can't wait to check out the next trade, which, I think, will be Secret Invasion stuff. I read one issue when it came out and really liked it, but it was part 2 or 3 and I missed the rest.

Oh, DO go on.

13.5 Quick Movie Reviews

2009-01-17
5:32:32 am

Hey gang, sorry again about my complete lack of posts lately, things have been crazy. I have been keeping myself busy with movies though, so here are 13 short reviews about some flicks I've seen lately, plus one movie I didn't watch.

SIX STRING SAMURAI (1998)

I really liked this post apocalyptic-like road trip movie with a samurai Buddy Holly. The howler-monkey kid got annoying fast, but the action and snappy dialogue kept things moving along at quite a clip. Much better than I thought it would be.

OUR MAN FLINT (1966)

Flint's a swinging secret agent int he 60s more worried about having a good time than stopping an international incident (at first at least). Great, campy 60s spy fun, that both pokes fun at but also sets itself up in the same universe as James Bond. A lot of fun, can't wait to check out the sequel.

THE MAJORETTES (1986)

I don't actually remember too much about this movie other than it involved some maniac hunting down and killing high school cheerleaders. It's a way lower budget movie and apparently very little of the money went to snag actors who can, you know, act. Skip this one unless you're a horror completist or you're looking to cross another movie off in your copy of Creature Feature (like me).

DAY OF THE DEAD (2008)

I was actually pretty impressed with this remake-in-name-mostly of Romero's Day of the Dead. I'm not a huge fan of the original or anything, but I wasn't expecting much out of this flick and was surprised. The story moves along the same speeds as the fast Zack Snyder/28 Days Later-like zombies, but my favorite part is seeing actual people I recognize like Mena Suvari, Nick Cannon and Ving Rhames killing and becoming zombies. When was the last time you saw a non genre actor semi-famous person in a horror movie after they became famous? Hopefully it's a trend that will continue. I'm actually kind of surprised that they didn't release this movie in theaters. Oh well, a pretty good zombie movie all said and done, though not a classic.

THE SHADOW (1994)

In my opinion, it's hard to go wrong when you populate a movie about a pulp hero with actors like Alec Baldwin, Peter Boyle, Tim Curry, Ian McKellen, James Hong and Jonathan Winters and luckily The Shadow held up my opinions. I'm not all that familiar with pulp heroes, especially the Shadow, but I like the idea of him having a network of people all over the city (usually people he has saved) who help him out. There's all kinds of cool stuff like secret labs and ancient forces of good and evil. Oh and for 30 Rock fans, I highly encourage you to think of these as the early days of Jack Donaghy.

LAST MAN STANDING (1996)

A pretty cool story about a gangster-era hitman (Willis) holing up in a ghost town populated by two rival gangs, gets slowed down with a little too much back and forth back stabbing. I definitely don't remember all the details about this one, but I'm a Willis fan. Michael Imperioli plays pretty much the same role he always does and Walken stars as Willis' main competition and they fight which is cool. Can you imagine Walken fighting now? Aside from a dance fight I mean. Oh, also Walter Hill of Warriors fame directed LMS, so it's gotta be pretty good, right?

FOXY BROWN (1974)

So far my experience with blaxploitation films as been hit or miss, but luckily Foxy is enough of a hit. In the plus column, Pam Grier cuts quite the figure, plus she kicks ass. I also like the idea of a group of inner city dwellers taking the law into their own hands and creating their own kind of police force. I'm not a big fan of the sexual assault stuff, but I guess that's all part of the exploitation riff. Too bad Foxy and Shaft never got together. That would have been a great flick.

LEATHERHEADS (2008)

I'm not sure if I've professed my heterosexual man love for George Clooney on the blog before, but I'm a big fan. I think we'd get along smashingly. I do know that I've talked about how much I like the American Office, so you probably know I'm a John Krasinski fan. So, Leatherheads was a good flick in my book. It doesn't make my top 10 sports movies of all time (well, maybe, I'd have to come up with that list actually), but it's fun and it offered up a look at a period in professional football that I am completely unfamiliar with, so that was cool. Of course, it's a comedy, so I'm not sure how accurate it was, but who cares? Like I said it was fun. Has similar story elements to League of the their Own (which probably would make my top 10 because I'm a huge softy). Not groundbreaking by any means, but worth a watch.

JOURNEY TO THE CENTER OF THE EARTH (2008)

I liked Leatherheads more than Journey, but it's not a terrible movie (even if it is very predictable). The special effects bounce back and forth between boderline okay, pretty good and not so great, but the effort is there. I really wish I would have been able to see this bad boy in 3D. I missed out on the phenomenon in the 80s and have gotten a taste for it by watching Superman Returns (ugh) and Nightmare Before Christmas in lame separate the background from the foreground 3D. I can't freaking wait to see My Bloody Valentine 3D!!!

KILLER KLOWNS FROM OUTER SPACE (1988)

Holy crap I loved this movie. Rickey got me a subscription to a horror movie mag called Horror Hound that's not expertly edited, but still offers up tons and tons of horror goodness. One such bit of goodness was a whole feature on Klowns. The movie is just so much freaking over the bigtop fun. I really can't believe that a studio made this movie. Please, do yourself a favor and check it out. Also of interest on the DVD is the Chiodo brothers' home movies from when they were making monster movies as kids. Pretty impressive stuff for pre-teens with a 16mm camera.

VAMPIRE EFFECT (2003)

The combination of Hong Kong action and vampires drew me to this flick pretty quickly on Netflix. Heck, it's even got Jackie Chan in a roll that's more than him just walking on and being called Jackie (which he is). As with a lot of movies like this that I've seen, the special effects and fight scenes are sick, but the story itself is nothing new. I did really like the cool retractable whip/sword weapons they used. I think I designed something very similar what I was younger.

LICENSE TO DRIVE (1988)

If you thought Corey Haim could have been a little bit smoother, though still pretty spazzy in Lost Boys and Corey Fledman from the Burbs could use a little mellowing out, then License to Drive is the perfect 2 Coreys vehicle for you (puns!). Haim fails his driving test, but still tells a young (though still 18 by my math) Heather Graham that he can pick her up. It's basically like an episode of a sitcom, but stretched to 90 minutes and definitely edgier than your average Saved By The Bell. Good stuff. Next up from the Coreys? Dream a Little Dream (which I have absolutely no knowledge of).

LEGEND (1985)

Legend is one of those movies that I don't remember at all, but have since come to find that it's kind of a big deal (to some people). I knew that Tim Curry was in it, but had no idea Tom Cruise was. I thought it might be kind of a funny movie, but when I saw Tom prancing around the forest or whatever I clicked this badboy off and deleted it from my queue. I am no fan of fantasy movies.

JOHNNY BE GOOD (1988)

I'm becoming a pretty big fan of Netflix's recommendations. I started watching Johnny after digging License and wasn't disappointed. It's got an older and more confident Anthony Michael Hall and a completely goofy Robert Downey Jr.. There's a good deal of goofiness to this movie, which focuses on Hall as a football star getting courted by and visiting different colleges that want him. Downey plays his wacky best friend, but what struck me about the movie is how real it can be at times. Hall and Downey sell their characters like they're up for an award. Oh, it's also got Uma Thurman as Hall's girlfriend and Jennifer Tilly has a quick role. If you're an 80s movie fan, or just curious to see what Downey might have been like back in the late 80s give Johnny a look.

AUGUST RUSH (2007)

Sometimes you've got to add a movie for your lady to the ol' queue. I was pleasantly surprised with August Rush, not because the story is all the unique (you've seen the broad strokes before plenty of times), but because of it's view of music. The way they show the young boy experiencing music in everyday life, what it means to him and how he's eventually able to play it in his own unorthodox way really struck me. If you've got to watch a chick flick with your girl and you're a music fan, this is a good choice. Also, Keri Russell is in it and looking good.

KING OF KONG (2007)

If you haven't seen this documentary about the surprisingly competitive world of classic arcade high score competitions, please stop reading and watch it right now. This one makes it into my top 10 movies of 2007 (should a list ever actually exist). First off, it shows off a world I've never seen, which you know I love. Also, that world is full of deceit, greed, cowardice, heroics, villainy, triumph and defeat. The way the story is put together feels like a really well scripted feature film, though the events and the ups and downs are completely real. If you've ever liked anything I've written about on here, watch this movie.

SUPERMAN/DOOMSDAY (2007)

Seeing as how The Death and Return of Superman is the story that got me collecting comics in the first place (and how deeply and utterly I bought into the idea that any of the four subsequent people could be the real Superman), I was very excited when I heard a few years ago that DC/WB was going to make an animated movie about that very event, I was psyched. I figured it probably wouldn't have EVERYthing that made the comic so cool (Superman turning back to save a family instead of finishing Doomsday off, that very 90s JLA facing off against Doomsday, an eyes-swollen-shut Guy Gardner asking his teammate to aim his fist at Doomsday so he could blast it, not to mention the four other "Supermen"), but that it could offer up a cool new look on the idea. And it's definitely a different look. I would have preferred them either go straight with the established look and continuity of the Bruce Timm/Paul Dini-verse or have a drastically different art direction on the project as little things like Superman's cheek lines become distracting. I was also distracted by the different voices for these characters that I recognize from a specific other incarnation that looked very similar but sound completely different. Even at 77 minutes it felt kind of slow, but the fight scenes are pretty great (though they don't hold a candle to JLU). I still hold on to my dream of one day seeing an epic, animated incarnation of the Death and Return of Superman though. A boy can dream, right?

Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: Abe Sapien The Drowning & Nightwing Freefall

2008-12-19
8:02:27 pm

A few more trade reviews for your reading pleasure, BAM:

ABE SAPIEN: THE DROWNING VOL. 1 (Dark Horse)

Written by Mike Mignola

Drawn by Jason Shawn Alexander

Like I said the other day, I love the Hellboy-verse and a big part of the world is Abe Sapien. This trade collects the very first Abe mini which also recounts his first Hellboy-less mission back in 1981. Remember how I said that even stories like this that take place in the past refer back to other stories? Well, there's a quick look at Abe's origin, but again, you don't need to know anything about that to enjoy this story. It's really fun trying to work everything out because, while this story came out after the B.P.R.D. trade which explained Abe's past, The Drowning, chronologically speaking, comes before that. I'd like to see a huge Hellboy timeline laying everything out (maybe even with the order you're supposed to read them in).

I've got the same complaint about this trade as the B.P.R.D. Vol. 9, though, in that we don't get treated to a Mignola intro (though there still is the requisite sketchbook). And speaking of the art, Jason Shawn Alexander is awesome. I have no idea what else he's done, but the way he draws the creepy little ghost things with the writing all over them is pretty damn creepy. Well done Jason, someday I'd like to have you contribute to my Green Lantern or eventual horror movie themed sketchbook.

I guess I haven't really talked about the story, so here goes. Abe's on an island looking for a magic spike in a demon, but soon enough these short demon dudes show up and everyone on the island dies! So, it's up to Abe to save the day. I don't want to get too much more into it without giving stuff away, but it's another great Hellboy-verse story that any fan or novice can pick up and love.

NIGHTWING: FREEFALL (DC)

Written by Peter J. Tomasi

Drawn by Rags Morales & Don Kramer

I'm not the biggest Nightwing fan in the world, though I did enjoy most of the Devin Grayson and Chuck Dixon issues I read back in the day. Of course, things haven't been so great in recent memory. But no more! I've been loving former editor Tomasi's run on the book. Tomasi has boiled the character down to his essence, added his own spin and really cemented him in his post-One Year Later setting of New York City. In this book we get to see Dick taking up skydiving, getting a new job and home and trying to track down a villain who's stealing super-corpses. What Tomasi does that I love is, he shows how much a part of the DCU Nightwing really is (remember, he lead the JLA at one point when they were stuck in the past). Not only does Flash (Wally) stop by for a beer, interact with Batman and Robin and confab with Superman on a case, but he also ha the JSA help set up his new pad (they're not too far away, also being located in NYC).

I also have to admit I'm fond of Peter's use of the New York area. I'm not as familiar with the city itself, but I totally geeked out when Nightwing flew under the Bear Mountain Bridge, which I pass every day on my way to work. There's also a few other locations that I think I recognized (hey, I'm still learning). Aside from the locations, I appreciate the writer's creativity and logic when dealing with the superhero world. Nightwing flies around on a 'Wing wing (a kind of jetpack with wings), but he also asked Bruce Wayne to purchase various buildings placed strategically throughout NYC to give him plenty of places to get to if he needs to hid out. Brilliant! Does Batman even do that?

There are a few downsides though. There's a bit of wordiness int he first few pages of the trade explaining how much Dick loves skydiving. It's not poorly written by any means, but it's a little bit dense and I know it turned a few guys at the lunch table off from reading the book (though I convinced them too soon enough). I'm also not sure what's up with Rags' art. I much prefer Don Kramer's work in the book. It's a lot cleaner and crisper and I kind of hope he becomes the regular artist.

So, if you're even a cursory fan of Nightwing or Batman, you should definitely check this trade out as it, in my opinion, greatly represents the character as well as the logical standing he has in the DCU as one of the very first sidekicks who has literally grown up in the superhero world.

Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: B.P.R.D. 1946 & Catwoman Crime Pays

2008-12-17
1:37:54 am

Okay, time for another installment of trade post:

B.P.R.D. 1946 Volume 9 (Dark Horse)

Written by Mike Mignola & Joshua Dysart

Drawn by Paul Azaceta

I love me some Hellboy, you guys and, of course, that includes B.P.R.D. I didn't get into the Hellboy-verse until a few years ago, which was pretty good timing because I was able to read all the trades at Wizard and I was able to hop over the long gap when there weren't any new books and Hellboy was spending a few years under the ocean. I'm a big fan of how intricate the history is. There's elements in 1946 that resonate later on, though I can't point all of them out, because it's really hard to keep everything straight in my head. I do like to re-read the books every year or so, but I haven't done that in a while and even right after I do it's hard to remember.

This story follows Hellboy's adoptive pops Trevor Bruttenholm in one of his post-WWII adventures with a group of soldiers in a bombed out Germany. This one's got everything from vampires and werewolves to little girls in white dresses leading the Russian version of the B.P.R.D.

One of the great things about Dark Horse's Hellboy and B.P.R.D. trades is that you can pretty much pick any of them up, understand what's going on and enjoy a great story with a beginning, middle and end. Sure there are smaller elements that you might not pick up on, but might also drive you to check out other books. The other thing I love about these books is that they almost always have extras. Usually that includes an intro by Mignola along with a sketchbook with commentary in the back by Mike and whoever else is drawing the book. Unfortunately, this volume lacks the intro, which usually has Mignola explaining the genesis of the idea (where the mythology came from, that kind of thing). I really like those and was bummed to see there wasn't one. There was, however an Afterward by Dysart explaining his first 1946 meeting with Mignola and the sketchbook.

Oh, one more thing, I really dug Paul Azaceta's art. Like a lot of the non-Mignola or Dan Davis Hellboy/B.P.R.D. it took me a while to get used to his style (what can I say? I'm used to my superhero artists), but Azaceta seems like the perfect artist for this project. I look forward to seeing him on future B.P.R.D. projects almost as much as I'm looking forward to all the other Hellboy-verse books.

CATWOMAN: CRIME PAYS (DC)

Written by Will Pfeifer

Drawn by David Lopez

Catwoman's one of those characters that I have an on-again off-again relationship with. I actually had a subscription to the Jim Balent-drawn version for a year which I dug. I'd also grab whatever crossover issues came out. I completely missed out on Brubaker's relaunch and still want to go back and read it, but I have read a few of Pfeifer's trades, this being, I believe, the second to last of the current run (it's getting canceled right? I'm super behind).

Anyway, this story follows Selina's attempt to start a new life with her baby, then get rid of the baby and finally waking up in her empty apartment which then explodes, leaving Cats on the run in Gotham without her mask or whip. There's a character called The Thief who disappears due to Catwoman's involvement in the Salvation Run storyline which feature supervillains being sent to a crazy planet far far away.

I was actually pretty interested in the Thief storyline and seeing Catwoman stripped of everything and on her own, but it got cut off by the Suicide Squad getting the jump on her and sending her to the prison planet. I wasn't a big fan of the whole Salvation Run storyline, partly because it seemed a bit too close the Marvel's Negative Zone prison (did they even really flesh that out? All things Civil War are a blur thanks to the Civil War Room column), even though it's a pretty sound idea in theory. I don't even know how that mini-series ended and this trade doesn't offer up much insight. You get an issue of Cats wandering around from faction to faction only to end up with Luthor's crew, but then she ends up in this weird world where's practically SuperCat and runs everything. Once she's out, she presumably rejoins the Salvation Run storyline. I feel bad for Pfeifer because it doesn't feel like the Salvation Run stuff was very organic, probably more dropped on his plate. But he handled it well, though the story itself doesn't hold much consequence (even though it's pretty cool).

I've liked Pfeifer's writing in the past, his Aquaman Sub Diego stuff was rad and HERO is one of the coolest books from the past five or six years not yet collected (seriously, what's the deal with that? come on DC, where's my omnibus?!), but for whatever reason Catwoman hasn't really absorbed me yet, though I'll probably grab the next trade when it makes its way into the Wizard office. I also like David Lopez, he's a solid artist with a distinct style that makes him stand out. He seems equally adept at drawing grim and gritty street-level stuff as huge superhero group shots, which he also gets to do in this book.

I can't really recommend Crime Pays to non Catwoman readers. There's a lot going on in this book that's not only connected to past Catwoman continuity, but also a part of DC's last year that seems generally ignored (seriously, I read a ton of DC books, how did the villains get back?). Hopefully the next volume will wrap things up with The Thief (I'm seriously interested in that storyline, as well as what the heck Catwoman's supposed to do with all her stuff gone).

Oh, DO go on.

Trade Post: Swamp Thing, Fourth World, Scalped and Wonder Woman

2008-12-11
5:32:55 am

Doesn't look like things will be letting up any time soon and seeing as I've been falling asleep pretty early these days, I haven't been able to watch many movies. I will get around to the second part of that Thanksgiving weekend round-up though, because I want to get to my Squirm and Return to Sleepaway Camp (love that movie!). But, I've got some time now and I've been doing some trade reading so here we go.

SCALPED: DEAD MOTHERS (VOL. 3) (Vertigo/DC)

Written by Jason Aaron, Drawn by John Paul Leon, R.M. Guera & Davide Furno

Scalped is one of those books that I got to late in the game and have yet to actually catch up to the monthly issues, so I'm mostly grabbing the trades from the library as they come out. I dig the story for the most part, especially because it takes me to a world that I'm otherwise unfamiliar with in the form of an Native American reservation. Plus, there's all kinds of action and intrigue and some great names (I especially like our main character's Dashiell Bad Horse).

This particular trade focuses mainly on Dashiell working on a dead hooker case because he promised her son that he would while others investigate his own mother's death. There's obviously a lot of history between Dash and pretty much everyone else on the reservation and Aaron does a good job of giving just enough details as we read to keep us from getting completely lost but also not overwhelming the reader with needles detail. It's a harder balance to achieve than you might think. I also like how the villain of the story, Lincoln Red Crow (the guy that Dash, an undercover agent is trying to pin a murder on) is more interested in finding his mother's killer (they used to be lovers) than Dash himself. But even he's got problems of his own as various outside forces are trying to push and pull him and the casino he runs.

Really, that's what I like about the series as a whole: there's a lot going on, but not too much. Aaron's got a great sense of pacing and knows when to throw in some kick ass action scenes to balance all the other personal aspects of the book. I'm really curious to see where the series goes (they introduced a new character in the form of honest reservation cop Franklin Falls Down who seems like he'll have a lot of potential). I'm also looking forward to seeing how Aaron writes a long form story like this one. I'm not sure if there's an end point in mind that he's working towards, but I've only read a handful of his other books, some I liked, some I didn't, so I hope he ends this one with a bang.

SWAMP THING: LOVE AND DEATH (DC)

Written by Alan Moore, Drawn by Stephen Bissette, John Totleben & Shawn McManus

This is the second Swamp Thing trade collecting Alan Moore's run on the book that helped launch his career and shoot comics to whole new levels. To me, it's one of the last few epic comic runs that I haven't read yet, so I'm glad to finally get to it (though I don't have any more of the trades, so we'll see how that goes), which is too bad because I really dug this book and am curious to see where it goes.

Most of the trade follows the developing relationship between Swamp Thing and Abigale including her short-lived death. There are all kinds of horror elements bouncing around these pages, including Swamp Thing's visit to the afterlife which boasts guest spots by Etrigan, Phantom Stranger, Deadman and the Spectre. I really like how firmly Swamp Thing takes place in the DCU, proving that you can do Vertigo type stories in the same world that Superman flies around in (Sandman also did this on a few occasions).

I've also got to mention the semi sex scene between Swamp Thing and Abigale at the end of the last issue. It's not as gross as it might sound as Abby eats a fruit that Swamp Thing grows from his chest and then they go on a super-trippy ride that we become voyeurs to.

But I didn't like everything about this collection. There's a story called "Pog" which featured some tiny cartoon-like aliens landing on Earth hoping to find a new home to call their own. The story itself is interesting, but the problem is the dialogue. These aliens talk different, making up words that seem and sound an awful lot like English, but took me way too long to read as my brain kept trying to read the words I'm used to. Props to Alan for coming up with this new language, but it drove me a little crazy. Oh well. I'm probably going to ditch these trades in favor of the hardcovers they're putting out shortly (or is it out yet? I dunno).

DIANA PRINCE WONDER WOMAN VOL. 2 (DC)

Written & drawn by Mike Sekowsky

Man, I love these swinging Wonder Woman issues, each one is like a Roger Corman movie starring my favorite Star Spangled Amazon (missing her stars of course). For those of you who may not know, these Diana Prince tales follow Wonder Woman around after losing her powers and becoming a kung-fu boutique owner hanging out with blind martial arts master I Ching.

This volume not only collects Wonder Woman issues, but also a Superman's Girlfriend Lois Lane issue in which the constantly swooning Lois gets jealous of Superman spending so much time with Wonder Woman who appears to have regained her powers. There's even this hilarious scene where Wonder Woman takes Superman to a club and he starts dancing so intensely that he almost sets the floor on fire, after which he thinks to himself: "Did I goof! I can't forget myself for an instant! That's the trouble with being super! I can't relax like ordinary people!" I don't want to ruin the ending, but it's your average cheesy silver age stuff (which is pretty different than the rest of the trade, because this particular story was written by Robert Kanigher).

There's also an issue of Brave and the Bold with Wonder Woman and I Ching in another country (though I don't think they ever say which one) in which a big car race is happening. It just so happens that Bruce Wayne is also there racing along with some bad dude (his name's not really important). Well, the bad dude tries to kill Bruce because he's such a good driver so Bruce calls Gotham and gets his buddy Batman to come race for him. There's actual panels with Batman driving and his cape shooting out behind him flapping in the wind. I had literally just watched a Roger Corman movie with similar themes that I had just watched (Young Racers). Man, that movie was boring (hey, look, a movie review!), but this comic is great.

The rest of the trade involves the return of Dr. Cyber along with an adventure to Hong Kong and the addition of a new young lady who Diana saves from THEM (always written in big red block letters) and then gives a job in her boutique. I really love how the series bounces around from somewhat typical superhero stuff to all kinds of other genres without missing a beat. There's also something fun about seeing Wonder Woman mingling with Superman and Batman even back in the late 60s/early 70s. These are great books for anyone even remotely interested in Wonder Woman or movies and TV from that time period, these are the books for you.

JACK KIRBY'S FOURTH WORLD OMNIBUS (VOL. 4)

Written & drawn by Jack Kirby

I've had a very on again off again relationship with these New Gods Omnibi (Ominbuses?). Sometimes I'll get really into them but then I'll put the book down for weeks or even months at a time, which was the case with this, the last in series. The main reason is that, for reasons that are probably explained in the intro by Mark Evanier that I haven't read yet, Jack's books weren't doing so well and were canned, which means this book collects the last issues of The Forever People (which I liked a lot more than I thought I would), New Gods (my personal favorite of the ongoings) and then a bunch of Mr. Miracle issues (it lasted longer than the others), the new stories Jack created for the reprints and finally the Hunger Dogs graphic novel. The problem is that it's like watching a TV show that you know doesn't have a real ending, one that got canceled before it's time; all the pieces are good, but you're not sure about the pay off.

I read the FP and NG issues completely but ended up skimming the Mr. Miracle stuff as it wasn't really my favorite of the books. I did enjoy the final two stories though, because it felt like Jack was finally able to tell the story that he intended to tell years before. But, man, just think of how cool it would have been to see Jack get to do his thing for real. It's too bad because it feels like that's a huge missed opportunity, a story only preserved in the library of unwritten books. Oh well, I really like Hunger Dogs, especially the big huge collage spread that Jack did in the middle of it. Check it out and see how many Star Wars pictures you can find (I spotted the rear end of a Star Destroyer first).

Anyway, there's a pretty interested ending to Hunger Dogs that I'm not really sure how it was resolved later on when the New Gods re-entered the DCU. I did have a basic history explained to me by Rickey. He said that, basically, Jack created the New Gods, but after he left they just kind of sat around and no one used them until the Super Powers cartoon came along and was looking for a villain. They dug up Darkseid and he's been a dominating force of evil in the DCU ever since. For someone who's been reading comics since the early 90s, it's pretty crazy to think that there was a time when Darkseid and the rest of the New Gods weren't a big deal.

And finally, if you're like I was when I first started reading these books and think that these older stories don't really offer up much to a modern, more sophisticated reader, give them a try. Sean Collins helped me realize what I liked about these stories even when I wasn't quite sure if I actually liked them. The true art isn't in the words (the dialogue boxes are pretty easily skipped for the most part in my opinion), but in the art and the emotions and gut punches that Kirby is able to convey with his trademark pencils. Plus, if you can't find a certain amount of giddy joy in tracing the lines of a Kirby machine, I feel bad for you.

Okay, that's it for now. Hopefully I'll get another post in this week, but I wouldn't hold my breath if I were you (seriously, that'd be crazy).

Oh, DO go on.

Fellows With Rings Part 1

2008-10-20
2:36:08 pm

Not seeing The Lord of the Rings has turned into the new "not seeing Star Wars" sense of shock and awe amongst the geek community. Up until Saturday, I had never seen the first of Peter Jackson's epic fantasy adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkein's Lord of the Rings books. I had actually seen the second one in college with some friends on a whim. I found it pretty boring.

When I was a kid all my friends read The Hobbit and the Rings books. I tried reading The Hobbit in fifth grade or so and found it so boring that I couldn't get through it. I've never been much a fan of fantasy literature or movies, with a few exceptions here and there. So when Jackson's first LOTR flick came out, I just didn't care. But Em did and she's been trying to get me to watch the DVDs of which she has all three (the regular ones, not the super-nerdy editions, thank goodness).

It was pretty good. I didn't fall in love with it or anything, but the story's compelling and the performances are great. I'm impressed with the cast to be honest. I mean, they got Leatherface: TCM3's Viggo Mortensen for goodness sake. But seriously, they did a great job.

What didn't impress me, though were the CGI special effects. Some, like Ballroq were really cool, but others just didn't look right. I know it's hard to do things like a giant squid monster as a practical effect, but it's no impossible, especially when considering how much thought and effort Jackson put into things like the hobbit feet (which rarely show up on screen) and the shire (which he apparently built a year before shooting to get the right feel).

I'm not going to get into a rehash of the plot, but it was engaging although long. And I hate when people complain about the length of a movie (Dark Knight for instance), but there did seem to be a good amount of padding (read: walking). I'm not really looking forward to watching the second movie because I remember a LOT of walking. Even the trees walk! Em even offered to skip it, but I'm nothing if not thorough, so we'll see how this goes.

As it stands, I've got to agree with Randall from Clerks 2 about Star Wars being the better trilogy, but we'll see how things go. (SPOILER: there's no way I'm going to say LOTR is better than SW.)

Oh, DO go on.