Thoughtcrime Inc.

Reboots suck.

2012-01-31T23:36:00.002-05:00

It was this or a picture of Enzo.

I've talked about this a long time ago,about respecting the rules of the franchise's universe you're workingin. Whether it be sparkling vampires or not understanding that robotscan have brothers, you always need to read up a bit and learn alittle bit about the story you're working on. It never hurts to atleast acknowledge that you're familiar with what came before, even ifyou're not fond of it... Because that way, you avoid reboots.Honestly, I am a huge opponent of reboots. In fact, I often find areboot to be the lazy coward's way out of a complex problem. When DCcomics relaunched last September, like a lot of people, I wasn't toohot about it. I mean, while there are some books I absolutely love,like Aquaman. (And I gotta admit, I've developed a bit of guiltypleasure for 'My Greatest Adventures') But I'm not too sure if it wasworth losing a married Lois and Clark, as well as Stephanie Brown'swell deserved graduation to the pointy eared cowl.

He's basically be the same character from
TF: Animated, but I have to admit, I'm
very glad he returned in TF: Prime.

One of the biggest problems I believethat hurts franchises like you wouldn't believe is the constantrebooting. Transformers actually suffers from this to a degree thatthe fans probably don't realize. Because we know any time now, areboot WILL happen, it makes it really hard to become emotionallyattached to any version of a story. One of the reasons the GenerationOne universe was so prominent for Transformers Fans is because it wasso long lived. That universe was ongoing from 1984 all the way until2000. Since then, there's been three universe reboots with thatfranchise. (Robots in Disguise, the Unicron Trilogy, and Animated.Only the Movie and Aligned universe are still intact... For now.) Andbecause of this, if we mention Bulkhead, we now have to specify WHICHBulkhead we're talking about. And the fact that the team line-up ofthe Autobots from Animated to Prime are almost virtually identical,outside of swapping out a brooding ninja badboy motorcycle with abrooding ninja badgirl motorcycle, I'm not sure if it makes it betteror worse. And it's not just the toy robots. We have a new Spider-Manmovie coming out this summer, which is in turn a reboot, from afranchise that didn't really NEED a reboot. Whether you likedSpider-Man 3 or not, other than Venom, nothing was so screwed up thata reboot was necessary. I mean, unless you just laid a 'Batman andRobin' onto the public, a reboot should be the absolute last resort.And even then, I'm not too sure a reboot was needed. (I'm glad theydid it, but you could have worked around it.)

If Frank can overcome
THIS, then everyone
else has no excuse.

And that's one of the problems I'venoticed with out entertainment culture. We're too eager to scrap whatcame before and start over again. It's almost like if we have one badstory in the series, we think the entire thing is tainted, and needsto be “re-done right” which is just crazy. If James Bond scrappedthe entire series every time he had a crappy movie... Hell, we wouldhave never gotten out of the Roger Moore films. Part of a longestablished history of a franchise is the bad crap too. ThePunisher's had some great stories told over the years by Chuck Dixon,Mike Baron, and Garth Ennis. He's also had some horribly stupidpieces of crap that you cannot believe got approved, such as'Punisher dies and becomes a vigilante angel' (which just wears off),and 'Punisher gets a surgery to make him a black man' (which wearsoff in three issues), and 'Punisher gets turned into a Frankensteinmonster' (which he's magically healed from.) Every franchise that'sworth a crap has these stories. For every 'Wrath of Khan', there's a'Final Frontier'. We're human. No matter how good people like tothink we can be, eventually, we all tell an Episode II. Unless youhave severely screwed things up so badly that you can't even ignoreit like Highlander 2, the answer is never to restart it over. I'm afirm believer in the theory of “Make that piece of shit shine.”

If you tell a crappy story, justcounter it with a good one. And that's how you do it. Some peoplebelieve it's just easier to just trash it or start over again, andwhile it's true it's easier... It's not better. Because no one reallylikes sitting through the origin story over and over again. Andunless you have screwed things up to a level of giving Superman abastard child and making him a deadbeat father, it really is betterto just move on and tell a better story. 2008's Hulk movie was one ofthe best ways I've seen this done. It didn't contradict the 2003movie and still served as a sequel to it, but at the same time, itdidn't dwell on it either, making it a decent movie that stood alone.Just don't dwell on the garbage... Move on and tell better. I thinkit's why the current issues of the Transformers comics are soamazing. Yes, it's following up on a massive cataclysm that came atthe conclusion of a rather lackluster run of stories, but they're notdwelling upon it. They're just telling good stories. They even madeDrift cool. (Imagine my surprise at that!) Yeah, that almost two anda half year run of lukewarm stories still exists, but it's in thepast now, and if they had rebooted the universe again, we wouldn'thave the stories we got now. It's like the old phrase of “why isthere evil?”

“Why are there bad stories?” So wecan appreciate the good ones.

Caught up and ready.

2012-01-25T22:41:00.002-05:00

Lord, it's been a long couple of weeks...

Long story short, if you remember thatnew job I started... Well, they've been pushing to get my immediatetraiing out of the way as soon as possible. So I've been workingschedule shifts all over the place, third shift one day, followed byfirst shift the second, and some days, both first and third shift inthe same day. My legs have murdering me like a crazy Victorian ladywith a hatchet. The good news to that is that I've lost some weightbecause of it. Bad news is that I have been able to do jack shit asfar as productivity goes for this last few weeks. I still got onemore day or training this Saturday, which is a dual shift day, butafter that... It'll stabilize. (Hey, I'm still just happy to beworking.) It didn't help that last week, my modem burnt out and Irealized just how much of my life was tied into the internet, which Imust admit... Disturbed me a touch. Realizing how much simple littlethings, like checking the web for my bank account status, movie timesand info, news, weather, and even silly flash games. (And that's noteven getting into the big things like reading webcomics, checkingemail, forums and good old fashioned pornography.) Obviously, asyou're reading this now, we got a new modem... But the fact it wentout right as I was starting to work those hectic and overwhelmingwork schedules... It's an understatement to say that I was ratherimpatient and very irritable during that time.

Now to be bluntly honest, I haven't hada real chance to break loose and do half the crap I've been wantingto do for the last few months due to the job and commissions. I mean,my friend Jen got me a new computer I haven't had a lot ofopportunities to get really experimental with, and my friend Jamesgot me these really neat 'crow quill' like pens, I've been reallydying to break out and try new things with. But with the completionof that, I've able to actually get to work on comic book work,finally. It seems like I've been talking about it forever, but it'sbeen a road with quite a few obstacles that's now passed. The commission above was the last of the commissions I had to get taken care of. I've been playing a bit with coloring techniques.

A few weeks ago, I read a reallyfascinating article (that, of course, I cannot find the link to)about market branding for comic creators. Now, even during theproduction of Shadowgirls, these were ideas I had in mind to do, andit was really neat to see that other people had the same ideas andimplemented them with success. So after reviewing everything, BlackBanshee, which I had been planning on doing next... Has been shelvedfor the time being, so I can focus 100% on Firecracker. I know thekind of comic I want to produce, and I got a feeling I know the kindof comic the people reading this blog wants to read.

I've been giving a lot of thought aboutthis, for well over a year now. (Ask my friend Silphy. She can verifythis.) When to comes to comics, there's a certain kind of comic I'vebeen wanting to read again for years. There's been a few of theseover the years, but far too often, they're the exception instead ofthe rule. (I've talked about the Captain America: Fighting Avengercomic, as well as Batman: Mad Love.) Pasty Walker: Hellcat isanother, almost any of the 2002-on-up Power Pack miniseries, as wellas the Marvel Adventures: Avengers comic. (Seriously, there was anissue where all the Avengers turned into M.O.D.O.Ks. It was freakin'awesome.) But a large majority of the books tend to be overlydramatic and needlessly dark and depressing books that are supposedto invoke the feelings of gothic noir, despite the fact it's freakin'people in tights. It shouldn't be silly and insulting, but it shouldbe freakin' fun. That's the comics I want to do and that's the comicsI'm going to do. So, now that I'm caught up with commissions andoutside obligations, I plan to begin major production, right now. Andsince there's only like seventy or so people reading this blog,you're going to be privy to inside character concepts, andsemi-spoilers about what to expect from Firecracker. So far, whatI've written, I'm happy with, and I hope I can excite you all withwhat I got in mind.

(By the way, the Transformers Mosaicsare still happening. Just there's no rush on those.)

Transformers: Mosaics... At least the ones I did.

2012-01-11T01:34:00.001-05:00

Well, I thought I'd talk a bit about myupcoming plans a bit. I've mentioned I've been doing some scripting,and I am. But I still want to keep drawing while I'm working thescript out. (I'm a lot less polished of a writer than you may think.)In the meanwhile, I plan to do a few more Transformers: Mosaics. Ifyou're not familiar with Mosaics, it's really simple. They're onepage fancomics. There's a lot of fan artists and writers in theTransformers fanbase, and quite frankly... This is a really wonderfuladdition to the fanbase, allowing for some real true creativity, notto mention, discovering of some amazing new talent that people aren'teven aware of... Yet. Some have been very good. (Aaaaand somehave been EXTREMELY bad. Goes with the territory of fanfiction, I suppose.) You can read the archives here.

I've done a couple of these in pastyears. None recently, at least not since I moved back up to Michiganin '08, but now I planning on doing a few more. I have a few stories I'd like totell, and since they're just one page long... Why not? (Not tomention, it keeps me drawing, and that's something I need to keepdoing.) So I thought I'd post the three Mosaic's I've done. The firsttwo are entirely done by me, but the last one I only just colored.Thing to remember though is that they are fan works, so a lot of themare not all too accessible by the average reader. So apologies aheadof time for it. (By the way, with the future comic scripts, likeFirecracker and Black Banshee, this is something I'm trying to avoiddoing.)

The first one was done around earlyWinter of '08, I think? (Can't have been sooner.) It was a storyinvolving the thoughts behind Megatron of the Beast Era of shows.(That would be the 90's Beast Wars and Beast Machines. He's not thesame Megatron that's popularly known in Generation One or themovies.) One of the issues brought up by the fandom at the time wasthat it was never relly explained why Megatron went from arevolutionary terrorist to a guy who basically imprisoned the sparksof the entire population and repopulated the planet with mindlessautomatons he controlled. I thought it might be an interestingchallenge to explain that. Now one of the problems that occurred wasthat this Megatron had a habit of talking in long rambling andsomewhat interesting Machiavellian speeches... And I kinda overdidthe wordiness and made a few misuses of tense. The script probablycould have used another pass to tighten up the words. However, I didlike the art in this one, especially the coloring in the first panel. I was actually rather proud of myself for using the BM Megatron toy as a reference as opposed to the cartoon show or the Transmetal 2 Megatron toy. (I actually don't mind the toy, despite it's flaws.)

This second one was done around lateSummer of '08. Occasionally with Transformers, Hasbro (the companythat makes the toys) will occasionally lose the rights to a name.Either they'll have to add a qualifier to the name (such as 'TurboTracks' or 'Autobot Jazz') and other times they'll have tocall them something else all together. (Such as Trailbreaker nowbeing 'Trailcutter' and Outback having to go by the name 'Fallback'.)Generally this sucks, but what can you do? Other than Hot Rod,Bluestreak to Silverstreak was probably the most well known exampleof the name changing. And I thought that considering Bluestreak'sirrational and talkative nature, it might be kinda fun to explain whyhe changed his name. This one was really well-received, which isfunny because it's wordier than the first one... But I think it's gotmore to do with the fact it's an exchange of dialogues as opposed toan internal monologue. Also, the sheer amounts of in-jokes probablyhelped. And I'll be honest... I liked how I colored it, but I thoughtmy lineart was especially weak in this. It was also the last majorTransformers comic I personally drew. I was happy to draw Smokescreen as his Alternators toy for this one, as opposed to his traditional look... I always thought it was a better looking toy. (And for those curious, Hasbro regained the rights to the name Bluestreak again.)

I wanted to do another one, but obligations to Shadowgirls understandably prevented that. But during this time I did a shitload of them for Martin Fisher where I just lettered. You can find them in thelink above. By the way, as a side note, I'm currently lettering acomic that he and Mark Miller wrote called Luna: Order of theWerewolf. It's in comic stores now. (A lot of people don't realize but I actually do quite a bit of lettering.) However, one of the Mosaics Icolored last summer. It was written by Fisher and drawn by Jeremy Tiongson... Ionly colored it, but the combination of the Jeremy's lineart and mycolors... I think it turned out exceptionally beautiful. I was reallyproud how I did the lighting effects in this one. And the story, it's really accessible so there isn't much you need to know... It's Drag Strip, and he's adick.

So yeah, while I'm writing Firecracker,I got a few of these short stories written out. Like I mentionedbefore with Robots in Disguise, I'm really feeling nostalgic lately,and I'd like to revisit some old stomping grounds. Even if it is justfor a short little visit...

...Because how else are you going tofind out why Megatron hasn't killed Starscream yet?

Artwork Evolution 2000-2011

2012-01-07T21:33:00.000-05:00

I did this Improvement Meme on my DeviantArt account toward the end of 2009, showing my art from 2000-2009. I would have gone back to the earlier years, but unfortunately. most of the artwork I had from back then has been scattered tot he winds from the various uprootings and moves across states. Not to mention they were drawn before I had my first computer in fall of 1999, so I didn't end up scanning in a lot of my old artwork. (And the stuff I do have, I'll be honest, I don't exactly remember what year it's from.) So with the new year upon us, I thought it might be a bit fun to update it with the last two years, just for comparison's sake.

...So hope you enjoy it.

Open it in a new window
to get the full size.

Stupid-Awesome: Alien vs Predator

2012-01-01T22:44:00.003-05:00

Okay,let's remind everyone of the playing field here. I am fond of stupidfucking movies. If you give me the option of watching theLord of the Rings trilogy orwatching an all night marathon of shitty Mega-Shark movies from theAsylum... I'm gonna be watching me some shark attacks. I love theHammer Dracula movies, I think John Carpenter's Pre- 'TheyLive' are some of the greatestbits of motion picture cinema ever made and you all know what Ithought of the Michael Bay Transformersmovie. But while I love stupid-awesome films, it doesn't mean Idon't like watching high quality movies. I loved Inception,I'm looking so forward to the Hobbit movies and the recent trailerfor Prometheus byRidley Scott really has me excited. But while I love highquality films, I also refuse to coddle to stupid crap that THINKSit's more than what it is. Avatar,that while pretty to look at, had a plot that made Revengeof the Fallen seem likemotherfucking Casablanca.At least Michael Bay knewhe was making a silly movie about toy robots and explosions. And thisis a serious problem with a lot of movies. (Also comics, books, videogames and music as well.) They forget that these things are supposedto be fun as well. It's good to have yourself some actualintellectual entertainment once in a while, but enjoying nothing but“high caliber art” turns you into one of those cheese and wineconsuming cockbites, who thinks there should be political meaningbehind everything.

I'mperfectly capable of enjoying stupid shit for what it is, andconsidering the dollar return for movies like the Bay-Former films,Clash of the Titans, and the like... I think most people are as well.But in order for that to happen, the movie needs to be honestwith what kind of movie it is. That's what it comes down to, BEINGHONEST. And fartoo often, especially in the 'nerd circle' we tend to let ournostalgic memories dictate our entertainment. We tend to get pissedoff when a movie isn't what we want it to be... As opposed to what itis. And no movie is this more true for, than our topic of today,2004's Alien vs Predator.

This was actually a
pretty cool book.

Nowwhen this movie came out, a lot of people were really harsh on it,and honestly, I just don't know why. The movie is stupid, but it'sright there in the title. Alien VERSUSPredator. That's right up there with Freddy Vs. Jason,Godzilla vs King Kongand Dracula vs. Frankenstein.If the word “versus” is in the title, if you are expectinganything more than stupid monster fighting, then I'm sorry... Thewine and cheese dishes are over there next to the complementarysticks... They're for your butt. This was a concept that originatedfrom a 1980's Dark Horse comic book. And if you remember... The 1980swasn't exactly known for being real deep. Some of the commoncomplaints I hear was that because it was rated PG-13, as opposed toR, it was tamed down. Well, they commonly air the original six movieson TV all the time, and other than language, it's almost entirelyuncut. Gore that was 'R-Rated' back in the 80s now is rather tame andyou can get away with it during daytime hours. Language? Okay, sothey didn't say the word “fuck”. Big whoop. Oh yeah... Thecomplaint mentioned on Wikipedia: “Wooden Acting and CardboardCharacters”

Because you know... There was NOTHING flawed
and stupid in Aliens before AvP, amirite?

Wait... Did... Did you SEE last batch of movies made since 1987?Predator 2 was nothingmore than an overly gory cop movie with bad acting. (Which was thelast Predator movie they made, almost fifteen years prior.) Otherthan select few, there was almost no one likable in Alien 3(though I'm still highly fond of the movie, and I'll get to thatlater), Alien Resurrection was hilarious for when the cast of Fireflyshows up and we all know what I think of THAT show. It was also theonly two Alien and Predator movie movie I currently do not own and donot wish to own. So 17 years of crap, and suddenly people areconcerned for the franchise? Was there EVER a franchise in the firstplace? Seriously, all the AvP movies since 1987's Predator... Havesucked. They are fucking stupid. (Once again, I would like to defendAlien 3, but that'sfor another time.) At least Alien vs. Predator pretty much admitsit's a hokey monster movie.

Imean, I get it. Some people have a real bad one for director PaulW.S. Anderson. They think he makes nothing but lowest commondenominator movies, and that dude from Ain't it Cool Newsseems to really have it out for him. Really, the guy to date, is theonly person to make a few commercially successful video game movie.Mortal Kombat was abig success, as was Resident Evil.I think Event Horizonis an extremely underrated movie. Sure Soldierand Death Race sucked.But name me one director who's never made a bad movie in their life,and I'll show you an egotistical delusionary. (Stanley Kubrick may bethe only exception.) Sure, Paul W.S. Anderson doesn't make highart... But where has he ever gone the Uwe Boll route and claimed hedid? You listen to the commentary, and there is zero pretentiousnessin his voice. But hey, he gets to bone Milla Jovovich on aregular basis... So he must be doing somethingright.

I'd say I used to fantasize about her, but
that would imply that I had stopped.

Lookat the plot for a second: A small team of explorers go to investigatea pyramid which has been discovered under the ice of Antarctica. Asthey're exploring, they discover that there are monsters there, andother monsters have shown up to fight them. This is totally a 1950'smonster movie, straight out of 'The Thing from AnotherWorld' mold. (By the way, theThing Prequel will be forthcoming here when it's released to DVD.)Except in this movie's case, the monsters were the Aliens andPredators. The whole set up was similar to a 1950's monster movie,taking it's time to slowly build up the scenario. The characters werea bit corny, but no more than any other Alien film. It's always greatto see Lance Henriksen in anything. (I loved the 1990's seriesMillennium, justbecause of him.)

All the little touches they added in there, fromWeyland's “knife trick” with the pen to how the credits were amerger of the title credits from both Alien and Predator. It wasobvious that Anderson was a big ass fan of the movies. There was a lot ofcreative film work with this one. They actually made it lookAntarctica, and they made a scene in Mexico look like Mexico, andthey had a rather creative transforming pyramid, which was reallyutterly cool looking. And it all looked expensive and detailed...When in actuality, all of it was filmed in Prague in summertime, fora fraction of the costs. I really applaud that bit of creativefilming. The special effects were decent. They weren't breaking newgrounds, because seriously... Making a shiny black armor-like bugmonster is pretty standard these days in CGI. The scene of the Alienand the Predator beating the shit out of each other was fun to watch.The story's faithful, and doesn't contradict anything established. Itdoesn't spit on established lore, like Alien Resurrectiondid. But we're nerds. If it's not exactly how we wanted it, we get pissed too easily. (Hey, in case you think I'm pointing fingers, I'm just as guilty of that as anyone. Perhaps even more.)

Ifthey had called this movie “Dark Ice” or just some other sillytypical title... No one would care. It's just that it was part of thesilly franchise, “how dare they ruin Aliens and Predator!” Thefranchise was already ruined. It's not like this movie cost a wholehell of a lot of money, and it made three times it's money back. Fora brief period of time, it renewed interest in the franchises... Thatwas until the horrible sequel came a few years later. No really, thesequel?

Throat-fucking pregnant women... Jesus. Christ.

Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem?It's on my list of one of the worst movies of all time. It is awful.It's one of the few moviesI almost walked out of. (And usually if I pay for a movie, I'll sitthrough it.) And what's hilarious about it, is that it took greatpains to include all the stuff that the “real fans” werecomplaining was missing from the first film... Excessive violence andgore, vulgarity, darker story, ect. And in their attempt to includeall of this, they made a horrible piece of shit, which convinced me that the fans should almost never be listened. How bad was it? It'sthe OTHER Alien and Predator movie I currently do not own and do notwish to own. (BTW, for the record, I have not yet seen Predators,though I plan to someday.)

IsAlienvs. Predatora perfect movie? Far, far from it. But like I've said before aboutother movies, it's bluntly honest about the kind of movie it is.Where the first Alien film was a claustrophobic horror movie, thesecond was an action film and the first Predator movie was an Arnoldmovie... This is a modern day 1950's monster movie. In short... It'snot a bad movie. It's a fun little romp. In fact, out of the entireAlien franchise, I would say it's the 3^rdbest. It doesn't run too long, it's fun and honestly... Harmless. (Unlike the sequel.)

Stooge Rating:
SHEMP

Comic Creators for Freedom

2011-12-29T16:58:00.000-05:00

Every year, I contribute a bit for theComic Creators for Freedom. It's a group of comic book creatorsvolunteering their help in raising awareness and funds for endinghuman trafficking across the globe. It's still a pretty big problem,and it's not just in other far away third world countries, whereindoor plumbing is a luxury, but it even happens here in NorthAmerica. (There are some stories out there that are prettydisturbing.) So essentially, we all pitch in our artwork to help outwith raising funds to donate to safe houses for the victims of thesedisturbing atrocities. If you head to their homepage here, it'llexplain all the details. So if you got a few bucks to spare thisseason and feel like helping a pretty good cause... Every little bithelps.

The theme this year is “snowballfight” and my contribution this year is Firecracker's MaricaKitamer. Yeah, her comic is still a year away from debuting, but Ithink she'll be a fitting role model. So she got drawn. (I could havedone Black Banshee's Stephanie, but that comic's going be abit dark. I'd rather keep with the more upbeat character for this.)

I start my first day of work tomorrowand I'm a bit excited. I'm sure I'll be exhausted as hell comeSaturday morning, but hey, I've been living a sedentary lifestyle forthe last few years, so this will be anything but a bad thing.

Have a Happy New Years folks, and I'mlooking forward to a productive 2012. (Barring any Mayanpredictions.)

Black Banshee: Rejected Page coloring walkthrough

2011-12-28T00:20:00.001-05:00

I've been writing some pages here, and I decided to scrap the beginning, as I thought it might be a little too "fanservicey". Which as you know, I have no issue with fanservice, as long as there's a time and place for it all. And this wasn't the time or place for it. First introduction to the character should have a real punch to it, and the scene was someone unneeded... So it got cut.

However, I did like the layout I gave to the second page, and since I was bored and waiting for dinner, and 'A Christmas Story' had been playing in a non-stop loop all day, I thought I'd color it. And since I just found out how to make animated gifs in Photoshop CS5, I thought I' make one of a "step by step" progress of the coloring. (Though it was mostly an afterthought. If I had given it more forethought, it would be a lot less jarring. Maybe for the future I'll remember this.)

This is the main character for the Black Banshee comic I mentioned, named Stephanie, granddaughter and inheritor of the titular legacy of the "Black Banshee". I'll explain more of the story as time goes on, but for now... Who is she talking to? Well, I'll let you decide, since that part was cut. :P

I hope you like it. You'll be seeing more of her soon.

The color walkthrough is under the jump.

The colors here are pretty much the same way I had done them in Shadowgirls, except the difference here is that since I'm working with a newer and more powerful computer, as well as a newer Photoshop, I don't have to make concessions anymore for file sizes and I can just plow straight on through with the best art I can try and produce. And with some more time to do it in, I'm able to be a lot more confident in my color choices and brush strokes.

(By the way, the symbol on her book? Big huge hint for what's to come in future stories.)

Merry Christmas. Let's build a universe.

2011-12-22T04:00:00.000-05:00

I mentioned last time about the newjob. Of course I still got to finish up some orientation for it all,and they can't schedule me for it until after they get theinformation from the background checks back... And the holidays arehere, so you just know that threw a monkey wrench into it all. Butit's not like they're going to find anything suspicious. Outside oftelling off one of my professors in art school, I've lived a prettyboring life for the last decade or so. So it just means I get to havea peaceful Christmas before rejoining the workforce.

Last time I also mentioned that I wouldbe talking a bit about the new projects. Well, it's still on thedrawing board a bit, but I'll just come out and talk about it all.For the last few years, I've had some story ideas, and it's really along term plan I've been wanting to do. You've might have noticedover the last few months, I have been mentioning various projectshere and there, including something called Firecracker andanother project called the Black Banshee? Here's the deal.There's a certain kind of stories I've been wanting to tell for thelast few years, and in order to tell those stories... I need toestablish a bigger universe. So the comic I'm going to be working onisn't just a comic, it's a series of comics. All with finite endings.(Perfect for preventing creative burnout and for later collectionsinto trade paperbacks!) Some will be longer, graphic novel type ofstories, and some will be short stories. Some will be in black andwhite, and some will be in full color. Some will be all ages storiesand some will be for mature readers. Some I will try to work with other artists on, and some I might work with other writers on. Somewill just be posted here, as they're just short little tales, andsome will be posted on their own webcomic site, as they're muchlonger. But in the end, they all share the one unifying element:They're all in the same universe.

Now you may be wondering if thefore-mentioned Firecracker project is the first comic on deck. It'snot. I know I've talked about it, but it's going to be a centralseries. (Much like how in the DC Animated Universe, though Batman:The Animated Series was first, it was the Superman series that reallyset the foundation for the universe and the stories to come.) It'scoming, but I need to lay some foundation work for it all first. Andthe first brick laying for this universe began with this story I didfor Shadowgirls last Spring: 'I am Providence'. The next storythat's being worked on right now is a graphic novella (The samelength of pages as the Mad Love story I was lauding earlier.Coincidence?) called the Black Banshee. Which is a love letterto Golden Age movies and films, as a young woman (see the banner atthe top of the blog) finds herself inheriting a house with amysterious legacy which gives her the keys to the secret history ofthe 20^th century. Somewhere around this time, before orafter that, I plan to do a slew of shorts, similar to the old earlySilver Age Anthology comics, like Vault of Horror, Weird Fantasyand Planet Comics. These will most likely be all B&Wstories. But before I even put the comic out there to be read, I wantthe ENTIRE STORY COMPLETED. So before I make a webpage for BlackBanshee, I need to have the entire story drawn and coloredfirst.There will not be a set schedule, until the book is complete.I'm doing the novelist approach. I'm not going to put a story out until it's complete and I want to take my time and makethese comics truly the best comics I can make. This is a multi-yearplan I got here. I'm keeping it open, honest and flexible. But like Isaid, it's all in the same universe. (For those asking aboutShadowgirls being part of this, I can give you a pretty goodguarantee that a certain black hair, blue eyed girl with a thing forcollars will pop up in time here.)

So there we go. So that's the tentativeplans for 2012. I hope you're interested, and if you have any questionsat all, just ask, and I'll answer 'em.

Happy Holidays.

Transformers: Robots in Disguise

2011-12-17T03:25:00.001-05:00

After a long time looking I've finallyfound employment, and I'll be working again. This makes me extremelyhappy. Now it'll be a third shift job. I've worked that before andconsidering the hours I usually keep, it shouldn't be too much of astruggle to work these hours. Last time I worked them though wasabout ten years ago, when I was a copy jockey at Kinko's, now FedExKinko's. (Of course the good news is now that I'll be working, I canfinally begin production on comic pages again!) Now that I'll beworking these hours again, it's made me start feeling nostalgic aboutthe last time I worked these hours. Like I said, it was back in2001-2002, and it was interesting times. 9/11 hadn't happened yet,the economy hadn't started slipping into the crapper yet, I was 25and weight about 50 pounds less, had a cute Australian girlfriend(who I'm still friends with), and generally, life was looking up.(Oddly enough, I complained about a lot of stupid crap back then, butweren't we all morons when we were younger?) Creatively speaking, Ifelt a lot of enthusiasm toward my art. (This enthusiasm wasundeserved, as I thought I was king shit, but that's only because Iwas in a bubble.) Webcomics weren't yet a major force in the comicindustry, comics like PvP, Penny Arcade and Megatokyo were notexactly commonly known names. And during that time I was heavily partof the Transformers Web Community, going by the name 'Machina'. (Youwill not believe how much grief I got from people thinking I was agirl!) You may have wondered just why I have such an undying love forthe Transformers? Well, part of it was, as I mentioned before,because I was part of Generation One's target audience and the connection I had with it and my mom. And the other part was becauseof this period of my life. During this time period I made an absurdamount of friends online, some who I am still friends with to thisday. And a lot of these friends I made through Transformers. (BeastWars and Beast Machines to be exact.)

During that time, we all had ahankering for a return of the Generation One characters. It seemssilly now, considering how hard it is to find a Transformer thatdoesn't turn into a GM product, but during that time... the toysdidn't turn into vehicles, they ALL turned into beasts. (Hence thenames of the shows.) And the Beast Era toys were really articulated,detailed and were rather awesome. But we all wanted to see thateffort put into a robot that turned into a car. I know how strangethat sounds, but there was a time this seemed like a pipe-dream. Andwhen we finally got vehicle Transformers again, after a hiatus ofover half a decade, they were the Vehicons from Beast Machines. Andfor those that do not know, the Vehicons tended to be rather sci-filike in their vehicle mode and had rather ugly robot modes. But thatwas the theme of the show, that the mechanical beings were themonsters of the show. Beast Machines was a little too tree-huggy fora lot of people. And actually overly dark. I mean, until the recentmovies, it was probably the darkest Transformers had ever been. Itwas actually kinda depressing.) We weren't thrilled, but we took it,as it was all we had.

And then it happened.

And happened it did!

The rumors started to trickle in. InJapan, Takara was producing a show called 'Car Robots' and the toyswere realistic returns to vehicular greatness. During this time, it'shard to explain. But to say that we flipped our shit was a majorunderstatement that I cannot put into words. Then the fan siteTFW2005.com started hosting videos of the show from Japan. They werenot dubbed or even subtitled. We were just watching this show oncrappy streaming video online, sometimes in Real Video Players.(Remember those?) We didn't know what the hell was going on. Wedidn't care! Me and my friend James we would take excursions acrossstate to a Japanese import store, just to buy these stupid toys. Andwe were excited. We were men in our twenties who felt like littlekids again! Then Hasbro announced they were bringing the show and thetoyline over as 'Transformers: Robots in Disguise'. And while somepeople were pissed off because (like us) they had gone out and boughtall the toys already... The majority of people were happy, becausethis meant that they could experience it like we have.

And there was quite a bit to like aboutthis new series. Optimus Prime (not Primal but PRIME) was back, andthis time a fire truck. (Interesting side note? Everytime OptimusPrime turns into a fire truck, his toy is awesome.) Several new andawesome characters were introduced too, including three new Autobotcharacters by the names of Side Burn, who had this comical anddisturbing fetish for red cars (I guess like some people like redheads), X-Brawn who spoke with a southern drawl (as a southern boymyself, I will always have an appreciation for those), and Prowlwho's a total stick in the mud. (His second toy is actually myfavorite TF toy of all time!) Sky-Byte, a Predacon who loved poetryand eve had his own rhymes. And the Predacon Trio, who are the badguy equivalents of the Three Stooges. The big addition to it all wasa bad ass character by the name of Scourge, who set the stage forblack repaints of Optimus Prime. (Usually called Nemesis Prime.) Itjust had that perfect blend of camp and robot love to make it allwork. And it was looking like we were seeing a return of the oldglory days of Transformers for a new generation!

Well, things didn't QUITE work out likethat. What a lot of people didn't know was that the show was made forlittle kids... And when I say little kids I mean, like the JohnnyTest audience, if not skewing younger. So a lot of viewers had areal bad-on toward the show because they felt it let them down. Somepeople were pissed off that we went from the decent and seriouswriting of Beast Machines to this campy show. (Interesting sidenote:The Stateside dubbers actually 'serioused up' the show. But a lot ofpeople really just didn't want to hear it.) Others were pissedbecause this was during the height of the 'Anime Boom' so a lot ofpeople thought they were just cashing in on the craze. (There mayhave been some truth to this.) And also, it aired on televisionduring 9/11, and due to some understandable sensitivities at thetime, a lot of the shows never even aired. There's a lot of peoplewho look on this show with disdain... But you know what's kind of funny? Youcan usually tell the people who were first exposed to the line whenit was Car Robots and when they were exposed to it as Robots inDisguise. Because the Car Robots people?

They remember that good feeling theshow gave them.

After the show ended, it was adifferent world. For me, and for a lot of people. It was a Post-9/11 world, the economy had tanked and finding work wasbecoming difficult. (I don't think any of us had a clue what wascoming!) My best friend James moved to California to go to animationschool. (And I won't lie, had I to do it all over again, I would havejoined him. I think I didn't go with him out of fear.) The girlfriendI had broke up with me, and it messed with me for quite a while.(Though she was right to. I mean, moving to another country acrossthe planet, like we were talking about was something she wasn't readyto do, and she was right in knowing I wouldn't be either. It took mesome time to realize that.) Dreamwave had obtained the rights to theTransformers comics and for the first time, I truly, TRULY felt likea fucking hack.

They were producing work that lookedlike this:

And I was producing work that lookedlike this:

Now before you say “No, it's just adifference in style!” No, I just simply wasn't that good of an artist. About thistime, I decided that I could do one of two things: Give up, or sit mybutt down and get better.

I guess as you guys are here readingthis, you know I took the second option. And all this time, I wantedto recapture that feeling I had. That feeling of eternal youth... Irealized that it wasn't just because of a silly toyline, but anoutgoing attitude I had about that show. It gave me a creative energy (energon?) thatpushed me forward. I remembered that youthfulness that I embracedduring the Robots in Disguise series, and tried to recapture thatsame again. My fellow Transformers art peers creatively pushed me tofind myself in my art. It was during this re-energizing period that Icame up with what we all now know as Shadowgirls. It drove me forwardand I'd like to think made me a better creator and hopefully a betterperson.

And right now, the feeling I havelately, reminds me a lot of how I felt during that re-energizingperiod. I feel excited, and unlike before, I know what my optionstruly are, as opposed to vague shots in the dark. I don't knowEXACTLY what the future is going to bring here, but I can tell youthat it's probably going to be some fun. And I'm reeeeeally likingTransformers: Prime.

Oh yeah, I did get a littlebetter...

But I still have quite a ways to go. But I'll get there... And leave it in the dust!

Next time, I'll talk a little bit aboutwhat's to come in 2012. (Here's a hint.)

Stupid-Awesome: Punisher War Zone

2011-12-12T17:41:00.002-05:00

I have seen greatness, and it is thePunisher: War Zone.

Okay, every now and then, my friend,Nik and I, venture forth to obtain really stupid movies, because...Well, we like stupid movies. And we got a bunch of them this lastweekend. Some that will be reviewed soon. (Except for one which I'llbitch about later.) One of the flicks we got was the last Punisherfilm. Now, if you know anything about Marvel's premierpsychovigilante, you know that the silver screen has not been all tookind to him. His '89 film, starring Dolph Lundgren was a borefestthat might have been saved, but for the lack of a ten dollar t-shirt.His 2004 movie starring Thomas Jane was... Well... Jane's heart wasin the right place, but not for movies. You see, the Punisher isn'tlike Batman. There's not many ways you can play him off. You cantreat him like a serious character, with gritty realism anddisturbing subject matter. Or you can treat him as the ultimateaction hero, where he'll find as many ways to kill someone as he can.The problem is, a lot of people love the former take on thecharacter... But movie-wise, to say that direction has been done todeath would imply a Charles Bronson shaped understatement. There hasbeen countless movies made that didn't feature a character namedFrank Castle. The story has been told. And retold. And re-retold. Andthe sad fact is, the more realistic you get the Punisher, the moreboring the story gets. And that was the problem the Jane movie had.Eventually, we want to see him shoot people. A lot of people. Andpeople who deserve it. (Which brings up an interesting side-note withthe character. There's an interesting debate on if the Punisher issane or not. It's a very interesting topic. I've heard compellingarguments on both sides. But that might be a discussion for a laterdate.)

Now when the Punisher: War Zone wasunder production, it was beset with countless of production hurdles,from Jane's replacement with Ray Stevenson to rumors of LexiAlexander being shitcanned off the project (she wasn't) and even somecreative conflicts. When it debuted during Christmas of 2008, it didnot do too well in the box office, making it one of the lowestgrossing Marvel films, right along side Elektra. So I didn't see iffor quite some time. This last weekend that changed, and you knowwhat?

It's the best fucking Punisher filmever made.

When we started watching this movie, wewere laughing at the bad dialogue and the simplistic plots. (I mean,all it lacked was an angry police chief screaming about being “tooold for this shit.”) But then people started dying... And this shitgot funny. (Odd sentence that would sound brutal anywhere elseoutside of a Hollywood film.)

Seriously, Frank found a neon Catholic Church. How
many of these are you seen outside of Vegas?

Let's clarify one thing: This movie isstupid. But it may be the entire epitome of “Stupid-Awesome.” Isat down and tried to count how many people got killed, and I justgave up when I got into the triple digits. There's this scene rightin the beginning, where he suspends himself from a chandelier, whilespinning around it shooting everyone in sight, Boondocks Saintsstyle... This comes right after he beheads some dude with a combatknife, breaks someone else's neck, and then kills everyone at thebusiness table. All in one minute. Frank Castle barely speaks for thefirst hour. The plot is so inconsequential and pointless, and I'm aguy who LIKED Revenge of the Fallen. The set designs are sosilly, there is literally more neon in this movie than BatmanForever. I'm not joking! Everyone's dressed in all black, and thebackground are all muted blues, yellows and reds, with neon lightsthem all. (According to the commentary, this was on purpose tocapture the feel of the comic book. It's a nice try, but it didn'twork.)

The acting is laughable. Ray Stevensonis perfect as the emotionless, angry and threatening Punisher thesame way that Courtney Love played Larry Flynt drugged out wife. (Inother words, was he really acting?) The rest of the cast was so overthe top, you ended up wondering if it was like Mark Hamill in StarWars: Badly acting, or acting badly? Dominic West who played thevillain Jigsaw was hamming it up on the screen so much, it was atotal hoot to watch. Doug Hutchison who played Jigsaw's brother“Looney Bin Jim” was also hamming it up to the Nth degree.Wayne Knight played Microchip, the Punisher's tech supplier... Andyou just can't watch him in a movie without blurting out Seinfeldjokes or dilophosaurus gags. Dash Mihok played Det. Martin Soap, acharacter who I wasn't very fond of in the comic books, but here...He's so laid back with his portrayal of him, he's got some of thebest lines in the movie. In a weary voice, he calmly speaks “AhGod. Now I got brains all over me.”

The rest... Who gives a crap really? Itwas so damn fun to watch.

Yeah, we'll take four McDoubles, three large fries, and
two McRib meals. And throw some extra wetnaps in.

Everything is so over-the-top... Ithink the best comparison would be 'Hobo with a Shotgun' or'Machete'. It totally feels like a Grindhouse movie. There's ascene where the Punisher punches in a guy's face. He's not wearingbrass knuckles, or any kind of enhancement. He just punches his fistthrough a guy's face. There's these obnoxious jackass free-runnershigh on meth running around, and he blows up one of them with agrenade launcher. It's an overtly brutal movie. And it's so damnbrutal, it becomes funny. It's a live action Road Runner movie. Thepicture you see to the left? That's an actual scene from the movie.It's Jigsaw and his henchmen in a car, looking like they're orderingfrom McDonald's. It such a surreal flick. If there's a major character inthis movie that dies, I guarantee you, it's a horrible and gruesomedeath. (One character actually dies by getting the glass stem of a wine glass shoved through the front of his throat, sideways.)

The director of this movie, LexiAlexander, recently did the movie 'Lifted' which was a prettydecent movie, which makes me think that the odd campiness of thePunisher: War Zone had to be done on purpose. And above all else, it feltmore like the Punisher than any of his previous movies. Ray Stevensonabsolutely looked the part. He looked like a guy who you don't wantto screw with. He looked grizzled, angry, and professional. Nooffense against Thomas Jane, I think he's just too attractive to beFrank Castle.

The movie clocks in at about 100minutes. It's pretty fast paced, it's a total 'shut your brain off'movie. I went into this movie expecting a rotten stupid movie, on aUwe Boll level, and I ended up being surprised with what I think wasone fun and awesome time. Bottom line, is the movie good? No. Is themovie fun? YES. And I can guarantee you there's worse thingsto sit through... Which I'll talk about with the next'Stupid-Awesome' entry. (Or I might not. I'm still determining if Iwant to review it at all.)

Stooge Rating:
CURLY

Stupid Awesome - Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne

2011-12-06T21:11:00.001-05:00

By now, it should be nosurprise that I'm a fan of anime. Like many my age, I first gotexposed to it in the 80s, when I didn't even know what thehell I was watching. Seriously, it never occurred to my nine year oldbrain that Voltron was this dubbed import. All I knew was that he wasgoing to form blazing sword and kick some ro-beast balls. Before Icontinue, my definition of anime is very simple: Animation intentlyproduced for Japanese audiences. That's it. As our worlds become moreand more closer, with the digital age and the internet, thatdefinition is eventually going to become defunct. But, there's stillenough of a stylistic difference in storytelling that there's still adistinction. For now. Now, I've talked about my favorites animationsbefore... This one isn't on the list and for good reasons. It's notgreat. But I'll be damned if it isn't interesting.

The very first time I ever heard of Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne came from a commission request about a year ago. Someone had asked me to draw a picture of the main character from the Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne, Rin Agosi. (I always assumed it was due to the physical similarities between her and Charon McKay of Shadowgirls.) The thing is, I never even heard of this anime. Granted my knowledge and keeping up on these silly cartoons is really behind, but that's another point all together. My opinion of the box art was "pretentious mopey bullshit". You know, like the other 90% of the imported anime out there. I ended up passing on it, because I was unfamiliar with the show and didn't feel like watching it. Flash forward about half a year, and the first episode of the cartoon came on Xfinity.

It's fucking stupid. Lordy Lord Almighty, this was dumb as fuck. But... It's damned interesting to watch. It's like a modern day fantasy series. (Some horror elements, some action elements.) The story's about a woman named Rin Agosi, who has this time sporeinserted into her, from the tree of Yggdrasil, essentially making herimmortal. The interesting thing about these immortals is that thecondition you're in when you're turned immortal is how you'll be forthe rest of eternity. How the rules of immortality works in thisuniverse is really the hook to the story here. First, the time sporesonly work on women. If inserted into men, they become mindless andsavage 'angels' that hunt out the immortal women to devour them.Um... In the literal sense. However, even though they're trying toeat the women, the immortals are sexually drawn to the angels, whichusually lead to an unpretty mess. (Hey, I told you this was stupid! But you've read this far, so you might as well keep going.)

The Time Spores aren't perfect either. Rin was near-sighted and needed glasses to correct her vision. That won't heal. If you have a broken leg when you're turned immortal, you'll have a broken leg forever. If you're half-rotted, you'll be half-rotted forever. You get the idea. She's working as a private investigator, who does odd jobs to pay the bills, with her partner Mimi and their pet dog, Genta, who are also immortal. (Yes, the immortality spores work on animals too.) She's hunted through the ages by an asshat named Apos and a woman named Laura who usually manages to shoot Rin. Or blow her up. Or something excessive. (One time, she even tried to kill her dressed as Santa Claus.) But Rin is immortal and she'll regenerate. And that's really what the show's about. Through the various cases that Rin ends up in, there's a fair share of action, sex and violence. And it is all gratuitous. Overly blown gratuitous. In fact, it's the last two what the show is best known for. Let's talk about them.

A lot of the criticism of Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne comes mainly from how kinda 'lowest common denominator' the show can be. I've heard people compare it to watching one of those late night Cinemax movies, and I'd say that's a good analogy. If there's a major female character, odds are really good you're going to see her naked. (Seriously, I think there's one female character in the entire series that doesn't have a sex scene. But there's a manga I never read, so maybe it's in there.) If you're the type that likes to see cartoon women have soft core bisexual sex... Well, then you'll be good. Though there's a lot of sex, it's never overly explicit. It's a lot like watching a Zalman King series... But with explosions. There's a lot of nudity, but nothing that would make this outright pornographic. But there's the contrast of the violence.

Subtle sexual subtexts. Say that five times fast.

Like I mentioned, there's a lot of violence here. But let me address it right now, and I'm going to be very honest about it. Some people will talk about this show like it's the animated version of the Human Centipede. It's not. It's not even close. It's not even the same game. While there's a few cringe worthy moments in it (the biggest involves is in the first episode and it involves some body piercings), if you've watched the Saw movies on SyFy, even with how they'll censor them for content, then this will be no problem for you at all. It's like Marvel's Wolverine... It's really hard to get squeamish about the fact he just got his entrails slashed out, when you know that it'll heal up in a few seconds. Yes, you do see Rin get sliced up and all that nonsense, but like I mentioned, it's so damned ridiculous and over the top, it's hard to take it seriously. (I mean, one episode she falls through the fan of a jet engine and get's diced up. She regenerates and lives. Seriously.) Some people like to talk up the gore in this show, but I'm telling you if you've sat through half the crap I've recommended to you... There's nothing in here that'll be too much for you.

There's some decent action scenes in here, and some pretty cool gunfights. There's a few moments where it tries to be a touch political, but it never goes into the “preachy” scale, which right away helps me place it on a higher level than most anime. Some of the technological concepts, like the Virtual Reality Network 2.0 is actually kinda interesting, and I would have liked to see it developed some more. Some of the notions seem to be comfortably right out of Masamune Shirow's imagination. (Umm... the futurist Masamune Shirow that he used to be, not the 'Galgrease' Masamune Shirow that he is now.) The character designs are decent. Nothing to write home about, but serviceable.

"He goes off for weeks praising Captain America comics
and now he's talking about cartoon boobs? I wish this
moron would get back to drawing comics."

And when it all comes down to it... The thing about Rin: Daughters of Mnemosyne. It's so fucking stupid, and it takes itself so damn seriously. And at first you're thinking “what a load of pretentiousness.” You're thinking it's a case of Stephanie Meyer's Twilight Saga, where the creators take themselves so damn seriously, that it's unwatchable. (And if not for the sex and violence, it would be.) But then they bring in clones, cyborgs, powered exo-skeletons, bondage gear, androids, a convent of lesbian Buddhist fighting nuns (complete with orgy scene), hermaphrodite gods/goddesses, naked kung-fu, naked gun-fu, naked car-fu, and then it hits you... Either this show is so pretentious that it's actually circled the compass and is creeping up on the other side to awesome parody, or it's a brilliant straight faced satire. And the fact it doesn't pretend to be more than it is, makes me believe it's the latter.

I believe the show's on Netflix now. If you're into stupid anime cartoons with silly amounts of violence and boobs... I would recommend it. I would say it's like watching professional wrestling. It's stupid as hell, but it's kinda fun to watch, as long as you don't have a stick up your butt.

Stooge Rating:
SHEMP

Zeitgeist of Comics

2011-12-01T01:19:00.001-05:00

Seriously, this happened to Hitler like every
other week. You don't even want to know
what Unknown Soldier did to his ass!

Sorry for the lack of updates here.Been a bit busy with the Thanksgiving holiday and stuff. I want totalk about something I've been thinking about for a while here andthe recent X-Men: First Class movie really cemented it into my head.One of the biggest problems in comics these days is trying to findrelevance in these characters. The Punisher has trouble working ifhe's not just a really pissed off veteran from Vietnam, and as timegoes on, even being really generous, he's got to be at least 60.Captain America got frozen in WWII, and let's be honest, as much as Iloved that movie, bringing Cap to the present has always been thetricky part of his origin. (It IS rather silly.) Especially when acharacter's origin is tied into a specific event in time, as it moveson, you either have to keep retconning stuff or start ignoring it.And while some characters like Iron Man is rather easy to do thiswith (Prisoner of the VietCong? No, we meant Northern AfghaniTerrorists!), some like Batwoman, who's origin is so directly tiedinto the now-defunct 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy of the ArmedServices... In about a decade, that origin is going to be needingsome retconning.

While there's certainly characters thatnever get updated in time and they stay period pieces. (Get to them in a minute.) Some should just take a note and not "update with the times." Take JamesBond... It's kinda hard to write a story about a British super spythese days. After all, the nations we're most likely spying on arealso the countries in the international market that we're trying tosell the movie to. And really, the Post-Cold War 007 films have beenvery weaksauce to say the least. And really, there's no real reasonfor them to be so. They change actors all the time, there's no realreason to not make them period pieces. Any attempts to update him,you end up, if you're lucky, with a copy of Splinter Cell or JasonBourne. And even then, it's hard to pull that off, because if you geta lazy production team, you end up making movies about Bond fightingTed Turner or a second rate SPECTRE wannabe. Let's be honest... James Bondneeds the Russians. But for now, let's focus on comic book charactershere.

As I mention, many characters areinfluenced from the zeitgeist of the period they were created in.However, that doesn't mean that their particular creation period isthe most suitable for them. After all, Superman was really created in1938, but a lot of the notions that we associate with him wereelements of the Eisenhower era of the 50s. The Fantastic Four reallydoes seem right at home in that Pre-Space Race Era of the early 60s,where you can get all funky and psychedelic with Kirby Krackleconcepts like Blastarr of the Negative Zone and the Silver Surfer.Spider-Man was created in the 1960s, but he really hit his stride inthe 1970s with the Death of Gwen Stacy. (And really, some ofMary-Jane's fashion senses could only have come from the 70s!) Thoughthe first team of X-Men were created as a commentary on the CivilRights movement, the later team with it's more worldly charactersseem more in tune with the Apartheid events of South Africa in the1970-80s with Marvel's island nation of Genosha. And of course withCaptain America, as much as I love Steve... The 'man out of time'story will never be as interesting as the 'man who punched Hitler'.

Sweet Christmas!

Am I saying that no character shouldEVER age? No, not at all. In fact, it's the aging of these charactersthat makes them so endearing. If Batman just stayed in the 1930s, wewould have never gotten Nightwing, Batgirl and Robin (any of them!)or even such endearing villains like the Riddler, Bane and HarleyQuinn. If the X-Men only stayed in the 1960s, we would have nevergotten the later X-Teams, with Wolverine, Rogue and Havok. And ifSuperman stayed in the 40s, he would never have gotten to the 1950s,where most people consider his most iconic period to be. Butsometimes, there are some characters that no matter how hard theytry... They just don't seem to make a lot of sense in contemporarytimes. Luke Cage (with the most awesome super-hero name ever of'Power Man') with his partner and friend, Iron Fist fit seamlesslyinto the 1970s Post-Vietnam War era, fighting a bunch of jive-turkeyslike A.I.M. But today, they just come across as awkward and seemssomewhat out of place. I mean, I like some of those Jim Shooter eraheroes... I just don't know if I like them how they are today. I'mnot saying that a character should never been taken out of his or herestablished time period... I'm just saying that it's an option thatshouldn't be taken off the table. Recently DC relaunched their entireuniverse. (It was kind of low-key. You might not have heard of it. :P) Seriously, I can't help but to think they might have missed a realopportunity here to really expand their books and universe. What if most of their books were periodpieces? Instead of trying to make Wonder Woman seem less silly today,just place her in WWII throwing tanks at the Nazis, along side theBlackhawks and Sgt. Rock. Or maybe not even going that far. Insteadof re-writing Superman's marriage and history, just place him in annondescript 'timeless' era akin to the 1950's. One of the reasons Ithink Batman's 1990's cartoon show worked so well was that before thestyle revamp for Kids' WB, you could make a real argument that theshow took place in a Great Depression period. The football playersstill wore those old leather helmets used before 1940, the mobstersstill used Thompson machine guns and all the vehicles looked likeModel B Fords. Sure Batman's gear was high-tech, but even his stuffwas very retro in it's technology. It felt like a period piece. But I'm not saying all super-heroes need tobe massive period pieces, but there are some characters that maybe,just need to stay in their time period.

This is Kato vs. Robin from the 60's Batman TV show
crossover. It was awesome. Rogen never had a chance.

If you're not a comic bookfan, then try to imagine updating someone like the Lone Ranger intothe Modern Day. Does Tonto become a female Native American? Do theyride around on motorcycles? Is he basically Walker Texas Ranger in amask? Do they use tasers and pepper spray instead of shooting theguns out of the hands? On top of that, a lot of people don't realizethat the character the Green Hornet is actually the Lone Ranger'snephew's son. (John Reid... Britt Reid. Also, they had the samecreators. Makes a hell of a lot of sense.) And that's anothercharacter that's best to remain a period piece and truly forget thatthe horrible Seth Rogen piece of shit film ever existed. Every timethey try to bring Tarzan into modern times, it's a disaster... Anddon't get me started on the Phantom. (I'm still seething about theSyFy movie.)

Okay, I admit, we can't really stickSuperman, Batman and the X-Men in a time bubble and leave them there,but perhaps that “timeless” feel I mentioned earlier could be anoption? Matt Wagner did two Batman stories called Dark Moon Rising.(Batman and the Monster Men and Batman and the Mad Monk.)They both took place in Batman's second year. But the way the bookwas handled, the art and style... Outside of a few anachronisms, itcould easily have felt like it was 1940. It was just a really welldone comic series. (Though the Mad Monk did slip a bit toward theend, I do easily recommend them. I'll probably talk about them at afuture date.)

In the end, we have no problem accepting thatsome characters are just forever part of a time period... But whycan't we do the same for certain comic characters? Why are they exempt from this? Do we thinkwe can't accept a period piece?

I have never accepted that.

And nor should you.

Recommendation Road: Captain America: The Fighting Avenger

2011-11-22T00:15:00.001-05:00

Captain America: The Fighting Avenger

To begin, I apologize for the washedout scans of today's pages. I upgraded computers this weekend, and mygood old trusty scanner apparently was too old for Windows 7, forcingme to use another scanner. The color scans aren't the greatest,however grayscale B&W scans just fine... And that's what I scanart in, so that's really all that's important for me at the moment.I'll grab a new scanner someday, but it's not a huge priority for me.(The more cleaner scans were grabbed from Scans Daily.)

I figured after Mad Love's review lastweek, I'd make a regular routine of talking about certain comic booksI truly enjoyed and recommend wholeheartedly. Basically, these arebooks that have inspired me creatively. Now today's book came outlate last spring / early summer, curing the hype for the summer movieseason. It's pretty much standard expectations that whenever a comicbook company has a major motion picture coming out that they're goingto put out a comic book, featuring the character from that movie, andthat comic book will have the feeling of that movie. Now here's thething, I hold the Captain America: First Avenger preeeety damnhighly on the echelons of comic book movies. It's probably somewherein the top three comic book movies I've seen... And I make it a habitto at least see every comic book movie at least once. (From the bigblockbusters like The Dark Knight to the stupid pieces of garbagelike Man-Thing.) The Cap movie was near perfect for me. If I had ANYcomplaints about it, it's that they put him in suspended animation alittle too quickly. I wouldn't have mind seeing him running around inthe 1940s for a little while longer, punching the likes of Baron vonStrucker and Hitler in the nuts.

Nowduring early summer, they released the comic of today's subjectmatter, Captain America: The Fighting Avenger.This was written by Brian Clevinger, who some of you might know asthe creator of 8-Bit Theater and the awesome Atomic Robo comic. Theart is by Gurihuri, who's a team of Japanese illustrators who's workI first encountered in Marvel's recent Power Pack series. There's afun, charming and whimsical feel to their work, and I won't lie... IfI could rip off their art style, I'd totally do it. Now rumors haveit that this story was originally going to be a four issueminiseries, but it got knocked down to a 48 page one-shot, which is acrime against humanity if I ever heard of one. This particular comicis not set in any preset continuity that I'm aware of. (Maybe theMarvel Adventures universe?) In this comic, it starts with a crackteam of commandos being forced to take this 'corny flag wearing'rookie on a easy bridge bombing mission. Their reaction when theyfirst see him?

Yeah,they are not thrilled with it all. Obviously as you can guess themission backfires and they get in over their heads, leading to somegreat moments. Even though the four soldiers are new characters thatwe've never met before, they were all charming and you could reallyfeel their frustrations with poor Steve... Who does know what he'sdoing, it's just he's just the new guy. This leads to a greatconclusion in a Nazi castle, with a showdown with a certainarch-nemesis of Cap's. (Here's a hint. He's got a red skull.) Theentire story is fun and adventurous... It was literally the most funcomic I've read all year.

Unfortunately,the comic's not very well known, which is a total shame. I begrudginglyunderstand why the story was shortened down from four issues to a oneshot... I don't agree with it, but I understand. (It's like the ChrisRock joke about O.J. Simpson: “Not saying he should have killedher... But I understand.”) With Gurihuri's artwork, it probablygives that impression of it being a “kid's comic” which is atotal damn shame, because it's not. It's all ages, much like themovie. Like I mentioned last week, with Mad Love, some people stillsneer upon cartoony artwork as lesser artwork, because of whateverreason they want to use, when in reality, I find it superior...Because there's less room for screwing up. Yeah, it's not AdiGranov's artwork... But it's Captain America! What the hell do youwant? 'DAAAAAAAARK AND SERIOUS'?

Hepunches Hitler, for God's sake! And he's awesome for it.

Thataside, I can understand that they were worried about the reception ofthe movie. There were a lot of people who were ready to call itMarvel's first bomb, thinking that having the name “America” inthe title would be bob office poison, especially in the internationalmarkets... Though I was very happy to be able to look those people inthe eyes and say to them “Eat it, hater!” You see, out ofall the Marvel movies, Cap was the one most was worried about. He'sthe most “corny” of them all. He's bluntly the most super-heroic.It's like I mentioned in the Intrepid Verisimilitude a bit back...Pretentious creators who think they're too cool for superheroes haveno problem doing comic book movies as long as they can disguise it assomething OTHER than a superhero movie. You see, they have thisthought that the average movie going audience cannot accept thenotion of a superhero, because it's 'too corny'. So they'll try todisguise it up as another kind of movie. It's not a superhero movie,it's an urban vigilante movie (Daredevil, Dark Knight). It's asci-fi action film (X-Men, Hulk). It's a horror movie(Hellboy, Ghost Rider). They'll save the label of “superhero”for the weaker parody titles, like Superhero Movie or MySuper Ex-Girlfriend. And when they don't do as well as expected,they can use the excuse that superhero movies just aren't a goodidea. The thing is, occasionally you'll get those rare comic conceptsthat no amount of lying will work... It's a goddamned superheromovie, and you can't fricking avoid it calling it that. LikeSpider-Man and Cap's movie. And almost every time they do it,it makes a crap load of money, both domestically and internationally.(I think the only exception to this rule was Superman Returns... Andeven that technically wasn't a bomb. It's just Bryan Singer thoughthe was making a different movie than the one we all thought we wereseeing. Still, considering what it looks like Zack Snyder is doing...Yeeesh!)

But my point before I lose my train of thought, out of allthe Marvel Movies, Captain America: First Avenger was the onethat was the most obvious superheroic movie. Bright red, white andblue costume, punches Hitler, corny speeches... And in today's world,that's a bit of a hard sale to a cynical movie-going audience. Butholy crap, did it deliver! Not only was the costume in there, theyactually managed to IMPROVE upon it, to the point I actuallypreferred it over the one in the comics! It was treated as a warmovie, but it was so obviously a period piece super-hero movie... Itwas near perfect. Got a bit slow in the middle, but so did BatmanBegins. And it set things up wonderfully for the Avengers movie. (However, that leads to my problem where I wish he had stayed in the 40's to punch Nazis in the nuts more. You can't help but to shake the feeling the entire movie was just a giant movie trailer for the Avengers. Oh it's great, and I love it, and I'll see the Avengers opening night... I just like movies to stand on their own a bit more.)

Gurihuri'sart has a bit of a cartoony flair, but it's completely awesome. AndI'm assuming that if you're reading this blog, you're probably herebecause I drew Shadowgirls, or those fake DC comic covers... So ifyou like my art, you'll like their art. As far as Brian Clevingerscript goes? I only wish it was longer, because I had such a fun timereading the comic. It's like the movie... There is no stick up it'sbutt. And there needs to be more comics like this.

Looks I'llhave to do something about it. *winks*

The greatest comic ever made...

2011-11-18T00:39:00.001-05:00

Ladies and gentlemen… BATMAN: MAD LOVE.

I was going to have a stupid-awesome movie review today, but I’ve been sick off my ass for a few days here, so I haven’t gotten around to re-watching it yet. So I’ve been laid up in bed reading a lot of older comics I got from my friend Jason Moser, and it occurred to me… I talk about stupid movies and stupid comics, and silly ideas I had all the time… But I’ve never come right out and talked about what I consider to be the greatest comic of all time. So if you’ll indulge me, allow me to talk about the comic that was probably the single most important comic book I have ever read, that if it wasn’t for it… I would have probably given up on drawing comics and just went to be a plumber or something like that. Now when I say it’s the most important comic to me, I’m not saying I’ve never had any other influences. I have many. But not like this, and this one was particularly important for a good reason… It came out and that exact right time for me, and you probably still see the influence in my art today.

The year was 1994. Being an aspiring comic artist in the 1990s was the greatest time in the world, and the absolute worst. It was the best because the energy and enthusiasm that came from the industry was at an all time high, and I have yet to ever see it come close to that since. We dreamt big, and hoped bigger. We all had big elaborate comic ideas that we were hoping could be picked up by Image comics and be the next Spawn or Savage Dragon… Or if you drew a little funky, The Maxx. Generally, the idealized pinnacle of comic art was Jim Lee, Marc Silvestri or Todd McFarlane. Very rendered and often detailed artwork that quite frankly made most up and coming artists feel somewhat impotent. Now try to understand, that at this time mainstream comics had a distinct house style they demanded. (Mainstream comics were of course Marvel, Image and DC.) We often make fun of the 1990’s and how they drew people, particularly the spray-on costumes, the shoulder pads, the bent spines, the over muscled bodies… But you need to understand, we were told me needed to draw like that. Sure you can say "no one made you draw like that" and it’s easy to make fun of now, but it’s like trying to explain living in the Cold War to someone born in the late 80’s, or explaining sex to a virgin… This was DRILLED INTO OUR HEADS that if you weren’t at least as good as the big popular artists in the Wizard Top Ten List… Don’t bother submitting! Sure, they always ‘encouraged’ you, but you know what they were really saying: “You suck, draw more like me.” But it was the worst, because when you realized how the industry worked, you got crushed and crushed big time… It’s easy to mock artist that still seem stuck in the 1990s, but they went several years being beaten down, told they needed to draw like this, just to find out that the person who told them that, was full of it. Especially when you realized that the entire system was built around “who you know” as opposed to “how good you are.” (I remember seeing this one artist standing in line with us, and his artwork was soooo damn good. He had a beautiful style, that I can only describe like Marc Silverstri inked by Kevin Nowlan. And he got rejected like he was just some putz learning how to draw with a crayon. I always wonder what happened to him.)

Stephen Platt's artwork, who was one
of the hot artists at the time.
(however this art comes from a later
year than 1994.)

And the thing is, it was just starting to sink in that I DIDN’T want to draw like that. I found a clean lined style more appealing than rendering the hell out of a grimacing visage. So people like me who didn’t want to draw like that, our options were very limited. Either we had to grin and bear it, and learn to love drawing disproportioned bodies and snarling teeth and hope we’re good enough to impress a cynical and fatalistic editor, or go the independent comic route, and hope we had a potential Bone, Usagi Yojimbo or Ninja Turtles to impress a cynical and fatalistic publisher. Remember, this was before computers the Internet was in every household, before cell phones were common place, and at a time when Photoshop was so early on, they had just added “layers” to their program. (None of that last sentence was sarcasm, exaggeration or a joke. It’s amazing how different things are now compared to then.) To top it all off, it’s not like there was serious camaraderie among the aspiring comic artists then. If you were trying out for “The Big Boys” you were in competition with every single one of these people to catch an editor’s eye. And if you said you wanted to be an independent artist, you were literally looked down upon by others. (That is NOT a joke. I’m serious when I say I understand what it’s like to feel like a second class citizen.) For someone like me who didn’t want to draw like the Wizard Top Ten, my future in comics didn’t look too promising. Top it all off, I was unemployed (wow, history repeated itself), wasn’t going to college, no major plans to do with my life, and going through some silly nonsense with my soon to be ex-girlfriend. (Really, aren’t they all silly nonsense?) Then one day, I was at the grocery store, and they still sold comics on the racks there. And I saw Batman: Mad Love. Now the Batman Adventures, I never bought prior to this, because it didn’t appeal to me yet. The cartoon show was dark and moody, but the comic pages were way too bright and cheery looking. Comic adaptations of shows to this day still have a problem pulling off that feeling. But it was the origin of the Joker’s sidekick, she seemed kinda fun, and it was done by the show’s creators Paul Dini and Bruce Timm. I was bored and I bought it...

HOLY... SHIT.

I was blown away. It was everything I wanted in comics, and everything I wanted to attain. Story telling was fluid, it wasn’t over detailed, the story was dark and moody, but not grim and gritty. I could hear the characters voices perfectly with the dialogue… It was a complete solid story that was better than just about anything I had read. It literally felt like I was reading an episode of the cartoon show. (And by now, I believe you all know the influence that animation has had on me.) The choreography was just so perfect for me, it all worked so harmoniously, I could even hear the theme music playing in my head. The scene that really gets me is the scene near the final climax, where Joker knocks Harley out the window… Showing me how using a rapid sequence of panels and then POW! You’re hit with these tall panels showing the poor girl falling… It really opened my eyes and showed me that comics weren’t just moments frozen in time, but that comics had their own methods of storytelling that had been forgotten in those days of splash pages and confusing panel layouts. (I can’t say it’s gotten better.) It really showed me how to tell a story, without getting drawn out and melodramatic. It told a very dark and psychological story… And it was ALL AGES. That’s that blew my mind the most. It was the most mature and sophisticated comic I’ve read in years, and it was all ages. I was about to give up on comic art in general, and a mere 64 pages of an all ages comic totally changed my outlook and refreshed my hope in comics.

Bruce Timm’s art was such a big influence on me, that I went out and bought the Batman Adventures comics, the toys, and everything related to Batman: The Animated Series, just to learn how to draw more like him. And after a while, I started learning from those artist who were working on the associated comics, like Rich Burchett and the late Mike Parobeck. (Seriously, there’s someone who was taken from us way too early!) And these artists didn’t follow it to the letter, but gave their own twist to the style, which started to influence me as well. And this dedication carried over to the other DCAU books, like Superman and Batman Beyond. And their artists also played with the style. Craig Rousseau, Aluir Amancio, and someone who became a favorite of mine, Tim Levins. And they all had their own styles, but followed the simple of “less is more”. And the writing on those books was also influential like you wouldn't believe, teaching me the power of a self contained story. Of all the things I’ve learned over the years, that’s the biggest lesson that’s stuck with me… And it all started with Mad Love.

The one thing I remember the most about it all, was I had gone over to my friend Katie's house and brought some comics with me. She was not a devout comic book reader. She used to read Wonder Woman when she was a lot younger, but Crisis on Infinite Earths sort of lost her readership. (I wonder how many readers CoIE lost back then. We know it helped out DC, but I do wonder if it's a similar situation with the current DCnU.) I had brought over a few books, WildC.A.T.s, Spawn, the Maxx, a Tim Sale Batman story ( I don't remember which one), some Keith Giffen book (I think either Lobo or Trencher) and of course, Mad Love. She just casually flipped through the other books, as they were convoluted or just too busy. Nothing caught her eye, but she picked up Mad Love, and I remember her sitting down and reading the entire thing from cover to cover, and she loved it. And that moment stuck with me. All the detailed artwork, flashy covers, or gritty critically acclaimed story telling in the world means squat if it's not entertaining!

It made me realize that I wasn't wrong in trying to go for an animated style. Sure, some of those fellow artists from before would still try and look down on you for liking these artwork and comics, but instead of feeling sorry for yourself, you actually felt sorry for them… Because they didn’t know what they were missing, just because it was labeled ‘All Ages’. I've seen so many so many people pass on well written and truly entertaining works, be it comics, movies, books, or even music... Just because it's all ages, meaning 'it's kids stuff'. But the truth is, a lot of great works of fiction are indeed all ages. Star Wars, Harry Potter, Indiana Jones, even Lord of the Rings. All that "All Ages" means is that it's written on a level that BOTH children and adults can appreciate. What I find hilarious is that there are people that when you point out that these works of entertainment are all ages, they'll say "No, it's not! It's totally made for adults! They have some mature stuff in there, like people dying and some swearing!" They're so against that all ages label, that they refuse to see the obvious. All ages means ALL ages. But some people still can't get over that. Even after Mad Love was the first superhero book to win the coveted Eisner Award, followed a year later by winning the Eisner award for an excellent Mr. Freeze short story. (Which by the way, the link I gave you at the top there to Mad Love, is a collection that contains these stories, as some other really good ones too.)

As most people know, they later adapted Mad Love to be an episode. It was good… But it was better in print. With the holidays coming up, if you’re wanting to treat yourself to a really good read, I cannot recommend a book more than Mad Love.

If for no other reason than just to see Harley in her near see-through nightie.

___________________________

One last thing, a quick picture of my original copy of the comic, just to show you how influential it's been to me. You can seen how much it's been read, re-read and re-re-read over the last 17 years. All the scans from above are taken from this copy. There's probably Silver Age books in better condition!

$20 Holiday Commission Sale

2011-11-15T20:36:00.001-05:00

Not this exact image, but something
along the lines.

It’s about that time of the year, so I thought I’d do a $20 commission sale again. Also I need to buy a new glasses so this will help me get a decent pair. I have ten slots. (I may add more. I dunno yet.) So I’ll keep it real simple, here’s the bullet points for the cost and rules:

$20 gets you a full color single character, with no or minimal background. This is the sale price. If you’re wanting more or less, the price is going to vary. (It’ll get you something along the lines like the image to the side there.)
Sorry, Paypal only.
I do request the right to post these. (This can be done anonymously if you wish.)
Nothing too weird, please. While I’m very far from a prude, if it’s something too weird, like furry breast inflation or just something I don’t think I’d do a good job on, I’ll pass on it.
Be patient when waiting on a commission. It might take a day or it might take a week or so. You never know if I end up sick or something. If you need yours done sooner, let me know and I can see if I can arrange it.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask away. Email me at thoughtcrimeinc at gmail dot com to start the deal.

Thanks, everyone! And I'll have a little more upbeat stupid-awesome movie by Friday for you all. :)

Occupy Sin City

2011-11-14T21:29:00.001-05:00

I'd ask how that costume works, but
I'm afraid I'd get an answer.

Sigh…

Frank Miller and his Occupy Comments. I’m not going to go through the issues of repeating them here, because odds are you already know them. (Read the link if you don't.) Honestly, I try to go out of my way to keep my political opinions to myself. I’m pretty well read, and I do keep up on current events. I’m not screaming at the Occupy Wall Street people, and I’m not gnashing my teeth at the Tea Party. Like most people, I am perfectly capable of listening to both sides of a debate, and coming to my own conclusion. I don’t need convincing when it comes to these things. Essentially, I don’t believe that strict dogmatic categorization of a system of political beliefs is really the way to go. Both sides have very valid points that should be given serious consideration, without getting all huffy and puffy at one another. I truly believe that the similarities between the American political wings are far greater than it’s differences, but we’re too busy being pissed off over those differences to get anything done. (And I need to emphasize this. Both sides of the political spectrum are horribly guilty of this.)

Like I said, I try to keep my opinions to myself and let them come up with their own conclusions. It doesn’t mean that I don’t like conversing with people who’s opinions differ from my own. On the contrary, I LOVE the fact that people have different opinions from my own. Even if I don’t agree with opposing opinions, it’s always a good thing to at least try and understand them. I know what I believe in and do not believe in. But I’m not going to batter you over the head with it or make fun or your beliefs… Because I am not a dick.

Because when it comes down to it, I’m just a dork who draws fanservice. Do you really give two craps about what I think about Herman Cain's 9-9-9 Plan or Obamacare? You really shouldn’t. And we shouldn’t care what Frank Miller thinks either. (Or 90% of comic book creators period.)

Controversy = Incoherency

This is Frank Miller for Christ’s sake. He’s the guy who once wrote Batman porking Black Canary in garbage. Every comic he writes has ninjas, lesbians and whores in them. (Sometimes, all three of them are the same person.) Sin City was vastly overrated, 300 was good, but it’s not like it was a masterpiece… The last TRULY great comic book this guy wrote was Daredevil: The Man Without Fear miniseries in the 1990s… And before that? Year One, in the 80s. He is the living definition of having “blown your load.” But the thing is, he may not be a great writer, but he's not an idiot. This is the internet age, where anyone with a blog can post his or her thoughts on various subjects. (I should know.) Ask yourself this: How has Holy Terror’s sales done since he’s made those comments? I’m pretty sure they’ve probably gone up.

Frank is stirring up controversy for sales on his book. It's classic marketing 101. And it's working. People are getting pissed off because the guy who cluelessly gave us the internet meme of “I’m the Goddamned Batman” and created the worst comic book of all time says that the Occupy Wallstreeters are a bunch of crying babies.

In short... The old guy told the hippies to go "get a haircut."

In the future, I'll try to stay away from politics. Because on all fronts, this is pretty silly. So I'll leave you with something equally as silly, but at least intentionally so:

"Not gonna."

2011-11-09T12:56:00.002-05:00

There’s a real reason why people like Stephanie Brown. It’s not just because she’s a cute perky girl with a smile and a cape. It’s not because she’s a symbol of female empowerment. It’s not even because she’s the version of Batman with boobs. She’s more than all of that. Stephanie isn’t some rich boy who sought vengeance as opposed to therapy, and she isn’t some well off military brat who’s pouty because daddy issues. She’s not some cute circus boy who got adopted by a billionaire and she’s not a messiah from another planet here to “be the light to show us the way”.

No, not this girl. Stephanie got the short end of every single stick ever drawn to her, from her dickhead dad, to getting knocked up by a serious douchebag, to constant berating by Batman and the rest of the Batclan, to even being tortured and beaten to ‘death’ by the Black Mask. (She got better with that last one.) Hell, it even seems at times that DC editorial had it out for her over more times than people can count. And she’s not perfect either. Stephanie’s mistakes could fill an entire graphic novel. (And they have!) She has all the reasons in the world to become a villain, but she doesn‘t. She could have just put the costume in a box and went on and lead a normal life… But instead she chose to do the right thing, even though it was the hardest thing to do. She’s that person who’s always been told by the best of the best to give it up, that she’s not good enough. From Barbara, to Tim, to her father, to well respected writers of comics who create her adventures. Instead of tucking her chin and walking away sadly, she plants her feet, looks back at them with a smile, and says “Not gonna.”

It has nothing to do with being a male or female, at one point in time in our lives, we‘ve been Stephanie Brown. From either being turned down for jobs, or rejected by someone we like, or being told by a publisher that you’re just not good enough… And sometimes, it’s our fault and we brought it on ourselves. At points in time like that, we can cry in a corner, waiting for someone to feel pity on us. Or we shake it off, get up, and try again, and keep trying until we get it right, even though we may just get told to give up again… And that’s when we look them in the eye and we say:

“Not gonna.”

We’ve all been Stephanie Brown. And I believe that’s the reason she endures.

The Batman: My Top Ten Episodes

2011-11-03T19:12:00.002-04:00

As Batman: Brave and the Bold is coming to a close, we have to say goodbye to what I think was one of the greatest (if not THE greatest) Batman cartoon shows ever. But as we say goodbye to one great show, I thought we’d take a positive look back at the show’s predecessor… The Batman.

People often complain about this show because it wasn’t done by the Bruce Timm crew. It had a new universe, new voice actors, new character models, new everything. A lot of people give a LOT of grief to this show, but here’s the thing about it… It’s nowhere near as deserving of the scorn people give it. It’s biggest problem was having to be the following act to Batman: The Animated Series. It also got some scorn, because of the infamous “Bat-embargo” which prevented the show Justice League from using the Batman villains and supporting characters in their show, because they were characters in The Batman. Basically people really hated it because it wasn’t Batman: The Animated Series. Of course, that was the point of it. It was never meant to be the urban realistic series B:TAS was. It was a stylishly dark superhero show, because Batman was a stylishly dark superhero. That’s one of the biggest problems that shows based out outside source materials have: When content gets changed, and it becomes so popular, that people don’t even realize how the source material really was in the first place.

Now some people think that the show not being B:TAS is reason enough to dislike it, but when has judging something for what it’s NOT as opposed to what it is, ever been a good idea? Ever been the new co-worker, where you’re busting your ass off to do a good job, but people keep comparing you to the old guy? Or the rebound boyfriend, where you like the girl a lot, but she’s still hung up on her ex? Because they’re too busy obsessing over what you’re not, as opposed to the qualities you have. In time, you hope they eventually learn. Or they don’t, and you end up some oddball black sheep of the family.

The Batman is one of these black sheep.

Now, I’m not going to sit here and say how utterly perfect it was, because the show did indeed have it’s flaws and some of them were pretty damn big. Almost the entire first season was pretty crappy, some of the character designs really irked people the wrong way, there were a couple too many Penguin episodes, and it wasn’t really all that dark of a series. So it didn’t get off to a good start, and we all know about first impressions. So because so many had already written the show off as a dismal failure, they missed out on what may have been some of the greatest Batman cartoons ever freakin’ made. Yes, the show had a weak start, but it was one of those rare examples of animation where it got better with each season, and by the final fifth season, it was at times, as good as Justice League Unlimited. And I don’t say that lightly!

I'm a fan of Jeff Matsuda’s art style for the show. It was a different take from the classic Timm’s style, and a nice change of pace I thought. The voice acting was decent… Some of them took a little bit to grow into the role, but they eventually did. The stories were light hearted, but it was able to get rather dark when need be, and they creators did pay attention. It was a different show, but once it got off the ground running, it kept going strong. It still had it’s flaws and there are those who still complain how it should have been better… But I’d rather praise the show for what it was, as opposed to condemning it for what it wasn’t.

So allow me to run down my list of my top ten favorite episodes of The Batman.I recommend each one of these. They’re all mostly self-contained, and you don’t need to know more than what’s in the episode. At current writing, it looks like some of these episodes are available on Netflix by the seasons, so I’ll make sure I mention the season the episode took place in for you to locate easier. (Most of these are in Season Four.) Now I’ve already mentioned that the direct-to-video movie Batman vs. Dracula was on my favorite animated movie of all time list, so I’ll omit that from this list, but it’s still highly recommended. (I would place it at #2.)
________________________________________________

10: Seconds (Season Four) - This episode was really odd, but oddly awesome. It’s the story of Francis Grey, a poor son of a bitch, who’s had one case of bad awful luck after another. He discovers he has the ability to review time by a few seconds. It goes for broke, causing some massive major incidences and while the ending is a bit of a cop-out, it’s like that ‘Over the Edge’ Episode in B:TAS… There’s really no other ending that it could have had.

9: Batgirl Begins Part 1/2 (Season Three) - There are some people who really disliked Batgirl in this series, but I for one rather liked her. Also, her costume looks like something a girl would actually wear as opposed to a leather/rubber fetish outfit. One of the big changes this series did was instead of making the relationship between Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn, they made the friendship between Barbara Gordon and Pamela Isley instead. (Since Harley wasn’t introduced yet.) It was very different, but I think it worked nicely. I still prefer the Harley and Ivy dynamic, but the friendship these two had, as a sort of trouble-making duo, where one went too far, was an interesting change of pace. Also, it showed right from the word go that Batgirl was not exactly a goody-two shoes girl, who broke a few laws, despite her father being the new Commissioner. Which actually brings up one of the interesting things this show did later one. This show actually ‘aged’ in real time. When Barbara was introduced in this episode, she was a sixteen year old Junior in Gotham High School. When Season Five came around, she was an 18 year old Freshman in college. Real time aging doesn’t happen very often in cartoons and it’s a nice change of pace when it does happen.

8: Lost Powers (Season Five) - This was the series finale, though to be honest… It didn’t feel like a series finale. (It felt like another episode) But that’s not why it’s on the list. The final season came out when Justice League Unlimited had wrapped up… So at the conclusion of the fourth season, they created this show’s version of the Justice League, which consisted of mostly Silver Age counterparts, and all but a couple of episodes of the fifth seasons was Batman team-up episodes. And add onto it that they often imported many of the same creators and voice actors from the Timm-Verse shows… It was a nice surprise. This two part episode wrapped up some plot points, and gave us one giant ass superhero battle. Sure it’s not on the level of Cadmus story arc in Justice League or even Teen Titans battle against Raven’s father Trigon, but it sure was fun to watch the depowered heroes have to take down robot versions of themselves, who stole their powers. And they even dealt with the issue that Batman developed weaponry to take down the Justice League if he ever needed to. Especially Green Lantern’s weapon: Yellow paint. (Note it was done BEFORE All-Star Batman did it!)

7: The Batman/Superman Story (Season Five) - I have always been a big fan of the ‘World’s Finest’ story, and should DC entertainment ever get their heads out of their asses, and make a Superman movie that’s not an embarrassment… Never mind, it’s basically what we’re all thinking. Anyway, this episode was great because after the events of the Season Four Finale, the city was rebuilding, and Gotham gets a visit from it’s sister city Metropolis’ guardian, Superman. However, as an interesting change of pace, Batman is the more open minded one and Superman is the one that doesn’t like to play well with others. Add in some Kryptonite plant spore, some giant robots, and Clancy Brown doing his classic Lex Luthor, it’s one awesome superhero team up episode, that’s an example for what’s to come in the fifth season.

6: The Rubberface of Comedy/The Clayface of Tragedy (Season One) - Almost all of Season One sucked, but it’s like one of those necessary sort of sucks, so we know who the characters are and why they’re doing what they do. But the two part season finale was interesting. There was a new character introduced here named Ethan Bennett. He was a Detective on the Gotham PD, and a childhood friend of Bruce Wayne. In many ways, he plays the role usually played by Thomas Elliot a.k.a. Hush, in the comic books. Ethan made Batman seem more real. The fact that Bruce never had any friends always came across as a bit odd. You’d have at least one or two acquaintances. (Especially if you’re loaded like Bruce is!) Ethan was always supportive of the Batman, and always felt that the police were wrong in pursuing him. Well, this episode took cues from so many stories that it makes it worth watching. Basically, Joker’s on the rampage with his newly created substance-altering Joker Putty. With his new putty he's able to melt and alter the texture of any surface, to warp it in his own vision like silly putty. This crap gets on Ethan… And he becomes Clayface. But basically, right up to this episode, Bennett had been not only a staunch supporter of the Bat, but a main character of the series… And we watch him break apart (literally) and become a corrupt villain. Character deconstruction is a rarity on kid’s shows these days. And speaking of deconstruction…

5: White Heat (Season Five) - Firefly was never one of my favorite batvillains. He’s essentially a pyromaniac who looks like a 70’s Japanese Sentai hero wearing foil wings. But when The Batman decided to use him, they overhauled his looks to something a lot more high-tech and interesting. (Giving him this glowing jetpack, that left a ‘light trail’ in the sky, like a firefly. But he was stull never THAT interesting of a character, as most of his episodes were used in “villain of the week” episodes, or to play the fire to Mr. Freeze’s ice in various episodes. This episode was different, as we’re introduced to his personal life and a girlfriend he truly loves. He get to see the deconstruction of the character Firefly and his rebirth as Phosphorus. You literally feel sorry for the guy, as you watch he go from actually being happy into destroying his own life.

4: Strange New World (Season Four) - It’s a Halloween episode… And it’s damn good. The story has some interesting twists and turns in it, but the general plot is this: Doctor Hugo Strange has unleashed a new virus onto the citizens of Gotham, which turns the entire population into zombie-like creatures. And one by one, he finds his friends and allied turned into zombies, all stalking him and all trying to… do… something… That’s not sarcasm. It’s part of the episode’s mystery. It had a fun little twist at the end too.

3: Riddler’s Revenge (Season Four) - The Batman took a very different take with many of the characters, some like Penguin and Mister Freeze were embarrassments, but some like Firefly and the Riddler were very interesting takes. With Mister Nigma here, they decided to eschew the antics of Jim Carrey’s hyperactive portrayal or B:TAS’s smartly dressed puzzle maker, and went with a more ‘goth underground’ look. No silly jokes or quips… He’s treated as a very threatening and serious villain. Now usually when a new villain shows up, we get their origin too, but with the Riddler, we didn’t. He literally remained an “enigma” until this episode, and the trade off was well worth it, as when trapped in a flooding crate with Batman at the bottom of Gotham harbor, we find that he’s not exactly the ‘evil villain” we all thought he was.

2: Artifacts (Season Four) - This was an enormous treat for Batman Fans as it played to multiple incarnations from the original animated series to the Dark Knight Returns. The story takes place during two separate timelines, the first being twenty years from now featuring Old Man Batman, Mister Freeze (now much more cyborg like), Nightwing AND Oracle… And the second being an archeologist team digging out the bat cave in the 31st century. (No, sadly no Legions of Superheroes mentioning.) It’s not a deep episode, but it’s extremely fun and very interesting seeing the archeologists making assumptions about Batman, and being so far off target. (Such as assuming the wheelchair was for his servant, or that Robin was Batman’s son, and so on.)

1: A Matter Of Family (Season Four) - The show did have it’s flaws, but when it had it’s game on, it’s game was freakin’ on, and that is certainly this episode right here. There wasn’t many times that it actually surpassed B:TAS in versions of the same story, but they did it here. They actually managed to not only re-tell Robin’s origin, but actually have it make sense, without having Bruce Wayne come across as kinda creepy in a ‘bad touch’ sort of way. It was well written, and actually surpassed B:TAS’s “Robin’s Reckoning” as a superior Robin origin episode. And I have to admit, I did really like the ‘split cape’ effect for Robin too.
_________________________

And there you go. Like I said, the show wasn’t perfect… But it’s far from deserving the damnations it gets. It’s still superior to 95% of the Marvel cartoons ever produced. And The Batman at it's worst doesn't give me the sense of dread that what's to come next does...

Firecracker Main Cast

2011-11-01T03:45:00.003-04:00

Well, I promised artwork this time around and here it is!

It’s the head shots of the five main characters from the upcoming Firecracker comic. Stareting at the top, and going clockwise, the names are Richard Kitamer, Kristoph Deitrich, Shampoo, and Richard’s daughters, Marica and Sela Kitamer. It’s always been a bit interesting, that once you have an actual face and design to with a character… They stop being vague conceptual notions and become more cemented. More real.

It’s just a notion that almost everyone who writes is completely aware of, and it takes me by surprise each time.

I hope you like it. There'll be more on this soon.

The New Stupid-Awesome Ratings System

2011-10-27T20:33:00.001-04:00

Even though I call these the Stupid-Awesome movies, not all movies are equally stupid awesome. Some are just Stupid-Cool, and some are just Stupid-Stupid. And of course, there are those which are Lame and just utter failings of cinema. I figured it might be kinda helpful to give my own rating system for them. Now since all these movies are stupid, I figured I’d use the kings of stupid, the Three Stooges as my rating guides. So in future Stupid-Awesome reviews, the following icons will be used for reviewing.

CURLY HOWARD = Stupid Awesome! Woo-woo-woo! The finest era of the Stooges. This is quality cinema, baby! You may not even have to shut your brain off to like this one, but it helps. Nyuck!

SHEMP HOWARD = Stupid Cool! Not as great as the early Curly episodes, but there’s quite a bit to like here. But if you have a stick up your butt, you’ll probably be a sourpuss through the whole damn thing.

JOE BESSER = Stupid-Stupid! These just aren’t good. There’s not a lot to like here. There’s a few good moments here and there, but they’re mostly because of Larry and Moe.

CURLY JOE = Stupid-Lame! Ugh, I can’t even recommend these. They’re bad, they’re not fun, and it’s just depressing because it’s obvious that the Stooges are all near death.

CHAPLIN = Stupid-Suck! Screw you and your Hitler mustache! Just because Tony Stark played you in the 90s, doesn’t make you funny!

So them’s the ratings. Hope they help! Next time, I'll have some actual artwork I drew to show you. :)

Fanservice and Frustrations (Yeah, I know how that sounds.)

2011-10-26T23:09:00.001-04:00

By Ed Benes, who pretty much has the
market covered on official fanservice at DC.

Fanservice has been around for centuries in some way shape or form, going back to Tiziano Vecellio’s ‘poesie’ series and probably before. Some people call it “art” and some people refer to it as ‘masturbatory fantasies”. (Even with his stuff. Titian’s art was often considered the first pornographic artwork.) The problem is all too often, the portrayal of an attractive woman can be quickly slandered by some to fall into that latter category, no matter how she’s dressed or displayed. The determination of what consists as fanservice is somewhat frustrating. And in the world of web, it doesn’t help matters much that the internet is not exactly known for it’s level headed methods of debate. The common argument people make against it is “Why don’t you look at real boobs?” I’m sorry, but in today’s age of photoshopping and digital airbrushing, prosthetic-like make-up, not to mention body modification, and recent advancements in the uncanny valley with CGI in films like Avatar… What would you define as “real boobs”? At least cartoons are honest in their portrayal. You know it’s just a drawing. It’s not lying to you, trying to pretend that it’s photo cover spread is what that actress really looks like, because our public perception of beauty has gotten to a level where it’s now impossible for a human to attain it. (And people wonder why we have a messed up society.)

It was this cover or the Frank Cho one.
I figured I'd save the 'Monkey-Boy'
picture for later.

Do I draw fanservice? Yeeeeah, it’s pretty obvious by now I do and I don’t apologize for it. But there is a time and place for it. If you’re going to produce fanservice, you need to be honest about it. as fanservice doesn’t really have too much of a place in the midst of giant robots beating the crap out of each other. But it’s kind of expected if you’re doing a barbarian fantasy story, since you know... It's generally there’s a lot of skin, boobs and butts in stories where pants are still considered new technology. (Also, porn generally has a lot of fanservice as well. But porn is also rather silly. At least the good porn is. You get to that pornography that takes itself way too seriously, and you end up into some creepy ass territories.) Why do people draw fanservice? Well, I’m sure there are people who would love to psychoanalyze the reasons to infinity and beyond, but I’m just going be blunt and explain it as best I can. Women are just more fun to draw. That’s really it. Now I don’t deny there are some people who are probably subletting their fantasies a bit too much through the pencils… But for a lot of artists, it’s really just that simple. Girls are more fun to draw. (Hey, I like drawing robots too, but it doesn’t mean I wanna go make out with Asimo.)

You see, the grand problem is there is an indeterminate line between what is considered acceptable and what is considered exploitative and some people really have no idea that they’re being exploitive. (And some don’t care.) Which often brings up feminism. Now the notion of feminism honestly confuses the hell out of a lot of people, and it’s one of the reasons Wonder Woman had been such a horribly written character for so long. Let me take you on a little history lesson here.

In the 1960s Wonder Woman was, well… What Wonder Woman was. She was basically the female version of Superman. Her stories were boring and not that entertaining. Sorry, but it’s true. If it makes you feel any better though, Superman was suffering the same problems as well. Wonder Woman’s book sales were so low, that it was going to be cancelled. So they did something radical, and revamped her. She no longer had powers, and was more of a super-spy. (It made more sense than it sounds.) Now to be honest, these stories were actually decent, and she was a really well-written strong female character. The problem started with Gloria Steinem, who had a serious problem with the fact that they depowered what was essentially the most powerful woman in fiction. I like Gloria, but I think she made a bigger problem than she solved. Like I mentioned, the sales were plummeting, and they needed to try something new. The biggest hurdle that they had was the fact that she was so powerful, she was hard to write. That’s the problem when you have a character who’s TOO powerful. You end up having troubles writing that character in any situation that wouldn’t be a real danger to them. (Especially since this is comic books. There’s generally action involved, and it’s hard to write action and suspense if you know your heroine can get out of any scrap.)

But Steinem still had a point. They DID completely depowered her, and it’s not like there was an alternative to it. Even though the result of this shifting of power did result in a stronger character that actually appealed to more readers, DC was forced into returning her back to status norm. Now this is where the whole problems comes from. Wonder Woman was reverted back to normal, and her sales started to slump again, because the stories quickly started back to the same problems they had before. And if it wasn’t for the Wonder Woman TV show, she probably would have been cancelled. (Okay, not quite that. But I have a point I'm trying to get at here.) This was the beginning of a serious problem that a lot of comic book creators had and still have to this day. Even now, there’s a silly controversy constantly going on with her over whether she should wear pants or if she should wear her trademark star-spangled trunks and it’s been going on for DECADES. (Personally, I think THIS is the best costume to use. but that's my opinion.)

In short, a lot of people want more strong female characters in comics, and it’s a notion I truly and empathically agree with. (And hopefully I have done it in the past and will continue to do in the future.) But you have to remember in other genres, when you ask for ‘strong female characters’, you get characters like Ellen Ripley from Aliens, Sarah Jane from Doctor Who, or even Major Motoko Kusanagi from Ghost in the Shell… Female characters who are defined by their actions and personalities. They’re characters who makes mistakes, are flawed and not some idealized individuals, but are three-dimensional people in their own rights. However, with comic books, the definition of ‘strong’ has a totally different connotation, and you end up with a strong female character, as opposed to a strong character who’s female. You’ll get a woman who can throw a tank… But that doesn’t mean you’ll get the other stuff too.

Sheepish half-naked teenager
is apparently acceptable.

This is one of the problems people have with the enforcement of this form of ’comic book feminism’. (And I understand how I sound by saying that, but please bear with me.) In theory, it’s wonderful. But in practice, it’s a bunch of mixed signals defined often by favortism. Creator A does something, and he’s labeled empowering, but Creator B does the same thing and he’s called sexist. I could start giving examples here, but as I’m a comic creator… So let’s use video games. Final Fantasy’s Rikku’s outfit is very revealing really. Which is a touch disturbing, since she’s supposed to be 15. She’s essentially wearing a stripper’s costume. But I’ve seen many people who don’t even think anything about it, much less when people cosplay as her. They do not even bat an eye. Her characterization is that of a vapid moron, even though we’re told she’s supposed to be smart and quick thinking, nothing in the games are shown to represent this. (Spoony recently called the games out on this, but it took eight years for someone to finally do so.) Yet the video game character Bayonetta is considered the epitome of negative fanservice even though she’s wearing a full body suit, is half a century old, and has the appearance of being roughly in her 30s. She’s very powerful and is in full control and confidence of her actions. One is usually considered acceptable, and I’m pretty creeped out when it’s the half-naked 15 year old.

Some people say “it’s all in context of the story. If that’s how the character is supposed to act, then nudity and sexuality is okay.” Some people even claim it’s just because of the country of origin’s attitudes toward sexuality… Which is fine, but that’s not what happens, and we all know it.

Confident asskicking grown woman
is apparently unacceptable.

Essentially the problem is that what one person finds harmless, another person might find in questionable taste, and yet another person might find utterly offensive. And that line is usually defined by how well we like the specific creator who‘s portraying the characters. I used Rikku and Bayonetta for my examples, because I wanted to step outside of comic books. I could name a dozen other sweet and innocent fictional (and some not-so-fictional) girls who are dressed in questionable outfits like that all the time. It can be forgiven if it’s a case of that fictional character’s culture, like for example, Teen Titans’ Starfire, where they’ve pretty much said that Tamaran has a pretty liberal attitude toward their bodies. (Their men too.) Or even the Twi’leks from Star Wars. But you can usually tell when that’s a case of the ‘universal norm’ pretty easily, without too much controversy. And it’s not even just Japan that’s guilty of this. Europe, United States, South America… Hell, the only continent that probably not guilty of this is Antarctica, and who can really tell with those penguins? (I hear they totally get their spheniscidae freak on when you get one or two Long Island Ice Teas in them.)

With someone like Bayonetta, there’s no hiding the fanservice aspect of her… Hell, the fact that the game can be played with “one hand/one button” is ironic and probably intentional. It’s honest and open about it, and not delusional. The character knows how she dresses and even uses it to her tactical advantage. For a fictional character, there is something admirably empowering about that. And while I have never claimed to be a feminist, I do respect the honesty of it. If someone wishes to think that her kind of fanservice is beneath them, that’s not a problem. I can respect that too. But when that same person condemns Bayonetta, Catwoman, Power Girl or even Cowboy Bebop’s Faye Valentine as sad and pathetic fanservice for basement dwellers, but in the next breath, goes and praises a crying heroine getting porked, pleading for validation, after being tied up…

*sigh*

Yeah. I'm not joking with that last one. I could list the example, but then I'd be getting petty and calling specific people out. Needless to say, it can be frustrating.

Is it fair? Well, no. But we have to remember that the notion of female empowerment and equality is still a relatively new concept in the manner of global sociology. People are going to screw up unintentionally on both sides. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m going to be embarking on a new comic project here shortly, where I’m the writer of it as well as the artist, and I’m certain I’m going to occasionally screw up and draw one gratuitous butt-shot too many. Hopefully I'll be given a bit of forgiveness when that happens. After all, not every creator who draws fanservice is a leering misogynist pig, who only thinks about sex. And not every reader who demands strong female characters is a man-hating feminist, who only wants to read about super-powerful Mary-Sues.

Usually.

Like politics, most people fall in the middle, with occasional leanings toward one or the other side. We just need to be a little understanding and patient, and it should work out alright.

Stupid-Awesome: Frank Miller's The Spirit

2011-10-26T04:05:00.000-04:00

Hey Frank? There are other fonts you
could use for logos. I'm just sayin' s'all.

If you were to ask someone what the worst comic book movie of all time is, they would probably say without missing a beat Batman and Robin perhaps followed by Catwoman as a close second. At least this was until recent years when the movie gods decided to bless us with the wonderful monstrosities like Jonah Hex and Frank Miller’s The Spirit. The thing is, The Spirit deserves to be called an awful movie, because… Well, it’s an awful movie! But I cannot say it’s not watchable. Now before you decide to lynch me, if you hadn’t already cast my opinions as worthless after my disdain for Firefly and my praising of Revenge of the Fallen, you have to understand… I know this movie is bad. This movie is everything a movie should not be. And a lot of people realized that when they went to see The Spirit and they were disappointed, hoping they would be seeing the next Sin City or 300. And some of you might only be familiar with Frank Miller from Sin City and 300. You got to understand, while I was NOT a big fan of Sin City, only liking the Marv story in it, and 300 I considered his best contemporary story... I suspect the reason the movies was so well received, was because the director decided to make it visually interesting instead of focusing on the script, and it worked. Miller’s comics turned to movies really helped set a new stage of digital landscaping, where the entire thing can be filmed in front of a green screen, allowing the line of fantasy and reality to be blended. But in the case of the Spirit's movie here, it’s a lot like the movie Tron: Unless the story is any good, then it’s a bad story printed on gold leaf paper. So they were disappointed.

But not me baby! Not me! You see, I went into this piece of slimy turkey fluff expecting a pricelessly horrible piece of crap. I was expecting a train wreck, and I was happy to see I was not disappointed! After all, this is the guy who gave us the Goddamned Batman:

Bruce Wayne: Agent of NAMBLA

The Spirit was everything I was expecting it to be. It’s plot is incoherent, it’s dialogue is laughable and it’s protagonists are so one dimensionally flat, you could get deeper characterizations from an episode of the Little Einsteins. (Though let’s be honest, the Little Einsteins ARE awesome!) The visuals are murky and unclear and it’s obvious that the director has never understood what’s supposed to go onto a storyboard. In short… It’s a Frank Miller story.

HAASSAAAAAAAAN CHOP!.

You need to understand that Frank Miller is insane. To a comic book nerd like me, buying a Frank Miller product is like the rest of the normal folks watching Anna Nicole Smith slowly destroy herself. You see, back in the 1990s, they used to make a ‘top ten writers of all time list” and at the #1 spot was always Frank Miller. ALWAYS. Whenever someone was to ask a creator “who would you want to work with?” They would rattle off the appropriate names to their scene and usually end it with “And of course, Frank Miller!” He was placed on such a high pedestal for writing a Batman book I’m not 100% is really all that great. Now naturally when you have that much of a buildup and expectations for a man’s work, you’re going to be disappointed on Episode I levels… IF YOU’RE LUCKY. After years of being away, he finally unleashed the Dark Knight Strikes back onto the comic book audiences in 2001. The readers sat there, totally dumbstruck saying this was utterly horrible, and the fellow comic creators gave very safe, totally non-descript reactions that didn’t comment on the story, but praised him for the story that “deconstructed the superhero myths”. (I heard that one thrown around quite a bit. I’ll spare you the identity of the various creators who sided with Miller.) But anyway, it was quickly obvious to everyone now that Frank Miller had lost his fucking mind. Most of us have only read All Star Batman and Robin just because it’s so badly written, filled with oodles and oodles of misogyny, anarchy, and underlined potential pedophilia… That it’s countered with Jim Lee’s amazing artwork. And it’s exactly what I expected out of The Spirit! It’s a beautiful, wonderful, violent, sexist, confusing train wreck of stupid!

Col. Fury, what the hell are you wearing?
You know what? I don't care. I'm just gonna
pretend you're fighting M.O.D.O.K.

You see, many people complain about The Spirit because it should have been better, but what many do not understand… This isn’t a movie like Revenge of the Fallen, or Clash of the Titans, or even X-Men 3 where it sucked but it COULD and SHOULD have been much better. But with The Spirit… My friends, this movie was unable to be more than what it was. This was directed and written by Frank Miller. This was the best that the movie could have ever hoped to be, and it’s a mean-spirited cynic’s treasure trove! Or, to be sure, it never should have happen. But it did. So we need to embrace it. And mock it.

As bad as my movie was, I still look less
ridiculous than Superman's new costume.

What follows is an in-depth review of the movie. Gabriel Macht plays the Spirit, a former cop in a corrupt city who survived death, thanks to the experimenting of the villainous Octopus to become virtually immortal. The Octopus (played by Sam Jackson) wants the blood of Heracles, and Sand Serif (played by Eva Mendes) wants the Golden Fleece. (Though this isn’t spelled out very well in the movie!) Octopus, who’s constantly making egg references (that honestly serve no point) has cloned himself a small army of mentally impaired henchmen. Every girl that the Spirit runs into immediately falls in love with him, where this leads him to Sand Serif, who’s making a trade with the Octopus. She has the Blood, he has the Fleece. They’re arranging a trade. This leads to a gun showdown, that ends up having Octopus blown into a little wiggling finger. The end. I am not shitting you. That’s a decent synopsis. It’s like a Uwe Boll movie, where it’s insane to watch, because you listen to the commentary and he’s talking about this, and you somewhat suspect that he knows he’s made a shitty movie… But the producer is kissing his ass, telling him how brilliant he is. It’s like listening to two stupid people, patting themselves on the back for making what was considered the worst comic book movie ever made, until Jonah Hex came along. The only difference here is that I suspect that Frank Miller, along with people like Rob Liefeld, is fully aware of his reputation and is playing it up for us. We all acknowledge it’s a stupid ass movie, but that said, it’s a wonderful drinking game movie. This is a great movie with friends, or one of those movies where you truly want to watch a stupid movie.

Honestly, for not really existing and just being
green-screened in, I thought the backgrounds
were rather impressive.

The acting is so hammy and over the top. Gabriel is decent as the Spirit, but Eva Mendez’s acting is soooo bad, the Baroness from the 80’s G.I.Joe cartoon came across as having a wider range or emotions. Even the teenage version of her is so badly written, it feels like I’ve stumbled across an episode of C.O.P.S., where one of the Bigboss’ crew was talking about how they love diamonds, see? The other female actors are so corny and hammy, I could bring up accusations of sexism, but none of the men come across as particularly intelligent either. It’s a bad movie, and I will honestly admit that I have watched it with my hand on the fast forward button until I can get to the next scene with Scarlett Johansson and Samuel L. Jackson. These two plays off each other wonderfully, and they’re the one of the only good things about this movie. You almost wonder how much of it was ad libbed, because they're quite fun to listen to. Sure, whatever they’re talking about is utterly ludicrous, but I can’t deny it’s entertaining, whether it’s Jackson staring as a failed clone foot experiment, or the two of them dressed up in samurai warrior gear, or one really oddball scene that makes no sense at all with them dressed as S.S. Reich officers. There is nothing quite like it. Now I can’t say the entire thing was a total waste. I know the movie was filmed in front of a green screen, and mock it if you want, they completely recreated the city of Central City. If future movie producers can get past Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller’s love of this chiaroscuro with near desaturated color, and actually use some of the techniques developed here… You could make some seriously impressive movies, on a fraction of the budget. Hey, I’m holding out hope for someday of one of my one silly ideas to be optioned. :P

So... Couldn't find the screenshot of my ass, huh?

Like I said. This movie is stupid. It is so incompetent in it’s execution, because Frank Miller doesn’t understand the basic fundamentals of film making that Uwe Boll understand… And that’s a guy who make three Bloodrayne movies, the latter of them consisting of mostly girl-on-girl tribadism. But if you’re like me, and you’ve developed an appreciation for the insanity that was once the skillful and rather clever writer, as he’s now devolved into a sad teenage wannabe old man who’s just obsessed with violence, whores, lipstick bisexual lesbians, and ninjas… Serving as a warning to all of us of the path to avoid. You should see The Spirit… Just to know what NOT to do.

Stupid-Awesome: The Warrior and the Sorceress

2011-10-26T00:46:00.002-04:00

I’ve never been a huge fantasy fan. I mean, sure I seen the Conan movies when I was younger, but the whole swords & sorcery genre never appealed to me all that much, as I was more of a science fiction nerd. And I mean no disrespect to the lovers of the genre. It’s just never been my bag. I mean, I liked to the Lord of the Rings movies, but I just never felt the love for the genre that I know others have, even though technically speaking, most of my favorite franchises would indeed fall under the fantasy categorization. (I mean, seriously Star Wars is more fantasy than it’s Science Fiction. And Star Trek is a socialist fantasy.) I can appreciate it, but it was just something that never held my interests as a child. But that doesn’t mean I never liked watching a halfway decent barbarian film, because I did. And mainly because there was a better than average chance, you were gonna see boobies. A couple of friends I’ve been hanging out with lately are big fantasy buffs, and they’ve sorta helped rekindle an interest in the genre for me. I mean, it’s still nowhere near my love for Cybertronians, but I have developed an appreciation for it. And recently, I stumbled across a movie two-pack containing the movies ‘The Warrior and the Sorceress’ and ‘Barbarian Queen’. Now my friends think that Barbarian Queen was a better movie, because it has a better narrative and the story flows better, and they’re probably right. But I prefer the former more, because of just how weird it is.

‘The Warrior and the Sorceress’ is an Argentine fantasy movie made in the early 80’s, during the wake of the Conan the Barbarian movies. It’s essentially a sword and sorcery version of a ‘Fistful of Dollars’ or ‘Yojimbo’, or whatever you prefer. Essentially on a desert planet with two suns, that’s not Tantooine, David Carradine plays a wandering former holy warrior named Kane. (That’s a stretch, right?) Two parties are fighting for control of the only well of water in the region, and he plays each other against one another for gold. Kane looks nothing like he does on the box art above. Where there, he looks like a strapping muscular hero who would be a real challenge to Thundarr the Barbarian, in the movie, he’s clad in a black cloak that covers his small frame… And he looks bored the entire time. Even when he’s in the midst of a battle, he’s going through the motions like he just doesn’t care.

...I feel like I've censored the wrong part.

One of the bad guys reminds me of the human version of Jabba the Hutt. (Pre-Return of the Jedi version) complete with a laughing muppet-like sidekick and slave girls. Seriously, all he needed was a creepy looking Twi’lek looking guy to whisper in his ear. There’s an evil slaver (as opposed to a ‘good slaver’ I suppose) who looks like he was inspired by Humungus from the Road Warrior. But the thing that stood out to me as a laugh fest… And sorry ladies. This is where I turn into a total guy here… Is the titular sorceress, who’s name, much like everyone else in this movie, is not important… Other than the fact that, and I kid you not, she spends the entire movie topless. And in the few scenes that she’s got some kind of top on, she either loses it, very quickly… Or she gets a suit of armor that covers her top, except her boobs. It’s like designing armor for Final Fantasy characters. It’s seems that functionality was second in conceptualization. I mean, it’s not even teasing or sensual… It’s just so casually done, it’s almost comical. I mean, later in the movie, she’s reunited with her father. Does her father cover her up with his robes? No. She keeps running around topless. You might say “well, it’s just that planet’s culture.” Yeah, except that some of the other women in the movie are wearing tops. And then we much bring up… The “other woman” in the movie. And if you’ve seen the movie, you know who I’m talking about. If not… You see the box art up there with the lady in it? Yeah. Except her hair is goofier looking. Yeah, I know. Four breasts and I’m talking about hairstyles. Go figure. I mean, both girls are pretty, and I’m not complaining. It’s just… Somewhere it stopped being awesome, and just turned weird. But not weird in a bad way. Just… Weird. (Like Quentin Tarantino’s foot fetishes.)

Insert casual 'Kill Bill' reference, or tasteless
autoerotic asphyxiation here.

Okay, ‘nuff about the boobs, let’s get back to the actual movie. Bad guy #2 wants the sorceress, because she has the ability to forge a mystic sword. (Maybe it’ll grant him access to Castle Grayskull.) Kane, being a former holy warrior, manages to free the sorceress in the world’s most uninspired escape scene. (Which involved climbing a wall and climbing back down it. And she promptly gets recaptured again.) There’s a lot of double crossing, and a spider-octopus monster, that’s not as cool as it sounds. In the end, she makes the sword for Kane to use against the bad guys, and stuff happens and then it ends. Yeeeeah… The thing is, it’s not the greatest sword and fantasy movie ever made. Hell, it’s not even in the second tier. (Maybe not even the third!) But I cannot say it’s not watchable. For all it’s stupidity, it’s a highly entertaining piece of crap. (Especially if you got some friends around.) There’s lots of weird stuff going on, and despite the constant nudity going on… Other than a drowning scene, which was just thrown in there to show how evil bad guy #2 is, it’s actually a quite harmless, like the Deathstalker movies. They’re silly and only offensive to people with a stick up their bum.

Stupid-Awesome: Leviathan

2011-10-26T00:37:00.001-04:00

I’ve been critical of James Cameron in the past, to the point that I’m sure many think I hate his movies. Well, I’m not fond of a lot of them, but his undersea documentaries I think are utterly beautiful, and I consider his 1989 movie ‘The Abyss’ his best movie. I really love it. Now what’s interesting is that in ‘89, the Abyss was not the first, but the SIXTH film in a slew of movies with the premise “Help, I’m trapped underwater and there’s a monster down here with me!” Cameron’s just happens to be the best of them. The others are honestly subpar. ‘DeepStar Six’ had laughably bad special effects, I don’t even remember ‘Lords of the Deep’ and the others I had to check Wikipedia to get the names. But there’s one that stands above those others that truly earns the title… Stupid-Awesome. Ladies and Gentlemen… ‘Leviathan’!

Okay, right of the bat, this movie is one of many rip-offs of Alien. You know the set up. Future setting, seven member crew (five men, two women), a shifty doctor with a questionable past, a corporate guy who’s heart’s in the right place, big cool black guy, ect. They get a call to check out an abandoned derelict on behalf of the company, and end up bringing a monster on board, which proceeds to kill everyone, one by one, until it’s down to one or two people. The monster is a genetic alteration, which after it kills people, it absorbs their memories, so it’s kind of like ‘John Carpenter’s The Thing’ as well. It’s very formulaic in it’s construction. You know who dies and in what order they’re going to die in. It holds no real surprises. You know the alcoholic’s gonna buy it first, and then the doctor’s gonna do something that’ll make escape impossible, and the cool black guy sacrifices his life to save the others, and he’s usually near the last to die. The corporation is ‘eeeeeevil’ and wants to doom them all. By the way, as an aside, how overdone is the evil corporation shtick? How exactly do you package and market evil? “Oooooooh! Big Guns and Big Pharmaceuticals are bad, man!” Because you know, soldiers can use harsh language and antibiotics are bad for you. Just once, for a change of pace, I’d love to see the evil corporation be a major manufacturer of wind turbines or hydroponic wheatgrass. I will give this movie credit though, in that the company didn’t want to retrieve the monster for some ‘bio-weapons’ division. They just wanted it to be destroyed. (They were just willing to sacrifice the crew to do it.)

"We need Thunder-Megazord Power now!"

But here’s the two things that makes Leviathan stand out from the others. It’s production values are pretty decent. Nothing ever really looks like a model or a cheap rubber suit. (With heavy exception of when you finally see the monster at the end. You’re kind of laughing, because you’ve seen more convincing Power Ranger monsters.) And the other is who they got to star in this movie. We have Peter Weller, Richard Crenna, Daniel Stern, Meg Foster (and her cool eyes), and Winston Zeddemore himself, Ernie Hudson! Holy crap, how have more people not heard of this movie! That’s almost a geek battalion right the hell there! We also have Amanda Pays, who played Tina McGee on the old Flash TV show. Her British accent’s so freakin’ alluring, the movie could just be an hour and a half of her reading a phone book, and I’d be content. (I could go off for a long period of time about how hot she is, but this would really quickly go from being pathetic to just plain creepy.) Generally the characters are well likable enough, especially Ernie Hudson’s character. However, Meg Foster’s character, as the company spokeswoman is so obviously evil. She’s like secreting underhandedness. It’s almost on a smarmy Doctor Doom level.

"Ah, if there's a steady paycheck involved,
I'll believe anything you say.

Okay granted, Leviathan is not high art. It’s formulaic. There’s built in cap to how good it can actually be. If they had actually broken away from the formula, it might have really been a good film. Simple little things, like had Meg Foster’s character not been a “heartless corporate shill” or if Ernie Hudson’s character could have survived and not die, as per the “black guy always buys it” trope. (Seriously, he’s the coolest character in this movie. But that’s probably because Ernie Hudson may be the coolest person period.) It would not have changed the context or direction of the story. In fact, it might have been somewhat revolutionary for it’s time. But unfortunately, it follows that formula to a tee, and I think it suffers for it too.

But as it is, it’s stupid but kind of fun. I don’t know if I can call it awesome, but I can’t exactly say it’s bad either. It’s a Diet Alien. It’s made with aspartame, so it’s like the original, but tastes kind of funny and not all that filling. But at like just over 90 minutes, it a decent rip-off. Which is more than I can say for the majority of the sequels to Alien.

Stupid-Awesome: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

2011-10-26T00:30:00.002-04:00

Now… I liked Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. I actually get a lot of crap for it. People have talked down to me like I’m some kind of backwater simpleton just because I’ve said I liked the film. Now I have some reasons for liking the film and giving Michael Bay a pass on it, but before I go any farther, I’d like to point out three things:

1. I’m well aware how sub-par the film can be. And not even in that “stupid-awesome” way that I loved movies like Blood: The Last Vampire or Clash of the Titans. (The new one.) The movie was very minimal on plot and honestly wasn’t as good as it should have been. It had a lot of factors going against it, mainly the half finished script that was done during the writer’s strike. Even the stars and director thought the movie was weak. Does that excuse them for putting out a half-assed product? Not at all. For $200M, if you got plot holes, stop filming and fix them. Now that movie made a crap load of money, and it was flawed up the ass. How much would it have made if it wasn‘t? There’s a lot of stuff that needed explanation that was just left the audience scratching their heads. Like for example, that scene at the end where Sam “dies”? Okay, if you’re a hardcore Transfan like I am, you know what was going on. Sam went into the Autobot Matrix of Leadership. For the Chosen One and the Bearers of the Matrix, this is a common enough occurrence to know that. (See Rodimus Prime and Optimus Primal for other examples.) But if you don’t know that, then it looks like he went to “Robot Heaven and talked to Robot God” (Which now that I think about it, that’s kinda what happened… Huh.)

Lethal teabag

2. Despite it’s PG-13 rating, the movie was still a toy commercial. Honestly, I’m a capitalist and I got no problem with entertainment doubling as a toy commercials. (Hell, even the original Star Wars Trilogy was dictated by toys.) But since it was a toy commercial, I feel it should have geared itself a little more all-ages. I’m not saying it should have had Optimus Prime pop his head out of the screen and say “Hey kids!” But there was some content in there that probably should have been geared back a bit. A lot of the mature stuff really should have been cut out. I’m not talking about crass stuff like the dogs humping or Devastator’s balls. (Kids love that shit!) No, I’m talking about just about all the stuff with Alice the pretender and the college scenes should have been re-written heavily. All the crude sex jokes probably should have been dropped from there, and there was some visuals like Scalpel’s Insecticon worm bug thing that went in through Sam’s mouth and was gagged up and stuff… It was no big deal for me, but I can totally see how that would be disturbing for kids.

3. The Twins. Yeeeeeeeah, they’re the Jar-Jar Binks of Transformers. I’m just going to leave that one alone.

But most of the other complaints are honestly common enough that every time they make a new series, the same bunch of whines and complaints pop up. Why isn’t Prime a snub nosed truck. Why isn’t Megatron a gun? Why can’t Frank Welker do the voice? Why isn’t Bumblebee a VW Bug? Why do we have to have so many humans? Why can’t it take place on Cybertron? Blah blah, etcetera to the ad nauseam degree. This may sound new to some of you, but Transfans have been putting up with this crap since “Trukk not Munky” from the mid-nineties. I usually disregard all these complaints as worthless because I’m sorry these people didn’t bother to notice that the franchise didn’t stop when they stopped paying attention, and that it kept going for 25 YEARS without them. Maybe the franchise might have come up with some new stuff that you fricken’ missed? (Allspark, The Fallen, Minicons, protoforms, ect.) The movies have some big flaws, but those kind of complaints aren’t among them. That’s like me being pissed off at Battlestar Galactica for Starbuck being a woman. Get over it.

I admit the movie had it’s big flaws, but you know what? I still liked it.

Pretender Facial Creme™:
For those with dry and cracked
prosthetic outer shells.

It’s the same reason I saw and loved the Expendables. It was the equivalent of a man-gasm for the nine-year old in me. Shit blew up, and when it got done blowing up, it blew some more shit up, giant robots blew up and got vivisected (Poor Sideways. But it’s okay, because I hear he’s a multidimensional hopper. He‘ll be okay.), John Turturro hilarious “One man” speech, and Optimus Prime just kicking all sorts of ass in the forest battle. And if I was a robot, I would so have gay sex with Sideswipe. Sure it had no plot, but I’m not too sure I needed one. It was like watching the last Rambo movie.

Honestly Transformers has never been a big “plot concept”. Transfans like to think it is, but really when you break it all down, it’s just one group of giant robots machine gunning another group of giant robots. Even the most respected and beloved Beast Wars pretty much broke down to this. It doesn’t mean it’s not fun… It just means it’s not Shakespeare. The original Generation One series was covered with gigantic plot holes you could drive The Motormaster through. And it was full of the same silly stereotypes too. Revenge of the Fallen was pretty much a Generation One episode fleshed out to two hours. It was stupid, it was dumb…

But I felt like a kid.

And it reminded me of times with my mom.

My mom bought me a GoBot when I was nine years old. (It was Turbo.) She thought that toys cars that turned into toy robots were really neat, and she encouraged it. You know how when you’re growing up, you would talk to your parents about stuff, and you’d talk to them like they knew all about it too. You’d mention Star Wars characters or whatever, and they’d smile and say “That’s nice” and not really care? Well, not my mom. She knew who the characters were. She knew who Bumblebee was. He was the cute little yellow car. (Which was her favorite of them, since she could actually transform that one, and it reminded her of her first car, which was a VW Bug.) I mean, she didn’t know finer details, but she knew what the names were and who was an Autobot and who was a Decepticon. She knew which ones I had and didn‘t have. They used to come with these little catalog books that listed off all the available toys and she used them. She didn’t have to. She just did. Even though I grew older, got less into toys and more into girls, art and other stuff… she still bought me Transformers, because it was something for us. Yeah, we argued a lot and drove each other nuts a little too often, but this was our little mother-son bonding thing.

Now my mom's favorite car was always the Camaro. She always thought they were beautiful machines, and wanted a yellow one, because it was her favorite color. Can you imagine how excited she was when she found out that Bumblebee was going to be a yellow Camaro? She thought it was so awesome looking, and she was so happy when she found a Bumblebee two-pack at Target. She bought the movie when it came to DVD and she bought all the versions of the Camaro Bumblebee toys that got released. Sure she couldn’t transform them, but she loved it, and she really liked the first movie. Mainly because of Bumblebee and it wasn’t just that he was a Camaro, but because he was Bumblebee. She remembered him from my youth. It was special to her. And thus it’s special to me too.

Not many people get a late Christmas present
from their mother, posthumously.

I’m sure either you already know or you noticed my usage of past tense to know where this is going. My mom passed away in March of ‘08 due to kidney failure complications. When cleaning the house sometime later, I stumbled across a Target bag, and in it was Offroad Ironhide… A Christmas present she forgot to put under the tree.

Look, I know the second movie was dumb. I’m a redneck, but I’m not an idiot. But you know what? My mom’s Bumblebee was in it, I still enjoyed it and as far as I’m concerned, Michael Bay gets a pass from me. And if I have a kid, I’m going to raise them on Transformers. And Nerf guns, and Star Wars and old classic horror movies, and comic books, etc. (And if it's a girl... She's gonna kick all their asses at being a super-geek.)

So yeah. I like the movie. But all that aside, TF: ROTF wasn’t even the worst Transformers has ever been. If you’ve never heard of Kiss Players, be VERY thankful. And whatever you do, don’t Google that at work. It‘s NSFW and very creepy. It’s from Japan.

Where else?

Why I didn't like Firefly

2011-10-26T00:12:00.002-04:00

I was originally going to let this just go off and be forgotten, but I thought I'd repost this, because I know it'll be brought up again some day.

I don't like Firefly.

Not the Cobra saboteur, or the Batman pyromaniac, or the Rob Zombie’s psychopathic family. Joss Whedon’s Firefly. Yes… THAT Firefly. (Oh yes, I’m goin’ there.) Before I continue, I want to emphasize that I got nothing against the man or his other works. I wasn’t a fan of Buffy or Angel, not because I disliked them, but because it just wasn’t what I was interested in. I loved his run on X-Men, up until that conclusion (and I probably wouldn’t have disliked it so much if it hadn’t been so chronically late all the time) and I look forward to his Avengers movie. (Though, I have nothing good to say about Dollhouse. I’m still irked they cancelled the Sarah Conner Chronicles for it.)

You see, at that time when the show was airing, science fiction was essentially was in a dearth. Star Trek: Enterprise was sucking Warp Factor vapors right out of drydock, Star Wars had just delivered Episode II, which I consider to be the worst of the saga (And I LIKED the prequels), X-Files had wrapped up with a whimper, Lexx had ended with a depressing sigh, Babylon 5 had embarrassed itself with Crusade, Stargate SG1 was still a Showtime exclusive, and Sci-Fi Channel had JUST cancelled the really awesome and really underrated Farscape. (I miss Scorpius.) If you were a science fiction fan, Firefly was your only real outlet. So I understand why it’s so popular. It’s one of those “right place, right time” sort of things. The problem is every sci-fi fan and friend I had was telling me I have to watch Firefly, and that it’s the greatest science fiction show in years. And at the time, I didn’t want to watch it, I just did not want to get involved into a new show. Especially on FOX, since it’ll be cancelled in a season. Doesn’t matter if it’s good or not, if it didn’t get higher ratings than reruns of Cops, then getting attached to a new show was just an exercise in masochism. And it had happened over and over again. Millennium, Strange Luck, VR5, Brisco Country Jr., Brimstone, Wonderfalls, The Lone Gunmen… I just didn’t feel like getting attached to a show AGAIN and having it cancelled, leaving the series in a cliffhanger or on a downer note. And of course, it was cancelled. Big shock. But even after it’s cancellation, people were still praising it’s greatness to me. And I just didn’t really wanna see it. I didn’t want to watch a series that I’d just get irritated at because it ended on an unresolved note. Then Serenity came out, and then my friends were all “Dave, it’s got an ending now! And the movie was awesome! You HAVE to watch it!”

You see, especially at that time, I had this reputation of being the ‘guy who doesn’t like anything.’ Like I was cynical and saw flaws in everything. Which is frellin’ hilarious, because if anyone even really talks to me for more than ten minutes, they find out that I’m a pretty open minded guy who likes cheesy stupid movies, bad pop music, and silly cartoons. I just don’t like pretentious. You might have noticed in our comic, when faced against great odds, our characters don’t pull out some magical deus ex machina about the meaninglessness of life and how humanity is a cancer or whatever. We use a steel chair on a vampire and had a green dreadlocked cyborg roundhouse kick the one-eyed bitch. Our book is many things, but pretentious is NOT one of them. I had a long rant about the Matrix movies here, but it was too much of a derailment. (So I’ll get back to them later.) But the same people who were telling me how The Matrix films were the greatest movies ever were telling me how Firefly was the greatest show ever. My Pretentious Warning Alarm went off like a klaxon. So I managed to avoid watching it for a few years.

So one day, I was bored, and I decided to borrow my uncle’s copy of the show, and sat down and watched it. I sat through seven episodes: It wasn’t pretentious at all. But it wasn’t the greatest show ever. It was okay. Really, that’s it. Just okay. After the seventh episode… Time came to swap out the disk, and just didn’t want to. I just didn’t care. I didn’t care about River, didn’t care about Mal Reynolds, even though we shared a last name, I didn’t care about Zoe, or the Reavers or whatever the hell. (I kinda liked Book though. He was kinda neat.) I could see why people liked the show and that was cool, but it just didn’t appeal to me. In actuality, I thought it borrowed too much from other science fiction shows. Outlaw Star is the one that immediately popped to my head. Space western, smart mouth but disallusioned hero in a brown trench coat and a pistol, renegade crew, young emotionally impaired girl who seems “sweet and innocent but harbors darkness in her”, badass chick who can kick anyone’s ass, a sidekick like mechanic youth, and of course the Serenity looked similar to the Outlaw Star. All it was missing was a Ctarl-Ctarl. But hey, you know… Star Wars and Indiana Jones were essentially homages and borrowed heavily from old 1930 serials and adventure flicks, and they were my favorite films. And it’s not like influences aren’t found rife in my own artwork. I didn’t mind the universe, I just didn’t care about the story. So I jumped ahead and watched Serenity and just to see how it ended, and “Oh wow, what a shock! Joss Whedon killed the kinda likable character! I didn’t see that coming a mile away.”

So yeah, I didn’t hate Firefly. I just didn’t like it.

That’s not where the fun begins with me though. It’s when I tell people I didn’t like Firefly, they start down this same exact list each time. This has happened so much, it’s in the double digits. It’s hilarious. Here’s an approximate retelling of all the conversations:
______
ME: I didn’t like Firefly.
THEM: Why not? (Almost always in an accusatory manner, like I just insulted their genitals.)
ME: I watched the first seven episodes, and the movie, and it didn’t appeal to me. Just wasn’t my thing.
THEM: Did you watch them in order?
ME: um... Yes.
THEM: What didn’t you like about them?
ME: I just didn’t really care for the characters. The characters they bothered to develop I wasn’t really liking and I wasn’t all that interested in the story.
THEM: (Usually here they ask for specifics, which they almost always tell me how River isn’t a one dimensional and she develops more as time goes on, or that Zoe isn‘t a Mary Sue.)
ME: Yes, but I wasn’t liking just about any character by the time I quit. I think they should have developed themselves a bit more… Like within the first few episodes.
THEM: Well you got to watch more than seven episodes! (This is always in that “insulting tone” like I’m an idiot for not realizing this.)
ME: I watched seven episodes and the movie. That’s over half the series. That’s the equivalent of watching two and a half of the three Lord of the Rings movies. If I didn’t care about Frodo and Sam by the battle of Minas Tirith, I wasn’t going to care about them ever. I’m not saying the show was bad, I was just saying it wasn’t my thing.
THEM: But you liked (insert whatever dumb sci-fi movie or show that I liked that nerds hated, like the Star Wars Prequels for example).
ME: Yeah, and they were flawed, but there was stuff in it I really liked, usually the characters. (As bad as Episode I was, Qui-Gon Jinn was really likable.) I just didn’t care about the characters in Firefly. It's like the one good line from the second 'From Dusk til Dawn' movie: "When I care more about the characters, I care more about the fuckin'."
THEM: Whatever, you’re an idiot.
_____
And that’s every goddamn discussion I ever have about Firefly. Even though I said I like Joss Whedon and I said I didn’t hate the show, and I’m not even saying people are wrong for liking it... The fucking Browncoats decide to get a major stick up their butt for it!

Imagine the crap I put up with when I tell people I liked Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

Stupid-Awesome: The Road to El Dorado

2011-10-26T00:04:00.000-04:00

Reblogged from the Shadowgirls site

Road to El Dorado was one of those overlooked gems of a movie that I have no idea why it wasn’t more popular. It’s beautifully animated, the voice acting is great, and even the Elton John music isn’t that annoying. I assumed that it was simply a case of bad marketing, since this was about the time that Disney came out with Atlantis: The Lost Empire and Titan AE bombed like a nuke in the theaters, effectively killing Fox Animation. But looking at Rotten Tomatoes today, it’s still not highly thought upon, which really baffles me. Admittedly, it’s not a perfect film, but it’s far better than Brother Bear or that horrible piece of crap, Shrek. It’s by far the best of the movies I’ve talked about here thus far, and the flaws the movie has are no better or worse than the flaws in other more popular films that came out later. But then I remember, these are critics saying that. They’re the same people who can’t figure out why Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was so financially successful, when they hated it so much. Anything that gives Ebert a headache is okay by me. (However, with the Road to El Dorado, I should point out that when you click on the RT Community tab on Rotten Tomatoes, the rating is like 64%. Usually you want to go by those numbers, since those are real people reviewing a movie and not a critic.) The Road to El Dorado is based around the old “Road to” movies that Bing Crosby and Bob Hope used to do. Basically about two fast-talking friends that through a series of events, end up on an adventure to a far away land, with a beautiful girl and danger is often involved. This movie is no exception. (You might have seen this trend done on Family Guy on more than a few occasions. I’m the farthest thing from an Family Guy fan, but they are usually their better episodes. That right there is about the nicest thing you‘ll hear me say about that show.)

Road to El Dorado is basically about two Spanish conmen named Tulio and Miguel, who bumble their way onboard Hernán Cortés’ ship bound for the New World. Along the way, they end up in a lifeboat with a horse (long story) and end up on a quest searching for the fabled city of El Dorado. (Akator to us Crystal Skull fans.) They find the place (accidentally of course) where thanks to the help of a curvaceous native woman named Chel (more on her later) they’re assumed to be gods. Being greedy conmen, this works wonderfully for the duo. I won’t spoil much more. Yeah, it’s about as historically accurate as 300 and the plot has been done before, but it’s like Stallone making action films: He may be in his 60s and the movies are pretty much all the same, but goddamn, I like watching him blow shit up.
The voice acting in this movie, particularly that of Kevin Kline (Tulio) and Kenneth Branagh (Miguel) is about some of the best I’ve heard in an animated movie. (I think personally, I would put The Incredibles above it, and maybe Ratatouille… But not many more.) Their rapport and the way they play off each other is classic comedy. I could fill this entire reviews of the back and forth dialogue these two have that just brings a smile to your face.

Now the animation is beautiful. It’s not exactly “Tarzan” levels of jaw-dropping, but it’s also well above “serviceable”. (For the record, I consider Disney’s Tarzan to have the best traditional animation of any movie ever. And for $150 million, it better have been!) What really shines out to me as an artist is the character designs… They actually look like they’re from South America as opposed to being just a bunch of white people colored tan. (Happens a lot more than you’d suspect. But that’s another issue for someone much smarter than me to discuss.) But one character of interest I want to bring up here: Chel.

Chel is interesting. Personality-wise, Chel is flawed. She’s as big of a con-artist as our two heroes. She’s seduces, she cheats, sets the boys against each other, AND she’s one of the heroes. She’s not a princess, and she’s probably what would be defined as an “anti-hero”. (I think Charon shares a lot of traits with her.) She’s voiced by Rosie Perez, who’s a good actress, so she kinda rounds out the dynamics of the two heroes. Visually though I believe is where she shines through. Check her character design to the right. What are those things she’s got? Oh, that‘s right! Curves! She's got curves! When you see a lot of female cartoon characters (both animated and comic), they far too often fall into a category that I myself may be guilty of, as well. Kind of a generic female body, where the major differences between them are either the height or the bust size. Sometimes not even that. Some of the Disney Princesses or female characters from the DC Animated Universe you could probably just swap their heads around and be none the wiser. (In fact, I believe the toys have proven this.) Chel obviously doesn’t have that issue. Now, if you type in “Chel” into Google, you’re going to find a bunch of fanart of her. In fact, you’ll find more fanart of her than official artwork. Some good, some not so good… And some NSFW, so don’t do it there. (In fact, it was a bit of a struggle to find even that image of her I posted.) The only other female cartoon characters I’ve only seen this happen before with is Kim Possible’s Shego and Rescue Rangers’ Gadget. (Maybe Raven too… Dunno.) And both of those are from very popular shows, as opposed from a ten year old movie that bombed at the box office. It’s kinda odd. But then again, fanboys and fangirls really shouldn’t be examined too deeply. Just accept what is and what is not.

Clocking in at about 89 minutes, the Road to El Dorado is actually a fun movie and I’m quite baffled why it’s not more popular. If you haven’t seen it, give it a shot. I think you’ll be pleased.

Stupid-Awesome: Innocent Blood

2011-10-25T23:57:00.004-04:00

Reblogged from the Shadowgirls site

Ah, Innocent Blood. During the early 1990’s, there was a slew of “mobster” movies made from ‘Goodfellas‘, to the third Godfather flick to even Stallone’s shark-jumping opus, ‘Oscar‘. In a way, Innocent Blood plays off this trend, but adds vampires to the mix. I’m not a big fan of vampire movies to be honest, for the same reason most people aren’t. Vampires are usually written as pretentious pretty assholes who suffer from severe cases of Mary Sue/Marty Stu syndromes. Fortunately, this movie, much like last week’s Blood: The Last Vampire is not the case. Now the movie is a black comedy, but what was funny about it is that it wasn’t advertised as such. People went to see the movie thinking it was a typical serious toned horror film, so some people wasn’t sure what to make of it. This plays into a theme I’ve often wondered: If you don’t tell someone that something is a comedy, will they know to laugh? Innocent Blood, was re-titled for international audiences as ‘A French Vampire in America‘, implying it’s a sequel to director John Landis’ earlier black comedy movie, ‘An American Werewolf in London‘. (Another charming film, but more well known, so there’s no need to talk about it.)

Innocent Blood is about a young beautiful Frenchwoman named Marie, played by the beautiful Anne Parillaud, who happens to be a vampire. It’s a classic theme that’s been brought up hundreds of times in comic books: “If I must kill, then let it be those who deserve it.” Essentially the city of Pittsburgh (where the story takes place) is in the midst of a mob war, and Marie decides to use it as a cover to feed on mobsters. She seduces the mobsters, and then they’re alone, “vamps out” on them. Then she covers her tracks with a shotgun blast to the face. (Also to make sure none of them turn into vampires.) Unfortunately, she attempts to feed off a mob boss by the name of Sal Macelli, played awesomely by Robert Loggia, and she gets interrupted before she can shot him, and thus the plot begins when he wakes up in a morgue with a thermometer in his stomach, and decided to start converting his gang. (Including Don Rickles. Srsly.)

Now let me stop for a moment here and tell you about these mobsters. They are every single Italian stereotype you have ever seen rolled up into a single movie. All the music they listen to is Frank Sinatra, they all wear Armani suits, and they eat nothing but the typical Italian foods like spaghetti and calzone. (Yes, there is a garlic and vampire joke involved in the film. Two actually.) It sort of hilarious in it’s generalizations. The vampires on the other hand, they’re played very straight laced. Super-speed, strength, flight, and even wall crawling abilities. But they also didn’t screw about with the weaknesses. Break their neck, they die. Shoot them in the head, they die. Expose them to sunlight, they die. No sparkling here. Of all the vampire movies I’ve ever seen, this one has my favorite ones. (I only wish they turned into bats.) It’s all straight forward and absolutely NO pretentiousness. It is SO unpretentious that in one scene, where Macelli is soaked in gasoline, the hero takes out a lighter… And Macelli doesn’t become afraid or trying to talk him down… He looks at him like “screw you and your punkass girlfriend!" It’s just this cocky machismo that is so appealing, especially in the wake of the Edwards of the world. The hero of the film is played by the guy who plays that dude on “Without a Trace”. I could look up the details, but I can’t care enough to remember the character’s name. He could be played by Urkel for all I care, he’s not the star of the movie. You’re watching this movie for two reasons: Anne Parillaud’s character and Robert Loggia’s character. Maire because of how beautiful she is, and Macelli because of how cocky-awesome he is.

I could (and should) fill this entire blog up
with pictures of her and be content.

As for the acting… Well, like I said, they’re all acting like stereotypes, so it does comes across a bit corny at times. None of the protagonists, other than Marie, is even memorable, and that’s probably because they played it too straight. The character of Marie is interesting, as she has that almost “innocent” quality about her. (Hence the title.) Not too much is revealed of her past, so she has that mysterious alluring quality to her. It needs to be pointed out how hot she is. She ws not only very beautiful in the movie, she's also aged very beautifully as well. (And I hear she's single now. Hmmm...) However, it’s a good thing she’s supposed to have a heavy French accent, because it barely covered up the fact that she can’t act. (But it does bring up the Luke Skywalker/Mark Hamill question: Acting badly or badly acting?) The special effects are nothing too fancy, especially for it’s time. There are two standout moments for me though. One is the eyes of the vampires are done in this multicolored kaleidoscope which looks really neat, and it’s an effect I’d like to seen done again today. Unfortunately, these were done in the older days pre-computer effects, so they were likely tinted sclera lens. (Which I’ve worn once, and feel sorry for anyone who ever has.) So sometimes, the pupils comes across as cross-eyed one time too many, making it look a little sillier than intended. And there’s this other scene, with a vampire being exposed to sunlight, and it’s a really impressive death scene that reminded me more of a charcoaling, than a typical “burn to flames” effect.

Innocent Blood is a silly film, but highly watchable. If you haven’t seen it, give it a try. It clocks in at about 110 minutes, so it’s not too long… And it’s a treat to see some vampires with an actual set of balls.

Stupid-Awesome: Blood the Last Vampire

2011-10-25T23:46:00.000-04:00

Reblogged from the Shadowgirls site

Now before I begin, I'm one of those people that has no problem shutting my brain off and enjoying crap. And even seeing a higher form of art in said crap. People seem to get a serious bug up their asses when it comes to movies like these. It’s like appreciating a good fart joke: The only people who don’t find a good fart joke funny, is people who’s never farted, or people who don’t want to admit they’ve farted. (Which really explains a lot, if you stop and think about it.)

When I saw last year that they were making a Blood: The Last Vampire movie, I thought “This looks like it’d be a really interesting way to waste a couple of hours.” I mean, did I expect good? Hell no, it’s a live action remake of an 50 minute long anime from ten years ago, which I thought was just “okay.” Unfortunately, it had a very limited release, as in no theater in Michigan was even showing the damn thing. So I had to wait until it’s release on DVD. By no means did I expect this movie to be all that great. I figured there’d be a ton of bad acting, a some head kicking, bad special effects and no script. I was right on all accounts. It’s not like I was expecting brilliance. Yet, despite the film’s flaws… And there were a bunch of them… It was rather awesome. In a nutshell, the movie takes place at Yokota Air Base in Japan around the early 70’s, during the closing days of the Vietnam War. (I find this time period interesting choice, as really, you don’t see a lot of modern movies picking this time period, much less this time period in Japan. Kinda interesting and allowed for a cool soundtrack.) Saya is a 400 year old half human/half vampire teenage girl who’s hunts other vampires, looking for the master vampire, Onigen. She has the help of an organization called the Council, which helps cover her tracks as she does cause a bit of a mess wherever she goes. During the course of the movie, she befriends a token white girl, who’s a rebellious General’s daughter which leads into a cover up mess involving the military and this fore mentioned Council. Yeah, I know, it doesn’t sound brilliant. But let me get the bad out of the way first and then I’ll get into the awesome.

The film has a very claustrophobic feel, which I THINK is intentional. I do not know. The acting is about what you’d expect from a movie like this. It’s not Iron Man but it’s also not exactly Dino Croc vs. Supergator either. It’s serviceable, which is really all that you can hope to expect. The special effects are none too special, and in some places are outright bad. There’s a lot of beheading and CG blood, and there’s a moment in the movie where a monster turns into his bestial form, and it looks about as convincing as a Ray Harryhausen’s Dynamation. (But not as cool.) The plot doesn’t really have any major holes in it, but it’s not exactly deep either. It’s not like The Dark Knight, where there’s multiple layers heaped upon more layers of complexity. It’s pretty straight forward and about as intricate as some of the more complex episodes of Power Rangers: Lightspeed Rescue. However, despite it’s flaws, the movie is well aware of it’s weaknesses and doesn’t try to be more than what it is.

This is where the movie shines. It compensates for it’s shoestring budget by being very artistically funky with it. Outside of that ‘monster form” I mentioned, it works well within it’s boundaries. If you’re wanting a movie about the human spirit overcoming personal odds, look elsewhere. This is a fight movie, through and through with some impressive battles, spreading across various sceneries, from flickering subways, to rooftops in the down pouring rain to an ash covered netherworld that’s somewhat psychedelic in it’s execution. While a few anachronisms are afoot, the costuming and sets are pretty accurate for it’s time period. There’s this fight scene in the second third of the film where Saya’s uncle (or whatever the hell he is) who’s like this old man, takes on a horde of vampire ninjas (seriously!) and a severe amount of ass is kicked. Limbs are chopped off, fingers are sliced, heads are decapitated, and through it all, it doesn’t slow down once. In fact, the whole film is like that. A nonstop action film, which is something that is exceedingly rare these days. Also, the film clocks in at about 90 minutes making it another rarity… A movie that’s not too long or too short.

Blood: The Last Vampire is a silly but awesome movie. It’s not brilliant by any stretch of the imagination, but damn, was it a lot of fun. There should be more movies like this honestly. If you’re in the mood for a fun hack and slasher film, then I’d say give this a shot.

Well, I did promise you something stupid…

2011-10-20T01:18:00.000-04:00

…Just didn’t expect the stupid part to be ME.

This last week, I attempted to actually make what I was hoping to be the first of many podcasts, that you could download in MP3 format and give a listen to. Just basically discussing a variety of topics… Buuuuuuut, not only did I screw up the entire podcast, which just plain and simple didn’t work due to a bad microphone, but I also wasn’t able to convert it into any format except for a .wav format. Yeah, that’s what we’re all listening to these days, right?

*shakes head*

Anyway, I apologize for that. That’s what happens with you plan shit out poorly. So I’ll have to wait until I have a new computer to pull that off. (Hopefully that’ll happen shortly after I find steady employment.)

In the meantime, there’s always been a stark difference in how I draw something for black and white vs. how I draw something that’s going to be colored. And lately, I’ve been feeling like I’ve come to rely too much on coloring. I know I’m a decent colorist, but I think my lineart isn’t where it should be. And there’s probably a half a dozen reasons for it all, but in the end, the results are still the same. And now that I’m no longer doing a regular comic anymore, and it’ll be a little while before I’m ready to do Firecracker… And when that time comes, I really want to “level up” to a whole new class, so to speak. I figured I’d take this time and force myself to get comfortable in B&W again. So these are a few B&W pieces I did.

At the top is a Harley and Ivy picture I finished up earlier tonight. I actually had no intention of coloring it, but I thought I’d tint it a shade of green, and then another shade… And well… The colored version can be found HERE. I kept the B&W lineart here for prosperity. (Or whatever the right word would be.) The second one is a simple barbarian chick picture, which is kind of a companion piece for this piece I did for a friend a little over a year ago. No, I don’t have a story for them. There’s a few others I did as well, but I’m pretty sure I can’t post them here. (Mature content and all.)

So barring any glitches of my intelligence, I’ll be back on a more regular update schedule next week, as I’ll the return to the stupid-awesome movie reviews and weekly drawing deal, I’m hoping. (If that doesn’t start next week, it’ll be shortly after.)

Last Daughter of Atlantis

2011-10-12T12:53:00.002-04:00

This one is a little different from the other faux covers I’ve done, because this one leads to something bigger. You’ll notice that there’s a lack of a “fake story blurb” with this one. Well, it’s a long story. Let me start at the beginning.

I’ve always been a fan of Power Girl. And I don’t mean I’m one of those people who grew to like her from her recent popularity thanks to her appearances in JSA and her defining run by Amanda Conner. No, I mean, I liked her back in the 80s. She makes up what I call my “holy four” of DC Superheroes. Back around that time, when I was JUST getting into comics seriously, there was four particular comics that jumped out at me. Those four were Blue Devil, Firestorm, Captain Atom, and a miniseries about some blonde bombshell named Karen Starr, aka Power Girl. Now some of you may not be familiar with her, so let me give you a quick rundown of her. She was introduced in the 70’s as a grown up version of Supergirl for Earth-Two. (If you’re unfamiliar with what THAT is, then I wouldn’t worry, because it really doesn’t matter.) Eventually there was an event called Crisis where the powers-that-be had decided they wanted Superman to be the only survivor of Krypton, so they killed Supergirl. Power Girl had survived because of her original name. (Seriously, how depressing is it that if she had been called Superwoman or something, she’d have been killed.) So, they decided to totally reinvent the character into this.

Power Girl was now an Atlantean Princess, placed in hibernation for aeons as opposed to being sent from Krypton. (Honestly the origin isn’t that different, except now instead of her powers being alien in nature, they were now mystical.) Now I really liked this. I thought it made her stand out as her own person, and not just an extension of Superman’s supporting cast. She was still powerful and strong, but not invincible. She was an actual interesting character. She wasn’t this Mary-Sue type, she had flaws and serious ones. She was hot-headed and arrogant cynic, who’s temper often got her into trouble with others. She had genuine friendship with many male characters, as opposed to just being ’the girl’ to have romantic stories with. (Her friendship with Captain Atom never had any romantic entanglements. They were often chucking verbal potshots at one another, like friends do.) She adopted this horrible, mangy evil cat that liked NO ONE but her. In short… She was a good character.

In the 1990s, she had some rather stupid crap happen to her, but it was the 1990s and if you were a comic character who managed to get through that decade unscathed, then you needed to thank the Kirby Almighty that you were probably overlooked and obscure. But as this was the 1990s, this was the time I started to take being a comic artist seriously. And honestly, I always wanted to put my spin on Power Girl. But I realized back then I had a ways to go before I was ready to draw for “the big boys”. (I still do. :P ) But during the 2000s, I became aware of the notion that people found Power Girl’s origin to be confusing. This honestly… Really baffled me.

For some reason, people were still obsessing over her Kryptonian origins, which weren’t really relevant anymore. At least they weren’t, until Infinite Crisis re-established them again. So basically, ‘She’s an Atlantean daughter put into hibernation’ is more confusing than ‘She’s another survivor of Krypton from a parallel universe, who also survived her universe being destroyed, and is running around in the current universe as the not-cousin of Superman.’ Of course. How could I have been so blind.

I never have liked that. She’s her OWN character. Sure, maybe her origin needed some fine tuning, but it was HER origin. Not Superman’s origin. To me, it turned her into another Superman supporting cast member. Power Girl was no different now than Supergirl or Steel. And that has always bugged me.

Now of course her ongoing comic and supporting characters are quite frankly all wonderful. (And the art, of course, as been spectacular.)

by Adam Hughes

From Atlee’s innocent minded look on the world (In contrast to Karen’s own snarky worldview) to her conflicts with the alien lothario Vartox to even the subtle interactions between Karen and the ever-tightly wound Doctor Mid-Nite. (Another character who I’m quite fond of, but that was more due to Matt Wagner.) And of course… Her damn cat. I’m glad Power Girl is popular today, because the girl deserves it.

I just don’t like that she has to share Superman’s origin.

Fast forward to this time last year.

A phone conversation with my friend James, who’s an animator out there in Tinseltown, led to the topic of re-envisioning various super-heroes with “Disney formula” origin stories. Some of them actually led quite nicely to the formula. Especially Aquaman. So did Wonder Woman. Especially if you added in period piece feel them to all. Then later that night, I thought about Power Girl. (No, not THAT was you pervs! Get yer mind outta the sewer and back in the gutter!) Basically the thought about how the Atlantean Princess angle, her cat, the fun adventures, ect. It really played up the Disney Formula nicely. So like I do when an idea hits me, I keep thinking about it. Tweaked the origin a bit, keeping the Atlantean thing, removing all elements of Superman or Krypton, fleshed out the supporting cast a bit… And the next thing you know, I had a story idea, I REALLY liked. So I stopped, because if I went any further, I was going to end up drawing this thing, and it would have only been just a fan comic. After all… I don’t own the character. But that didn’t stop me from still going back and tweaking the concept more and more. Changing some stuff here and there, to make it more of an original concept. Instead of Atlantis, we’d make it Lemuria. Instead of a snarky cat, we’d make it a lemur. (Lemuria… Lemur. I’m nothing if not full of groaning puns!) Instead of a buxom blue-eyed blonde, we’d make it a smaller framed redhead with heterochromatic eyes. I was slowly turning the story from a Power Girl fanfic into something original.

Now I know that may sound a bit derivative, but hey, lots of things started off as something else entirely. Donkey Kong (and by extension Mario) was originally going to be a Popeye game, Watchmen was going to be the Charleton Comics characters and Star Wars was going to be Flash Gordon. And the last time this happened with me, I ended up with Shadowgirls and that turned out pretty decently I think. So I’ve learned just to go with the flow, when it comes to these things. You never know how these things turn out.

So around the time that we knew Shadowgirls was coming to a premature end, I did that Batgirls fake cover. I thought I’d do up a few more fake covers. I had one for Superman and one for Wonder Woman… And I thought about that Power Girl concept a bit. And I decided to just go for it. Below this post, you’ll probably see a entry called “Intrepid Verisimilitude”, which shows a quick promo picture of the Intrepid Firecracker and her lemur…

Care to take a guess where that idea originated from? :P

Now, here’s the deal. I AM going to do this story, and I’ve gotten it roughly plotted out, and it’ll be roughly four issues in length. But I want to get the entire thing drawn first before I even release it. It’ll be full color, and it’ll be released on the web, with a collection afterwards. But it’s going to take me time to draw it all, and right now I’m still scripting it. And I do want to do a short unrelated B&W story before it. So it’ll probably be well into next year before it ready. But I think it’ll be a lot of fun, and hopefully… You’ll be interested.

If not, well, it’s not like I won’t be drawing other stuff too. And since you got through all that self-indulgence nonsense I just threw at you, here’s the Power Girl cover, minus the logo and stuff.

Next time, we’ll talk about something really stupid.

Intrepid verisimilitude

2011-09-29T02:50:00.000-04:00

I said I’d have a little information about the next project I’m working on so here go. There's a couple of short side stories I want to tell first... But they're going to really short. The big project though...

I’ve mentioned that I love super-heroes and so do a lot of people. I mean, there’s a reason Captain America did so well at the box office. There’s a motion in a lot of comics and even webcomics to downplay the whole super-heroing aspect of super-heroes, like getting rid of the costumes or the secret identities, or just trying to not make them too “corny”. And to me, that’s like calling a story a fantasy story, but not having anything magical or enchanting in it, or calling a story a western and it doesn’t have any horses in it, or gun-slinging, or tumbleweeds. That’s part of the fun of those genre’s and to omit them just feels dishonest to me. If you want to do super-heroes, then Goddammit, be proud of it and do them. Yes, you should try to do them GOOD, but don’t be ashamed of it! Hell, if you do it good, then there is nothing to be ashamed of AT ALL.

Now this is a project I’ve had on the back burner for quite a few years, and with Shadowgirls premature ending, this project has been booted up to the forefront. You see, there’s not a lot of super-hero-like comics in the webcomic community. Oh, there are some to be sure, and some of them are pretty damn good. But they’re far outnumbered by the sheer amount of video-game reference books and slice-of-life books. And of those super-hero books, there's a small few that do it with pride and dignity, but it seems to be that the majority of them are mostly comedy series or parodies. And making a super-hero parody is like making a parody of Twilight: The jokes have already been told and it’s unoriginal. It’s too easy to be cynical. But telling a super-hero story with true verisimilitude, dignity, optimism and respect to the genre… THAT takes actual skill. And I think I can do it. Or at the very least, you’ll all get one hell of a great laugh at my sheer incompetence! :P

Now, is this in the same universe as Shadowgirls? Well, this series is it’s own story. (But don’t be surprised if a certain girl rears her glowing blue eyes around.) I don’t have a release date for this, as I’m still writing the script. (Which I'm totally having a blast doing.) But I want to get the entire first story arc (which is about 4 issues long) completed and drawn first before going live on the web with it. I also want to get the rest of Shadowgirls Season Two done before as well. I'll be keeping you posted regularly here about it's progress.

So I know I didn’t reveal too much, but I think you can get a good idea what I’m thinking. If you’re going to super-heroes, you can’t cower away from it, coming close to doing them, but then just pulling back enough, painfully disguising the series with some genre buzzwords like “deconstructionism”, or loading the book with rampant violence and near tasteless sexism… All in a vain hope that you won’t get taken less seriously by the elites.

You have super-powers and costumes. You need have verisimilitude. And you need to be…

...Intrepid.

Red X and the Outlaws: Or if I had my way on this one too.

2011-09-24T01:44:00.004-04:00

If you’ve been paying attention to the comic scene for the last few days, you’ve probably noticed a bit of an uproar over the recent book “Red Hood and the Outlaws” due to the sheer fact of how bad it is. You see, in the comic, they had the Titans known as Starfire essentially offering herself to be Roy Harper and Jason Todd’s boner warmer, as if this was merely a quaint boredom reliever for her. It basically turned the proud and passionate Starfire into a really badly written sexually degrading character.

Now I’ve gone on record to admit I’m a pervert, but even as a pervert, you need to do what Italian Spider-Man says and ‘respect the women’. I’m not going to go into details on my thoughts about this whole mess, because Laura Hudson over at Comics Alliance pretty much said all that needs to be said. Between this and the “Batgirl Cosplayer” from SDCC, I don’t think DC’s public relations with female readers is going over too well these days.

Along with what Ms. Hudson says, I also have another problem with Starfire propositioning herself to Roy Harper. You see… When I read comics, if the character has been voiced in a cartoon, I will read the dialogue in that voice. (Kevin Conroy for Batman, George Newbern for Superman, ect.) But you see, when it comes to Starfire… I think of Hynden Walch’s voice from the Teen Titans cartoon show. So um… This image got put into my head…

And now I want to put my head in a wood chipper.

Annnnyways. I thought about it and wondered if I could do for Red Hood and the Outlaws concept, and see what if I took the idea and put my own twist on it, like I did with the Batgirls concept? How would it be different? Maybe I could make it better? So I thought about it, and drew up the fake cover and series premise here.

RED X AND THE OUTLAWS: REDEMPTION ROAD - The mysterious Red X has discovered that Arsenal's daughter is still alive. While Roy and Starfire believes him, unfortunately, everyone else believes former villain is lying to take advantage of the grief stricken archer. Together with Red X, the trio will journey the dark and mystic Redemption Road to reunite father and daughter together again.

So why did I use Red X as opposed to Red Hood? Well, it’s simple. Red Hood sucks. Never liked Jason. I accept that Jason Todd is back from the dead, but I won't accept that I'm supposed to like him. (I mean, Christ... I PAID fifty cents to kill that little bastard back in the 80s!) However, Red X from the Teen Titans cartoon was awesome, and there's worse things to do than introduce him into the DC universe. Like, you know... Turn Starfire into a dick depository for the male leads.

And here’s the logo-less cover.

So next week… I’ll try to actually talk about the next comic book project. (For reals!) Unless I get distracted by another horrible comic book.

My Top 25 Greatest Animated Movies of all time

2011-09-21T14:49:00.001-04:00

This is reblogged from the Shadowgirls site. With the comic over, I didn't know how long the site will still be there, so I wanted to archive it over here while I could. I have a new list I'm writing up, but it's taking a little longer than I expected... Sorry about that.
________________________

I love cartoons. Hell, it’s no mystery to anyone here. The art of making a series of lines and colors pieced together in sequential motion to create the illusion of life, is something that I truly respect beyond like you wouldn’t believe. (Hopefully my art style shows that.) Recently, Time.com made a list of the top 25 best animated films of all time.

And this list is bullshit.

Let’s get it out of the way right now. This is a list made up by a dork who has no idea what makes great animated movie. ‘The Fantastic Mr. Fox’ makes that list, but ‘The Incredibles’ or ‘Monsters Inc.‘ does not? The piece of shit ‘Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who’ makes the list, but ‘Fantasia’ or ’Peter Pan’ can‘t make the cut? The ONLY movie by Hayao Miyazaki that makes the list is ‘Spirited Away’ with nary a mention of Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind or Princess Mononoke… But oh, we gotta give props to the environmentalist dancing penguin movie! (What? Was Ferngully not preachy enough? What about Wall-E? Oh wait… That’s #2. I’m shocked speechless. Really, I am.) I was going to go off on a tangent insulting the article writer and his mother… But I decided to let it go, and present my alternative list. Unlike the writer of that article, you all have a brain and are completely capable of making your own list of great cartoon movies. So I’ll let you go ahead and do so. By all means, you’re more than welcome to add your opinions and additions below. (In fact, I welcome it.) In the meanwhile, I present to you my top 25 badass animated movies of all time! Why are they badass? Because I’m biased. There are better movies made than those on this list, and while you may not agree with my choices… At least I won’t tell you it’s good because I’m kissing up to someone famous. (Fuck you, Happy Feet.)

One of the few images of Chel I could find that
wasn't erotic fanart of her.

25. The Road to El Dorado- Road to El Dorado was one of those overlooked gems of a movie that I have no idea why it wasn’t more popular. It’s beautifully animated, the voice acting is great, and even the Elton John music isn’t that annoying. I assumed that it was simply a case of bad marketing, since this was about the time that Disney came out with Atlantis: The Lost Empire and Titan AE bombed like a nuke in the theaters, effectively killing Fox Animation. But looking at Rotten Tomatoes today, it’s still not highly thought upon, which really baffles me. Admittedly, it’s not a perfect film, but it’s far better than Brother Bear or that horrible piece of crap, Shrek. The voice acting in this movie, particularly that of Kevin Kline (Tulio) and Kenneth Branagh (Miguel) is about some of the best I’ve heard in an animated movie. (I think personally, I would put The Incredibles above it, and maybe Ratatouille… But not many more.) Their rapport and the way they play off each other is classic comedy. I could fill this entire reviews of the back and forth dialogue these two have that just brings a smile to your face.

24. Rock & Rule- The name is Rock & Rule… What about it isn‘t obviously badass? It’s one of those early 80’s movies made in the spirit of Heavy Metal or Wizards. Like Heavy Metal, it’s got an awesome soundtrack. Unlike Heavy Metal, it’s a badass and fun movie to watch. Oh sure, you can nitpick the movie apart from here to the ends of the Earth with it’s plotholes, but it’s highly watchable, and funkatastic with it’s soundtrack. Besides, you find me another movie that involves drug use, devil worship and mild sexuality. Well, besides…

23. Fantasia- This movie is an acid trip without taking the acid. It’s beautifully animated (despite being over 70 years old) and it’s a wonder to watch. But let’s be honest… We all know the badass part of it is Night on Bald Mountain, which gives us the Chernabog, who may be Disney’s most evil and badass villain ever made. (Except for #12.) And for many of us, it was the first time we ever saw cartoon boobs.

22. Transformers: The Movie- Oh really? You’re sitting there surprised I put this one on the list? Come on. 1980’s power rock soundtrack, a giant planet eating robot, Sharkticons, “One shall stand, one shall fall”? Please, it inspired an entire generation of Transformers fans, of which you know I am one of. It goes on the list, but at least I put it the higher numbers.

21. Ducktales: Treasure of the Lost Lamp- This movie is actually a really underrated gem of Disney’s movies. It’s not been released to DVD yet, but you can rent it on iTunes, and I do recommend doing so. If you remember how awesome the cartoon show was… This movie is more of the same, but bigger and better. I really didn’t understand why it’s not more popular. It was a really great animated movie. It might have been the short run time though.

Uh, Motoko, I realize this is the future and all...
But have you ever heard of pants?

20. Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex: Solid State Society- Okay, here’s the thing. I love Masamune Shirow (even if in his later years he has been turning out some really pornographic material) and GitS was my first major exposure to manga and anime. And to be honest… I have a warm spot in my heart for it.However, as beautifully animated the first two animated movies were, they were boring as shit. When the series Stand Alone Complex came out, it took all the elements that was good about GitS, and made up some new stuff that was also good, and got rid of the boring stuff. I consider GitS: SAC the best anime series ever made, with beautiful animation, extremely interesting characters, and some really solid forward-thinking about a post-cyberpunk society. And the animated movie, Solid State Society was basically one giant wonderful story, stand alone story. I loved it. It was, to me, the GitS movie I was waiting for.

19. An American Tail- One of the biggest influences in my art and life is Don Bluth, and his movie about Fievel Mousekewitz and his journey into the new world, was not just an amazing animated masterpiece, but probably the real reason that launched the Disney Renaissance. (You see, it made a lot of money and was a critical success, and the then-new CEO Michael Eisner was like “We’re Disney. We make cartoons! How the hell did this beat us at our own game?!” Next thing you know, Roger Rabbit and the Little Mermaid was made.

18. Metropolis- A wonderfully fun, and sometimes rather dark anime from 2001, based on the manga from Omasu Tezuka. And after watching it, you’ll probably never think of the song “I Can’t Stop Loving You” the same way again.

I'm Batman, and I can breathe in space.

17. Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths- You know what I love? Super-heroes. You know what I love about super-heroes? The fact that only with super-heroes can you do a story where evil alternate universe versions of those heroes are trying to build a quantum bomb that will end up destroying the entire multiverse, and it’s up to the good heroes to traverse across dimensions to stop them. This stuff ONLY happens with super-heroes. (And maybe Star Trek.) Flawed? Totally. But it’s so utterly fun, I love it. Besides, that line with Batman telling Owlman: “There is a difference between you and me. We both looked into the abyss, but when it looked back as us… You blinked.” Hell to the yeah.

16. Batman vs. Dracula- Honestly, I know what you’re saying. You’re like “Wait, but that’s THE Batman. The stupid Batman show?” Look, whatever your opinion of the show was, the Dracula movie here… It’s a complete and total homage to the Hammer Dracula films. Dude is drawn like Christopher Lee, the music plays up the violin chords like the Hammer films, and even Gotham looks a little more gothic in design than usual. Plus the fight with the vampire Joker and Batman in the blood bath was a little unsettling. It’s got a couple of holes, and they totally do that Alucard thing, which by now is like the world’s worst kept secret identity… But it’s a fun horror flick that’s not pretentious at all. (And in today’s world of horror, that’s saying a lot.)

Bang.

15. Cowboy Bebop: Knockin’ on Heaven‘s Door- One of the greatest animes of all time, and this is it’s movie. Really, not much more to say than that. They did such a good job on the show, that when the early rumors were abound that the DVD release wasn’t going to have a dub job, and be subtitled only… Fans bitched. It was one of the first times anime fans finally acknowledged that the English dub jobs can actually be good!

14. Tarzan- Really, out of all the traditional 2D animated movies, I think this one of them all, has the greatest animation. It’s fluid, the character designs are wonderful, and the rescue scene with Tarzan, Jane and the Baboons is just one of the greatest minutes and a half of animation ever done. The only reason it’s not higher on this list is because of that annoying gorilla. But it does contain probably the most horrible Disney villain death of all time… Yikes!

13. Dragonball Z: Super Android 13!- I admit it. I loved DBZ. I mean, it was a great show, and what I liked the most about it… Was the dubbing of it. I’ve seen the subtitles and the like, and you know what? It’s not as fun. The cheesy rock soundtrack, the screaming about sending people to another dimension, and really… Who doesn’t love that it’s over 9000? It’s a stupid fight show, that never took itself too seriously in the slightest. And the dubbing, there was a certain logic to it, that really showed through with this movie. (Like non of the heroes would swear, they’d always say “darn it!” and the like. The villains would, but not the heroes. They’d never say kill, they’d say destroy. It’s a funny logic to it that’s hilarious.) That said, this one was one of the more self-contained of the movies, made a little later, so the animation was better, the dubbing was smoother, and it had all the characters we liked. (Hey, at least it’s better than the live action movie!)

12. The Emperor’s New Groove- Watch THIS and try and tell me that Yzma is not the greatest Disney villain of all time? This movie is like a big budget version of a Chuck Jones cartoon. It’s witty, funny, and just a joy to watch. And even more amazingly, the spin-off cartoon, The Emperor’s New School was also a great cartoon in it’s own right.

Stockholm syndrome at it's finest

11. Beauty and the Beast- The follow up to the Little Mermaid, this was a great animated movie. Also, it was the first animated film to be nominated for the best picture Oscar, which caused a huge stir at the time, because it’s a cartoon and shouldn’t be taken seriously. So they made the best animated movie Oscar category, which of course goes to whatever movie Pixar is doing. Anyway, movie’s great, songs are wonderful and Gaston is hilarious.

10. Batman: Under the Red Hood- You know, it’s a really good Batman story. I had my skepticism, because the story of how Jason Todd survived his death, always… Well, it wasn’t that good. (Superboy-Prime punching the universe?) But they re-wrote it, got rid of that horrible Superboy-Prime crap and actually made it a good movie. There’s a few moments in the movie that really takes me out of it, because it was probably left in from the original comic script. (Amazo, cyber ninjas, ect.) And if they had more time to flesh out the story, it really could have been extraordinary, as opposed to just great. And it asks the question I’ve always wondered: Why is the Joker still alive? And Batman’s answer… Just wasn’t that good of an answer. You actually started thinking that Batman was wrong and Jason was right.

9. Ninja Scroll- I saw this movie in college during the summer of 1996. At this time, we were used to our anime being essentially robots, magical fireballs, fuzzy animation and the occasional boob shots for no reason. Then we rented this one on a whim. Holy crap, we were blown away. Now bear in mind, this movie is stupid. It’s like goes so far into the ‘stupid’, it creeps up the other side, into ‘awesome’. One of the opening sequence pretty much set the entire tone of the movie, with the Koga Ninja getting slaughtered by Tessai the stone giant, is just insane the first time you see it. And the whole conflict with him and Jubei just continues the insanity. But there’s a few things in there, like pretty much how the character Kagero gets treated by some of the villains that make me feel a little squicky.

8. Justice League: New Frontier- This was one of the earliest DC Animated movies, and it’s one of the best. A period piece set after the Korean War, at the dawn of the Silver Age of comics. It’s mostly a Green Lantern story, but it’s quite clever and incorporates quite a few of the DC heroes in it. There’s some truncation, from the great comic story it’s based on. (The bit with Aquaman and Superman at the end.) But I’m a big sucker for awesome, epic super-hero stories, and I’m also a sucker for period pieces too. Combine the two together, and it’s quite great. In fact, if they had fleshed out the truncated parts a bit more, they could have easily released this theatrically. (The animation not quite up there, but the story makes it work.) Seriously though, with the success of X-Men: First Class, and the less than stellar success of Green Lantern… Maybe Warner Bros. should consider a live action version of it?

7. Kung Fu Panda- As of this time, I have not seen Kung Fu Panda 2, but I intend to soon. You see, when Kung Fu Panda came out, it was around the same time that Wall-E came out. And everyone was like “Oh, Wall-E is great! Eve is so cute!” And I was like, Wall-E is pretty good, but I liked Kung Fu Panda more. At least KFP was about kung fu fighting. Wall-E… I think the message in the movie was that if we pollute the Earth enough, Wal-Mart will send us on a Galactic Cruise for a few centuries, and then the Earth will fix itself. Or something like that. But seriously, Kung Fu Panda is awesome to watch, especially that opening dream sequence. (I was actually disappointed the entire movie wasn’t done like that!)

6. Princess Mononoke- Hayao Miyazaki’s environmental movie here was the perfect way to do it. It’s not preachy, the people of Iron Town and Lady Eboshi are not depicted as soulless monsters, the forest spirits are not all pure and good… It’s a very level and honest movie about industry vs. nature, with the character of Ashitaka as our eyes into this conflict. It tells the same story, that movies like Happy Feet tries to tell… Minus all the pandering and pretentiousness. It’s honest, haunting and beautiful. I think it’s Miyazaki’s greatest film he’s ever done. I truly admire this film.

5. The Incredibles- This movie proved to the rest of the world that super-heroes CAN be taken seriously, and be a financial success. This movie is near prefection, and of all the sequels that Pixar seems to be making with Toy Story last year, Cars this year and Monsters Inc. coming up soon… The one movie I want a sequel to is the one they won’t give me. I want a second Incredibles movies. (Though I truly respect Brad Bird for coming out and saying that he won't do another Incredibles movie unless they got a story that's better than the first.) The scene where Dash is running away from the scissor ships, and he discovers he can run on water? Good God, that scene STILL just totally gives me goosebumps. It’s just so freakin’ super, I loved it. If I have only complain, it’s that because of this movie, we now see what the Fantastic Four movies SHOULD have been and weren’t.

4. Mulan- I love Mulan. It was intelligently written, and beautiful to behold. It was also Disney’s last musical movie until the Princess and the Frog from ‘08. Yeah, they took some liberties (like a lot) from the original poem, but I can totally forgive it. They took the message of women and men being equal, and did not get preachy or pandering in that ‘After-School Special’ sort of way that we were all expecting. You felt for Mulan. You understood where she was coming from, even if you were a guy… You understood. It’s a beautiful movie. In almost every way. And the animation and coloring styles in the movie is so damn influential on my and my art, that I can’t even begin to explain it. This to me, is everything I love about Disney movies. The only reason it’s not higher than this, is because of how important the other three are to me.

3. The Secret of Nimh- This is one of the first animated movies I ever saw, and it was probably one of the biggest influences on me ever. Don Bluth showed me what adventures can await, with a little mouse. To a six year old kid who was so wrapped up in Star Wars at the time… It was eye opening. I just remember seeing it (and still do) and thinking “that is so beautiful.” And I’ve spent years trying to recapture that same feeling. So yeah, you ever wonder why I try to emulate an animated look with the comic? Blame Don Bluth. He got me when I was six years old. (And then Mulan got me again later!)

2. Tangled- Now if you’ve paid attention at all over the last few years, you’re well aware that I’m a big fan of Disney movies. Sometime during the latter half of the Disney Renaissance (which is the period of 1989-1999, or ‘The Little Mermaid’ through ‘Tarzan’), Disney tried to shift gears and get away from the stuff they do good, and we were given crap like the very deplorable ‘Brother Bear’. Seriously, I would rather sit through a Uwe Boll film festival than sit through that dreck again. Sometime after that disaster of a film, the Then-Disney CEO Michael Eisner came forward and said that 2D animated movies were dead, and that Disney would push forward with 3D animated films in it’s place. (This has since been rescinded with the appointment of Stanley Iger and John Lasseter into the creative roles at Disney.) This however, was not much better, as movies like ‘Chicken Little’ and ‘Valiant’ showed us that it’s not the medium of the movie, but the content that determined if it was any good. I’m going to be as blunt as I can here: For the large majority of the 2000s, Disney productions that didn’t involved Pixar and Johnny Depp… Sucked. And sucked badly. There are some wonderful exceptions like ‘Lilo and Stitch’ and the ‘Emperor’s New Groove’. But for the most part, it wasn’t really all that good. When Disney announced they were going to do a new 2D movie, a lot of us got really excited, and couldn’t wait to see the movie. We hoped Disney learned from their mistakes and could we be seeing the start of a new second Disney Renaissance.

But when ‘The Princess and the Frog’ came out, while it was nice, it felt… Off. Like it was missing something. I’m sure there are tons of people with theories on why it wasn’t a better, more popular movie, and while some have validity and some do not, I think the answer is simple: The movie wasn’t that great. It was… “Just okay”. I don’t hate it, if it came on TV, I wouldn’t change the channel. But it felt just acceptable, but not exceptional.

I felt… Old. Like I was becoming one of those bitter cranky fanboys that hate anything that’s not from when I was a kid. (I seriously have a fear of becoming one of those people.) Seriously, you know the types. The ones that when they make a new movie or cartoon of something they grew up on when they were a kid, they get all bitter and angry about it, because it not the same. I remember a few years back, when they made the new He-Man cartoon that was on Cartoon Network, some friends of mine were literally pissed off angry because they switched the Iron Cross on He-Man’s bandolier to a more stylized original symbol. (Which I didn’t realize until later was a stylized “H”.) Or the fact that they changed the Sorceress’ costume, or Man-At-Arms may not have been Teela’s father… They ignored the fact it was actually a good show, and just obsessed over the changes. If it’s not exactly how it was when they were kids, then they’re pissed. It comes across almost like they’re not just being nostalgic, but trying to find a time machine to make them younger, to relive their youth. And I was starting to worry I was becoming like that too. I wasn’t exactly thrilled with the recent ‘Star Trek’ reboot, I actually prefer the Tim Burton ‘Batman’ over ‘The Dark Knight’, and ‘Clone Wars’ has been driving me away with their sheer ham-fisted commentary about politics, as opposed to showing clones and wars in my CLONE WARS. (Seriously though, I DO like the Dark Knight very much. I just liked Batman more. That‘s all.) Yet, at the same time, when people are ranting and raving over new stuff coming up like the new Tron movie, or ‘Megamind’ or even ‘Sym-Bionic Titan’, I just sat there going… Meh. I was getting worried I was becoming that cynical bitter man-child that hates anything fun.

Then I saw ‘Tangled’.

I love it. Oh, how I do I love it. I cannot emphasize how good of a movie I thought it was. There was a young boy in me, just yearning to get home and draw and sketch and create. The same young boy that was there when I saw Sebastian telling Prince Eric to “Kiss Da Girl”, or seeing Tarzan rescue Jane from a horde of vicious baboons. The characters were designed amazingly, the music was charming, the story was good, and as a whole the entire movie was just… Fun. It was probably the best movie I’ve seen all year, and probably the best animated movie I’ve seen in almost twenty years. I went into the movie expecting something along the lines of ‘Enchanted’ or even at best “How to Train your Dragon”. I certainly did not expect to see what is probably now my second favorite animated movie of all time. I mean, is it perfect? No. There’s no such thing as a perfect movie, except Ghostbusters. Like anything, if you go into it, like one of those cynical dicks, purposely looking for flaws, you’ll find them. But if you’re looking for a movie that is all ages, funny, clever and even enchanting… Then you’re not going to find better.

1. The Little Mermaid-Considering the infuence this movie's had on me, and how my feelings with Tangled above started with this one... It shouldn't be a surprise.

Yeah, those are my choices. I probably would have added a few more in there too, but anime like Read or Die, or Talespin: Plunder and Lightning are really a compilation of episodes and not really films. I could fill an entire list out of just animated series that kicks rocks. I could give honorable mentions to stuff like ‘Aladdin’ and ‘Ponyo’… But I‘ll leave it at that for now.

------------------------------

In the original posting, some of the readers offered up their choices for greatest animated movies, and a few of them I feel I should repeat here, such as The Iron Giant. But someone mentioned about the subjective nature of top ten lists, and I offered up my own counter...

If any of these “top whatever” lists was truly about quality and influence on the animation medium, I can guarantee you that at least half of it would be comprised of works that most people in the Western world have never even heard of. The problem I have with the Time.com list, is that it’s essentially what I call an elitist review. He picked these movies as the greatest, because they won awards and critical accolades, and not because they were good or influential. (Though quite a few of them are.) There was no real research to the list, no real substance.

A ‘top whatever’ list means nothing without actual research and consideration into the subject. Thus these lists seem to slide toward personal preference. In my case, I came right out and said “mine was biased.” My list is based upon my own personal preferences and experiences. I mean, seriously. If my list was about quality… Christ, you think Transformers and Dragonball Z would be on there? (I love those movies, but man… Are they stupid!) If someone truly sat down, and gave actual research and consideration to what would be the “Top 25 animated movies of ALL TIME”, actually looking into the history of these movies, what they accomplished, what they overcame, how they influence others, and so forth… One could make a truly profound, interesting, and informative list about the history of animation. ESPECIALLY with the resources that Time.com has. (THAT’S what pisses me off about that list.)

_________________________________________

Thanks for putting up with that re-posting there folks. I'll have some more info on the new comic series very soon.

Batgirls: Hope Prevails character cards

2011-09-13T01:30:00.000-04:00

Daaaaaark Vengeance!!

I thought I'd give a shot at drawing each one of the Batgirls in their own simple illustration. They were drawn in a sketchbook as roughly the same size as the screen version here, with no reduction in size, so the line work is a little thicker than usual. But they were still fun to do, since I've never actually drawn Misfit's entire costume before (she's usually popping her head from the background) and and it was neat to do some tweaks to Flamebird's costume.

I've actually been giving consideration to doing some short fancomic stories with them. (Nothing huge or epic. Just short little tales.) But I'm still up in the air about it. I do have to admit though, the appeal of drawing Batman stories, even unofficial fanworks is... Well, isn't it like half the reason we artists got into comics in the first place? (Well, at the very least, it would be awesome practice for the next big project I'm doing, the Lemuria Project.)

Well, anyway. These were really fun to draw, and I'll do Barbara, Cassandra and Stephanie next. (Probably in that order.) And when they're done, I can probably tell you all about the Lemuria Project that I'm currently fleshing out... Or at the very least, how it came about. And interestingly on topic, it involves DC Comics' Power Girl... And Ariel, the Little Mermaid.

Hello to the new people

2011-09-08T02:36:00.002-04:00

Well, considering the jump in average page views jumping up almost 85% in one day, I’m assuming you’re either here from the Shadowgirls site or you’re here to see the Batgirls cover below. Either way, welcome to the place. Since I don’t know how longer the Shadowgirls blog will be around for, I’ll be posting updates and the like here. I’ll be mainly posting my usual lunacy like talking about things like the top 100 hottest cartoon girls, or the philosophical lameness of a universal reboot. If you check to the side there, you’ll notice a couple of links. One to my DeviantArt Gallery, one dead link to Comics, and one to submission guidelines.

DeviantArt Gallery, which is where I submit a majority of the art and commissions that I do. Most of them are pretty SFW, though there’s the occasional few that might not be. (I try to put a mature label on those few, so people browsing there at work doesn’t have to worry about any problems.)

The Comics link is blank for the moment. I mentioned at the Shadowgirls site that first and foremost I want to finish the remaining season arc for Season Two’s collection. I do got a few projects in mind (some of which you can see teases for in earlier posts) but until I get the financial situation figured out, I won’t be making any release date announcements for those… I’ll want to get the entire story done first. However, you’ll probably be seeing me run a few stand alone short B&W stories. Mainly because I’ve not worked a lot in B&W and I think it might be a bit of fun to work in that, to keep myself busy while I tryuing to get my shit together. (If you’re familiar with Adam Warren’s Empowered series, about how he did his earlier stories, with short self contained tales… That’s what you can look forward to. Some will be Shadowgirls stories, some will be all new characters. And some will be something completely different. But for right now, it’s left blank as there’s nothing there… Yet.

Commissions are there in case you wanna help out with me making a few bucks. Nothing illegal, please. (The picture of Kos-Mos and T-Elos up there in this post is a recent commission done for a friend.)

For those of you who came here to see the Fake-Batgirls: Hope Prevails cover, I will be doing more of those. That was extremely fun to do, and I see no reason not to continue the fun. (Yes, I've given consideration to doing a fancomic of it. How long of one, I don't know yet. I got a few other urgent financial matters to take care of first.)

Other than that, I’m going to try to keep a regular update schedule here… I haven’t decided what it’ll be yet… As I’m kinda making some of this up as I go. Other than that, feel free to say hello, and if you have any questions that you might have… Ask away.

Sincerity

2011-09-04T22:28:00.002-04:00

Recently in an interview with Rolling Stones, writer Grant Morrison said this, when asked if he thought Superhero comics were in it’s death spiral:

“Yeah. I kind of do, but again, you can always be wrong. There’s a real feeling of things just going off the rails, to be honest. Superhero comics. The concept is quite a ruthless concept, and it’s moved on, and it’s kind of abandoned, the first-stage rocket.”

Alright, this is there I get back up on my soapbox… Okay, Grant? The problem is not superheroes. The problem is stupid writing. I can’t sit here and say you suck, because you did write one of my favorite comics of all time, All-Star Superman… But you did also write Final Crisis, which was a turducken of a comic event if I ever saw one. Seriously, over two years of build up and crossovers, just to have Superman save the universe by singing a ‘super song’? Dude, that was the conclusion to the Smurfs Christmas special.) Sometimes, creators make crap. It happens. It’s okay, it’s not the end of the world. Did you know the guy who wrote ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid’ as well as ‘The Princess Bride’ is also the same writer who wrote that horrible movie ‘Dreamcatcher’? Not everything we crap out is gold. Sometimes we just fart and it’s unnoticeable. And sometimes, it’s a silent but deadly type, where we don’t notice it at first, but then it builds up like a plague. And sometimes, we hatch a Tyrannosaurus Shit that just needs to open the windows and air the whole place out before we die of methane poisoning. We ALL do it, and sometimes we’re ashamed of it… But you know, we’re not supposed to blame the toilet.

Almost every decade, someone ALWAYS talks about how superhero comics are dying. They don’t remember the late 70’s and early 80’s, which was worse. That’s like saying because album sales are down for record companies, therefore rock music is dying too. While I don’t deny there’s been a severe lack of decent rock bands lately, (Seriously… Chickenfoot?!) it doesn’t mean there’s not an interest. People still like superheroes, and always will.

Sometimes you want high quality. And sometimes you just want stupid but pretty. But above all else, you want SINCERITY. That’s what it’s all about. Do you ever wonder why a movie as bad as Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen did so well? Why people keep seeing the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, even though they’re just getting worse? Why people go see stupid Saw movies every Halloween, even though it’s the same damn plot?! The answer is easy. It’s sincere. They’re honest in their advertising. Nowhere in any advertising for the third Transformers movie were you even slightly lead to believe that the movie was going to be anything more than just mindless explosions and action. Not once in Thor or Captain America did the audience suspect it was going to be anything more than shield slinging and hammer smashing comic action. The Final Destination movies make a crapload of money for several movies, because it was just a mindless excuse to kill douchebags in horrible and ironic ways… And it has never pretended to be anything but that. And if it happened to be more than that, it was a happy surprise.

Hell, with comics, why does Rob Liefeld keep getting work? He draws like crap and he can’t write… But you know EXACTLY what you’re going to get in a Rob Liefeld book. If that’s what you’re wanting, you are not going to be disappointed! Even with the good stuff! Do you know why All-Star Superman was such a hit? It embraced the notion of the Silver Age of Superman, from wacky time traveling, to robot Supermen, to alien sun-eaters, to super formulas that grant powers for 24 hours… It was so honest about how silly and cool it was. It didn’t lie to us. And that’s it. That’s the secret.

BE HONEST.

Don’t say your comic is going to change the way people read books. Just tell them what it is. This was the reason people are upset about the loss of Batgirl… She was one of the few honest comic characters. Superheroes aren’t the problem. It’s trying to turn them into something OTHER than superheroes that’s the problem. And no amount of lying to yourself will change that. Think about it. Remember the second Fantastic Four movie, how people were pissed about Galactus the storm cloud? Really, was the giant cloud any less silly than a giant dude in armor? Or the constant finagling over silly costumes and origins? Or the recent Superman movie pics, which carries over to the comics too. The big controversy is over the classic Superman‘s costume, because it was stupid and corny. Let me get this straight…

THIS is unacceptable and stupid for the average new audiences for Superman.


"Gawd, it's just soooo gay looking! Who can take THAT seriously?!"

THIS is cool and not stupid for the average new audiences for Superman.

"The lack of underwear now makes him less silly looking."

I believe we have found the problem. All these changes are just superficial changes made, to hopefully trick someone into thinking that a superhero story isn’t a superhero story. And THAT, my friends… Is not being sincere.

Batgirls: aka "If I had my way"

2011-08-25T03:04:00.003-04:00

I figured it might be kind of fun to do a mock cover, of what I would do, if I had my way with the new lineup of the DCnU 52 books. Some others had done theirs, as seen here... This is mine.

BATGIRLS: HOPE PREVAILS - One year after Barbara Gordon has regained her ability to walk again, But the actions of a rejuvenated Mister Freeze has forced her to take back up the cape and cowl again. Fortunately, for her, she's this time forming a small cadre of crimefighters consisting of the novices Misfit and Flamebird, the deadly Blackbat and the team leader Spoiler... The Batgirls!

Corny? Yes, but I admit it.... I totally have a dozen story ideas for this... Here's the Unlettered and unlogoed cover. I hope you like it. It was kinda fun to do. :)

"Girls have Cooties"

2011-08-23T19:10:00.000-04:00

*reblogged from the Shadowgirls site July 28, 2011*

Amanda Conner's
Power Girl: Both missing
from the new DC lineup.
Yet Rob Liefeld still gets
work.

Hey folks. Sorry I’ve been quiet on my end here, as I’ve been a little busy. I was going to talk about some anime this time, but the San Diego Comic Con was this past weekend and a few things popped up that kind of made me have a couple of second thoughts. There was a woman at SDCC dressed as Batgirl who asked a very important question: Why aren’t there more women doing comics for DC? I’ve had this conversation with my girlfriend many times. At first my answer was the same as many male comic readers. ‘Don’t be ridiculous, there’s tons of them.’ And when asked to name them, I start to rattle off Gail Simone, Colleen Doran, Jo Duffy, Devin Grayson, Louise Simonson, Jill Thompson, Nicola Scott, and even one of my favorite artists Amanda Conner. But I started to realize I couldn’t name any others. And a lot of them I did name, I’m not sure are even working in comics anymore. There was a few others who’s done work for Vertigo comics, like Elaine Lee or Alisa Kwitney, or even some of Marvel’s more off-the-wall comics done by Colleen Coover or Kathryn Immonen. (Seriously, I cannot recommend ‘Patsy Walker: Hellcat’ enough!) But really, I started to hit the end of my list there. And I‘m really good at minutiae, and I can name almost hundreds, if not probably thousands or male comic creators. But I couldn’t even name fifteen female ones? It bothers me. (For the sake of discussion, I’m referring to comics and webcomics as two separate entities, though I shouldn’t, it just makes discussion easier.)

Just why AREN’T there more women working in comics? (Not just DC, but Marvel too.) I mean, there’s a lot of women working in ancillary roles, like inkers and colorists. (I really don’t know if I’ve ever seen a female letterer… Then again, if a letterer does their job, you should never notice them at all.) But why not more writers and artists, the ones that get the fame and acclaim? Look, I’m a perv and we all know this. (You’ve seen what I draw!) But I’m also the furthest thing from a misogynist as well. If the talent is there (and it is) then why isn’t the industry utilizing it more?

I thought about the usual excuses I’ve heard for many years:

- It’s been a man’s game for so long, and the women creators just haven’t stormed the field yet.

I’ve heard that before, and yeah, I could accept that, back in the early 90’s, when I was a young lad buying Youngblood. But it’s been almost two decades now. Try again.

- Women just aren’t as interested in superheroes like men are.

You think all those women cosplaying at conventions are just men in drag or there just to make their boyfriends happy? You think girls don’t read and like superheroes? What the hell is this, the 1950s where girls are only supposed to read bad romance comics? That’s a crock of crap if I ever heard it. Tons of girls like many of the same things as guys do.

- There just aren’t as many women comic creators out there as there are men who are up for the job.

So this wide plethora of female webcomic and indy comic creators only came into existence because they’ve only read manga and other webcomics in the past ten years? And many of them I know weren’t exactly influenced by reading girly manga books in high school. They read Batman and X-Men like the rest of us. (And quite a few of them make me look like a high school art student who holds his pencil wrong.)

Nicola Scott's
Wonder Woman.
One of the best Dianas
you'll ever see.

- Well, what would you consider a good affirmative action for the industry to take?

Christ, this isn’t the Equal Rights Amendment, or some public relations diversity ratio so you can get Rachel Maddow to write the foreword to your comic. It’s simple point. There’s lots of women comic creators, and there’s less than ½% of them working on the “big boy books”. Why? That woman dressed as Batgirl had a very good point and no one can give her a good answer, and when she pressed for one, she was mocked and ridiculed. I think that’s what bugs me more than DC’s response to her, was that the surrounding fans pretty much told her to shut up and sit down. Every time I think comics are on the verge of being taken serious as a respectable creative medium, like novels, movies, and television… Crap like this happens and reminds me there’s a real reason stereotypes like the Simpson’s Comic Book Guy exists.

Now since this post was originally posted back in July, DC’s come out and announced that they’re going to start having a bunch of female creators working on some of their books, and that’s great. But I can’t help but to feel it’s just a band-aid for a self inflicted wound. I get why they got angry… No one likes to be called a misogynist, a racist or any other kind of ’ist’. And it’s a complaint thrown around so commonly these days, you’re always on guard for it, even when the accusation isn’t really there. But how much damage control could have happened if instead of getting pissed off at a girl in cosplay, if they had just simply said “It’s not an intentional oversight. It’s just how it happen to work out. We’ll make sure to look into it for future projects.” DC editors would have looked good and been happy, ‘Batgirl’ would have happy, the fans would have been happy… And the big news from SDCC would have been about DC’s new titles and not that DC's a bunch of sexist jerks. (I don't personally believe they are, but unfortunately, that's the stereotype they're going to have to be fighting now... And comic book nerds have great memories.)

Women creators are akin to nuclear power. They’re an awesome powerful resource that people aren’t using for reasons that are steeped in traditionalism and fear. Taking it all into consideration, the only reason I can come up with is that ‘girls have cooties’. It has to be that! Because otherwise the only other logical reason is that the industry still has some serious cases of sexism going on, and that would just be insulting, infuriating and just outright depressing. I don’t want to say that, but they’re running out of reasons. And that’s one trait I really got to love about the webcomic community. It’s truly a community where anyone can be a creator, who’s judged on talent and not their gender. (Or race or sexuality.) It’s just about the talent. And as comics start to go digital, blurring the lines between them and webcomics… I hope that this is a trait that they someday will also adopt, in actual practice and not just lip-service.

Schrödinger’s Canon

2011-08-22T22:07:00.001-04:00

(reposted from the Shadowgirls blog)

Prepare yourself for some real ‘dork talk’ here. To no surprise to any of you, I’m one of those old school nerd types and I love universes. I personally believe it’s the greatest literary invention. In fact, we might not admit, it, but we all love the notion of our favorite characters living in a bigger more exciting universe filled with other interesting characters. But this isn’t just a comic thing, as it goes into many other mediums as well. I mean, I’ve lost track how many times Richard Belzer guest starred on other shows as Detective John Munch, and deeply suspect this is one of the reasons Kingdom Hearts was so popular a game. In comics, it’s become so commonplace of a deal that quite frankly it’s a non-event now. Superman and Batman are so intertwined with each other, that not only are they’re on a first-name basis, their sidekicks and partners are on a first-name basis as well. I’m under the old belief that if there’s no contradictions between two properties, then there’s no reason they cannot co-exist in the same universe. The recent batch of DC Animated movies are a perfect example of this. Other than All-Star Superman and New Frontier, there’s nothing in those movies that says all they couldn’t exist in the same universes with each other, even though officially, only the two Superman/Batman are related to each other. We usually term this ‘personal canon’, because official or not, we like the idea, but it’s not official. All stories written are in their own universes. It’s just what we personally choose to accept as canon. Are those movies in their own universes? Yes. But could they co-exist in each other’s universes as well? Yes. It’s like Schrödinger’s Canon. Until events in one story dictate that a shared universe is not occurring, then they are occurring. (This works the other way too, if you don’t want them to be shared.) And crossovers are the proof of it. (I mean, you can have cameos, but really, it’s not much more than a simple shout out.)

Crossovers has always been one of those subjects in comics that excite a reader and at the same time, fill them with dread. But when it comes to crossovers, there has to be a certain amount of logic with it. It makes sense why Batman would meet up with the Punisher. They’re both dark urban vigilantes, and in the 90’s they were both written by Chuck Dixon. (God, I miss him on those books.) It makes sense for Ghost to meet up with Hellboy. One’s a ghost and one’s a paranormal investigator. Things go hand in hand. But when you get a little more out there, you got to get more creative with crossover. Batman vs. Predator makes perfect sense, as the Predator wants to hunt the most dangerous prey, and in this case, that would be the Dark Knight. But Batman vs. Aliens makes no sense, as in order to make it work, you got to put Batman in the jungle with a crashed spaceship or something. And while that makes sense for the Aliens, it doesn’t really make too much sense for Batman, being that whole fore mentioned urban vigilante. (I’ll elaborate on this on a later blog post.)

And that’s something that’s the most important thing about crossovers… It has to make sense. Especially if the concepts are different enough. That’s another thing we love about crossovers and universes is playing the ‘six degrees of comic characters’ game, linking them to each other through various crossovers. (For example, Sabrina the Teenage Witch has meet Archie, who’s met the Punisher, who’s met Spider-Man, who’s met Batman who’s been romantically involved with Zatanna. Thus is it logical in our heads that Sabrina the Teenage Witch and her cat Salem can understudy underneath Zatanna.) But you have to give real thought to how it works out.

All the same, yet different. Very whelming...

The big obstacle to overcome is to make sure your crossover is compatible. (You also got to be a fan of the comic and creator as well, but that’s a given.) Now you would think that’s the easier part, but it’s actually the hardest. Because you have to apply that Schrödinger’s Canon to every possible candidate. Now some might say “Is that really all that important” to which I say ‘YES, it’s important!’ It’s the most important factor, because without that Schrödinger’s Canon lining up, then it’s not really that character. It’s just someone who looks like it. It’s like in the DC cartoons. You got Robin from the Batman: The Animated Series, and then you have the Teen Titans’ version of Robin, and then you have The Batman’s Robin, and then you have Young Justice’s Robin… And they’re ALL same Robin, but they’re not. Schrödinger’s Canon had declared them alternate versions of the same guy. Which really, if you stop and think about it… Is really a strange concept.

Now is a shared universe really all that vital? It’s not important at all. It’s just a fun nerd concept we all love. But it’s the same reason we hung around after the credits for Captain America to see the Avengers trailer. We’re nerds and we like universes. Sometimes we get our panties in a bundle, and complain a bit too much that shit doesn’t line up with each other. And people make fun of us for it, and we DO need to lighten up sometimes about it… But we shouldn’t discard it. Shared Universes is comics’ gift to the literary world. Comics and the fans are usually put down by others medias, but the literary tool of the shared universe was created by the comics creators and it’s fans, and it IS something we should embrace whenever possible and be proud of.

Lemurs!

2011-08-16T15:59:00.000-04:00

Since I work a lot in inkpens, I usually don't like working in sketchbooks, because of the roughness of the paper, and how it usually doesn't take ink that well. But over the weekend I got this sketchpad that's supposed to take microns and ink pens really well... And I'll be damned, it works as advertised. I figured I'd make it my Lemuria Project sketchbook. (More on that later.)

Headmasters Cover recolors

2011-06-20T22:40:00.001-04:00

In the 1980's there was a Transformers miniseries by Marvel called Headmasters. This story, was to me, one of the most memorable Transformers story I have ever read to date, introducing the Headmasters, Targetmasters, Nebulon and much more. So some time ago, a friend of mine got a hold of the original lineart to the covers for this miniseries. As it was a big influence on me, I really wanted a shot at coloring the covers. (As in the past, they weren't always colored with the highest accuracy due to a combination of technological limitations and plain and simple "get it done and out the door".

Over the past year, on and off when I had time, I took my time and colored the four covers. So, here they all are. All four covers recolored.

I hope you like 'em.

Banshee Project model sheet

2011-06-15T18:00:00.006-04:00

Model sheet for the Banshee project, particularly the main characters. More to come soon.

Why does the Joker still live?

2011-04-07T00:40:00.001-04:00

No, seriously. Please refrain from the usual "that's how the writers want it" excuses. I know that, I GET that. But what is the Batman's motivation for letting this clown live. It's been brought up millions of times, and millions of times, it's never a good answer. He says something like "That's too easy." Or "I want to, but I can't become like him." And it was brought up in the recent animated movie ‘Under the Red Hood’.

Seriously... Jason had a point. Why is Joker still drawing breath? It's not Harvey Dent, Arnold Wesker or Harley Quinn, who there's a honest to God chance to cure them of their insanity and become productive members of society. Even Ra's al Ghul, who's probably killed more people than the Joker isn't above redemption. But the Joker is beyond that. He ain't ever going to be good. He knows what he's doing and he knows it's wrong in society… And he doesn't care. (The only time in my memory that I’ve seen Joker be an actual upstanding member of society, it was an alternate universe, where Superman lobotomized him.) The only person who's probably worse than the Joker is Lex Luthor, and that's because Lex is smarter and richer. (Seriously, Lex cross a serious evil threshold with the Everyman Project in ‘52’.) And Lex has pointed out that Superman likes being a hero too much to do it. But Batman supposedly doesn't have that problem.

I understand the Joker has to be around to be Batman's arch-nemesis, and I get Batman doesn't have to be the one to kill him. I get that and I respect that. But there's been plenty of others who's tried to kill Joker and Batman's actively gone out of his way to save his life. Hell, if he put as much effort into saving his own teammates as he does with the Joker, Jean-Paul Valley would still be around. Also Cassandra would have never been corrupted by Deathstroke, and that's not even mentioning Barbara, Jason, and Gordon's wife Sarah. Even the most stereotypical bleeding heart 'everyone deserves a chance' type would say "It's okay to let the Joker die.” Even the Spectre would say it's okay... And he's part God. (Like THE God, too.)

Now I'm willing to accept all of this, if they're willing to just come up with a single good excuse why he's alive. Why Batman won't let anyone else kill him. (Be it Jason, other mob bosses like Black Mask or Rupert Thorne, or even the Punisher.) Nightwing killed him once, and it wasn't even intentional. (A heat of the moment thing.) Batman performed CPR on Joker to save him, so Dick wouldn't have blood on his hands. Somehow, I think Nightwing, the former Blüdhaven cop, would have gotten over it. Everyone would understand. Barbara would understand. Alfred would understand. Superman would understand. His FATHER would understand. (And before points out the Dark Knight Returns, there was some seriously unique situations going on at that time.)

But I can't accept that "I'll become as bad as him" excuse because that's bullshit and it's always been bullshit. Police and soldiers kill. Are they bad people?

"But that's self-defense!"

No, not always. There are plenty of times they got to kill someone, not for their own safety but the safety of others. And especially soldiers. (Especially snipers.) You think every al Queda terrorist was shooting at an trooper when a predator plane flew into them?

"That's different. That's war!"

And Batman doesn't always refer to his fight against crime as a "war"? In fact, does he not often refer to his Robins as his "soldiers"?

"But killing is the coward's way out!"

Oh yes, and arresting, locking him in an asylum, where he'll escape and kill again, and repeat this over and over again to the point it's a joke is the brave way? Sounds like the moronic way. Isn't the whole reason Batman exist is because he knows the system is corrupt? He knows that all that's going to happen is the Joker will be locked up at Arkham and escape all over again. There's an old phrase that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting a different result each time.

So either the great Dark Knight Detective is the dumbest son of a bitch in the world, or he's just as crazy as the people he locks up.

I'm not saying ‘kill him.’ I’m just saying next time he falls off a building, DON’T throw the Bat grapple out to save him.

Sad thing is... The little bastard Damian Wayne gets it.

Project Banshee has begun...

2011-03-28T02:49:00.001-04:00

The Black Banshee is a side project I've been mulling over for a while now, and I've started pre-production work on it. (Pre-production means character and scenery concept art and script writing.) For you long time Shadowgirls readers, you know what this is, even if you're not sure of the finer details. For those that aren't, it's really simple. The Black Banshee will be my love letter to the Golden Age of Comics and Movies. Details are still being worked out and I don't want to talk too much about it this early in the game... But it's coming.

It's coming.

I'll be posting production work here as it develops more and more. I hope you'll like it.

Thing's thing and Rob Liefeld

2011-03-13T22:36:00.002-04:00

Ben Grimm has an rocky orange penis.

Recently Vanity Fair published an article with Stan Lee, and he said that Thing’s private junk is probably covered with orange rocks as well. As odd as this sounds, this brings up something I’ve actually been wondering for a few years now. Now I’m an immature giggling fanboy that will stand by Stan Lee claims that Thing’s dork is orange rock. (However, poor Alicia Masters. Ouch! And I thought Betty Ross had some stamina!) But Stan the Man hasn’t written the Fantastic Four book in almost four decades. At what point does the creator’s desires no longer become valid to the creation? New creators come onto properties al the time, with their own desires and directions. Does Stan’s decree override the wishes of the current creative teams?

Now I’m a staunch believer in the notion that if it didn’t happen in officially sanctioned media (books, movies, comics, TV shows, ect) then it never happened. If it’s so important that it needs to be mentioned, then it should go in the media… Otherwise it’s apocrypha. J.K. Rowling made a big deal a couple of years ago at a reading about Dumbledore’s sexual orientation, and I couldn’t help but to think “Hey, Rowling… If this was so important, why didn’t you put it in the book?” So does making public declarations like that even count. It akin to Schrödinger’s Cat… But with orange rocky wangs.

Now this is a different case since Harry Potter is owned by her, and Fantastic Four is not really owned by Stan Lee, but by Marvel. So it’s really up to them. But this can also lead to controversy. Recently, it was announced that Warner Bros. are considering a reboot of Buffy the Vampire Slayer without Joss Whedon’s involvement. Whether you like the idea or not, (and it seems most do not) it’s really WB’s property to do with as they please. Obviously Whedon’s fans are not going to be very welcoming to a Joss-less Buffy reboot, and might heap tons of scorn upon it… And I can sympathize and agree with them in some regards. But at the same time, not long ago, X-Factor writer Peter David had a bit of controversy with the character Shatterstar being in a same-sex relationship with the character Rictor, when Shatterstar’s creator Rob Liefeld said “That’s nice, but Shatterstar’s not gay.” Most people sided with Peter David because Liefeld hadn’t worked on Shatterstar in over a decade and… Well honestly, Shatterstar was less than a one-dimensional dork who wore boxing headgear and football shoulder pads into a battle, so making him in a romantic situation with Rictor can’t actually hurt. And Marvel’s then E-I-C Joe ‘I hate Mary Jane’ Quesada said “Take it up with the next Editor in Chief” which is a nice way of saying “Whatcha gonna do about it?”

But regardless, whether we like Liefeld or not, he IS Shatterstar’s creator. Do we just disregard Rob Liefeld’s opinion because he’s Rob Liefeld, and we don‘t like him or his art? Even if the choices made are for the best? If companies are actually supposed to take the opinions of the creators, like Joss Whedon, seriously, then should they not take the opinions of ALL creators seriously? Including the Rob Liefelds of the world? Or are one’s legal creative rights are dictated only by how well you’re liked. Especially in wake of the Jerry Siegel’s family vs. DC comics lawsuit, the creators may have more say over their works than originally thought. And that’s Superman… A multibillion dollar franchise, having to answer to the family of one of his creators who‘s been dead for fifteen years. And there are rumors murmuring about that Jack Kirby’s family is preparing a lawsuit for some of his creations now that Marvel is owned by Disney. And last I checked, Rob Liefeld was the creator of Deadpool, who’s currently one of Marvel’s most popular characters, who has a movie in the works.

So what if Rob came out and said that Cable’s wang was cybernetic with chrome plating running down the veins? Would that be canon?

Commission Guidelines

2011-01-15T02:09:00.002-05:00

You’ve all been around enough to know how this works. Send me an email at thoughtcrimeinc at gmail dot com to start the deal.

These prices are for full color, and not B&W lineart. If you want B&W lineart only, I can arrange it and it’ll cost less too. But for the most part, people’s usually asked for color, so I’m just giving the color costs. These prices are not set in stone either. They’re a rough estimate. But for the most part, these are the usual prices, with some descriptive details. Paypal only. Sorry, but it’s just easier on me for now.

One or two characters, with no or minimal background: $35-40
Single character with a detailed background, determined on content: $45-50
Two or more characters with a detailed background, determined by content: Above $60.
Anything more or different than what’s above: Talk to me. We’ll negotiate the price.

I do request the right to post these. I mean, if I’m going to put the work into it, I want to be able to show it off. Now, I understand some people wish to remain anonymous, so if that’s what you wish, I shall make arrangements with you to do so. And if the content you’re buying is time sensitive, like you don’t want it shown before a certain date, like if you’re getting a cover done and you want to show it first, I can work with you on that too. I’m pretty flexible on this. I just would like to eventually be able to show my work. I mean, this serves the multiple purposes. Not just providing art for you and funding for me, but also to get my work and name out there more for exposure.

As far as content goes… Nothing illegal. I hope that doesn’t need further explanation. I’m not a prude... Hell, very far from it! But there's certain things I just WON'T draw. I retain the right to turn down a commission. It might be something as simple as it doesn’t appeal to me or I don’t think I could do a good job on it. Like for example, furry art. I’m not bashing it, but it’s just not my thing.

More or less, you get the general idea of what I mean. If you don’t understand or have a question, please ask. I’m aware I might not be the most clear here. If you’re wanting a high resolution of it to be printed out or something, let me know and we’ll make arrangements. The time you would receive them will vary. You might get it in a day, or it might be a week or two. But I will get to them. So please be patient waiting for a commission.

Beast Machines: Generation's End

2010-09-10T03:25:00.006-04:00

Roughly ten years ago (less actually, but who’s counting really?) I did a Transformers fanfic comic that until recent days with Shadowgirls, was probably the single piece of work I’ve one that I’ve been asked about. It was title BEAST MACHINES: GENERATION’S END (From here out called BM:GE and it was conceived to be basically “Season Three” of the late Transformers series. A little back history for those that might not know what the hell this is. You see, Beast Machines was the follow up series to Beast Wars, which is considered by many to be the greatest Transformers series ever. (This has been argued quite a bit as of recent days. I personally think “Transformers: Animated” was a better show and there was some who think that the original Generation One is superior to all. (They’re wrong.) Regardless, Beast Wars was held in very high regard. And when Beast Machines debuted, to say it was controversial was putting it as mildly as you can possibly imagine. Now, I won’t rehash the controversy here. You either know of it, need to look it up, or you won’t care. Odds are, I’m willing to bet that if you’re reading this and you’ve gotten this far, you’re in the first category. So I’ll continue on. Now when Beast Machines ended, it was supposed to lead up into the next series called Transtechs. Now for a crap load of reasons I don’t feel like retyping, this never happened and Hasbro imported a Japanese anime called ’Car Robots’ as the very underrated and pleasantly awesome ‘Robots in Disguise’. (I should note, this was the first time in almost ten years we would see the return of not just Autobots and Decepticons, but of realistic vehicular Transformers, and even the beginning of the whole “Alternate Universe” concepts that had been a mainstay in Transformers for the past decade. (Seriously, the reason I’m not bother by the differences in the Michael Bay films is that we’ve already been exposed t the concepts of alternate universes for like… seven years now.) Seems odd now, I know… But it was a big deal then. But that’s another story all together.) When I learned that the story of Beast Machines wasn’t going to continue, and it had left a few plot issues unresolved that I wanted some closure on, I decided to attempt to continue it in comic book form. Prior to this, my friend Jason Moser and I had done something similar with a “missing Beast Wars script” called Dark Glass. We got a rough little synopsis of the episodes content and we decided to make a comic out of it. (I wrote, he did the art.) Well, I wasn’t going to ask him to do this, since he didn’t really care all that much about the series, and I’m supposed to be an artist (though by looking at my art then, I’m sure you couldn’t tell it) and I decided it might be prudent for me to do the art chores myself.

Just so you all understand a timeframe here: This is early 2001...
There was no Transformers cartoon show on the air at the time. Beast Machines had run all 26 episodes in Canada, and Fox Kids was just finishing it’s run in the states. The next show ‘Robots in Disguise’ would not run in the states for another eight to nine months. There was no regular Transformers comics to buy. Dreamwave hadn’t gotten the rights to the license yet and wouldn’t for another year or so. The only Transformers comic we had was the yearly Botcon comic books, which were… Well… Um… Not all that… Good. (If you’re one of those people who worked on the early 3H comics. Sorry, but that’s how I felt.) Webcomics was something still in it’s infancy. (Some would say it still is… Or at least it’s a toddler now.) People wrote fanfics all the time, but fan comics was kinda rare. There wasn’t many. The most popular ones was Don Figueroa’s Macromasters and Matt Nelson’s Superdeformers. I’d like to think mine was respected… But I can’t say that since I never got that far in it.

One of the largest factors in the creation of BM:GE was the reaction the fan base had to the conclusion of the series: Cybertron was reformatted into a technorganic planet. Now personally, I thought “Wow, the possibilities one could do with this!” But they were kinda pissed that the wholly mechanical Cybertron was no longer such. Since then, opinions have been re-evaluated more favorably (especially in the wake of such shows like Energon.) but it’s still far from universal. It inspired me to fashion a story around the notion of xenophobia among robots. The idea was that after the Reformatting, the old Maximal elders rolled right back in and tried to run the show like how they used to, ignoring (either willingly or not) the fact that the world had changed. It was kind of meant to be symbolic with the fan base. Many were vehemently opposed to the notion of any change in Transformers that differs from what they’re used to. Highly ironic, considering this is a show about robots that change. The overall message in the story is that “You can’t live in the past, life is change and change isn’t always bad.” I’d like to think that the fan base has come to terms and realized this… But then I’ll hear people complain about Animated, the Michael Bay movies, or the upcoming Prime series, and it’s the SAME COMPLAINTS as it was ten years ago. (It also taught me the most important and interesting lesson in life: “All politics is essentially over glorified fanboys at work. There’s people who want to force change, or the worst will happen. There’s people who want to force status quo, or the worst will happen. And then there’s people who like to see where things go naturally, without forcing anything, where most people, including myself, are.” (Seriously, apply that rule to everything controversial from the Ground Zero Mosque to the Star Wars Prequels and even to serious issues like New Coke vs. Classic Coke. And it suddenly makes a hell of a lot of sense.)

So I started the story, with the full intention of seeing it all the way through. The problem I ran into was the same problem I always ran into until my time working with David Rodriguez on Shadowgirls… I get started on stuff, and suddenly I wanna make changes to it, because I think I came up with a better idea. I started this off doing it normal comic page orientation, the I tried horizontal, and then I was going to go back to horizontal but in B&W, and so on and so forth. Basically, the story stopped before I even got started. My pride got the better of me and I was like “I should be doing this for money, not for free!” (I think I had an ego I didn’t really deserve, to be blunt about it.) But no matter what I told myself, the truth of why I stopped doing this was simple: I knew I wasn’t good enough to pull it off, especially all on my own. Now, I always had it in the back of my head that one day I’d return to the story when I was more artistically mature and better experienced to handle the story. In the past several months, I’ve come to realize that I have indeed reached that point… But I no longer have the drive or desire to continue this story for several reasons:

1. Many of the ideas I had, such as Optimus Primal being considered not of sound mind has been done now in several other comic books by far more talented people than I. What was once I thought an original concept would now be just repeating was had been told already.

2. Some of the concepts of the story that I was going to address, such as the origin of Primus and Unicron had basically been made null and void on a ’multiversal‘ scale.

3. The amateurish level of the original pages. Seriously, some of the dialogue in there was… Bad. Very, very bad. And the art was worse. I mean, I’m assuming at this point in time, if you’re reading this, it’s because you’re familiar with my art now. Well, my art then wasn’t that good. It was the opposite of good. If I was to continue it, I’d want to start over completely, and if I do that… Then I might as well make other changes too, which would be drastic enough to make it a different story all together.

4. Part of my interest in doing BM:GE was the controversial nature of it. Since then, my interests and areas of focus have changed dramatically. I’m not the same bitter angry fanboy I was then. I don’t enjoy picking stuff apart and ridiculing the hard work of others. (I’m not sure I ever did, though some sure seemed to think I did.) Even though the intent of the story was indeed “Pro-Beast Machines” and I wasn’t going to verbally dissect it, I DO understand the apprehensions people had toward the series and I didn’t feel like dissecting that either.

So in short, will I ever return to do BM:GE? The answer is no. If I do another TF fan comic, it’ll either be a Transformers: Mosaic, or something with another artist. I have too many other artistic obligations that must come first. I do have a few stories ideas in mind I’d love to do. I got what I think would be a great story for the Machine Wars. I have what I think would be some awesome stories for the movie universe. And above all else, I would love to tackle Robots in Disguise. In fact, if I do one that I end up drawing… It’ll be that.

So in the meanwhile, HERE is the infamous story, such as it was. Well, I’ve told the back story of how the story came about and why it stopped… I guess it’s only fair to tell the story of what was going to happen:

__________________

It’s mentioned in the second chapter that Silverbolt was missing in action. The reason was that he was retro-reformatted as Jetstorm. After the incident in the Citadel, where the Maximal Elders were protesting the technorganic, it was going to be proposed to set up retro-reformatting camps, to change anyone who had been reformatted into a technorganic back to being completely technological. The idea was that this was at first going to be voluntary. Essentially, the Elders felt that the Technorganic citizens (or meatbots) would become a potential welfare state, since the biological differences between the Technorganics and the Standards would require vast considerations. Trees would be needed to produce the oxygen, food would have to be grown, there was now certain tasks that they could no handle anymore, ect. Essentially the Standards were looking at the Technorganics as inferiors, and was creating sectors for them to live in, under the guise of “doing it for their own good.” Sound like apartheid? It should, because that’s what it was meant to be.

The political situation on Cybertron would have been explained a lot more. Now before I continue, understand that at this point in time… It had NOT been explained. We did not know about the bi-partate committee. We did not know about Magmatron or LioConvoy being on the same counsel. All we really knew was that the Maximals were in charge, the Predacons were second class citizens, and it’s been like that since the end of the Great War. So I was pretty much thinking that the moon of Cybertron (I called it Sion) was like Australia: A former prison colony that earned it’s independence. Now during Megatron II’s occupation (which I called the Viralclysm) he pretty much left the moon of Sion alone, saying “The Predacons are my brothers, and as far as I’m concerned, you are now a free state. But stay off my planet, or you will meet the same fate as the Maximal Imperium. I have great plans for us, and you cannot interfere with them.” So the Viralclysm happens, and eventually so does the Spark War. Megatron II is defeated, Cybertron is reformatted, but the moon was left untouched. (It’s part of that whole balance thingie.) Afterwards, the Maximal Elders, who fled to space when the slag hit the rotor blade, returns like the gods from Olympus all proclaiming “We’re back. Everything is going to be okay now!” So serious tensions arise between the Standards and the Technorganics. Essentially, some of the Technorganics were running around like the I.R.A. in Northern Ireland. Tensions was getting high. (I want to point out that this story was written in early 2001, before 9/11 and the War on Terror.) The Predacons have been supplying weaponry to the Technorganics, and the largest freedom fighter cell, the Victory Knights was led by Nightscream. (now Knightscream.) The Predacons have changed as well. No longer Decepticon-Lites, they were modeled more after Dinobot’s code of honor, led by Magmatron. Knowing what it’s like themselves to be treated as less than equal, they side with the Technorganics and offer sanctuary to any that feels persecuted.

Big Convoy (who in my scripts I realized I wrote horribly and I still feel bad about it) would have approached Cheetor, who had unwillingly become like a holy figure. (Since he talks to the Oracle.) Big Convoy felt the Maximals Elders were wrong in their persecutions of the Technorganics, and wanted to ask Cheetor for assistance in stopping the violence. There was a lot of support for the Technorganics, but in order to make the Elders listen, violence needed to stop. Big Convoy felt that since Cheetor was a former teammate, coupled with his recent standing as a holy figure, perhaps Knightscream would listen. If they can stop the acts of terrorism, then perhaps they could use this as leverage against the Elders and make positive changes. Big Convoy’s partner Nightviper was a former member of his crew who also attended. (Yes, I had made her a female. I think I’ve explained before why I did. Regardless though, if it still bothers people, then we can just say it’s a different character, or just say it was the Japanese version of her. Like Magnaboss and Magnaboss II were different characters named the same who looked the same.) Big Convoy and Nightviper were romantically involved. (Yes, I know… I know… Forgive me.) Cheetor had an interest in Nightviper, but quite frankly, the interest wasn’t reciprocated. Cheetor of course agrees, and thinks the fighting doesn’t help anyone, and wants to do whatever he can to help. I need to point out right now that all this time, Waspinator, now a tiny bug is still flying around Cheetor irritating the hell out of and making fun of him. So during the entire story, he’s by Cheetor, mocking him. During the meeting, they were attacked by Jetstorm and some Vehicons. (I don’t remember them all. I know Spy Streak was one of them.) This surprised everyone, since Jetstorm was supposed to be Silverbolt now, and not evil anymore. During the attack, Jetstorm gets a lucky shot in (I believe it was going to be one of those “taking a bullet” things) and kills Big Convoy. He escapes, but one dead Vehicon is left behind.

Cybertron is in a state of mourning for the fallen hero, as forensics evidence point out that the dead Vehicon was a Technorganic who had reverted back to his Vehicon self. Fear starts rising that the Technorganics are turning back into Vehicons and the Viralclysm is going to happen all over again. Since it’s impossible to tell which Technorganic was once a Vehicon or not, they need to be tested. Using this as an excuse, martial law is imposed and testing camps are created. Several Technorganics escape to Sion and many are captured along the way. Cheetor, with Nightviper, Rattrap, Botanica, Blackarachnia (and of course Waspinator) follows a train of clues to find the Victory Knights which take them to the crashed “Megatron Head” (which we now know is called the Grand Mal) where they discover Strika and Obsidian commanding an underground army of retro-formatted Vehicons. Among the retro-formatted are Silverbolt and Knightscream. They find evidence that the Vehicon Generals were following a “Last Command” of Megatron’s called “Operation: Generation’s End.” Megatron always had a backup plan, and in case he fell, this was his. A fight ensues, and during it Nightviper slashes off half of Obsidian’s face. (He lives though. Think Two-Face.) Cheetor grabs a computer file with visual evidence on it and with Nightviper and Waspinator they escape. Though the others are captured and retro-formatted themselves into Vehicons.

Cheetor and the girls arrive at the Counsel of Elders with the proof that the current state of violence and fear on Cybertron is playing into Megatron’s hands. They have to cease the testing camps, as there’s no danger from the Technorganics. They must team up with them to stop Strika and Obsidian from seeing Megatron’s last command through. The Elders ask for proof, and Cheetor shows them the evidence.

Here is where the story takes place through Megatron’s journal entries. It tells the story how when he fell off the Autobot Shuttle, he landed on Cybertron some 200 years before the Darkside and Axalon’s departure to the Beast Wars. Working underground, he develops much technology and takes on the name Cryotek to avoid drawing attention to himself. (Yes, I know Cryotek was a different guy. But at the time, he wasn’t much more than a blue Megatron toy.) He realized that he would become his own mentor and he loved the idea of basically creating himself. He performed experiments on the Transmetal Driver, which allowed him to explore the evolutionary concepts.

Now if you’re going to read anything, this is the key part right here. The part that if anything, is the part I’m still proud of. Remember, prior to BM, Megatron never had an issue with Organics. But once the series began, he did.

Upon doing experiments, he discovers that the Transmetal process was merely another stage in the evolution of Transformers, just merely accelerated by the alien Vok. One day, the Transformers would eventually have become Transmetals on their own. This was fascinating to him. So he did further experimentations. (And by experimentations, I mean, torturing innocents.) Eventually in his tests, he discovers an advancement of Transmetallization: Technorganics. Machines so precise and advanced they mimic organic mechanisms. No need for a CR chamber, the chassis will eventually heal itself. No need for Energon anymore, the body can extract energy from acids and sugars, as well as Energon. Fuel could be grown. Upgrades were natural evolutionary functions and no longer needed to be body overhauls. Abilities could be learned now, as opposed to installed. They weren’t organic, they were still machines… But machines so advance that nothing had been seen like it ever. There was the drawbacks of courses. They needed to breathe, and the bodies weren’t as durable as the machine ones were. But those could be easily compensated for. However there was one catch that sent it all spirally to Hell… He noticed on the female Technorganics, a unique strain in their spark’s DNA that’s been dormant in all female Transformers since as far back as the records go. Until now. This strain allow with coupling of a male spark to form “Spark Mitosis” or a form of dual budding.

Basically the Transformers would one day sexually reproduce.

This sends Megatron into a fit of rage. He finds this notion an abomination to the species, cursing organics and their ways. Currently the Transformers needed to be manufactured, with help from the Creation Matrix of various other methods. The population was under control. But you put population control in the hands of the simple minded fools, procreation would become a virus. A virus which would overcome and destroy any manifest destiny that the Cybertronians had. Then it occurred to him that since this strain was present in the Spark all along, that this was part of Primus’ grant plan. Instead of accepting this, Megatron’s ego declared that Primus was wrong. He felt destiny needed to be changed, and by force if need be. He decides that revolution against the world s the best solution. To extract the sparks of those who would oppose him, and subjugate them all. No one could be spared. It was all or nothing. Then he could consume the sparks, rewrite them and start all over, with him as their god now. (Once again, remember the 13 or the history or Primus and Unicron was not established yet.) He would leave the Predacons alone (for now) because after all, what’s a god without followers? However, should he fail, he had a backup plan.

The moon of Sion, though now a colony was once a giant Transformer named Dark Nova. The moon was built around his remains. On him surface though is a giant dreadnought thruster. The thruster would activate for a few second, knocking it out of orbit, causing it to collapse into Cybertron’s surface, kicking up shrapnel and debris, wiping out all organic life on the planet, and the ensuing Nuclear Winter would ensure it’s destruction, leaving only the technological Transformers in it’s surviving wake. This would also kill all Predacons on Sion as well. And the activation switch was in the Cybertronian Citadel, where the Maximal Elders current reside.

After playing that message, members of the Counsel replies with “We know.” And then Obsidian and Strika show up behind them. The Elders were working with the Vehicon Generals to help rid Cybertron of Technorganics AND the Predacons once and for all. There are some Elders who didn’t know about this, and they start to protest when they’re taken down. They’re all surrounded and taken prisoner, when Cheetor lashes out to help everyone escape, by taking the traitorous Maximal Elder hostage. Jetstorm and Knightscream intervene, and try to stop him. A fight ensues that takes them over a deep chasm. Obsidian, not taking any chances, orders the planetary defense batteries to open fire on the four of them. The blasts destroys the Elder and almost kills Cheetor, Silverbolt and Rattrap. They fall to their apparent death, down the chasm… Almost to the core. Waspinator follows.

Fighting breaks out and in under a day, a new war threatens to eclipse all of Cybertron, this time with the factions being Maximal Elder Loyalists and Vehicons against the Predacons, Technorganics and the rest of the population that doesn’t agree with genocide. Which is most of the population. Vastly outnumbered, the Vehicons would be overturned, if not for the Doomsday device held in the Citadel.

Obsidian, not willing to overlook a good revenge tactic, in classic vaudevillian style, ties Nightviper to the top of a spire, exactly a ground zero impact pint of the moons collapse. Strika starts to have second thoughts, telling Obsidian that Megatron is dead… They do not need to follow his command. He is no longer Cybertron. Since they are loyal to Cybertron, they should be loyal to the population. Genocide is not be the answer. Obsidian replies that for centuries they have protected Cybertron ever since they left their peaceful home of Paradron. They lost one home already, and now he’s lost another. The Cybertron he knew and loved was no more. And that’s when he reveals that the moon crash isn’t just going to destroy all organic life on Cybertron and Sion, but with the coordinates locked in place, the impact zone the moon would collide with would shatter Cybertron into pieces and cause all life, organic and machine to be destroyed. Obsidian plans to kill himself and everyone with him. Strika realizes that her lover has gone too far tries to talk him back from this. It looks like he is agreeing to this, when she lets her guard down and he blows her head off. In what I think was going to be an extremely emotionally touching moment, he would weep for her, and then in his name press the button which activates the moon’s thruster. Across the entire planet, people look up to see the moon falling toward them. In five hours, the moon would collide, destroying everything. People all over the planet tries to evacuate in ships, but the planetary batteries shoot down the ships as they attempt to escape. Predacons on Sion attempt to escape as well, but many ships are shot down by orbital cannons. Essentially, they’re all trapped there.

Meanwhile at the near-core, Waspinator buzzes about Cheetor and barely wakes him. The others are barely conscious or alive as well, when they’re surrounded by a giant light. The Oracle has approached them. It takes the form of various fallen comrades of theirs. Optimus Primal, Rhinox, Dinobot, Depth Charge, ect. The Oracle explains that Cybertron must survive, that not only does the Transformers have a great destiny, but so does Cybertron, the planet itself. If Obsidian is allowed to destroy it, then all hope would be lost, though their destinies are different, they are entwined with each other. Cheetor, fed up with the cryptic talk, demands an answer. If this is all part of a grand plan of Primus, then he needs to know what is going on. The Oracle concedes and a flash of light later, it is revealed that the Oracle is voice of the Vok. The Oracle retells the origin of Cybertron. (Remember… This was before when all we had for the origin of the Transformers was the Quintessons and the Primus origin, and not much else.)

Billions years ago, near the dawn of space and time, there was two rivaling members of the Vok species… Primus and Unicron. During their battle, they were imprisoned in planetoid. Unicron, a force for Chaos fashioned his planetoid into a transforming world and went out to continue to destroy the universe. As a giant planet, his world developed life. This life would come to be known as the Quintessons. Unicron promised to spare them and this galaxy until the end of the universe, if they would go and seek out and find Primus for him. They agreed. (But they’re Quintessons, so they’re not very trustworthy.) They spread their empire throughout the galaxy… Including a small green organic planet. Life was abundant on this planet, but the Quintessons did not care. They would have though, if they had known that this planet was the world in which Primus himself was imprisoned. His life essence bled out into the world creating life fro the lifeless. They paved over the world, creating in it’s place a giant factory planet for their works. They called this factory planet Cybertron. Using the indigenous species there as slave labor, they fashion experiments out of them, including the Trans-Organics. Technological evolution took place and what was once organic, became mechanical. What was once souls, became sparks. And what was once the Oracle, became Vector Sigma. Evolution continued, until it led up to the events of the G1 cartoon show. Cybertron was built over an organic world, which was actually Primus itself. To destroy Cybertron would destroy Primus. To destroy Primus would mean that Chaos would have no opposition and all of space and time would be in peril. So the Beast Wars was predestined. They were sent to Earth to bring back the organic material to Cybertron. While the planet was originally organic, the mechanical was also of it’s nature. BOTH was needed. For the Transformers grand destiny was to (in twelve billion years) become the Vok, which in turn, since Space and Time have no meaning for them, would be responsible for the creation of trillions and trillions of life forms and worlds throughout time. Including Cybertron and Earth.

Cheetor, Jetstorm, Rattrap, and Waspinator are pretty much at awe at this revelation. Obviously they agree to help and do whatever they can to save the day. The Oracle tells them that the Technorganic bodies they possess are merely just another stepping stone of evolution. They must “transcend the technorganic” and become greater than that. A light ensues, and they become the Transtechs. (Some of you might have seen my character designs for that already.) Silverbolt is back, but he still possesses his memories of Jetstorm… But is more at peace with it. It’s not a dark side like before… He’s accepted it as part of himself. Rattrap and Cheetor pretty much become more powerful. Rattrap is now heavily armed and turns into what I think was going to be a monowheeled tank cycle, looking more owing to Computron than anything. Cheetor is much bigger… Like almost Optimal Optimus big and turns into a huge ass dragster. And Waspinator is a motorcycle, whose’ wheels flip around onto his shoulders emulating “bee wings” allowing him to hover. Their transformation codes is now “Optimize!” Part of Silverbolt’s new abilities is folding space, so he’s able to transport the quartet to the surface of Cybertron, right as panic is setting in, with less than ten minutes to go. So in the midst of panic, here’s these four warriors appearing out of nowhere looking like gods, and people start to freak out more. (If Techspecs were available, they’d all be 9, 10 or 10+) Obsidian sees this and orders an attack on the four, as a horde of Vehicons start of swarm them.

The four go battle ready and start fighting. One of Cheetor’s abilities is to use his Swords (which glow like a light saber) and by striking the Vehicons, he can transcend reformat them into Transtechs. Essentially, by striking them down, he can cure them. (But this only works with those that were already Technorganic in the first place.) The fellow teammates like Blackarachnia, Botanica and Knightscream are those that are healed. Blackarachnia turns into like a Tachikoma tank from Ghost in the Shell, Knightscream turns into a bat shaped “digital interface sword” (Think Armada’s Star Saber) and I don’t remember what Botanica turned into. Rattrap gets this brilliant idea. Calculates real vast, and suggests to Silverbolt to rocket up toward the approaching Sion as fast as possible (too fast for the planetary cannons to target him) and try to spin the moon rotation 45 degrees, so the thruster is pointing laterally to Cybertron. Rattrap and Botanica heads to the Citadel to get the thruster activation device as Knightscream transforms into Silverbolt’s sword, and they flie up toward the orbit of Sion as near light speeds. This leaves Cheetor, Blackarachnia and Waspinator to fend off the approaching armies.

Cheetor sees Obsidian hovering by the bound Nightviper and he activates his “Prime Jets” and flies off for the rescue. Waspinator tells Blackarchnia to go help get the Technorganics to safety, and she asks if he’s crazy or stupid to be left alone and vastly outnumbered. He replies “Both, but Waspinator need Spider-bot out of range. Waspinator has plans.” Helping the Technorganics escape, Waspy activates his special ability: “Hyper-Speed Buzz Kicking Mode”, which essentially slows down space and time, slowing the approaching Vehicons to a standstill, allowing him to whip around each one, taking them all down, without killing a single one. And at the end of the fight, Waspinator stands on top of a giant building sized pile of deactivated Vehicons proclaiming “Waspinator Rules!!” which impresses Blackarachnia and the citizens of Cybertron, who start to regain hope.

Cheetor’s fight with Obsidian takes him high around the spire where Nightviper is bound. During the fight, Obsidian turns the planetary cannons on Cheetor. It looks like Obsidian has the upper hand, but he didn’t realize that during the fight, Cheetor had freed Nightviper and used his sword to Transcend Reformat her into a Transtech, who jumps on Obsidians back and impales him from behind. This distracts him enough for cheetor to fly at Obsidian as full speed, and ram him into the spire, sticking him to it, trapping him. Of course the guns have turned on Cheetor, who was right there next to Obsidian, and they start just blasting the two of them apart. Nightviper’s new power is the ability to heal, so she grabs Cheetor, and heals him. (On the surface, the Technorganics take out the planet guns.)

Rattrap and Botanica fight their to the activation button and obtained it. Silverbolt had just finished spinning around the moon as fast as he could and the thruster had rotated only 44.7 degrees. The moon is less than a minute from impact, gravitational pulls from it is totally screwing up the planet, everything is going in total chaos. Rattrap figures its now or never, and both him and Botanica hits the button together, and pray it’s rotated enough. The thruster activates full force and flies off at an angle. The direction of the blast makes it go to the side, but it still skims across the surface of Cybertron’s skyscraper skylines, tearing up the local topsoil… Obsidian, right in the line of the moon’s trajectory just stares at it coming toward him, and has enough time to whisper “Strika” right as the moon collides with the spire destroy it. But the rotation was enough, though heavily devastating the area, the moon scraps Cybertron’s surface, but rockets off away from the planet. The Predacons on Sion are freaking out, as Silverbolt and Knightscream combines together (sorta) and Silverbolt slams the Knightscream sword into the surface of the moon, and folds space, and teleports every Predacon on Sion (as well as himself) to the surface of Cybertron, while the moon spirals out of control into deep space.

In the aftermath, a strong peace has formed on the world, with Predacons, Maximals and Technorganics working side by side to rebuild Cybertron and society in general. A senate is formed, with the Axalon crew, Magmatron and several others taking their place as equal powers on Cybertron. Centuries pass. Cheetor has grown into a wise leader calling himself now Cheetah Prime, with his consort Nightviper at his side. Silverbolt and Blackarachia has split up, they remain true friends. With Magmatron and Knightscream’s assistance, he recreates the Matrix Templars which become like a Jedi Order, traveling around the system up keeping peace and order. Rattrap and Botanica help form a new science division, which developed Space Bridge technology to span across the entire universe. And there’s Obsidian, in status lock floating in deep space, where he’s caught in a tractor beam, and brought aboard a ship. He looks up, and sees his saviors… Megatron and the Decepticons. They’re coming home.

And as an epilogue. Countless billions of years from now, the universe is collapsing upon itself. And Cybertron, now the size of a small galaxy, at the center of it, is at the center of the collapse. The universe nears it’s ends, as Cybertron explodes, creating a new Big Bang starting a brand new universe.

_______________________

So that was the story.

I won’t lie… I do regret not being able to tell that story in it’s entirety, but I know I won’t be able to. And it’s better to get it out there at least in text form, as opposed to just existing in my head. There’s quite a bit of it that wouldn’t work in today’s established universe. (Especially that bit with Primus and Unicron being a Vok.) But that’s what there was. In the meantime, if you have never read it... HERE is a Transformers Mosaic I did a few years ago.

Thanks for reading and I hope you liked it. And for making it this far... Here's a burger and fries.

Some Assembly Required.

2010-05-23T22:29:00.004-04:00

Prosthetics are freakin’ amazing.

There’s a woman named Aimee Mullens. She has no legs. They were amputated at a young age because she had no fibulae in her legs. So she gets around on artificial appendages. And when I say get around, I mean, the woman moves about running, jumping, jogging, and not to mention a dozen other things that my overweight ass can’t even dream of doing with both my legs intact. And that's not even touching on the fact she's hotter than I'll ever be too. It wasn’t that long ago that the loss of your legs meant you were bound to a chair for life. And if you got artificial legs, you could do a little walking, but you would be limited in your mobility. You'd be like the old motorized Transformer toy Sky Lynx, which could "walk". And I say walk in quotes, because the toy was a piece of crap and I'm pretty sure it didn't do much more than waddle back and forth. (Omega Supreme FTW!) This is not the case anymore. It’s utterly astounding the advancements we are making in prosthetics and even robotics. There are currently robotic limb, that not only can do delicate things likes grab coins off a flat surface, (Seriously, you try doing that wearing a pair of gloves. Hard, ain’t it?)… But through surgical attachments to nerve endings, it can allow the wearer to actually FEEL through the arm. Yes, the current technology is nowhere near the advancements of Masamune Shirow’s Ghost in the Shell series, but considering that your cell phone has more computing power than some high end computers ten years ago… Let’s be honest, it’s going to get there. I firmly believe we are a the dawn of a post-humanism society, and we didn’t even notice it.

Now, I’ve been around for a while, and I’ve seen cars… Hell, I’ve OWNED cars... that was held together with not much more than bondo and duct tape. I’ve seen computers that jury-rigged like crazy, with old and used parts, and a box fan blowing onto the opened interiors, because the internal fan broke. Nintendo and Xboxes that’s been broken, taped, stapled and even glued back together. It’s ugly as hell… But it all still works. And you know what? As time goes on and cybernetics get more and more informally acceptable in society, we’re going to see cybernetics and prosthetic limbs jury-rigged. Just imagine, you break your artificial arm… You can’t afford to go get a new one. So you go to a Home Depot or a Lowe’s and you buy yourself duct tape and some bonding glue, and fix it yourself. Looks like crap, but it works. Or you get drunk, and your friends decide to swap out your pudgy white robotic leg with that of a slender black woman’s. (Which brings up another question: If you have a prosthetic body, does the concept of race even exist for you anymore?) Getting a tattoo will be the equivalent of getting airbrushed detailing. And you know they’ll make sex toy attachments for the cybernetic limbs, with like various gadgets instead of fingers. Use your imagination. I sure did. (And it’ll be from Japan. Where else would it be from?) We’re going to have iPod jacks (or the future equivalent of the music/entertainment players) built into them. Our bodies will be like our cars. We can have custom made, high priced Mercedes-Benz models… And the low-priced Kia model. We’ll have small ecological friendly models that run off no power at all, that will let you lift ten pounds before needing a recharge, and we’ll have giant ass SUV models that are enormous, guzzles power, pisses off environmentalists, and allow you to lift a ton or more. (If I’m around, I’m so getting one of these! Gonna put a paintball gun in there!)

We’re gonna have cyborg rednecks.

The post-humanist future is freakin’ awesome!

Evil Tree

2008-08-11T04:15:00.003-04:00

I drew this for a friend who was wanting an "evil tree." I was originally going to draw it in black and white, but she had bought me this set of watercolor pencils and I wanted to try them out a bit.

Pleeeeassse don't be harsh. I know it's very rough. It is the first time I've used watercolors in like 15 years.