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short appreciations of poetry and pop culture
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Jason Powell has taken on the yeoman's job of doing an issue by issue analysis of Chris Claremont's 17 year Uncanny X-Men run in an effort to make me feel bad for saying Morrison invented all kinds of things he did not in his New X-Men run, and for spelling Claremont "Clairmont" in my superhero book.
Scott McDarmont (Scott91777) is an Instructor Of English at Radford University, Radford VA, an avid reader of books by guys named Chuck, he usually “waits for the trade” on comics unless Frank Miller is somehow involved. He owns more Def Leppard CDs than Bob Dylan CDs and he is ‘Ok’ with this and, while he may answer different publicly, he secretly feels that The Empire Strikes Back is the best movie ever made. He also feels that there are two kinds of people in the world: Indiana Jones people and John McClane people. He considers himself an Indiana Jones person
Jill Duffy, girl reporter, is a professional writer and editor in New York. She spent five years covering video game development in both San Francisco and London, examining the art, science, and business of the industry, and in 2006 was named one of the top 100 most influential women in the game industry. Her work has appeared in The Examiner newspaper in San Francisco, where she was the food section editor, as well as Game Developer, Gamasutra.com, Intelligent Enterprise, DigitalTrends.com, and several other publications. She holds a BA in English from the University at Buffalo. Indeed, she is on the Twitter and also keeps a blog about food.
Andy Bentley is a graphic designer in upstate New York. The first series of Batman movies got him in a comic book store and the DC animated series made him a life long fan. His senior thesis was a short film on the culture of comic books. Animal Man, Starman, and Preacher are among his favorite comic runs. He is an avid toy collector and enjoys playing basketball, mash-ups, karaoke and dark beers. He will be sequestered most of September with The Beatles: Rock Band.
Would you like to write for this blog?
Scott McDarmont (Scott91777) is an Instructor Of English at Radford University, Radford VA, an avid reader of books by guys named Chuck, he usually “waits for the trade” on comics unless Frank Miller is somehow involved. He owns more Def Leppard CDs than Bob Dylan CDs and he is ‘Ok’ with this and, while he may answer different publicly, he secretly feels that The Empire Strikes Back is the best movie ever made. He also feels that there are two kinds of people in the world: Indiana Jones people and John McClane people. He considers himself an Indiana Jones person
Jill Duffy, girl reporter, is a professional writer and editor in New York. She spent five years covering video game development in both San Francisco and London, examining the art, science, and business of the industry, and in 2006 was named one of the top 100 most influential women in the game industry. Her work has appeared in The Examiner newspaper in San Francisco, where she was the food section editor, as well as Game Developer, Gamasutra.com, Intelligent Enterprise, DigitalTrends.com, and several other publications. She holds a BA in English from the University at Buffalo. Indeed, she is on the Twitter and also keeps a blog about food.
Andy Bentley is a graphic designer in upstate New York. The first series of Batman movies got him in a comic book store and the DC animated series made him a life long fan. His senior thesis was a short film on the culture of comic books. Animal Man, Starman, and Preacher are among his favorite comic runs. He is an avid toy collector and enjoys playing basketball, mash-ups, karaoke and dark beers. He will be sequestered most of September with The Beatles: Rock Band.
Would you like to write for this blog?
The Best of the Blog
- HAMLET MASH UP
- KILL BILL AND MILTONIC ALLUSION
- Favorite Comics
- Open Letter to Anthony Lane
- Star Trek Review
- 3D Glasses: Beowulf, Coraline, Up, Superman
- MORRISON'S NEW X-MEN: THE ISSUE BY ISSUE ANALYSIS
- Whedon's Astonishing X-Men: The Issue By Issue Analysis
- The Maxx
- Russell Edson's "The Fall"
- John Ashbery's "This Room"
- The Heresy of Paraphrase
- Edward Gorey's The Curious Sofa
- Harold and the Purple Crayon
- The Mountain Goats's "Fault Lines"
- Superman Returns
- Spiderman 3
- Pan's Labrynth and Children of Men
- Buffy, Angel and Evil
- Beowulf, David Lynch and Evil
- In Defense of Ally McBeal
- The Surprising Will and GraceSeries Finale
- A History of Violence
- All Star Superman and Jamie Grant
- Lex Luthor's Desk in JLA: Earth 2
- Frank Quitely and a Detail from WE3
- Casanova and Pathos (Guest: Matt Fraction)
- Hellboy
- Brad Winderbaum Interview
Best of the Blog: Comment Threads
- Alan Moore and Blackest Night
- Abrams v Whedon
- Lost Projects
- No Country for Liberal Men
- Dark Knight
- Miller and the homosocial
- Style v. Substance
- Growing Up and Art
- Favorite Comics
- Comics Events
- Planetary 26
- Heroes Pilot Debate
- Rhymes
- Cover Songs
- Live vs Recorded Hip Hop
- Batman (and others) on Film
- Ratatouille
- Pirates 3
- Little Kid Jokes
- Fictional Crushes
Guest Blogging
- Andy Bentley (New Gods)
- Brent Saltzman
- C Lue Disharoon
- Chad Nevett
- Chandler Bennett (Miracleman)
- Charlie
- Cove West (Lovecraft)
- Erin (Captain Fugmerica)
- Gordon Harries
- Graham Tedesco-Blair
- HCDuvall
- James Wheeler
- Jason and Ximena
- Jason Powell (Non-X-Men)
- JASON POWELL'S ISSUE BY ISSUE ANALYSIS OF CLAREMONT'S X-MEN
- Jill Duffy, Girl Reporter
- Lucas
- Mitch Montgomery (Reviewery)
- Ping33
- Plok
- Sara
- Scott91777 (Miller, Music and Miscellany)
- Stefan Delatovic
- Streebo (Black Summer Review)
- Tim Callahan (Reviewery)
- Ultimate Matt
Blog List
Bio Stuff: Published Work
Is your copy of How to Read Superhero Comics and Why missing pages?
Bio Stuff: Other Online Work
- Teachers vs Cell Phones
- Using Media to Pace your Classroom
- Superheroes and Fashion Panel at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Casanova Review
- Reconstruction: Posthumanism (an issue I co-edited)
- X-Men, Emerson, Gnosticism
- Harold Bloom's Pal, Donnie Darko
- Superheroes (Oxford Student Paper)
- X3 (Oxford Student Paper)
Bio Stuff: Interviews
Read, free and legally, the comic book in which a villain's name is inspired by my own (Doctor Klock)
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February
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- TV This Week: LOST, BSG, 24, Dollhouse
- Three Years
- Jason Powell on Uncanny X-Men #200
- Free Form Comments
- Jason Powell on X-Men Annual #9
- U2's No Line On the Horizon (inital reaction)
- Super Late Reviews: Deadwood, Gran Torino, Coraline
- Satisfying Resolutions to Long Term Mysteries
- TV this week: LOST, BSG, 24
- Jason Powell on New Mutants Special #1
- Greatest Hits Albums: Are they Only for Housewives...
- Free Form Comments
- Jason Powell on Uncanny X-Men #199
- 30 Rock this week
- Dollhouse (Spoilers)
- LOST, BSG, 24 this week
- Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?
- Haters Can't Be Stopped
- Jason Powell on Uncanny X-Men #198
- Tarantino's Inglorious Basterds Trailer
- Free Form Comments
- The Blackmail Scene from Dark Knight
- Jason Powell on Uncanny X-Men #197
- David Savran's Taking It Like A Man
- Is the Album Dead?
- Top 5 first tracks on an album
- TV and Comics This Week (LOST, BSG, 24)
- Avatar Live Action Casting
- Jason Powell on Uncanny X-Men #196
- Day Flight: Rome to New York: Mama Mia and, ugh, S...
- Free Form Comments
- Bruce Springsteen's Working on a Dream
- Jason Powell on Uncanny X-Men #195
- Airplane Movies (Hancock and Sex and the City)
- The Invisibles #1
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21 comments:
The original Top Ten series - the revelation that the off-world drug customer was the Commissioner.
Another Alan Moore piece, the Supreme Story of the Year - the revelation of Darius Dax as Supreme's old girlfriend.
Man, Alan Moore keeps coming up, Watchmen - the revelation of Ozymandias as the mastermind behind the plot to get the superheroes, plus WHAT the plot really was.
Fables - the identity of the bloody-handed Adversary as Gepetto.
And I'd like to throw in two of my own personal favorites, though they're a bit off to the side,
Alan Davis' run on Excalibur as writer and artist - revealing that everything in the series to that point had been to prepare Excalibur to battle Necrom, all plotted out by Merlin and executed by Roma, even though (to my knowledge) THIS WAS NOT THE CASE WHEN THE PRECEDING 41 ISSUES WERE BEING WRITTEN.
Avengers Forever - completely straightening out who knows how many years of Kang continuity, and making Kang a compelling villain to me for the first time.
Uh, who my real parents are?
whether or not this girl in my eng class has a boyfriend. Answer as I found out today: no.
Also, if anyone here keeps up with South Park, the answer to who Cartman's 'father' is was wierd because it was both empty and dull yet at the same time completely unexpected and, to an extent, satisfying because I've never thought of it more since then.
His father is his mother. You never find out who his biological mother is.
Kyle, are you talking about South Park or Lost?
Fins,
Yes, but does she have a girlfriend?
Now the mystery begins for me as to who this is... do they have dreads?
Oh, I agree with Watchmen and Top 10... however, having read these in trade, they weren't as 'long-term' ... but along the same lines... the resolution of Morrison's Animal Man run.
I'm surprised at the number of girls here in college with girlfriends. To relate the subject to the blog, it seems to be an increasing occurence in media...almost 'trendy.' And no, they don't have dreads or a girlfriend.
Season 1 of Veronica Mars. I did not think that season 2 had the best conclusion to the year long story, but season 1, I thought, was wrapped up perfectly and in an interesting way.
Season 1 of Babylon 5 - season-long mystery of "what happened at the battle of the line"? (or more precisely, why). Also Seasons 1-2 of B5 -- two-season-long mystery of "what to the Vorlons look like (and why do they care if we know)"? Very, very, very strongly *NOT* included is the three-season long mystery of "What do the shadows want?" -- the failure of that mystery is, I think, at the heart of B5's collapse as a story. ... Ok, as Willow would say, My issues.
Small mystery, but well done: The Wire, s1: "refrigerate it". A tiny mystery woven through a season for those who were paying attention, well paid off.
Oh, and I strongly endorse what Gary said above about Alan Moore (various) and Fables; and Madd Hatter on s1 (but not s2) of Veronica Mars.
I don't think, incidentally, that any of this is very hard to do. For the most part (s3 of B5 is an exception here) all you need is to *have a plan* from the beginning, to be writing the mystery with a knowledge of the end. The reason I gave up on Lost, and eventually BSG, is my coming to believe that neither writing team was doing this... which leads almost inevitably into X-Files territory.
SF
By the way, Geoff, I'd love to read your reaction to this rant about BSG:
http://notesfromthegeekshow.blogspot.com/2009/02/battlestar-galactica.html
...I think that he gets the basic problematic politics of the show right, although I'm not enough up on the show to say for sure, particularly having not seen any of s4. Still, I'd be interested in your thoughts on it...
SF
SF -- Veronica Mars was not satisfying I thought -- we started out with rape and incest as plot points, then in the season one finale removed the teeth out of both. Weak Sauce.
That essay is pretty amazing. I am still thinking about it. It seems very smart, except for the fact that stuff that is weak ideologically can still make for great television. My first reaction is that he is totally right but that it does not really bother me.
Brad: South Park
Dennis Potter's "The Singing Detective" mini series.
While sick in the hospital (suffering the same condition Potter did) mystery writer Phillip Marlowe's fevered mind enters a fantasy world that is a mix of his novel, The Singing Detective and his WW2 childhood in London.
The noir mystery of the novel intersects with the mystery of his mother's death as characters from both, as well as his hospital life, begin to bleed into one another.
Geoff,
I *strongly* disagree with you about Veronica Mars.
First, neither of the things you mentioned were the main mystery of the season, so even if one were to grant your quibbles, the point would still stand.
But your quibbles are way off-base. The solution to the rape plot was brilliant -- that what *seemed* to be a rape was not, but rather was a chain of individually cruel, but not criminal, actions; that, as Abigail Nussbaum put it, "Veronica was raped not by a person but by a social class and a mindset." It was a far more interesting solution to the mystery than any individual rapist would have been (which is why I hated the s2 retcon of it). It was a solution that was plausible, convincing, and appropriately disturbing.
And for the incest -- I think they *did* a lot with that plot. Demanding that any hint of incest be real is, I think, silly.
So -- respectfully -- you're just wrong here.
SF
Of course, Veronica was raped, by Beaver. Even though it's revealed in Season 2, isn't that technically the end of that long-term mystery? Duncan's just a red-herring (even if it wasn't intended to be or presented that way in the 1st season.)
Jeff - That was what I meant by "the s2 retcon". I think that was, in fact, a retcon, and that the solution in "A Trip to the Dentist" was originally supposed to stand on its own -- and should have been left to, since it was much, much better.
In reference to Geoff's Tweets:
As satisfying as Frisky Dingo season one is, season two is even moreso (and the end of the first half is brilliant).
I would like to recommend season 1 of DEXTER as a long running mystery that offered a satisfying conclusion. In short, Dexter is about a forensic blood specialist that moonlights as a serial killer who preys on serial killers. The mystery in the first season revolves around a killer that knows Dexter's secret. The Ice Truck killer as he becomes known as - attempts to draw Dexter into a dangerous cat and mouse game. I won't go into any specifics for fear of spoilers - but would like to recommend Dexter for everyone.
I thought Dexter season 1 was actually pretty awful, and the handling of the "mystery" was fairly inept compared to the book it was based on.
Of course, that was because they had to pad out what was a fundamentally sound 2 hours worth of plot into a full 13 hour season of television, but even then at least the book gave us some ambiguity as to whether Dexter was actually committing the murders instead of the show, which made the killer's identity fairly obvious for around 4 episodes even before they finally revealed it.
I know I'm in the minority here, but I cannot stress enough how absolutely awful I found the writing on the first season and how completely terrible every actor other than Michael C. Hall was. In the novels the fundamental flimsiness of the characterization works to the advantage of the story, since we are immersed in a sociopath's subjective perception of the world and there's no way he could have any insight into these people anyway. However, the show attempts to present these characters objectively, and consequently every attempt to add depth to Deb, Doakes, Angel or LaGuerta misfired spectacularly and killed any momentum the season was building with the main plot.
I'd back up The Singing Detective though, the original BBC miniseries is seriously the best screenplay ever written.
I'd also argue that Carnivale was able to pace and present the questions and answers behind its mythology in an amazingly successful manner for the two seasons it aired, but I don't know if you would count that as a "mystery" due to the fantasy nature of the show.
I've never read the original novel of Dexter. I've been meaning to pick it up. I thought the killer's identity is revealed before the end of the season in order to create tension - while leaving some connections as mysteries that aren't unraveled until the end. I enjoyed it as do most of the people that have seen it. Thanks for your comments, Dave. I need to read the novel soon.
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