Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Free Form Comments

Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.

ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.

AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.

You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.

WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.

Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Uncanny X-Men #250

[Jason Powell keeps on truckin with every issue of Claremont's X-Men. People in the comments have been disagreeing with him, which is cool, as long as you remember two things: 1. that you are wrong and 2. that Jason is right.]

“The Shattered Star”

Compared to other multiple-of-fifty anniversary issues that comic-book creators love to make a big deal out of – Claremont being no exception – Uncanny X-Men #250 arrives with little fanfare. A caption reminds us that it is the 250th issue, but apart from that it feels much less like a turning point than issues 150 and 200. Though there is one subtle acknowledgement of history: The story sees Lorna Dane placed into a giant plot device that magically strips her of her magnetic powers, a moment dramatized on the cover. This makes it a bookend with the 50th issue of Uncanny X-Men, which saw Lorna placed into a similar device to activate those powers in the first place (a moment also chosen for dramatization on that issue’s cover).

Monday, December 21, 2009

Blog Updates

I realize that I hardly every blog here, in part because I have become busy, in part because I have become more than a little jaded about things like the current comics scene, in part because I am lazy, and in part because twitter allows me to do a lot of things I used to to with this blog in an easier and more economical way. This is not an announcement that I will be blogging less, so much as an acknowledgement of the fact that it appears the amount I blog currently is probably not a temporary position -- although I still hold out hope that I will come roaring back, or take up some big issue-by-issue or episode-by-episode thing. I will certainly be blogging about each of the final 18 Lost episodes, for instance, and really should return to the Maxx. And I am on Winter break now, which means I will finally go to the movies (the last one I saw was Inglourious Basterds): Avatar, Nine, Where the Wild Things Are, The Informant, 2012, The Men Who Stare at Goats, The Box and The Fantastic Mr Fox and the upcoming Legion are all on my list. I expect to have some strong opinions on at least some of those. If I do, I will share.

What is the point? The point is that I used to post, and then add labels to distinguish guest bloggers -- so that if you wanted to follow Jason Powell you could use your RSS reader and his label to just see his posts. But I figured I was the default blogger and you would see mine just from following the main link at geoffklock.blogspot.com. No more. All my posts now have their own labels -- which you can use to avoid me or follow me specifically or whatever. The toolbar on the right has been altered to reflect this, and I have made sure each of our primary guest bloggers has the link to their posts with their names.

http://geoffklock.blogspot.com/search/label/geoffklock

Mister Miracle 11 & 12

[Andy Bentley continues his look at Jack Kirby's New Gods series -- for the final volume, generally considered to be a major fall off, he is going to look at two at a time. I, myself, wanted to read all of the New Gods issues after Final Crisis, but stopped right around here.]

“The Greatest Show Off Earth”
“Mystivac”

From here on out, I’m going to combine two Mr. Miracle reviews into one post. As mentioned previously in my column, the other Fourth World titles have been suspended indefinitely and Kirby has a mandate to make the Mr. Miracle title friendly to new readers. The result is a standard superhero tale with little mention of Apokolips or any other aspect of the ongoing saga.

“The Greatest show on Earth” involves the return of Doctor Bedlam to once again challenge Mr. Miracle’s skills as an escape artist. This is the first repeat villain we’ve seen in the series which is a sign something is off. If you do not remember, Bedlam is merely a consciousness which can inhabit any of the blank animate robots he controls. Like his last appearance, this one centers around the power of the mind and overcoming fear. The plotting is quite familiar: an elaborate trap that Miracle escapes with a generous contribution from his mother box.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Kevin Geeks Out Tomorrow

[I will be at this tomorrow, as will Sara. If you are in NYC, come visit. Sara talks about Smurfs and I talk about how Ocean's 12 is the best movie ever, which you may have heard me talk about before, but not as fast as tomorrow night.]

Part of the series Kevin Geeks Out!

Kevin Geeks Out is the comedy-variety show hosted by writer-comedian Kevin Maher – a monthly confabulation of vintage film clips and videos, new finds, guest experts, games and curiosities. To geek out with Kevin you don’t need to be a geek, you just need to love cool stuff.

This month, Kevin gives the audience a Holiday Grab Bag; an evening filled with surprise video entertainment. Eight Special Guests give the gift of weird, wonderful movie and TV clips, with topics including Godzilla: History, Biology and Behavior of Hyper-Evolved Theropod Kaiju; How He-Man spends the Holidays; Gratuitous Shark Scenes in post-JAWS Cinema; and using the Socratic Method to debate whether or not Oceans 12 is the greatest movie ever made. Guest Speakers/Presenters include:

Professor Geoff Klock (author of How to Read Superhero Comics and Why)
Shyaporn Theerakulstitb (actor/writer/director/D-List YouTuber)
R. Sikoryak (author of Masterpiece Comics)
Sara Reiss (occasional blogger and self-described “hater”)
M. Sweeney Lawless (writer for The Lowbrow Reader)
Noah Tarnow (host of Big Quiz Thing)
Craig Wichman (writer-director-actor of award-winning radio dramas)
Nick Nadel (blogger for Comics Alliance and American Movie Classics

All this, plus holiday cupcakes, trivia prizes and video tributes to Chanukah and Christmas and other secret surprises that will not be revealed until the night of the show.

CLICK HERE for directions/tickets.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Free Form Comments

Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.

ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.

AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.

You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.

WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Uncanny X-Men #249

[Jason Powell. Chris Claremont. X-Men. Every Issue. Seriously. It's like a blog inside the blog.]

“The Dane Curse”

The Savage Land, another classic X-riff, is reprised here. Neal Adams’ Savage Land mutates are brought in as the villains, a development seeded in X-Men Annual #12. There’s something very poetic about the way the classic settings and characters start returning during this phase of Claremont’s run. There is the feeling that everything is coming full circle before Claremont’s story ends. And thanks to Harras’ tight editorial rein (a double-edged sword in many respects), the integration of subplots seems more focused than in earlier eras. It’s nice that the Zaladane subplot from the “Evolutionary War” annual is not being left to languish on the vine for years, as it might have back during the Simonson or Nocenti editorial tenures.

Uncanny X-Men #249 is an issue in two parts. The earlier half sits in a murky psychological darkness, with Alex lamenting recent deaths and the overall unraveling of the team. Both his soliloquy and the accompanying images by Marc Silvestri turn a bit meta. We see Havok slashing red “X”’s through portraits of his lost teammates, which were originally painted – we are told – onto a giant conference table by Madelyne Pryor back before “Inferno” began. This is all rather out of the blue; we were never shown the X-Men using this table, and such a garish chunk of furniture feels like something out of DC’s Silver Age. And crossing the heads off with “X”’s as the corresponding characters leave the series feels like something a fan would do, not an actual character within the story. It is all rather surreal, almost as if this were a dream sequence. It is only compounded by the illogical and/or outlandish plot turns. Some of them are deliberate on Claremont’s part: The computer’s seeming to be alive and able to heal itself is deliberately pointed up as a mystery to be solved. Others seem the result of sloppiness: How did Lorna have the phone number to the X-Men’s secret base in Australia? But the compound effect of so many bizarre twists coming one after the other is kaleidoscopic, and contributes to the issue’s overall tone of psychological turmoil and existential despair.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Dollhouse's "A Love Supreme" (Season 2, Episode 8): some random thoughts



Spoilers.

I wont go crazy with Hulu clips, since it takes too much time and ends up also being kind of culturally chauvinistic, and basically people reading this post should probably have simply seen the episode anyway.

I had a few disconnected thoughts about this episode, which I saw moments ago, that I thought maybe worth a share. All on my old hobbyhorse: influence and allusion.

Since I seems to think in twitter posts:

1. The cold open reminds me of Kill Bill -- the music, the way Alpha's head is kept off screen, the focus on feet, the desert, the voiceover, blades, themes of love. It reminded me both of Bill approaching the bride in the beginning of the movie and of the Sheriff approaching the bride in the church.

2. Which doesn't mean anything except at the end when Alpha activates all the dolls in the dollhouse to go crazy and fight in order to screw with our girl hero, -- the setting and action is straight out of the House of the Blue Leaves, sans budget. This episode of the Dollhouse is bookended with the bookends of Kill Bill 1.

3. Alpha was very much Frank Miller's dandy Joker from Batman: Dark Knight Returns: the focus on the suit, the reference to Beau Brummel. But it was by way of Heath Ledger's Joker: the monologuing, the knives, the bombs.

4. Look also to Grant Morrison on Batman. When Echo finds Alpha's first victim notice the rose petals on the black and white checkered floor -- a staple of imagery of Morrison's ambitious failure in Batman: RIP, which also introduced his new Joker.

5. Notice also that Echo and Alpha are kind of set up as these post-human super-men because of their multiple personality thing -- which is how a psychiatrist describes the Joker in Morrison's Arkham Asylum.

6. Notice also that the unaired season finale of Season 1, Epitaph One, jumps into the future, then kind of jumps right back to the present for the start of season 2, which we now feel alluding to that future. Same thing in Morrison's Batman.

‘Tis The Season…. To celebrate the Simpsons Turning 20!

[Scott on the Simpson's 20th. Jesus Christ, that show is like Law and Order. Two thirds of my LIFE you know what I am saying? OF MY LIFE.]

It was 20 years ago that the first full length episode of the Simpsons, “Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire”, debuted on Fox thus inaugurating the beginning of one of the most influential shows ever to grace the airwaves. It is no secret that I am a HUGE Simpsons fan, Geoff can testify to the fact that my knowledge of the show (at least the first 10 seasons) is downright encyclopedic. A short while back, I challenged the blog to think of their favorite latter day Simpsons moments, those from the era when most considered the show past its prime; however, prompted by TV Guide’s recent list of the ’20 Best Episodes’ , a list that feels like it was almost contractually obligated to shoehorn newer episodes with true classics, I’ve decided to compile a list of that , I feel, is truly more representative of the best episodes from the show’s golden age.

Friday, December 11, 2009

The New Gods #11

[Andy Bentley. Kirby's New Gods Epic. Every issue. I was late putting this up folks. Sorry. End of term stuff, as usual.]

“Darkseid and Sons”

The final issue of The New Gods appropriately contains the most conclusive and important chapter of the Fourth World Saga to date. The issue features the second battle between Kalibak and and Orion, but this iteration has more depth and meaning. Kirby also reveals more backstory around Darkseid which makes his tale more shakespearean than totalitarian. Although it isn’t the ending Kirby hoped for, he finds an appropriate one for the situation.

After an opening prologue where Kalibak breaks free from the police force, the scene shifts to Orion and Lightray at their friend Dave Lincon’s apartment. Here, Orion is at his most manic and crazed. Kirby might has well drawn foam on the corners of his mouth. This characterization is unfortunately the one Morrison uses for his JLA run. I much rather the stoic and passionate version found in the early issues of the saga which is similar to the take Bruce Timm had in the recent DC cartoons. Although the attitude is grating, Orion’s point is quite welcome. His argument to Lightray is that they must be more proactive and take the fight to the villains of Apokolips. An organized effort from New Genesis to take on the invaders from Apokolips is something I have been looking forward to for quite a while. The point becomes moot when Orion learns of Kalibak has escaped and is moving quickly toward their location.

Wednesday, December 09, 2009

Free Form Comments

Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.

ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.

AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.

You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.

WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.

Tuesday, December 08, 2009

Uncanny X-Men #248

[Jason Powell is like Hercules, if Hercules wrote blogs about Claremont's X-Men. And was also really nice and smart. He continues his issue by issue look at the greatest X-Men run ever. What will this blog do when he goes? It keeps me up at night.]

“The Cradle Will Fall”

There is a great bit in the documentary that Patrick Meaney is doing on Chris Claremont, wherein the author and Ann Nocenti are recounting a bit of their history on The Uncanny X-Men. When Nocenti mentions that she left her assistant Bob Harras in charge when she went freelance in 1988, Claremont gives her a loaded look and wryly says, “Thanks.”

Continuing the analogy of the Seige Perilous being a safe haven for Claremont’s children against Harras’ ever-expanding reign of editorial terror -- with Rogue going through first because she’s the one Claremont created himself -- what does one make of the unceremonious departure of Longshot in Uncanny X-Men #248? Longshot, of course, is Nocenti’s child, deliberately imported into “Uncanny” during her tenure so that nobody else could touch the character. When Longshot is torn to shreds in this issue’s dream sequence, then dropped from the series permanently in Storm’s blink-and-you-missed-it hallucination, is it a kind of tit-for-tat for the way Nocenti abandoned Claremont to Harras’ tender mercies?

Monday, December 07, 2009

Mainstream Comics Are Increasingly Lame (it's not just Tim Callahan and Chad Nevett)

Tim Callahan and Chad Nevett are blogging about Mainstream Comics Being Increasingly Lame (Or Is It Just Them). It may be just them, but if it is, then it is just me too.

Tim says "I was easily reading 25-30 comics a week in 2008, I'm down to 8-10 a week right now." Well I used to read 4-6 comics a week and now I am down to one -- Morrison's Batman -- that I am getting, not be cause I like it, but because Morrison-Stewart and Morrison-Quitely have enough capital built up with me that I sort of owe them at this point. But just barely. Oh, and I get Detective Comics because the JH Williams art is awesome, but I also have this bad habit of just forgetting to buy it, which I supposed speaks to my involvement being minimal. It is the kind of thing I would like to admire in a nice hardcover. Because I am not invested in the story, only the art, I was never really "hooked," though I will eventually get every issue.

Tim writes

Maybe it's the Morrison lull that I'm feeling -- or we're all feeling -- with the giddiness of "Final Crisis" and "Batman" being replaced in recent months with the atrocity of the most recent "Batman and Robin" arc. I'll take Tony Daniel over Philip Tan any day, if I were forced to make such a choice. Or maybe it's the kind of events we're seeing now compared to last year. I don't think "Blackest Night" is aesthetically worse than "Secret Invasion," but Bendis's event comic at least sparked plenty of discussion. With "Blackest Night," the conversation amounts to, "who's going to come back as a zombie next?" And even though you may or may not enjoy the series -- I do, and you don't -- nobody seems to care about the answer to that question. And justifiably so.

It's diminishing returns.

Friday, December 04, 2009

PERSONAL Best of the Decade Lists

In the comments to this post I would like to see your best (or worst) of the decade list in all the usual categories (Movies, TV, Music, Comics, Games, Books) and maybe some less than usual ones (single best panels? Death scenes?). The catch is I do not want you to go for any objectivity here. I want a shameless list of your personal favorites with no consideration of representing anything for anyone else -- so if your three favorite movies are the three parts of Lord of the Rings let them hold the top three slots. Let your guilty pleasures be seen with your "important cultural landmarks" -- and maybe even beat them.

Forever People #11

[Andy Bentley continues his issue by issue look at the New Gods, where he takes on the last of the Forever People. On a personal note, I wish I had a good reason for not updating the blog yesterday but the truth is I just plain forgot. Sorry about that. Also -- what is the origin of this "five guys become / summon one guy" thing as seen in The Forever People, Voltron and Captain Planet?]

“Devilance The Pursuer”

This marks the final issue of the Forever People and with it Kirby provides at least a temporary resolution for the teens from New Genesis. The story features the return of a forgotten character and even a brief appearance by Darkseid and Dessad, but the issue is one long chase scene that provides very little in new concepts or deep characterization.

The final antagonist for the Forever People is Devilance The Pursuer, who bears more that a passing resemblance to the Manhunters, the robots the Guardians of the Universe retroactively used to police the space sectors before they enacted the Green Lantern Corps.. This is no coincidence, as Kirby would go on to create these cold and unrelenting soldiers in DC Comics 1st issue Special #5 in 1975. Devilance, like the Manhunters, is clad in red, carries a staff, and has an undeniable will to capture his prey. He shows up on the Forever People’s doorstep and tracks them over many lands to a final showdown on an unknown island. The FP’s take him on one by one to varying degrees of success and it isn’t until the return of the Infinity Man that the group is able to take the Pursuer head on.

Wednesday, December 02, 2009

Free Form Comments

Say whatever you want to in the comments to this post -- random, off topic thoughts, ideas, suggestions, questions, recommendations, criticisms (which can be anonymous), surveys, introductions if you have never commented before, personal news, self-promotion, requests to be added to the blog roll and so on. If I forget, remind me. Remember these comments can be directed at all the readers, not just me.

ALSO. You can use this space to re-ask me questions you asked me before that I failed to answer because I was too busy.

AND you can use this space to comment on posts that are old enough that no one is reading the comments threads anymore.

You do not have to have a blogger account or gmail account to post a comment -- you can write a comment, write your name at the bottom of your comment like an e mail, and then post using the "anonymous" option.

WRITING FOR THIS BLOG. If I see a big free form comment that deserves more attention, I will pull it and make it its own post, with a label on the post and on the sidebar that will always link to all the posts you write for this blog. I am always looking for reviews of games, tv, movies, music, books and iPhone apps.

Tuesday, December 01, 2009

Uncanny X-Men #247

[Jason Powel, not unlike Beowulf were he doing an analysis of Claremont, forges ahead undaunted by this huge task of covering every issue of Claremont's X-Men run.]

“The Light That Failed”

The previous issue was one of Claremont’s typical “characterization”-heavy issues, with just a few pages of superheroics right at the tail end. Uncanny #247 is given over entirely to full-out action, superbly rendered by penciler Marc Silvestri and inker Dan Green. Indeed, “The Light That Failed” is extraordinary for containing some of the most exhilaratingly rendered superhero violence of the Silvestri/Green era.

The central conceit has an appealing symmetry to it: Mastermold, the very first Sentinel, merges with Nimrod – which previous stories established as the “ultimate” Sentinel. The alpha/omega concept works beautifully, especially given that this would be Claremont’s last Sentinel story before quitting in two years. His resolution to Nimrod’s arc is tidy and quite satisfying, and hearkens back to the classic “robot defeated by logic” trope that also ended Roy Thomas’ and Neal Adams’ Sentinel story 20 years earlier. (In fact, it was Claremont who – as an intern at the Marvel offices in 1969 – suggested the ending to Roy Thomas back then.) Nimrod defeats both himself and Mastermold with a syllogism: Sentinels destroy mutants. Yet Nimrod and Mastermold have evolved beyond machines, to become living organisms. Therefore they have mutated, and therefore they must destroy themselves. Even the delivery – with Nimrod’s dry logic counter-pointed against Silvestri’s visual bombast, recalls the Thomas/Adams “Sentinels fly into the sun” sequence. Both as a new story and as an homage, “The Light That Failed” succeeds admirably.