So, the whole Thrift Justice thing started off strong. I told a cute story about a little kid, and I reminded everyone about Stranger Danger. Then, I dropped the ball. Fear not, true believers! I’m back with more words and more treasures. Here’s what I got during last night’s trip to the thrift store (forgive the pics; couldn’t find my camera, so I had to settle for the phone):
As you can see, it was a run of the mill toy haul. Still, let’s take a closer look at what I got:
First up, we’ve got Apocalypse from the Super Hero Squad toyline. Basically, he’s the same scale as the Spider-Man and Friends line – Marvel heroes in the Rescue Heroes scale for younger kids. These, along with Mattel’s Super Friends, came out while I was working at Toys “R” Us, but I just couldn’t bring myself to pay retail for these things that were clearly made for preschoolers. I have no problem, however, paying $1 for them.
Isn’t he the cutest little genocidal maniac you ever saw? I think I want to give Apocalypse a hug!
Remember how I mentioned Super Friends? Of course you do – it was just a few inches higher on the page! Anyway, here’s Lex Luthor from that line.
And the Spider-Man and Friends line? Yeah, this is Spidey #3. I also have a quick-change Peter Parker and a shiny suit Spidey.
So clearly I’m addicted to “toys made for preschoolers”. This is a new low for me. You see all these guys? I’ve acquired them all over the course of the last month. Still, never paying more than $1 for any figure, I don’t feel too bad about it. Hell, they’re so cute that I’m even mixing universes, and I’m a staunch comic segregationist!
I’m always fascinated by the wear and damage that I find on some toys. While a lot of stuff is in pretty good condition, there are also many items that look like they’ve been to Hell and back. What the Hell did they do to Raphael’s foot? Were they reenacting Roots? Sure, he was a dick, but DAMN!
This, my friends, is a Nerf scope. As my twitter followers know, I’m slowly building a Nerf militia. Ya see, I wasn’t allowed to have toy guns when I was growing up. The closest things I had were the Nintendo Zapper and an old hair dryer that didn’t work. So, when I struck out on my own, as a man, one of the first things I bought was the Nerf Nite-Finder. That didn’t quench my foam lust, however. Luckily, my lovely girlfriend (Lindsay/@specialEteacher for y’all playing along at home), got me the Nerf Raider for Christmas last year. This was soon followed by the Maverick, Long Shot, and Recon. And another Long Shot. Basically, if I found one at a yard sale or thrift store, I bought it. They all had a tactical rail for adding scopes, but you can’t find them in stores or the Hasbro website any longer. So, imagine my joy when I spotted this baby sticking out of the stuffed animal bin at a thrift shop! Lawdy, lawdy I can see! Anyway, got this baby for 69 cents!
Well, that’s enough rambling from me. I took more pictures, but I’ll save those for the next post.
OK, so by now you should’ve read my Flashpointpost. As that was the end of an era, Justice League was touted as the beginning of a new one. I wish I could say that it worked for me, but it just didn’t.
Justice League #1 is chock full of gorgeous Jim Lee-ian action. It’s the kind of stuff that’s really going to hurt your heart when you hear that Jim Califiore’s taking over the art a year from now. Recent series have launched with the big names, but settle into a routine with the journeymen. Anyway, for all the action, there’s just not much substance. It’s reminiscent of Lee’s work on the “Hush” storyline in Batman a few years ago. That was a good excuse for Lee to play in the Gotham toybox, but the story didn’t make much sense. This book didn’t really have a story; this was just an appetizer.
A few nights ago on twitter, Comics Bulletin had a great rant about the folks who’ve been comparing the issue to a television pilot. I can’t even do it justice (no pun intended) by trying to repeat it, so I recommend you hop over to their feed. Basically, though, they said that a successful pilot makes you want to come back for more, while this doesn’t really have that effect. I couldn’t agree more. However, I think I’d like to even go a step further. Justice League #1 isn’t a pilot – it’s the “cold open”, or pre-credit sequence, to the pilot. Sure, there’s a bit of padding in it, but once you get to that last page:
you know that it can only be followed by something like this:
God damn, I love that theme song! Is there any way that Jim Lee could just draw music? I’d preorder every issue! Here’s a little secret about me: I only watch the cold open for Smallville. I’m gone after the theme song. Hell, if I turn it on, and find I missed both the open and the song, I turn it right off. Sure, that was a cliffhangery last page, but I’m not convinced that I shouldn’t change the channel. I’m looking to the next issue to help me make that decision.
So, that was Flashpoint, huh? Ya know, over the years, I’ve bullied DC by saying they should be more like Marvel. I felt they should be better at social networking and also start leaking their big stories to the New York Post. Over the past year, DC seemed to have heard the same suggestions from others more important than me, as their social network presence increased and they got chummier with the press. I did not, however, say that they should ape Marvel’s storytelling style. At the same time, though, they started recreating Marvel’s starting lineup from 1994. They already had the Kuberts and Fabian Nicieza, but they also brought in former Marvel E-I-C Bob Harras and former X-Men writer Scott Lobdell. The end result is that Flashpoint ends up being Age of Apocalypse by way of House of M. It looks like DC had been paying attention to the competition, but at what cost?
I compare Flashpoint to Age of Apocalypse, as it utilizes the same “alternate reality on the verge of cataclysmic war – comprised of minis and one shots” format. The tone is very similar to that of AoA, plus it doesn’t hurt that Andy Kubert did the art on both storylines. Also, Flashpoint #5 is almost a beat-by-beat retelling of the end of AoA. They even do the “final battle as the bombs go off” thing.
I mention House of M because it provides the setup for the story. Everything changes in a flash, as people are living their lives one way, and a flash of light completely changes their circumstances. Also, HoM did have lasting effects in that it allowed Wolverine to remember his past and, more importantly, it reduced the number of mutants in the Marvel Universe to roughly 198. Flashpoint, similarly, has the repercussion that it sets off an entirely new iteration of the DC Universe.
I’m not gonna do a recap, as you’ve read the book. This isn’t even a “review”, per se, but I did want to share a few thoughts I had along the way, bulletpoint style:
-I know, I swore I wasn’t even going to read this “event”. I felt like the Big Two were just repackaging old concepts, and I didn’t feel like rereading the same old stuff. Then, two things happened. First, it emerged that Fear Itself was basically a Thor story, which just solidified my lack of interest in it. Next, DC announced not only the “New 52″, but also the fact that Flashpoint would be the springboard for all of that. So, excited for the future, I decided I should probably board the Flashpoint train.
In all, I enjoyed the core Flashpoint mini. It moved quickly enough that I didn’t focus too much on characterizations and motivations. I got the gist of it, and I knew that if I wanted more, there were always the spin-off minis. I only picked up the Batman one, though.
-The story’s resolution felt like some kind of marketing mandate to ensure that Flash: Rebirth “mattered”. Even though people trust Johns to dust off these older concepts, nobody wanted Barry Allen back. Nobody. We were all fine with Wally. The ending felt like “See? You didn’t want Barry back, but you couldn’t have had this shiny new universe without him. You’re welcome.”
Marvel does a much better job of making you think that everything was connected in some grand plan. Secret Invasion pays off a plot point from five years prior, and you have to wonder if they got lucky, or if they really did have this planned all along. DC didn’t pull off that magic with Flashpoint. I don’t think Flash: Rebirth was ever intended to result in this, as it was *meant* to pay off in a monthly book on which Manapul couldn’t keep up the pace.
-While I understand that Flash has the power set/mechanics to set this ball in motion, it feels like this would’ve worked better as a Batman story. Maybe they couldn’t do it, as Lord knows Batman’s been through enough in recent years, plus they needed to really reestablish Barry’s importance. Just like Identity Crisis was all about loss, this was about familial ties and the notion that “you can’t go home again”.
The problem is that Barry’s momma drama isn’t as well known as Bruce’s. A man on the street could tell you next to nothing about “Barry Allen”, let alone the fact that his mom was killed. Everyone, however, knows that Bruce Wayne’s parents were killed (even if they think the Joker did it), which led him to become Batman. For true gravitas, and to help Batman move along in a more positive direction, it should’ve been Batman displaced in time, working side by side with his father, as master tactician during the war, yet still getting the closure he has sought all these years. In fact, that would’ve been preferable to the whole Quantum Leap drama of The Return of Bruce Wayne.
-Sometimes I have trouble conveying myself outside of analogies, so I hope you can follow this: let’s say a person has an accident and ends up in a coma. The family mourns initially, but if he’s in that coma long enough, when it comes time to pull the plug, they realize the guy had basically been dead since the moment he slipped into the coma. Still there? How does that apply? Well, I felt like this series would pay off in some kind of grand farewell for the old DCU. Instead, by issue #5, you realize they were basically already gone and wouldn’t be making an appearance. There was no “goodbye” or “that’s all, folks”. Silver Age comics would’ve had silhouettes of the JLA waving goodbye from the clouds or something as the last panel. I think was expecting that “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?” ending. What a Hell of a way to cap off an era that was!
Even though all of the solo books wrapped up (some better than others), Flashpoint really was just a Flash book, as none of the “real” depictions of the characters ever made an appearance (with the exception of Booster Gold). I guess I expected some kind of spillover into the “real world”, and the end result would be this weird amalgam of them both. Instead, we learn there are *3* timelines, which are all just hastily combined into one.
-What was that 3rd reality? I recognized the one we were leaving (left page) and the new one (right page), but was that the full 3rd along the top? So, it was Wildstorm and alt versions of 2nd tier characters?
-Barry has memories of EVERYTHING now? That’s a seed for a future storyline, if AoA is any indication. In that story, Bishop was the only one who remembered the AoA timeline, which caused him to go insane down the road.
So, in all, I didn’t hate the ending, but it certainly wasn’t what I was expecting. I guess I could call that a success, as it proves this old dog hasn’t seen it all. At the same time, I’m no more jazzed about the New 52 than I was, and I feel that’s a failing. I admit that I haven’t read Justice League #1 as of writing this, so maybe I’ll change my mind. All I know is that this was billed as the end of an era. Everything renumbered. A shit ton of new launches. A clean slate. All that said, I still don’t feel like Flashpoint truly gave me the chance to say goodbye to what we were leaving behind.
After all these years, I still find that I’m too immature for “Got Milk?” ads. These things have been around for almost 20 years, so it must be an effective campaign. That said, most of them just look like a money shot from a celebrity sex tape with high production values. Even when they did one with Batman – my hero among heroes – it just made my heart hurt for the Caped Crusader! Was that how he was replenishing the Wayne fortune?!!!
Anyway, I work at…a place filled with…people who might be inspired to drink milk, and these posters are everywhere. Hell, I think we ran out of money, and they’re just using them as cheap wallpaper. In any case, I thought I’d share a few of them with you, along with my thoughts. Before we get started, I apologize for the quality of the pictures; Ansel Adams never had to use a BlackBerry camera…
Just look in that dog’s eyes. He clearly saw the whole thing. This just makes me think back to the time Amanda quit Twitter because she got a bunch of backlash for saying she preferred black guys. What did Devante do to you, Amanda?! What did he do?!!!
They finally came up with a way to get me to not notice the milk mustache. Ha! He’s with a giraffe! Honestly, I think the funniest part is that the giraffe actually finished college.
This is probably the worst picture of Demi Lovato I’ve ever seen, and I say that as a Demi fan. Hell, you don’t say something nice about her, and she will punch you in your face! She went to rehab for it and everything. Anyway, this picture looks like it might be some sad artifact sent to the past from a future where her career has totally derailed, yet the “Demi Loves Otto” sex tape is tearing up the SuperNet.
This one is disturbing to me because, in real life, Victoria Justice looks like a bad Photoshop job. She’s got the face of a 25 year old, yet the body of a fit 15 year old. She’s like a younger clone of Giada De Laurentiis. She just seems like an odd choice for a milk ad. “Your body will be suspended in teen animation, but you’ll be pretty. Drink up!”
And I thought R. Kelly was the one who sang “Down Low”. Notice how you can’t really see from the waist down? These are my confessions…
All of the “real” sites used their connections to see the rejected Wonder Woman pilot right after the network upfronts in May, but I don’t have that kind of Rolodex (does anyone use an actual Rolodex anymore?). Anyway, thanks to a pal on Twitter, I was finally able to see what all the fuss was about. Let me just get my snobbery out of the way: as a student of comics and television, it’s glaringly obvious as to why NBC passed on this show. Even in its position at the bottom of the ratings, Wonder Woman was NOT going to be NBC’s salvation. If The Cape didn’t save them, this sure wasn’t going to do it, either. Honestly, Wonder Woman is more on the level of the short-lived Birds of Prey series.
Few people remember it, as Smallville went on to last ten seasons compared to BoP‘s one, but I maintain that Birds of Prey and Smallville were of the same level of quality. The only difference was that Superman was a more recognizable character than Commissioner Gordon’s crippled daughter/niece and Batman’s daughter (?!). Both shows were on The WB, where it didn’t matter what the shows were about, as long as the people were pretty. With Adrianne Palicki and Elizabeth Hurley, Wonder Woman‘s got that in spades. Also, Birds of Prey struggled with the fact that it was trying to tell a story without being allowed a full understanding of the characters. As BoP was laid out, Barbara Gordon was the former Batgirl who, after being crippled by The Joker, now operates as infojock Oracle. If you’ve read the comics, that’s familiar enough. Next, you’ve got Helena Wayne, who in this situation, is actually the adult daughter of Batman and Catwoman. Oh, and she’s also a mutant. She’s got heightened senses and jumps high and shit, which enables her to patrol the streets as Huntress. Now, here’s the kicker: since Warner Bros wanted to focus on revamping the Batman movie franchise (this was pre- Batman Begins), they didn’t allow Batman in the show (except for a brief sequence in the pilot). So, you’ve got your core cast, whose origins revolve around a concept that can only be danced around. And to explain it in the show, apparently The Joker killed Catwoman. TV Batman was such a punk bitch that he became distraught, and left Gotham City forever. So, what followed were 13 episodes of Barbara and Helena, both inspired by He Who Shall Not Be Named, defending Gotham City in the hopes that He Who Shall Not Be Named decides to stop being a bitch and comes home. Sadly, the show didn’t last that long, but the finale did involve a cool fight scene set to the t.A.T.u. classic “All The Things She Said”.
How does this all relate to Wonder Woman? Well, just like BoP, it doesn’t seem like David E. Kelley was allowed full access to the character. Sure, it’s a Wonder Woman costume, and DC was behind the project, but it lacks an understanding of Wonder Woman. This has been one of the biggest problems for Wonder Woman, as the comics lost sight of what makes her tick quite some time ago. The Greg Rucka era was the last time that anyone proudly read the WW comic series, and even “female character wunderkind” Gail Simone couldn’t get a grasp on the character. I ranted about this at length on twitter, but I felt like they should’ve focused figuring out the answer to “Who Is Wonder Woman?” before committing her to other media, like a weekly TV series. If they had called this show “Donna Troy”, it would’ve worked better. She wears a similar costume, looks the same, and nobody knows what the Hell her deal is. That’s her gimmick! Over the past 30 years, her mere existence is perpetuated on the fact that she’s just a walking identity crisis. Wonder Woman, however, should have a defined mission statement, which is neither present in the recent comics nor this pilot. There’s nothing to “wonder” about the woman in this pilot unless you’re wondering how she got cast. Anyway, here are the thoughts that occurred to me as I watched the show:
-There’s a LOT of exposition, but you’re really only informed of Wonder Woman’s backstory through newscasts and political pundits. I liked the pundit sequence. Not sure if they actually got Dershowitz, Dr. Phil, and Nancy Grace on board, or if it was just clever editing, but this is what would happen if superheroes existed in the “real world”. If that’s what they’re going for, however, this could be a problem down the line.
-OK, here’s where things get more confusing than they need to be. In the show, Wonder Woman has THREE identities! She’s Wonder Woman, she’s international businesswoman Diana Themyscira (who’s also publicly known to be Wonder Woman), but she’s ALSO Diana Prince, which is the mousy-’cause-she-wear-glasses-and-a-ponytail-even-though-you-know-she’s-really-hot-like-in-She’s All That identity. By day, she’s one of the first two, but by night, she goes home to be Diana Prince, where she watches The Notebook with her cat. Yes, that happens. Since she’s not a lawyer, nor is she in Boston, I’m left to believe that this is the “David E. Kelley Touch” on this project. First off, I don’t think Wonder Woman would watch The Notebook, nor would she ask her cat if she should set up a facebook profile. This is all part of the “Well, she is a single woman, so she’s got needs and is probably lonely.” Family Guy conveyed that best here:
I get it. Set up a love story to grab some female viewers, but all that’s missing is the pint of Ben & Jerry’s. Also, I don’t see why she needs a 3rd identity in order to be lonely and “normal”. So, she puts on glasses and hides in her modest apartment so she can pretend she’s making decent lonely single lady money, when she knows that she’s actually a multimillionaire with a penthouse and a multinational corporation? I can understand having a weekend getaway, but this is a bit much.
-I’m the one guy who’s never watched Friday Night Lights, so I have no previous experience with Adrianne Palicki, but I don’t feel this was good casting. She never conveys the strength of Diana. Instead, she’s soft, and comes across as Kelly Kapowski in a Halloween costume. Her acting is also phoned in. Surrounding Palicki, everyone else feels like they’re over acting. Everyone has a sense of urgency, while she just seems…bored. In my mind, Lake Bell or Missy Peregrym would’ve been stronger, better choices, as they have the look, and they’re still somewhat “unknown talents”, since nobody watched Surface or Stick It.
-I liked the color/weight blind casting on Etta Candy, but I know the fanboys would’ve loathed that! They hate Wonder Woman, but still would’ve jumped on that. Plus, I some fangirls would be upset that Etta Candy wasn’t “properly” portrayed as a larger gal…
-This is always going to be a problem when you make an adaptation of a comic character, but the suit doesn’t translate to reality. Batman works ’cause he hides in shadows. Superman works in a way. Wonder Woman just looks like she’s on her way to her shift at The Crazy Russian. Call me sexist, but the suit doesn’t work. You don’t know if she’s gonna arrest you or try to take you to the champagne room.
-I hate Diana’s male assistant, Henry. Had the show been picked up, I feel like he exists solely to be the person close to Diana who gets killed by some villain trying to make a point.
-They say “prick”, “balls”, and “tits” as an attempt to be edgy.
-Can we talk about the political/legal ramifications of the structure of this show? Everyone knows that businesswoman Diana Themyscira is Wonder Woman, yet no one goes after her company in a lawsuit? They kinda address it, when a senator threatens to sic the Justice Department on her. Diana answers that threat by saying that the country’s in two wars, so it doesn’t have time to investigate her. Not only is that lazy storytelling, but it’s another problem with combining real world aspects with comic aspects.
-She fucking kills a guy! I mean, she throws a pipe through his fucking throat! A security guard who’s just following orders! Not a Star Wars guy, but it’s really the whole “independent contractors on the Death Star” debate all over again.
-The villain, Veronica Cale, was experimenting on folks from a slavery ring, yet they were all white males. Not who you usually think of being involved in slavery, even the white kind. So, I guess this is when the show decided to stop trying to ape the real world, huh?
So, in the end, it’s not a horrible show, but it’s certainly not great. Based on production value, this show would’ve lasted 6 seasons in weekend syndication back in the 90s, but sadly that market is dead. It could’ve been in a block with Mutant X, Night Man, and Viper. It might even work as a cable show, but it certainly wasn’t a good fit for NBC. At the end of the day, it’s a serviceable action hour of television, but it’s not Wonder Woman. They tried a different take on the character that just didn’t work. The funny thing is that there’s source material for what they were trying to do: it’s called Ultra. As the first big comic project from The Luna Brothers, Ultra was a miniseries from Image Comics which was basically “Sex and the City with Powers”. Sure, it had dating drama and whatnot, but there was also a lot of action. Based on what I’ve seen here, David E. Kelley would be the PERFECT guy to adapt that series. Wonder Woman, however, just wasn’t the project for him.
So, I finally saw Green Lantern last night. Yeah, I know most of y’all saw it last week, and have already weighed in on it. Some of your reviews I read, others I didn’t. Mainly, I didn’t want my experience to be tainted by outside thoughts. That said, I didn’t go in with an entirely open mind, as I didn’t have big hopes for the film. The casting seemed off, the budget had ballooned, and the footage looked like a bunch of CG-why? Still, it’s a comic movie, so I wanted it to do well so lazy journalists would can it with the “Is The Comic Movie Craze Over?” headlines. So, what did I think of the film? Well, in my best Jay Sherman voice, “It stinks!” I know a few of you are going to disagree with that sentiment, so I thought I’d let you in on my thoughts, bullet point style:
-No one is likable in the movie, least of all Hal. Ryan Reynolds, once again, shows up to work to play himself. Seriously, outside of Definitely, Maybe, Reynolds hasn’t shown much range since Two Guys, A Girl, and a Pizza Place. Hal Jordan is already a boring character (unless he’s losing his mind, or trying to avoid DC’s Chris Hansen), so casting Reynolds didn’t really do much to give the character a personality. It came off like “National Lampoon’s Green Wilder”. They even gave him another brown friend, just like in Van Wilder.
-I found myself pleasantly surprised by Blake Lively. While I didn’t buy her scenes as “tough as nails Sapphire”, she and Reynolds had good chemistry everywhere outside of the dogfight scene.
-I liked how Reynolds went all Greatest American Hero when transported to Oa, but hated how he automatically knew how to fly. Where’s my flight montage, dammit?!
-Others have said this, but Sinestro is the most heroic character in the movie. Also, I should point out that I don’t really have a problem with comic Sinestro. He’s not exactly “evil”. He just ruled his sector with an iron fist. He was a good cop, who later became corrupt as power went to his head. But you know what? It worked. He maintained order like a boss. Sinestro’s tale is played out in many small towns throughout the heartland. Over time, however, I feel DC writers have gone out of their way to really make him seem like a bastard, as they realize his raison d’etre really wasn’t that bad.
-I’m pretty sure Hal killed at least one of those guys who jumped him. Sure, it was self defense, but still…
-As most of us fanboys know, Warner Bros pumped an extra $9M in for additional effects, but most of that seemed to consist of enhancing the suit glow. While it would’ve been unique during a transformation sequence, it really got old seeing the energy pulsing through the piping at all times. The “perma-pulse” really took away anything that might have been special about the suits.
-Speaking of that effects budget, where the fuck did it go? Really, how did they spend that money? A lot of the stuff that was supposed to “wow” me was about 15 years old, from a technological perspective. I’m not saying I was expecting bullet time, but the Lantern flight sequences looked lower tech than the teleportation trails used in Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie. Oa looked like animation from a mid ’90s video game – I’m not even talking console games; it looked like Shareware. Did you see Kilowog’s clunky movements when he was simply walking? It was like my system didn’t have enough resources to render all the pixels.
-Speaking of Kilowog, I was distracted by the fact that his movie design appeared to be based on the pre-gastric bypass appearance of LA DJ Big Boy (fans of Fastlane will recognize him).
-When did the Guardians get so fucking huge? I thought they were little guys. Here, they’re towering. Plus, the chick sounded like Janeway, which only made me hate her more.
-So…I’m guessing Tim Robbins needed to raise that child support money, huh? You were in Shawshank, man!
-in my mind, Amanda Waller should only be portrayed by Marsha Warfield. Or Shirley from Community (or a zombie Shirley from What’s Happening!!). Or the wife from House of Payne. Basically, a thick black woman with no ankles. That said, I actually liked Angela Bassett in the role, though I don’t remember when she started looking like Cicily Tyson. Apparently, they want her to be the Nick Fury of the DC movie universe. Good luck with that, seeing as how I’m sure she’ll be nowhere near The Dark Knight Rises or The Man of Steel.
-OK, in the top secret lab scene where Hammond goes from Folksy Xavier to Trailer Park Beetlejuice (right before Shawshank gets flamebroiled), how did Hal know where they were? He just comes busting through the wall. Don’t give me that “the ring pulsed and told him” garbage. If that’s true, the director failed to really show that in action, and that throwaway line about the ring warning of surrounding danger becomes a cheat.
-When the Guardians reject Hal’s request to help defend Earth, why does he ask their permission for him to go back? They hadn’t taken his powers, and it’s not like he had any deference to authority figures. I feel if he were truly fearless, he would’ve been like, “Fuck this, I’m going to save my planet!”
-He threw it into the Sun? Are you fucking kidding me? I get that this is a movie, and not everyone has read the comics. That said, Parallax is a big fucking deal. There’s no way Hal’s gonna beat him alone – especially not in his rookie state. This should’ve been an all-out space battle. THIS is where the money should’ve gone instead of making all the Lanterns look like they’ve got those old timey Christmas bubble lights in their suits. As a fanboy, it’s kind of insulting that they would deflate the enormity of Parallax simply because they needed a movie villain. I felt the same way when Smallville introduced Doomsday. He killed Superman! It had never been done before. And they want to just casually introduce him as the big bad of the season, played by an Abercrombie model? It’s as cheap as making Galactus a damn cloud!
So, there you have it. I feel I should point out that I didn’t *hate* the movie. Hate is a strong emotion, and I struggled to feel, well, anything from the movie. It just didn’t draw me in. I found myself bored and wanting it to end. I’m not the biggest GL fan, so it’s not like it insulted any fanboy knowledge I may have possessed. On the flipside, however, it didn’t make me want to learn more about the Green Lantern franchise. Over the past few years, the comics have really picked up steam, from emotional spectrum wars to zombie space fights. If I hadn’t known any of that, I’d look at that movie and wonder what all the hype was about. You see Iron Man, you know Tony Stark’s a cool cat, who has a badass suit. Spider-Man‘s a geek with a lot of power (and responsibility). X-Men are a bunch of minorities fighting for acceptance. According to this movie, Hal Jordan’s an asshole who gets a ring he didn’t deserve. I didn’t know this was a sports movie! At no point does he ever really prove himself worthy. Sure, he beats Parallax, but it seemed like luck. Even with that victory, he didn’t come off as “heroic”, and I feel that’s a problem. I didn’t want him to lose (’cause I’m smart enough to know he won’t), but I didn’t really want him to win either. The whole thing just left me kinda “meh”. If you enjoyed it, more power to ya. I’m not gonna say you’re wrong or dumb. I really wish I could’ve liked it, but it just wasn’t for me.
So, we don’t get a lot of audience participation here at Casa West. Before I moved over to WordPress, I had written about 1,025 posts over the last 8 years, and I only had comments on about 100 of them. Of those comments, many of them were just spammers whom I approved because I was impressed by their syntax and/or flattery. What I’m saying is that it brings a little e-tear to my eye when I write something that encourages participation, and it just sits there like that half-empty Starbucks cup on the shelf at Ross. Anyway, a few months ago, I wrote this post detailing my experiences as an adult fan of the Power Rangers. In that post, I mentioned Jason Bray, who had been featured on an episode of MTV’s True Life called “I’m A Fanboy”. I discussed how the way he was portrayed contributed to the reasons as to why I keep my Ranger love in the closet. Well, if there’s anything I should’ve learned about the Internet by now, it’s that anyone can read this stuff. It turns out he read my post. Not only that, he responded! Now, if you keep up with the Comments sidebar, you’ve already read this, but I felt his response deserved its own post. So, without further ado, I give you the only interaction I’ve had with anyone who’s been on MTV (other than my tweet from Serena Altschul):
I was actually quite impressed with this article as it describes how about a third of Power Ranger fans really are. When Power Rangers first started to dwindle in popularity, I managed to avoid ridicule by keeping my appreciation for it a secret.
The Power Rangers fandom, like many fandoms out there have three sections to them. The “socially awkward” section, the “This is one of the things I like” section, and the “I know everything, and if you misquote one line I will KILL you” section. The socially awkward people tend to not interact enough with regular people and spend most of their time writing BAD fan-fictions, and confessing their love for one of their favorite characters.
In case anyone reading this was wondering, I am the person from “True Life: I’m a Fanboy” that was mentioned in this blog post. Almost two years later from when the episode aired and I STILL see my name come up at some point when Power Rangers is mentioned. I guess that’s both the beauty and the curse of existing in the re-run world.
I have to admit though every time it airs my friends and I get a huge laugh out of the episode. This is mainly because we know of everything that went on during filming. I love how many people don’t even recognize me after talking to me for a few minutes because I am nowhere near as awkward as I was made out to be in the episode. I even got a comment at a convention I attended from a person who said “you know, you look a lot like that guy from the true life episode” and when I told her I WAS the guy from the True Life episode she didn’t believe me.
That’s one of the dangers of editing. I will admit there were parts captured on film where I was acting awkward, mainly when I was dancing, because I can’t dance worth S**t. Also, the Dragon Dagger moment where I say “Oh my GOD, How much is that?” Also genuine me. But everyone who is in some type of fandom has that moment where they see something they have always wanted and want to know if they are able to buy it. The other Danger of editing is taking out ANYTHING that made me seem even remotely like a regular person. To give you an idea, I was only on the episode for about 15-20 minutes total, yet MTV Shot over 35 HOURS of footage.
When someone films for for so many hours, most people would not want that time to be wasted. I could quickly tell the direction they were going with the episode though when EVERY question they asked was about Gemma. First they would ask the question “how do you feel about Gemma? and I would say “She’s a really good friend and I’m glad I met someone else from the fandom” They would then say something like “Yeah, we know that part, but how to you really? feel about her? could you simplfy it?” So, eventually you figure out the response they are looking for is “I really like Gemma.” I wasn’t really surprised by that. The basic structure of TV is they are looking to tell a story, and they already had the “Fanfilm” side from Travis. In other words, even though this might disappoint some people, the “Asking Gemma out” scene was staged by Gemma and myself. if you watch carefully, it is quite obvious we are both acting.
On Another note though I am still somewhat a Power Rangers Fan, and I still have MOST of the stuff that was shown during that episode (which was actually hard to gather together to make it seem like I had a huge collection. My collection isn’t nearly as large as others from Power Rangers fandom.) But if anyone watches the episode carefully there were hints of my other fandoms that couldn’t be edited out. The WWE foam titles in the background showing I am a WWE fan, The Suit I was wearing during some of the DC scenes was part of a 10th Doctor, Doctor who costume (Because that is also another one of my fandoms) I was originally told the episode was going to be about how I balace my fandoms with my normal life, yet there was virtually NOTHING from my normal life shown on screen.
The last thing I say before I rush out into oblivion until the next time my episode reruns and I do a search again, is I noticed how the blog mentioned some fans looking up the Japanese episodes and watching them with subtitles. I would actually consider that a totally different fandom. With Samurai, I ALMOST hate Power Rangers now, but Sentai has almost always kept me entertained, especially the new Series, Gokaiger, which if you haven’t seen any of yet is worth checking out. Just thing GIANT POWER RANGER WAR.
So, there you have it. Not only was he a good sport about the whole thing, but he even gave us a little behind-the-scenes info regarding the episode. I hope I wasn’t too hard on him, as I think we all know the liberties they take with reality show editing. After reading that, however, he doesn’t seem like a weird dude at all. Jason, if you’re reading this, thanks for your input, and I’m sorry I bunched you in with the other weirdo Ranger fans. I stand by my opinion of Rangerboard, though. Those fuckers scare the shit out of me.
So, according to a comment on my last post, I’m apparently deplorable for implying that the “DCnU” diversity books are simply that – affirmative action books to fulfill some diversity quota. If this revamp actually holds weight, more power to it. The thing is, I’m not new to this game. For all the changes of staff and direction, at the end of the day, the same people running the industry were running it 20 years ago. It’s a 4-color country club. That’s not to say that they don’t occasionally have good intentions, but they’ll always be thwarted by the baby boomer fans who don’t like change (remember the “Donald Glover for Spider-Man” debacle?). Sure, those fans will die out, but is there enough of a new generation to take their place? That, in essence, is the point of the DC revamp. I get that. I just don’t know if there’s as much an audience for that as one might think.
With all of this going, I decided to look at the matter from the perspective of the “black comic reader”. That’s not a normal thing for me, as I tend to just think of myself as “comic reader”. It rarely hits home that the heroes “don’t look like me” ’cause it’s fiction. A lot of people in real life “don’t look like me” either, as I’ve had a few unique experiences. Then again, I got into comics at an age when I was no longer looking for heroes, so maybe that has colored my view. In any case, I can turn a blind eye to a few things as simply “comic reader”. I find, however, that’s it’s when things are targeted directly to “black comic reader” that I have the most problems. One particular example of this is Mr. Terrific.
As the second person to go by the name “Mister Terrific”, Michael Holt has genius-level intelligence, and he’s an Olympic-class athlete. He became a self-made millionaire through his company, Cyberwear. After his wife and unborn baby were killed in a car accident, he contemplated suicide, but was stopped by The Spectre. The Spectre told Holt of Terry Sloane, the original Mr. Terrific, which inspired Holt to want to follow in his footsteps. Not only does Mr. Terrific eventually become chairman of legacy group, The Justice Society, but he also becomes a ranking member in the Checkmate intelligence agency. Sounds good, right? Well, not so fast.
First, I’ve always had a problem with the fact that his intelligence is ranked. According to the comics, Mr. Terrific is the 3rd smartest man in DCU. Why does his intellect need to be qualified? Some might see this as a great advancement for a black character, but I always saw it as “Well, there are 2 people smarter than him, and I’ll bet they’re white.” If this were a race, he’d be the 2nd loser. Marvel did this with Amadeus Cho, who was the 7th smartest person in Marvel Universe. In both situations, all this does is point out that “he’s good, but he’s not the BEST”. Can’t he be brilliant without a rank? It’s bad for public schools, and it’s bad for super heroes.
Second, Mr. Terrific suffers from what I’m going to ignorantly refer to as “Doing-Too-Much-Itis”. This is one of the reasons that he always came off as a pandering, “diversity” hero, as there are 2 ways to play this: 1) make him a street-smart stereotype OR 2) go WAY overboard in the opposite direction. With Mr. Terrific, #2 is flying the plane. You see, it’s not enough that Holt is a genius and a successful businessman. No, he created T-Spheres which hover around him, and do whatever the story needs them to, and he’s also invisible to electronic detection. Plus, he’s an Olympic decathlete AND he holds 14 PhDs. FOURTEEN PhDs!!! In my best Seth Meyers voice, “Really?!” They couldn’t take one thing and stick with it? Now, my commentor would probably say something like, “Well, Batman’s smart – are you trying to say that a black man can’t be just as smart?” Here’s the difference, while Batman probably could’ve earned 14 PhDs, he DIDN’T. Ya know why? He didn’t need some institution of higher learning to qualify what he’d learned. He was too busy being trained by ninjas and shit.
It’s like comic book writers haven’t figured out how to handle the black middle class. It’s not all Sweet Christmas and Uncle Toms. There is a middle ground. Two great examples of this are Steel and Static. Both started a bit rough, as they were mired in the early 90s culture in which they debuted. Over time, however, they carved out identities that weren’t so stereotypical, and were something we hadn’t really seen before in comics. Steel became a trusted ally to, and engineer for, Superman and the Justice League. Static, if handled probably, could be the Peter Parker for a new generation. The key to both is that, to me, they’re relatable. I can’t relate to a dude with 14 PhDs. Mr. Terrific should be out teaching college courses or curing diseases instead of fighting Black Adam.
Finally, another thing bandied about regarding Mr. Terrific is his atheism. He has fought alongside the Wrath of God, but still isn’t a believer. Um, OK.
Let’s forget the fact that throwing real world religion into comics was a notion bound to fail. Some could say that the existence of a deity is more plausible in a comic universe than in the real world. So, by the very structure of his fictional world, Mr. Terrific is already unnecessarily outcast. Now, let’s add to it that the church is one of the cornerstones of what one might consider “the black experience”. His stance, therefore, distances him from many of those for whom he was most likely created. While we live in the age of the rise of the “Blatheist”, this was just another Terrific aspect to which I couldn’t relate.
Now, let’s take another stance. Let’s assume Mr. Terrific wasn’t created for the black comic reading audience. Instead of appealing to the “black comic fan”, what if he’s meant to appeal to simply the “comic fan”? Let’s take the aging fanboy of the old school persuasion; I dealt with a lot of these back when I was with Diamond. In this situation, Mr. Terrific would still be fail as a concept. You know why? He’s an uppity, rich, intelligent black man, who doesn’t believe in God. Oh, and he dates white women. But he runs real fast (don’t forget to include a stereotype that they do believe in, ya know – so they can relate).
So, for whom was Mr. Terrific created? To whom does he appeal? Are any of you Mr. Terrific fans? With the DC relaunch, he’s slated to have a higher profile. As one of those old school fans pointed out on The Beat, the series will be “written by a black”, so who knows if I’ll find myself liking him more. If there are more fans like that Beat commentor, then the future doesn’t look too terrific to me after all.
Did ya hear the echo in the title? There’s supposed to be an echo. Anyway, if you’re a comic fan, you’ve probably heard the big news: In September, DC Comics will be launching 52 different series, all with new #1 issues, led by an updated Justice League. It’s a line-wide, simultaneous revamp of their entire universe, and it’s got the internet all a-twitter. I told myself that I wouldn’t really comment unless I had something new to add to the conversation. After all, EVERYONE’s contributing their two cents, and if it’s one thing comic fans love, it’s talking about shit nobody wants to hear. That said, the more I followed the discussion, the more I noticed that a certain question wasn’t being asked. Everyone is screaming “How could this do this?!” or “Don’t they know that this is gonna fail?!” Well, let’s look at it another way: What if DC didn’t really have a choice in the matter?
A few months ago, I wrote this post, where I critiqued DC’s failings, especially in regards to marketing and social media. In that post, I noted that Diane Nelson had been brought in to find new ways to monetize the DC properties so that the comic wing would stop being the Warner Bros redheaded stepchild. As it stands, though, comics aren’t a huge chunk of Warner Bros’ revenue. In fact, they could make more money by using the characters in other media, and just publish reprints from here on out. So, what if this new reboot was a forced mandate? Sure, it could be spun as “Wow, DC has balls” or whatever, but it was more likely a change or die situation. Something of this magnitude doesn’t happen for no reason, and it’s a huge undertaking. Sure, there’s a big risk of failure, but for a company to decide to take this course of action, circumstances must have been more dire than we realize. This isn’t a case of them trying to be the #1 US comic publisher, or even short-term sales. This sounds more like a battle for mere survival. Sure, that sounds kind of dire, but we are talking about comics here, and hyperbole’s the name of the game. I’ve said before that I’ve considered myself to be a “DC Guy”, so if this is what it takes for those properties to survive in comic form, then I’m all for it. I guess we’ll just have to see how this plays out.
Considering the Twitter Whore that I’ve become, it’s hard to imagine a time when I wasn’t into social networking. This week, however, forced me to take a look back, as I learned that Friendster would be switching over from social networking to a gaming format. Many of you probably started your social networking with MySpace (or maybe Black Planet), but I started with Friendster back in ’04. That was such an odd time, as I remember I actually had to beg people to check it out and sign up. Nowadays, you get comfortable with a person, and the next thing is “I’ll friend you on Facebook.” Back then, I engaged in a lot of conversations that began with “Well, what is it?” or “Doesn’t that Classmates.com site do that?” Friendster had a small following amongst my meager social circle, but I saw big things in its future – or so I thought.
Eventually, I amassed about 50 or so friends – laughable by today’s social media standard, but quite an accomplishment for the time. Unlike the MySpace model, where you might end up friends with a bunch of strangers, these were 50 people that I actually knew from some walk of life. An interesting thing was that Friendster introduced the Wall concept on your profile. People have no problem throwing up a random “What’s up?!” or “Call me back, bitch!” on someone’s Facebook wall, but Friendster people seemed somewhat uncomfortable with the concept back then. It was called “Comments and Testimonials”, and people seemed to take that last word to heart. Most of the stuff on my wall (all 7 messages) read like something someone would write in my high school yearbook. Friendster eventually added more features which were already commonplace on MySpace and Facebook, like photo tagging, but most people had moved on from the site by then. I, too, had moved on to Myspace and, later, Facebook, but I’d still get messages from Friendster, saying “We Miss You” or telling me some random spam skank had sent me a message. It got to the point where I eventually forgot my password, and never really looked back.
This week, I got an email telling me that I’d need to export any personal profile data I might want to keep, as Friendster was switching over to a gaming format and would be deleting profile info. It was like hearing that an old friend with whom you’d lost touch was now dying. In any case, I decided I should take one last look around to see if anything was worth saving.
The layout’s already been changed, so Lord only knows what’s already been deleted. Plus, I’m apparently single. Last I knew, I was still “in a relationship” back when I last cared about that profile. Then again, that was back in ’05, and it wasn’t a very memorable relationship anyway, so…
Looking at the pictures, I apparently only had three uploaded to the system. I didn’t have many digital pictures back then, and I learned how to remove ex-girlfriends from pictures I had (Those were my best pictures, and it made no sense for me to have to get rid of them ’cause some broad made a stupid decision!). Nothing worth saving out of those three, so farewell visual representation of 2003/2004 Will!
Next, I move on to the messages. Apparently, there are 63 messages, but 95% of them are spam chicks. “Melissa”, “Sara”, “Jennifer”, etc – all sending me messages like “sjhsd ghfhd fs” while using the same avatar. No real loss there. Then, I go back to the first page. My first message was from my friend Tarek. I guess he invited me, as it’s one of those form letters that begins with “Welcome” and explains how the site works. Huh. I guess I forgot about that. In fact, it looks like most of my messages from those days are from Tarek. Kinda sad, seeing as how we don’t talk as much anymore. Then, I see a message from someone named “Alicia”. from Fredricksburg, VA. It seems she wrote “i love ur smile, it’s sexi.” That was nice of her. I hope she didn’t die in a meth lab explosion or anything. Still, nothing worth saving there, either.
In all, there’s nothing very memorable about the whole Friendster experience. I remember trying to get people to join, and looking forward to messages, but that experience didn’t stand the test of time. All of that was replaced by glitter backgrounds and pokes. And one day, those won’t mean anything, either – especially considering MySpace is up for sale, and Facebook is more concerned with becoming Skynet. I remember enjoying Friendster, but looking back, there doesn’t seem like there was much to enjoy. It all just seems so…empty. Is that how I’m going to feel about Farmville one day? God, PLEASE tell me that’s not how I’m gonna feel about Farmville! In any case, I’m getting bummed out, so I’d better stop here. So long, Friendster. I’ll catch ya on the flipside, see ya at the crossroads, after ‘while crocodile, and all that other good shit. You were a fun whore at the time, but your pimp is blowing up your pager, and I’ve left your money on the nightstand. Thanks for the memories.
