Urbane; Also, Sorceror Supreme
Jun 15Chris’ post about the Cabal of Convenience…excuse me, the ILLUMINATI and their impending smack-down by the Hulk really harshed my morning buzz.
You see, last night, I started reading Doctor Strange: The Oath, the recent miniseries by Brian K. Vaughan and Marcos Martin, in which the good doctor receives a well-deserved character tidying–not a revamp or reboot or anything so drastic, just a repositioning of sorts.
And man, is it great. Imagine David Niven with Peter O’Toole’s attitude and the ability to cast whacked-out spells that open portals between dimensions and shit.
Yeah, he really is that cool. It’s like, finally, someone picked up this kicked-around secondary figure from Marvel’s Silver Age and given him exactly the perfect spin. Even Strange’s supporting cast gets a goose, with the addition of Night Nurse as a cross between Scully and Nora Charles. It’s one of those stories where you’d like to sit down afterward and have a good meal with the lead characters; they’re that entertaining and well-written.
Then I think about how this Dr. Strange has nothing to do–absolutely fucking nothing–with the Strange who now occupies a fairly prominent supporting role in the modern Marvel Universe, and it just makes me sad.
Buzz officially harshed. Thanks a lot, Chris.
Black Summer
Jun 14I’ve always liked Warren Ellis enough to forgive the things he does that drive me nuts – which is to say for every prig that gleefully picks up on his “underwear pervert” term, he is still cashing in on my goodwill towards Planetary. Were we ever to meet (unlikely) it would probably start with a beer and end in a fist-fight, with both side declaring it a total success.
This time, Ellis has written Black Summer – the story itself lays things out pretty clear. In short, the most powerful member of America’s premiere team of science-heroes, comes to an uneasy conclusion – what’s the point of working to make the world a better, safer place, when the nation is complicit in an illegal war? And his solution is that the country has to be rebooted, and he will start the process by taking out the Honcho Supremo of the executive branch, a handful of right-hand men, and tells the country to ponder, get their shit together, and go back to the polls (pencil and paper this time.)
And if that isn’t a clear enough allegory, Ellis’ letter at the back of the issue makes it pretty clear that as a Mad-dog Englishman, the world today wears on him as much as anyone, and Marvel’s Civil War was perhaps a little too coy in its message. Ergo, Black Summer.
If you like Planetary, or the early Authority, or the Doctorow Power Fantasy that is Transmetropolitan, I’m going to recommend Black Summer – don’t know how far this bird will fly (for example – issue #0 alternate cover. Holy shit), but I’ll watch.
Jesus, Ellis. There are easier ways to keep your file in the active pile.
No, no, no, yes, no – Thanks a bunch USA Today.
Jun 13So, the discussion of women in comics got co-opted today in order to pimp the new Fantastic Four movie, and it’s enough to make grown man who happens to like reading comics cry. Comic fandom just got sucker punched by marketing execs.
Everyone had a look at the USA Today article? Here we go.
Ding Ding – and in this corner, The Strongest One There Is
Jun 13As I’ve said before, the past year of turning the bulk of the Marvel Universe into pricks I could care less about, has created a strong desire in me to see them all beaten to snot. And with issue one of World War Hulk coming out today, it’s time to smash.
The heroes we loved as kids, because they stood for all the right things and had the strength to back those principles, are now the focus of new story themes – the fear of a world where we can’t protect our children, the fear that the people of power who used to protect us are now following agendas we have no say in, and in the name of protecting us, are make dark, dark choices. They don’t stand for what we’d like to do ourselves, they now stand for what we don’t want to see happen, are afraid is happening, and we don’t think we can affect the change needed to keep it happening.
The list of heroes that are still fighting this shift in heroic principle is short. And the one that got the shaft hardest is now back. And the retribution starts here.
A Tale of Two Reviews
Jun 10My full and unhinged enjoyment of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer hinges on one totally unreasonable question: Will they give us Kirby Galactus, or something exponentially less cool?
Jack Kirby’s design of Galactus embodies everything that is great and fun and strange about the Marvel Comics of the 1960’s: He’s a gigantic dude in a purple outfit with horns on his helmet who devours planets, but feels kinda bad about it.
The idea that we would see even a quarter-assed version of this character on the big screen sends me into fits of geekish delirium.
However, in a slightly odd twist of events, even the fanboys/plants over at Ain’t It Cool can’t seem to agree, serving up two very different reviews of the film. And they’re not just different in the “cool as balls” versus “suxorz” sense; one claims we see a full-frontal Galactus several times in a Kirby design; the other claims Galactus is some kind of boring, formless tornado thing.
As cool as the trailers have been, I find it almost impossible to give Fox and director Tim Story enough credit to actually bring Kirby’s Galactus to the screen. Still, a guy can dream, can’t he?
