O.G. Buffy: Consumed, Enjoyed
May 26
Buffy the Vampire Slayer is my favorite show of all time. Still. Probably always, unless someone decides to come up with a neo-CW sensation called Buffy the Vampire Slayer Kicks It With Veronica Mars, Sydney Bristow and Kara Thrace. Also, Daisy Steiner Is There.
And yet, I never got around to seeing that bit of early ’90s teen dream cinema that started it all — you know, the Buffy movie. The one with a just-beginning-to-bald Dylan McKay and cameos from whodathunkit future Oscar winners Hilary Swank and Ben Affleck. This is very unlike me. When I love something, I am generally all about absorbing any scraps of expanded universe data I can get my hands on, even if said scraps end up looking more like sloppy, crayoned renderings of the classic product. (This level of obsessiveness may or may not have led to me Googling for fanfic about a certain pairing on a certain show, the name of which may or may not rhyme with “Schmossip Schmirl,” and then reading a story based exclusively around the notion that one half of this pairing smells like strawberries. Just for example.)
Anyway. My avoidance of the Buffy movie was never meant to be one of those big, fat geek medals of honor — a red badge of nerdage — or anything. I didn’t shun it so I could loudly proclaim that I only recognize TEH ONE TRUE BUFFY. I just didn’t think it was…necessary. Joss Whedon always said that Buffy the show was Buffy done right, and Buffy the movie was sort of a not-done-quite-right false start. So why bother?
But when our friends at Fantastic Fangirls declared this What Are You Waiting For? month — ie, read/view/consume some vital bit of geekiana you’ve avoided up ’til now — I realized maybe it was time to just watch the thing. After all, how can I consider myself a true Buffy Buff if I’ve never seen her original origin story?
If this isn't a real trailer, then I must be on Qward
May 26It really busts my dilithium crystals that this movie is real one universe over (possibly the evil one in Fringe. The pricks.)
But that said, it’s a really clever trailer. And really, not sold on their real pick for Green Lantern.
Stuff We Like This Week: May 22 Edition
May 22
In an effort to combat our occasional…okay, okay, near-constant negativity, we give you a regular feature full of nothing but love — Stuff We Like This Week. Appearing every Friday, SWLTW will recap the things that have set our little nerdly hearts aflame within the past seven days.
Crushing Moments in Geekdom
May 21
Pondering The Phantom Menace‘s magical tenth anniversary this week has produced a couple of semi-interesting thought blipverts for me. First of all…I’m old. Undeniably, decriptly, cantankerously old. If I had a lawn, I would defend it.
Second, what a moment that was, eh? Judging from all your Poodoo comments, everyone has a seminal TPM memory, and most of them involve dreams/childhood/formerly extensive action figure collections being crushed. For some of you, maybe it was the first time this happened. Others were already jaded, veteran fans at that point, accustomed to being disappointed because you always managed to care just a little too much.
To be honest, I don’t really recall how the raging stinkbomb that was TPM made me feel. I think I just tried to convince myself that it wasn’t that bad. It took a good, long while for the sheer, childhood-obliterating awfulness to set in.
I do, however, remember — in crystalline detail — the first time fandom absolutely crushed me. It’s one of those things that’s hideously embarrassing to recount….but aren’t all the best nerd stories?
In Comic Shops Today: Johnny Hiro Vol. 1!
May 20Once in a great big blue moon, you will find a new comic that not only fulfills any expectations you may have had for it, but far surpasses them; it easily vaults over your wildest hopes and becomes something that just amuses and entertains the living shit out of you.
That comic, my friends, is Johnny Hiro.
Johnny is a busboy living in Brooklyn with his beautiful girlfriend, Mayumi. They struggle, but they make ends barely meet, and they love each other very much.
Also, Johnny has adventures. Wild, stupid, crazy fun adventures that spring whole-cloth onto the page from the brain of writer/artist Fred Chao, in some remarkable goulash of chop-socky kung fu comics, cutesy indie relationship books, and just wildly imaginative good comics.
In issue 2, for example, Johnny is chased by crazed ninja busboys, angry at him for stealing a precious lobster so that his boss, Mr. Masago, can serve it for the food editor from Vogue and save his dying restaurant. The heart of the book is a dynamic chase sequence that takes Johnny and his pursuers onto the rooftops of Brooklyn before a stunning one-page splash with follow sound effect that gives your stomach a little jump, like when Luke and Leia swing over the chasm in Star Wars.
Everything about this book just works. Johnny Hiro is an amazing, refreshing, exciting surprise–one of those books that makes you feel so glad you even bother buying and reading comics. I cannot recommend this one highly enough.
Johnny Hiro returns to shelves TODAY in a trade paperback collection–three single issues were published by AdHouse Books, who now combine those three issues with new material to create one single fantastic volume of pure awesomeocity.
Order Johnny Hiro Vol. 1 from Amazon, from a fine online comics retailer such as Heavy Ink, or from the comics emporium of your choice using Diamond order code APR090627.
