The Journey Might be Important, but Having a Destination Doesn't Hurt

As I said last week, I got Flow as part of a 3-pack of games because I really wanted to play Journey. And play it I did.

You start in a desert. Behind you. . .is more desert. Ahead of you is. . .more desert. But also a mountain! A gleaming light shines in a narrow slot that splits the peak in two. That's where you gotta go, with your character, a vague shape in red robes. One of the first things you see, besides a bunch of odd markers sticking out of the sand, is a platform with little carpets or rectangles of fabric fluttering around. You get a scarf there, and it allows a limited amount of flight or hovering before it's drained. The flying fabrics can recharge it, and you can sort of call to them with a button press that makes you emit a chime. This can also be used to reveal murals that detail either the path ahead, or the history of this place.

Other than the chimes and the music, the game is silent. You can make the chime sound whenever, even if there's nothing around to respond. Maybe you just wanna make some noise. You're along out there, who's gonna complain? Your character reaches altars at the end of levels, where you commune with a giant, white-robed figure whose face (or mask) kind of reminds me of an owl. You get to see a visual representation of things, but no dialogue, no subtitles. Take from the scenes what you wish.

Most of the levels let you proceed at your own pace. There are limits to how far you can wander afield, but you aren't rushed. Go on, investigate that shadow you saw in the distance. Maybe it's ruins, maybe it's another mural, maybe it's nothing, a trick of the light. Happened to me a couple of times, pressing through the dunes to find nothing at all.

Maybe it's a metal box caging more of the little fabric pieces that will help you on your way by forming a bridge or extending the length of your scarf. If there's a limit to how long it can be, I didn't find it. Journey is very mellow in those moments. When you use the scarf to fly, your character does a barrel roll with a little flourish and their cloak flaps around them. It's a neat little touch, I really like that. it makes me want to keep flying for as long as I can.

There are larger creatures of fabric, like carpets or jellyfish or even dragons later on, that you can hitch a ride on. So if you want to just sit back and let them cruise for a bit, go for it. If you're flying, and you stay close to those creatures, they'll keep your scarf charged and you can just keep going (as long as you're OK going the direction they're going.)

Or you can keep the mountain in the center of your vision and go straight for it.

The game does change things up. One level is an extended slide down a massive sandy slope, with branching paths and ledges to do high-speed jumps from. Doesn't lend itself to nosing around, but it's fun. A nice run down the hill, leaping off ramps and using the scarf to fly for a while, then drop back down to resume the slide. There's an extended bit near the end where the perspective switches so you're sliding right to left, with the sun in the background setting amid the remains of the city, making the sand glitter like gold.

In the later stages, as you climb the mountain, the frigid temperatures sap the energy from your scarf. You're reduced to slowly plodding through snow drifts as ice accumulates on your robes. It was an odd shift, to take away the mobility, make it a matter of how badly you want to keep going now that it's a grind. Adds an element of a pilgrimage or a quest to the journey, instead of simply a fun adventure.

There's one particular enemy, a flying, mechanical snake thing you encountered earlier that makes a return among the snow. Except now the ability to escape is gone. It's a game of hide-and-seek, watching its flight pattern, waiting for the chance to make it to the next bit of cover. I don't know what happens if it catches you. I didn't really want to find out, so the tension might have been self-inflicted, but it worked. I was trying to urge my character to walk just a little faster, cursing the game each time the wind picked up to the point I made no headway. It does make the very end, when you take flight again, all the sweeter.

Like Flow, not a lengthy game. I reached the end on my second time playing, and I hadn't been playing long the second time. I know I didn't find everything, and if you play again, the game gives the option to warp ahead to other places. I wish I'd known that before I walked into that floating image. I just thought it was an opportunity to commune with the god that I'd missed the first time around. Instead I was back in the snow. Whoops.

A Stable Fall

November's solicitations weren't all that different from September or October's. At least not in terms of how many things there were I was interested in. Not that much difference in what those things were, either, but let's run through 'em.

What's new? As alluded to above, not much. There's a one-shot for Grit N Gears, following on the heels of the mini-series and focused on a character that apparently is in the mini-series, but I'm not sure I've seen them yet. A "maybe", at best.

Other than that, Ryan Lindsay (who wrote the min-series Everfrost I reviewed back in '21) and Louie Joyce have a one-shot GN out through Comixtribe called A Fistful of Pain. Which is about two sisters who have always quarreled over their family's pet and are either going to fight one last time, or team up to beat a bunch of other people up. Or maybe one then the other if they're feeling ambitious.

Also, I want to take a moment to alert everyone of disturbing news: Marvel is releasing another Sentry mini-series. Granted it's about random people gaining some of his powers and memories, so a bit of the old Captain Universe concept, but this is still a dire portent that we may be cursed with that character's presence once more.

What's ending? Captain Marvel: Dark Tempest is wrapping this month, and so is Marco Fontanili's Space Outlaws.

And all the rest? Moon Knight 29, Uncanny Spider-Man 3, Ms. Marvel: The New Mutant 4, two issues of Fantastic Four. On the latter, I half-expected it to be canceled at 12 issues, but it's at least going to 14. Probably not much further, since they're ready for the Baxter Building to reappear after Richards shunted it forward in time.

With Ms. Marvel, which I assume is the book they kept soliciting with absolutely everything listed as "CLASSIFIED", we'll have to see. The first issue comes out today, and I think trying to rebrand her as a mutant is dumb, but so was killing her off in a Spider-Man comic. Marvel does dumb shit all the time.

The more solicits I see for that Fire and Ice mini-series, the more sure I am it's getting passed by, and the solicit for issue 2 of Slow Burn didn't exactly light me on fire. However, there is still the third issues of Coda, Lone, and Midnight Western Theatre: Witch Trial to look forward to. Seven Seas Entertainment is releasing the fourth volume of No Longer Allowed in Another World, which I am eagerly awaiting. Viz is releasing volume 12 of Zom 100, which I might get around to reading one of these days.

3022 (2019)

A crew on a ten-year hitch manning the space station acting as a waypoint between Earth and a colony on Europa are rapidly falling apart barely five years in, when the option to be recalled to Earth is taken out of the hands. Because there seems to no longer be an Earth to be recalled to.

The movie switches between scenes of the captain (Omar Epps) limping through a dark and empty station, scanning for something out in space, and the past, which gradually reveals how things got to that point. It's a somewhat effective technique, because it gives the audience enough to encourage them to wonder. What happened to the crew doctor? What's Epps scanning for, exactly, and why the hell is he limping?

The movie adds the wrinkle that Epps suffers from night terrors, or something to that effect, because of stress, even before everything goes terribly wrong. The doctor warns him he'll eventually starting hallucinating, which adds an additional bit of mystery to the sequences in the future, as the audience can't be sure whether he truly is alone as he appears. Because he certainly isn't.

Beyond revealing how things got to that point on the station, the flashbacks mostly show how people react to terrible things. Epps tries to carry on with his duties. Not ignoring the issue, just thinking of it as one more thing he must lead the others through. The doctor takes a nihilistic approach, and grows blunt with the others. Except it's revealed as only skin deep once he actually makes the logical choice given that mindset (the one I'd been telling him to hurry up and make for at least 15 minutes by that point.) The, either second-in-command or chief engineer, was never clear on each person's duties, wants to try to get back to Earth, on the chance there's someone still there.

The movie uses a lot of, unpleasant lighting, is how I'd describe it. Dull orange or white lights that make everyone's skin look sallow or sickly. A lot of those shots were the light is almost rising above the curve of the person's skull, so it flares and partially obscures their features. Those in particular seemed counterproductive in a movie that had many stretches of one character or another on their own, where it's down to their expressions and body language to sell it, because there's no one to talk to.

What I Bought 8/26/2023

My old roomie used to say people in Tennessee didn't know what stop signs meant. I can't verify from my visits. However, after spending a week in Nashville for a training, I can report drivers in that town don't know how crosswalks work. On consecutive days I was in the crosswalk, with the white little walking guy symbol, and nearly got run over by dipshits. Maybe they figured it was so hot no one would be out walking around.

Unstoppable Doom Patrol #5, by Dennis Culver (writer), Chris Burnham (artist), Brian Reber (colorist), Pat Brosseau (letterer) - The Doom Patrol has no respect for the difficulties American cities have maintaining their infrastructure.

The Doom Patrol attack a town in Illinois they suspect as a front for experimentation on people with metagenes. It's a trap set by some goofy-looking Musk/Zuckerberg mash-up who really wanted to makes Niles Caulder a job offer. The guy think Caulder's "Catastrophe theory" for super-powers is a great idea, especially combined with his work in nanotechnology.

They've subjected people to horrible accidents to activate metagenes, ala what Caulder did to the OG Doom Patrol, then used nanotech to steal the genes and graft it to their volunteer, Metawoman. Who is what would probably be a typically generic and photogenic cheerful and eager blonde. Because optics are important when you're a rich nitwit who thinks he's a visionary. 

She beats up the Doom Patrol until it turns out there were serious flaws to this whole idea and she the metagenes go nuts in a truly disturbing display. Because the rich guy rushed the whole process without considering the potential drawbacks. Why would he? Always another eager volunteer, and the military's funding him, so shoot for the moon. Be a "disruptor," or whatever. The most surprising part is he's built a robot proxy that actually works. I would expect it to be glitchy as hell, randomly start screaming about killing all humans.

Yeah, that. I'm glad I wasn't eating when I read this, because that might have made me upchuck. I don't even think that's the grossest panel. Well played, Burnham. Not that she was that strong to begin with. Couldn't even trash Robotman's body with her first punch, and that guy goes through bodies like Iron Man does armors.

Culver emphasizes that Caulder has learned from and regrets his pat actions with the Doom Patrol. Which might mean "The Chief" is being needlessly protective of her current leadership role. She's limited the influence Caulder and Mento both can have (and I gotta wonder if Mento's stuck in that tube all the time by choice or not), and it backfired. Mento's powers are so restricted that it was easy to trick him into leading the team into a trap. Caulder kept the rich moron talking until he could hack the Chief and Degenerate's restraints. Culver's been hinting that all is not well in The Chief's system, that Jane wants out, so is that causing problems in how the team functions?

Two issues left to find out.

Sunday Splash Page #285

 

"Public Works Disaster," in JSA Classified #1, by Geoff Johns (writer), Amanda Conner (penciler), Jimmy Palmiotti (inker), Paul Mounts (colorist), Rob Leigh (letterer)

Again, on my first attempt, I typed it as "Geoof". The universe clearly wants me to lean into it, but I do try to avoid typos.

JSA Classified was an earlier attempt to get two titles out of the Justice Society, following in the footsteps of JLA Classified. Rather than splitting the cast into two teams, JSA Classified tended to give characters a solo spotlight. I bought one arc, the first four issues.

On the plus side, you have the Amanda Conner/Jimmy Palmiotti/Paul Mounts art team doing good work. Conner's great at background details that help it fell like the story takes place in an actual world with people and things that have their own lives going on, and also can add a bit of levity. The body language Conner gives Power Girl - alternately confident and fragile - does a lot to try and carry along the story.

On the negative, you have Johns twisting himself into knots trying to resolve Power Girl's conflicting origins.

Except, not really. Because while he does provide an answer - she's not from the future, not Atlantean, but a Kryptonian from a dead universe - he doesn't really spend any time on why that matters. Lots of pages on Power Girl insisting she doesn't care where she came from, when Conner's art reveals she clearly does. Because Johns saves the reveal for the very end of the fourth issue, during a whole thing with Psycho Pirate that feeds into Infinite Crisis, he doesn't show us how this knowledge affects Power Girl. Does it make her feel happy, to finally know (or remember, maybe?) Is she sad, that (almost) everyone she knew is even more dead than she thought?

She's a strange artifact of a multiverse that no longer existed. She hasn't had much success building a new home or life on Earth, and now it seems there's no previous home left to go back to. Seems like that might prompt some sort of reaction. To the extent there's any of that, it's buried under Old Earth-2 Superman yelling at Earth-1 Superman to get off his lawn, while Superboy-Prime and Alexander Luthor do their thing.

Oh, this is also the story where Johns tries to explain the boob window in Power Girl's costume as being because she never decided on an appropriate emblem to put there. I suppose it could tie into the way her origin had drifted for years, leaving the character looking unsuccessfully for something to anchor to, but it doesn't really fit. She's had costumes without a logo that also didn't have any sort of window over the chest. The (in-universe) explanation up to then seemed to be, "it feels comfortable to her, and she's confident enough to rock the look." That was probably good enough, unless the writer was fixing to give her a logo, which Johns evidently was not.

Saturday Splash Page #87

 

"Death Takes a Holiday", in Thanos #7, by Keith Giffen (writer), Ron Lim (penciler), Al Milgrom (inker), Christie Scheele and Krista Ward (colorists), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

Years and years before he would be the tentpole villain for the culmination of multiple phases of a cinematic universe (I'm imagining myself reading that sentence 20 years ago and muttering something about gobbledygook), Thanos got himself an ongoing series. Jim Starlin wrote and drew the first 6 issues, where Thanos trying to chart a new course for his life, after having yet another epiphany in the Starlin-written mini-series Marvel Universe: The End. 

Having decided to try and make amends for past misdeeds committed in Dan Jurgens' Thor run by what was actually a rogue clone of himself Thanos made (because Jim Starlin doesn't like it when other people mess with his toy), Thanos saves the universe from some cosmos-devouring thing called The Hunger, which played Galactus like a chump. Because when Jim Starlin writes Thanos, all other characters become 1000 times dumber and less-competent than normal.

Because Jim Starlin has no problem messing with other people's toys. Which is why I didn't keep those 6 issues. He's got some interesting ideas, I just completely hate the execution of those ideas.

I did keep the other six issues, handled by the Keith Giffen/Ron Lim team. Where Thanos decides to make a pilgrimage to the Kyln. Which is a combination power plant/max security prison/holy site at the edge of the place where the universe is generated. I'm unclear if that puts it at an expanding edge or some "center", but whatever. Point is, it's a delicate place, and while Thanos is ostensibly there to think, he gets sucked into a mess involving some version of the Beyonder, having made itself mortal.

In the process of that, Galactus' true first herald escapes. No, not Tyrant, his other first herald. The Fallen One, who goes gunning for Galactus himself, while Big G is still worn down from that previous story arc. Thanos handles that, albeit out of desire to have a herald of his own. Especially one that apparently is powered by dark matter. 

Giffen's Thanos is patient when he wants to be. Smart naturally, able to quick figure out weaknesses in his opponent and bring them to heel. He's also got a bit of a sense of humor - dry, to the point it isn't clear if he's trying to be funny - and not above provoking someone if he thinks it in his interests. And for all that he proclaims to Death - who Lim draws as a child dressed all in black - he's done serving her, he still seems inclined to listen to what she has to say.

That arc is probably most notable for the number of things Giffen introduces that he later used in Annihilation. The Kyln and the Crunch are where Annihilus' army emerges. This frees the two elder beings Thanos encourages to take down Galactus and the Surfer so he can use them as weapons of planetary mass destruction for Annihilus. 

Most importantly, this is where Star-Lord steps back out on the stage for the first time in a long time. Ship is gone, the element gun is gone, the cybernetic eye is there. Quill's an inmate, for what he did to stop the Fallen One originally, but he's also there to make sure the Fallen One stays locked up. He's sarcastic, cynical, basically ready to die whenever. Gladiator's there on made up charges to keep an eye on the Beyonder, and even he treads carefully around Thanos. Quill basically gives zero fucks, maybe because he realizes that if Thanos decides to kill him, it could have very little to do with anything Quill says or does.

The one odd thing of note is, one of the guards responsible for sending pilgrims on through to the Kyln is an Earthling named Cole, who was abducted, then abandoned. To what end he was abducted isn't explained, possibly because Cole doesn't know. But that's pretty much the origin they gave Star-Lord in the movies, except the kidnappers kept Quill. Hard to believe, as annoying as movie Star-Lord can be.

Random Back Issues #114 - Legend of the Shield #2

Yep, that'll do it.

Joe Higgins passed his trial run with the Shield armor, which actually involved keeping the armor from being stolen by a big cyborg guy called Mann-X. Now it's time for his first mission: rescuing some American hostages from the fictional Middle Eastern country of Bahkti. Except Higgins is having weird dreams about what seems to be the original Shield, fighting in Korea, possibly.

He won't open up about them to anyone, even his best friend, Lt. Devon Hall, so Hall decides to get ready for his briefing with Higgins' father, a brigadier general. He's a bit early and sees a dossier on the desk. It's not about the mission, but about the fact the general made up charges to get his son court-martialed and busted to sergeant so he could be used in the Shield project. I guess the Army wasn't willing to spare any officers for the job.

Hall doesn't get a chance to tell Joe before the mission, and the general's none-too-subtle that he knows Hall read something he wasn't meant to. Worse, the general arranged for the loan of a Major McGill from the Green Berets for the mission to Bahkti. Because General Higgins is a fucking lunatic. The type who threatens his ex-wife just because Joe visited her.

The mission starts well enough, as Joe's team use the element of surprise to rescue the hostages, while Devon's squad disable all the Bahktian helicopters except one. Just in case. But when Devon's group go to free the other group of hostages they were told about, they find nothing except a bunch of Bahktian soldiers.

While Joe's rigging explosives to blow the munitions dump and cover their tracks, Devon's wounded and pinned down by an entire angry squad. The explosion gives him a chance to get to the chopper he spared as a back-up, but McGill disabled it, too. So Devon's stuck trying to reach the original helicopter as the rest of the soldiers, Joe and the hostages lift off.

Unfortunately, Devon gets gunned down, and Joe can't hear the warning that his father railroaded him, either. Nice touch having the sound effects cover the speech balloons. Joe flips out and gets knocked unconscious by the other soldiers, but by next issue, he's a fugitive trying to figure out how to bring down his father.

{6th longbox, 120th comic. Legend of the Shield #2, by Grant Miehm (writer/artist), Mark Waid (writer), Jeff Albrecht (inker), Tom Ziuko (colorist), Albert Deguzman (letterer)}

The Luminescent Circles of Life

Well, with a Playstation 4 in hand, might see something resembling semi-regular video game reviews around here again.

I didn't set out to get Flow. What I really wanted was Journey, but the easiest way to get a disc with that was to get the 3-pack of it, Flow, and Flower, all made by thatgamecompany. Flow is pretty straightforward. You are some sort of aquatic lifeform, swimming or floating with a bunch of other aquatic life, and you try to eat and avoid being eaten.

Everything is made of silvery outlines with at least one (but usually more) glowing spheres or rings within the outline. If you can eat all of another organisms spheres or rings, they dissolve. The larger, more complex organisms break up into smaller pieces (which you can also eat). The smaller ones are just devoured. Eating increases your creature's size and number of rings, helping you to survive, although your creature doesn't really die. You can also grow in complexity, adding elaborate wings or projections.

If all your rings are eaten, you are sent back up the water column to get your bearing and try again. At any given level, there's always one little flagellate with a blue center, and one with a red. Eat the blue, you'll go one level back up the column, while the red takes you one level back down. Get deep enough, you get the chance to play as a different organism. The end goals will be the same, but not all of them play alike. Some are swift, some just sort of drift or spin. At least one can poison what it comes in contact with, mostly as a defense mechanism. If you're poisoned, you can't eat until it wears off. Another can, not exactly paralyze, but at least slow down what it comes in contact with.

I had to figure all that out as I went along. The game didn't come with an instruction booklet, and to the extent the game tells you anything, it's that you tilt the controller to guide your creature and press a button to either get a burst of speed or use those other abilities. I figured out the poisoning thing (eventually) by having it happen to me. Until then, I couldn't figure out what was happening when my critter turned yellow.

It can be a mellow game if you want it to be. There's no time limit I ever saw, so if you just want to drift around a peaceful section, gobbling up little algae that can't fight back, you can. You can try to speedrun through, dodging the bigger critters, or go after them relentlessly. I usually avoided tangling with the bigger, more aggressive creatures if I could. Content to build my critter up on the little ones enough to have some cushion and make my way deeper.

But at one point I got fairly deep, to a spot where there was just one, immense version of the same kind of thing I was. It couldn't fit entirely on the screen if it was stretched out, and my critter was maybe a third its size. Since I didn't have to worry about anything else attacking me, I decided to just go for it and see if I could kill. And I did, eventually.

The music is a gentle background thrum, or someone humming with a lot of bass. Each time you eat something, there's a single note that rings above the background. Combined with the setting, which is variously-shaded water sometimes with bubbles in the background, it makes me think of just sitting and staring at a lava lamp. At least it does when I'm taking things easy. If I'm being aggressive, I barely notice the music. It doesn't distract and can enhance in the right circumstances.

Hidden Strike (2023)

Watching this at 2 a.m. might not have been the best plan, but Alex needed something to watch and it wasn't like I had to keep track of an intricate plot.

Jackie Chan is Dragon Luo, head of an elite mercenary team hired to retrieve some big oil company's employees from a refinery is some ill-defined Middle East country. John Cena plays a guy named Chris, himself a former mercenary who dropped out of that life to be a helpful guy around a village in the ill-defined Middle East country. Chris' brother is hired to take someone from the convoy Dragon's leading and Chris signs on because the money could really help the village, and the person they're abducting is supposed to be a scumbag.

Surprise! The "scumbag" is actually just the person with control over the refinery's pumps, because the guy Chris is working for wants to steal half a billion gallons of oil. Chris bows out (after completing the abduction) and eventually reluctantly teams up with Dragon and Dragon's estranged daughter Mei (played by Chunrui Ma).

Like I said, the plot is just barely there. The mastermind - played by someone Alex described as playing some asshole on Game of Thrones, which hardly narrows it down (it's Pilou Asbaek) - kills Chris' brother after Chris leaves for not getting Chris to stick around (I think) and tells the rest of his goon squad to make it look like Dragon's team did it for payback. I assume partially to cover his tracks, but also to get Chris to go after Dragon, keeping both of them off his back.

Except it doesn't work. Chris and Dragon do fight - Cena's willingness to look silly works well with Jackie Chan's brand of fight scenes, plus Cena's a big guy who can look impressive throwing Chan around - but at no point does Chris seem to think the Chinese mercs are responsible. They're both just angry and talking past each other and punching.

Also, Mei being angry with her father not being there when her mother died doesn't really come off much after the first time it's brought up. Dragon keeps assuring her he'll protect her, or he'll come back, and I guess you could read her strained smiles and quiet nods as her not quite buying it or not allowing herself to buy in, but the overt hostility falls away.

But the movie is mostly relying on Chan and Cena's interactions as an enemies to friends scenario, and that works pretty well. Cena's solid at comedy and willing to look foolish, so they get some mileage from Dragon and Mei each independently reacting to Chris' tendency to name his trucks and be protective of them. Or Chris digging himself a hole telling Dragon about how hot he thinks Mei is, not realizing he's speaking to her dad.

Although the well they go to the most is miscommunication, but not really the language barrier stuff like in Rush Hour. Turns out Chris speaks Chinese (mostly), and Dragon knows one word in French (which seems to be less than Jackie Chan knows in real life), but since it's hard to discuss plans during shootouts they keep trying to use hand signals and it keeps going awry. Dragon's version of "six o'clock" looks more like a surfer doing a "gnarly" gesture (the thumb and pinky extended the other fingers closed).

In conclusion, plot's weak, some of the character beats are underdeveloped, but there's at least a few funny lines or scenes and some of the action sequences are solid and make good use of the leads skills.

Family Problems Lead to DOOM

Truly, Latveria is a land of contrasts.

Fantastic Four and Power Pack: Favorite Son is not so much a team-up between Power Pack and the FF, as it between the kids and Franklin Richards. The Fantastic Four are basically background characters through the whole thing. Johnny Storm has literally zero dialogue across 4 issues. It's at least a different approach than most of these other Power Pack mini-series took.

The Power kids are having some turmoil because Julie and Jack want to stop hiding their powers from their parents, but Alex is dead-set against it. Julie thinks it would make their lives easier without the need to lie or sneak off. Jack just wants an easier path to stardom and attention. Katie wants to go along with what Alex wants, as van Lente writes her as seemingly closer to and more protective of Alex than her other siblings.

Enter Franklin Richards, who's convinced his parents to let him attend public school in an attempt to get out of his family's shadow. Except he becomes popular immediately because of his last name, making Jack jealous and ending up as the target of the Wizard's son. When Jack fails to keep his identity secret, Alex blows up at him. With Franklin angry at his parents for deciding public school is too dangerous and he can just learn from HERBIE, the two boys decide to run away and become a crime-fighting duo.

It says something about how sheltered Franklin is that he thinks "Smarty Pants" is a good codename.

All this gives Dr. Doom a chance to put a plan in gear. A plan involving Kraven the Hunter, body-swapping, throwing a fight against 4 children, and delicious Latverian chocolate froth. The last one doesn't sound too bad. The plan ultimately fails because Doom can't stop monologuing about it, and because Franklin's not bad at coming up with plans of his own. Which is how he gets to be part of Power Pack, although I don't think any of the other mini-series used him.

van Lente doesn't use Jack picking on Katie nearly as much as some of the other writers, maybe because Jack's around Franklin so much, or because Julie and Alex are the primary source of conflict in the team. Alex is sort of a know-it-all, bossy older brother, while Julie is the one most likely to call him on it, and the most booksmart of the group. Although Katie happily having a pen pal ends up being a big help, as does her distrust of all robots. She doesn't exhibit the "boys are gross" attitude she would in the mini-series Marc Sumerak wrote

Sunday Splash Page #284

 

"Carry a Big Star Rod," in JSA All-Stars #10, by Matthew Sturges (writer), Freddie Williams II (artist), Chris Sotomayor (colorist), Pat Brosseau (letterer)

Justice Society seems like the Fantastic Four. It rarely can sustain two titles, but that won't stop their respective publishers from trying whenever they think they can get away with it. And so, JSA All-Stars, started up in 2010 because Justice Society of America's roster swelled to such ridiculous proportions DC needed two books to even pretend they might use them all.

As it is, there are members of this squad that get basically no focus in the 18 issues the book ran. Wildcat's kid, who was a cat-person and I think also codenamed Wildcat, for one. I can't remember much of anything happening with Judomaster. Sand showed up with some premonition dreams and kinda hung around. Hourman was starring in a back-up feature in the book with his wife, Liberty Belle (who stayed on the other roster), and that accounted for about 90% of him doing anything. It was still just too big of a roster for Sturges to give everyone a chance to demonstrate what they brought to the table.

As this was one of those times where DC gets a hard-on for Kingdom Come, Magog was co-leader with Power Girl - for about 5 issues. Then he decided they were being too soft on criminals and stormed off to be an antisocial dick and hopefully get erased from history. But, pages wasted on a character that apparently wasn't going to stick.

The book didn't even long enough to be canceled by the New 52, as it was one of a handful of titles canceled three months earlier to clear space for various Flashpoint-related mini-series. An ignominious end if I've ever seen one.

Saturday Splash Page #86

 

"Anybody Lose a Dragon?" in Thing and She-Hulk: The Long Night, by Todd DeZago (writer), Bryan Hitch and Ivan Reis (pencilers), Paul Neary and Randy Emberlin (inkers), Paul Mounts (colorist), Randy Gentile (letterer)

A 40-page one-shot about a bunch of vampire bug-things planning a subway tunnel collapse in the vicinity of a Roxxon lab that's preparing to experiment on Dragon Man, while the ever lovin' blue-eyed Thing and the Sensational She-Hulk just so happen to be on the two trains that get caught in the collapse.

Hitch and Neary draw the first 25 pages, which is mostly build-up. Why these two heroes are taking the subway, plus each of them dealing with their own brand of jerks, what Roxxon's doing, the vampire geeks, the leader of which looks like he raided Killraven's closet. Reis and Emberlin handle the fighting and whatnot that occurs over the remaining 14 pages. I don't really see a reason why they switch teams at the point they do (Hitch/Neary draw one page after the one above.) This hardly seems like a book where you bring in another team because Hitch couldn't finish the whole thing in time. So maybe they thought Reis was better for fight scenes and Hitch for building the setting?

For having two heroes ostensibly trying to get two trains full of civilians to safety when there are vampires, dragon androids and unscrupulous corporate scientists and goons running around, DeZago doesn't take hardly any of it seriously. Ben suggests that Sue has success calming Dragon Man down by being 'seductive' with him - which, what? - and She-Hulk suggests maybe he should try it and runs off to look for the civilians. The Thing proceeds to stand there and try and talk Dragon Man down while being repeatedly doused in flames. They seem more concerned about getting mobbed by the press after they rescue everyone than anything else.

I have no idea why this comic exists. It was released in 2002. Neither character had a series of their own in a while, so maybe it was a way to renew two trademarks in one go?

Random Back Issues #113 - Spider-Man 2099 #22

As long as he can still make the smug, in joke innuendos. Otherwise, that's 30% of Peter David's dialogue off-limits.

Miguel O'Hara starts the issue in cyberspace with his brother, Gabriel. He had to go in after Gabriel's mind got stuck due to an attack by some other cyberhead called Discord who intended to destroy the 2099 equivalent of the Internet to prepare the world for the apocalyptic end his models predicted would occur in 2112. 

That's all been dealt with. What hasn't is the fact Gabri knows Miguel's Spider-Man. And apparently he's known almost from the start. He assures his older brother he won't tell anyone, because that would ruin the fun. The fun of knowing how much shit gets dumped in his big brother's life for being Spider-Man.

They return to their bodies in Gabri's apartment, where their mother and Miggy's girlfriend Dana are waiting. Miguel assures his mother that Gabri won't get addicted like before. In exchange, Miguel wants his little brother's help repairing Lyla, the holographic agent in his own apartment. She went into a jealous, murderous rage when Discord started his attack, but Miguel may have caused the real problem when he told Lyla to try and think or understand feelings several issues earlier. Because Miguel's a self-centered prick who runs his yap a lot. Given his ego and intellect, Miguel might be more Iron Man of 2099 than Spider-Man.

Anyway, Gabri's pretty sure he can't fix Lyla, and he doesn't understand why Miguel's so intent on it, but suggests contacting an expert in AI. And Miguel happens to know one. His ex-girlfriend, Xina. Good luck with that.

In subplot developments, Kasey Nash is captured by agents of Stark-Fujikawa, because their boss feels he owes Spider-Man a debt for saving his life two issues earlier. Which is awkward considering they've sent assassins to kill Spider-Man more than once so far. But Kasey seems to have a connection with him, so they're hoping she'll help them out. Or she can disappear forever. When you put it that way. . .

And in the back-up story of Miguel's time in a private school, Xina saves him after someone tried to drown him in the school pool. Miguel lies to the teachers about having a cramp, but admits to Xina someone held his head under. It's probably Kron Stone, son of Tyler Stone, CEO of Alchemax and Miguel's future dickweed boss (among other things), but Miguel's got no proof and declines to press the issue against the big psychopath on campus.

{10th longbox, 109th comic, Spider-Man 2099 #22, "Did You Just Say", by Peter David (writer), Rick Leonardi (penciler), Al Williamson (inker), Steve Buccellato (colorist), Ken Lopez (letterer); "Dead Boy's Float", by Peter David (writer), Chris Batista (penciler), Don Hudson (inker), Steve Buccellato (colorist), Ken Lopez (letterer)}

Miracle Mile (1988)

Through a bizarre series of events involving a bird using a lit cigarette to build its nest, big band trombonist Harry Washello (Anthony Edwards) ends up answering a ringing pay phone at 4 a.m. and learning civilization is about to end in nuclear fire.

From there, the film is Harry's attempt to reach Julie (Mare Winningham), the girl he'd recently met and get her to safety, creating a widening gyre of chaos as he does. Prompting an entire diner full of people to climb into a food truck and haul ass for an airport. Hijacking a guy with a trunk full of stolen stereos. Firing a gun in an aerobics studio while looking for a helicopter pilot.

It could almost seem farcical, especially the whole sequence at the gas station with the cops accidentally (or stupidly) self-immolating. Or the bit where a guy chases Harry through the sewers, shooting at him for briefly standing on the roof of the man's car. But I don't think it's meant to be, or at least, not entirely. More just how people respond when they're terrified at the imminent prospect of non-existence.

The head cook at the diner pulls a huge revolver on Harry, demanding to know if he's bullshitting before starting the mad dash to hoped-for safety. Julie's grandparents, who haven't spoken for 15 years and no longer remember why, choose to spend their remaining time at a diner, eating unhealthy food, because why the hell not? The guy Harry eventually finds to pilot the chopper insists on bringing his best gal, and calmly dares Harry to kill him if he objects. People figure out what matters most when the heat's on.

Beyond that, the movie's just kind of a "Hey, That Guy," movie. The cook's played by Robert DoQui, who I always think of as the the sergeant from the Robocop movies. Earl Boen, the annoying psychiatrist in the Terminator flicks is having some drunk conversation about BBQ joints in the diner with another customer, using noodles as a road map. Denise Crosby (aka Tasha Yar) is in there as someone with enough clout to have a mobile phone in her shiny silver briefcase and be able to call someone to confirm humanity's fucked. (She's also reading a Cliff Notes version of Gravity's Rainbow, and boy do I wish I'd been smart enough to go that route.) Kurt Fuller, who has been in a million things, is the guy Crosby calls to arrange for a chopper to get them to a private jet. The guy who swiped the stereos is played by Mykelti Williamson (who was Bubba in Forrest Gump.)

The movie is focused on Edwards and Winningham (mostly Edwards), so it isn't really a movie where the background or character actor types really get to shine on center stage, but it was kind of cool to see such an eclectic bunch, even if only for a bit.

Losing for Future Losses

It's not been a good year for the St. Louis Cardinals. Hard to complain too much about their first losing season since 2007, but it has been a generally miserable experience watching them find ways to lose. 

Early on, it was the starting pitching - minus the since-traded Jordan Montgomery - being mostly garbage. When that started to round into form, the bullpen started blowing every lead it was handed. Didn't matter which reliever they used, he'd fuck it up somehow. The offense would alternate explosion of eight or more runs with weeks where they couldn't score more than three. The defense, which had been a strong point the previous two seasons (and is vital for a pitching staff that still doesn't strike anybody out), degraded through a combination of injuries, poor personnel choices, and just inexplicable play from normally good defenders.

Nolan Arenado's won a lot of Gold Gloves, but one could have expected some age-related decline as he continued into his early 30s. I didn't expect him to look like his talent was stolen by the Monstars in a baseball-themed remake of Space Jam.

Anyway, the season's done in any real sense beyond seeing if any of the younger players can show progress, or waiting for a few of the veterans to reach personal milestones. Adam Wainwright's quest for 200 wins has been difficult to watch. He pitched so well the first 5 months of last year, I really figured his struggles in September were related to the ground ball he took off the knee. If so, the issue has lingered for over 11 months now.

Situation being what it is, there's at least some portion of the fanbase rooting for the team to be as bad as possible. To tank, in pursuit of a higher draft pick next summer. I guess they figure the team is going to lose anyway, they might as well look for the silver lining.

I can't quite get to that perspective, never have been able to get into tanking as something to support. It seems contrary to the idea of competitive sports. You're supposed to be trying to win. Plus, thanks to all those years watching the Arizona Cardinals, I've seen too much losing due to incompetence rather than design to be enamored with, "We're losing, but it's on purpose!"

Besides, tanking's not a one-year strategy. Certainly not in baseball where it usually takes multiple seasons before a draft pick makes it to the major leagues. It ended up working out for the Astros and (to an extent) the Cubs, but the Astros had 162 wins and 324 losses over a 3-year span, then lost 92 games the next year before finally reaching the playoffs. Took another two years, plus trash can aided cheating - to win a World Series. The Cubs weren't quite that bad - 198 wins to 288 losses over 3 years, then an 89 loss-season before making the playoffs - but their run also ended much faster.

Point being, if the Cards do tank the way some of these folks are rooting, it won't stop with this season. While getting to pick earlier in the draft improves the chances of getting a difference maker, high draft picks crap out all the time in baseball. Pitchers get injured, or can't learn a changeup. Position players turn out to be unable to hit better pitching. It takes a lot of good players to make a good baseball team, not just one or two (ask the Los Angeles Angels.) And it takes time for those players to make it through the minor leagues before they can help. Tanking this year might improve the team in 2026, but it isn't going to do shit for 2024.

It's probably moot, since the Cardinals seem to like being competitive every year. Have a good chance to make the playoffs, then hope things break right their way so they can win it all. Plus, they rely a bit more on attendance for revenue than some of the other franchises. Losing teams don't put butts in the stands with or convince people to buy $12 beers (at least, not at the ballpark), so hopefully this isn't the start of a long trough.

Dr. Fixit - Greg Hatcher and Fred Adams Jr.

This is a collection of stories Greg Hatcher (formerly of CBR's Comics Should be Good blog and the Atomic Junk Shop), wrote for a, I believe, sci-fi/pulp magazine about a character he created called Dr. Fixit (real name Ernie Voskovec). Adams had to finish the fourth and final story after Hatcher died of cancer in 2021.

Ernie's claim to fame was that, from the late '50s through the '60s, he was the go-to guy for lairs and assorted gizmos of the super-villain set. The stories are set years later, when a young NPR reporter has figured out who he was and tracked him in down in an assisted living facility. She convinces him to tell some of his stories, when he's remained tight-lipped about it previously. And so each story is Ernie telling her about one of his adventures. 

Each story has its own hook. The job that ended Ernie's career, the one time he worked for a superhero, his actual last job, so on. Hatcher fills in the backstory of the fictional setting as needed, to the extent Ernie would know the information. So there are heroes who received powers from an experimental serum, and others from radiation, and heroes with no powers at all. Most of the super-villains are eccentric goofs, wanting wild things as part of their "conquer the world" schemes, rather than caring much about money.

Hatcher writes Ernie as alternately bemused and frustrated by the villains. One villain just wanted some of those big poles you run electricity up between to sit behind his main chair, because it looked cool. But Ernie also enjoys the challenge. Trying to figure out how to make some sort of ray gun you can carry like a pistol with enough charge to fire more than once, or how to get enough power for some device that's going to blanket the entire city.

But Ernie's also careful enough to take precautions, because some of the villains are nuts, but they're dangerous nuts. So he carries a few gadgets of his own as protection, and he's not above getting violent if necessary, usually when someone close to him is threatened. Ernie's written with as a straight talker, but with enough rough charm it doesn't come off as rude. Ben Grimm if he were a bit older, maybe.

I think you can feel Hatcher's fondness for the things he's building off in these stories, the superhero or super spy stuff of the '60s. So even though things get heavy occasionally - a few character die ugly - it doesn't weigh the stories down. Maybe because we're hearing about them years after the fact, and so Ernie's made his peace with those outcomes.

'Alastair harrumphed. "I have designed it to be the ultimate stealth urban operational vehicle, infinitely maneuverable with multiple defense and offense capabilities." One corner of his mouth pulled up in another thin-lipped smile. "But yes, with your help, Doctor - Ernie - I expect the Ghostmobile shall be a very cool car."'

Family's Complicated

Is volume 7 of Kino's Journey: The Beautiful World as much a downer as the previous volume? Well, that depends how you look at it.

The volume is split between two stories. The first involves Shizu and what is now his dog, Riku, as they journey towards Shizu's home nation so he can take part in the tournament seen in volume 3. His vehicle has engine trouble and they're forced to stay in a neighboring nation for a few days. A young girl named Rafa sets her eyes on Shizu, and begins to pester him to buy her. See, her family is poor and she has to work to support all her siblings, plus her parents. But if Shizu's buys her, she can leave this land and never have to worry about such things again!

Shizu's got his own impending patricide and subsequent death to worry about, so he's not interested, but she keeps at it and eventually wears him down. As it turns out, Rafa's motives aren't exactly how she presented them, and Shizu is left with nothing to show for his trouble. But as she points out, he's planning to die soon, so what does it matter?

The other story revolves around Kino, at some point in their apprenticeship with Master. It's a very different Kino from the one we see in most stories, and not simply because they have long hair and is still adjusting to being known as "Kino". This Kino is wide-eyed, naive, and still a bit of a child. Thinks that "Master" is an odd name, not realizing it's a title. There's little of the poker face Kino sports later in life, as she cries and shouts and in general doesn't show any patience or forethought.

We see some shooting practice where Kino has to be reminded to wear hearing protection, with the impression this is typical. After doing quite well shooting a frying pan dangling from a rope, Kino tries to jump to grab it to bring it down, succeeding mostly in just making it bob and sway on the rope. It's pretty likely Kino would have a more efficient method later on.

The real hook of that story, and one that prompts a change in Kino, is a traveling salesman who recognizes the coat Kino kept from their namesake, and knows where that land is. It's Kino's first trip with Hermes since escaping their home country, this time going to deliver news to the first Kino's mother.

That trip does not go well, though I like the thicker, wavy line for Kino's perceptions while drugged. End result is, Kino has to leave another country, and understands a little better the dangers that Master left unsaid in the stories of her travels.

Sunday Splash Page #283

 

"Enter the Sandman," in JSA #63, by Geoff Johns (writer), Jerry Ordway (penciller), Wayne Faucher (inker), Hi-Fi (colorist), Ken Lopez (letterer)

DC has this long history and vast backlog of characters, and how they deal with that varies. JSA came out during one of those times when DC apparently decided to lean into the decades of history. Funny to note they tried a Justice Society book in the early '90s and it ended after 10 issues, but flash forward about 6 to 7 years and you've got this book, which last 87 issues, plus various annuals tie-ins and ancillary series.

Maybe James Robinson's success with Starman convinced DC to try to actualize utilize the characters they had just lying around. Fans - a subset of them, at least - liked seeing things connected. Characters with the same codenames tied into a (theoretically) coherent legacy. Like No-Prizes (yeah, it's a different company, I know) come to life. The kind of stuff Geoff Johns seemingly lives to write (dismemberment optional, but highly recommended.)

Or that might have nothing to do with it. I didn't pick up any JSA until years after the fact, and it was due to positive word-of-mouth when I did. Some of the guys at the local comic store liked it, and Kalinara talked about the book a fair amount on her blog, as I think she was a big fan of Sand, aka Sanderson Hawkins, aka Sandy, the Golden Boy, aka whatever the fuck '70s fever dream is going on up there.

Plus, it seemed to be a book that was trying to do something with Power Girl, letting her kick ass and not take any crap from Wildcat, so what the hell. I bought trades of the first couple of arcs, then scattered issues that looked interesting. Sometimes it works for me. There are a couple of done-in-ones around issue 40, one focusing on Power Girl, another on Dr. Mid-Nite, that I like. The insistence on making Black Adam a more-violent Namor, some morally grey guy with noble intentions behind his dismembering of people? Eh, I could take or leave that on its own, but it seemed like it was Johns' in to indulge more graphically violent impulses.

That said, sometimes the stories might as well be gibberish. Sand having powers that gave him control over the earth because there was a story once where he got turned into a big sand monster? OK, sure, fine. But then Johns tries to work in prophetic dream stuff that's either part of weird '70s Sandman or Vertigo Comics Sandman Mystery Theater and it all starts to be a bit much. How many things is Sand supposed to carry on from his mentor? Pick earthbender or pre-cog. Plus, that story has all this stuff about Hector Hall (the new Dr Fate) and his wife Lyta (who is a Fury, or the Fury, I don't know) that I couldn't make heads or tails.

Johns is trying to connect dots that aren't even in the same activity book. Props for the effort, I guess.

Saturday Splash Page #85

 

"Bad End," in The Thing #1, by Walter Mosley (writer), Tom Reilly (artist), Jordie Bellaire (color artist), Joe Sabino (letterer)

Released in late 2021 through early 2022 with the subtitle, "The Next Big Thing," this was a six-issue mini-series set at some point in the FF's history, written by novelist Walter Mosley. In it, things go wrong for Ben Grimm very quickly. He comes back from a fishing trip to find the rest of the FF away and Alicia having a pleasant afternoon with the owner of an art gallery. Ben gets aggressive, then gets arrested, and Alicia breaks up with him.

So he accepts the offer of a pink fairy-looking thing to use their dating service to find someone, and is matched with an attractive and creative 'choreographic clothes designer' named Amaryllis. At which point, people start attacking him. Ben doesn't know why they attack him, but is all too willing to punch them.

Amaryllis is obviously more than she first appears, and the two of them meet a young boy who is endlessly curious and wise beyond his years. He also turns out to be more than he appears. The Thing, however, is still The Thing. Not a genius, but not an idiot. He can tell there's stuff going on with Amaryllis and the boy he doesn't understand, even if he can't figure out what. He's not about to let Doom have a robot army, but he will help him try to recover his mother's soul. (Curious how this and Clobberin' Time both have The Thing team-up with Dr. Doom.) He refuses to give up, which is both a strength and a weakness, especially when combined with his temper, which Mosley seems to amplify. Mosley's version of Ben rarely strikes in response to being struck. Instead, he strikes first.

During the frequent fights, Reilly often goes to series of small panels of hits being landed, which Bellaire shades in the same manner as the splash page above. The fights aren't graphic, exactly, but the Thing's opponents do a fair job getting blood from a stone. The rocks that make up his outer layers aren't stripped away, but they are often pierced or cut, suggesting a certain brutality, as though the opponents respond to his increased aggression with their own.

I think the story ends the way it has to, for who Amaryllis is and who Ben is. He's not going to accept her, not yet. Won't have a choice some day. For now, he and Alicia find their way through the forces trying to manipulate or separate them, and Ben agrees to try getting some anger management.

What I Bought 8/9/2023

Tuesday morning I told the maintenance people at my apartment something related to the AC was leaking water. The last time it happened, it made the linoleum on my kitchen swell and caused stains on the ceiling of the apartment downstairs. I figured given all that, they'd get to it that day.

Took them until yesterday afternoon. Hopefully the floor didn't get worse since I had to choose it a couple of times in between to keep the temps tolerable.

Captain Marvel: Dark Tempest #2, by Ann Nocenti (writer), Paolo Villanelli (artist), Java Tartaglia (color artist), Ariana Maher (letterer) - Aw crap, Nitro's exploding so hard he's fracturing the walls of reality.

Carol and the disaffected teens arrive on another planet. The planet is kind of a craphole, because apparently Earth companies have been paying someone to illegally dump all sorts of waste there. The wealthy on the planet fled underground to bunkers and left the rest of their people on the surface. Carol tries to investigate the surroundings, but gets jumped by Nitro and Nada. She doesn't recognize the former and they fight in space so he can't talk and say who he is, but Nada drags her in somewhere with her weird powers and that's the last we see of her.

Meanwhile, the teenagers and Keziah (the anthropologist who was also talking to the teens) are trying to figure out what the situation is on this planet and how to survive. Blake, who built the AI smartbot, is mostly complaining that the teens are complaining about helping him after he didn't make any effort to help them during atmospheric entry. The robot is rather polite, in that way it offers information that is sorta relevant to their conversations and thanks one of the teens for rolling it out of its landing crater. Then Nada shows up, offering them power.

Also, Spider-Woman's trying to figure out some way to get to Carol when all the super-teams are off doing other crap. Can't believe she wasted time calling Cyclops, like the X-Men were gonna help some inferior human.

I guess we'll see if Nada gets them to accept her offer. She's very good at playing to people's desires or worst instincts, at complimenting them or being glib and sounding clever. Like with Nitro (who is at least starting to question if he just a tool to her.) But even when she does play empathetic, she can't resist being condescending. When Nitro grouses that Captain Marvel is hoarding power, Nada questions whether "power" can be hoarded, that there's a finite amount of it in the universe. She even asks Nitro if, by being so angry at Danvers, is he hoarding anger, and thus depriving others of it. It doesn't seem like a serious question, more like she can't help stirring shit up, even with someone she ostensibly wants on her side.

Of course, Danvers is taking the brusque approach with the teenagers. Accusing them of whining, rather than trying to do something, or spouting motivational poster stuff about how even if they die tomorrow, if they do something good today it was worth it. It's half lead by example and half "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" speeches. It could work in the way reverse psychology does, but it could also be very off-putting.

Villanelli doesn't have as many chances to draw Danvers standing tall and looking impressive, but Danvers does still tend to dominate the panels she's in with the others. And the internal narration Nocenti gives her doesn't spend time on doubt. It portrays Danvers as confident, direct, seemingly always knowing what to do or at least what to try. No indecision, no hesitation, just action because she's sure she has things under control. Meanwhile, Nada tends to be drawn with her face obscured by her hood, just eyes and a Cheshire Cat smile. But she also leans in towards people a lot, invading their space like she's trying to read them so she can tailor her sales pitch.

Paratime - H. Beam Piper

This is a collection of stories Piper wrote with his "Paratime" concept, originally published in a sci-fi mag back in the '40s and '50s. The basic conceit is there are thousands upon thousands of parallel timelines, some very similar to others, but none identical. In one of these timelines, humanity (which apparently originated on Mars) figured out how to move between the timelines.

Not forward or backwards in time, and not in space. If you slipped to the next timeline over at 2 p.m. today in your living room, you would appear in that same place at that same time. It might not be your living room, though, or anyone's living room, for that matter. Humanity might not have progressed past the Iron Age and you just appeared in the king's bath chambers, or it's a Jetsons world and all the buildings are miles above your head.

Piper doesn't get into those aspects all that much, beyond mentioning that as the machine carries one to their destination timeline, it may inadvertently pick up hitchhikers. Piper's more interested in the problems caused by humans. The timeline that developed this machine (which calls itself the First Level) economically exploits all the other timelines.

In "Temple Trouble," a company's employees present themselves as priests of a particular god and use the temples as cover to mine uranium. The issue isn't that they're doing this. It's that their god fell out of favor and several of them are to be executed, which risks their technology being found by the locals. In fact, the protagonist Verkan Vall, who works for the Paratime Police, criticizes a company bureaucrat for not authorizing the head "priest" to use their advanced weapons to kill a few locals and put the fear of the god back in them.

"Time Crime" likewise revolves around Vall and his wife Dalla trying to track down a criminal organization that's abducting people from one timeline and selling them into slavery in another. Again, slavery itself not so bad, as Verkan and Dalla have servants that were pulled from such timelines and are referred to as "proles". But we are assured that's different, because they're treated well. Unless one refuses to cooperate with a police investigation in which case, the brakes are off.

It was a different time, I suppose. Governing systems or ideologies that could be broadly compared to Communism pop up in a couple of stories, always as boogeymen to be averted. Being forgiving, I could figure Piper was pointing out how easy it is for Vall to make these pronouncements, as someone at the top of the heap, and eager to make sure no other timeline figures out this technology and challenges the "First Level's" access to all those resources. He wasn't taken away from his home to be a servant for some guy whose face Piper variously describes as "immobile" or "expressionless" (which I originally thought meant Vall had suffered some sort of injury, but I think he's meant to be stoic.) I'm not sure that's what is happening here.

Paratime is a concept writers could (and I'm sure, have) do a lot with, but Piper sticks to notions suited for adventure. Shootouts and fighting. Maybe that was the constraint of writing for a sci-fi magazine, which probably had certain expectations of the stories it would print. Or maybe that was just what Piper was interested in writing.

'"But, fortunately, they now have the atomic bomb, and they are developing radioactive poisons, weapons of mass effect. And their their racial, nationalistic, and ideological conflicts are rapidly reaching the explosion point. A series of all-out atomic wars is just what that sector needs, to bring their population down to their world's carrying capacity; in a century or so, the inventors of the atomic bomb will be hailed as the saviors of their species."'

Black Phone (2021)

There's someone abducting kids from a Denver suburb in the late '70s, and eventually the unlucky victim is Finney (Mason Thames), who wakes up in a cement block of a basement, confronted by a guy in weird masks (the lower half of which he periodically changes so it shows a different expression each time we see him.)

While the police flail about ineffectually, and Finney's sister Gwen (Madeleine McGraw) tries to find him via her dreams without their alcoholic dad finding out she's doing so, Finney starts receiving calls via the black phone on the wall of his cell. A disconnected phone, the calls from The Grabber's previous victims. Each of the kids has some bit of advice to offer from their own time there. Ways they tried to escape, or things they learned. Like an unlocked door being a trap.

The movie uses their fading memories as a way to build tension. One kid knows his bike lock is on the screen door at the front of the house and he wrote the digits involved down, but not the actual numbers. They were important to him, but since he was a quiet kid with no friends, Finney doesn't know what numbers would be important. I thought the movie might play with the question of whether Finney could trust what the kids were telling him, maybe have an earlier victim be one of his bullies, but it doesn't go that route. Tension enough in Finney trying to MacGuyver an escape from what they give him.

Plus, he has no idea how much time is passing or what sort of schedule the Grabber's visits are on. He's observant enough to realize there's some complicating factor, but any time when he's trying to rig an escape, there was a terror The Grabber would show up and find him digging through the floor or bashing out part of a wall and who knows how things go then.

The movie doesn't go directly into Finney's abduction. Takes the time to establish his and Gwen's lives. That Finney has a crush on a girl (which Gwen playfully taunts him about), that he gets bullied, that both of them live on tiptoes at home because of their dad. Gwen's adopted the approach of being loud and aggressive. When she's questioned by the police because she mentioned something in her dream to one of the victim's sisters, she eventually starts sarcastically admitting she abducted a kid twice her size, then calls the cops "fucking fart knockers," which was hilarious. When her father beats her over this (not hilarious), she grabs his bottle of vodka and smashes it on the kitchen floor. Which gets her beat harder, but was still an impressive move. She can't win, but she can still resist.

Finney takes the opposite approach. Head down, eyes averted, run if you can. But Thames gives him this intense stare and stance. You can almost feel him vibrating with anger during the scene where his sister's being hit. I kept expecting him to fly across the kitchen and try to tackle his dad or clock him with the toaster or something. He doesn't, but you see it again sometimes with The Grabber, so I was waiting for when it finally bursts free. And it was extremely gratifying.

What I Bought 8/2/2023

Fixing to be a slow month for comics, not helped by the fact the local store didn't have any copies of last week's Fantastic Four. I wonder if he got shorted or if it's selling so poorly he doesn't order any. Did get one comic, at least.

Moon Knight #26, by Jed MacKay (writer), Federico Sabbatini (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Travis Lanham (letterer) - Moons over Moloid.

The issue is framed through Dr. Badr, Hunter's Moon, having a session with Marc's therapist Dr. Sterman. Badr's becoming more aware of how his resurrection by a constrained Khonshu was subpar. He went back underground to help the Moloids (who have painted moon emblems on their foreheads, Badr's out here being a missionary, or perhaps moonsionary) that were being used as slave labor in issue 19, because the tunneling has resumed. It's no more clear what the purpose of it was, but the force behind it is revealed as Hunter's Moon found himself up against Vibro, who gloats about working for this Black Spectre. 

Gloats about it in a terrible costume, while making glowy green bullseyes with his powers to repel attacks. Isn't a visual that really screams "vibration", too static. Could have given it more of a jagged, seismograph look. That might infringe on Shocker's look too much, I suppose, but he gets treated like a loser, so why worry about that?

Badr was determined to capture Vibro and get some answers, but when the battle went south, the chorus of past "Fists" in his mind took over and put Vibro in a coma. And that's the issue. The Chorus, as he calls them, are now less a database he can pull from for help, and more a raucous bunch of wild frat boys fucking with his appliances and triggering the security system. Also, you know, it erodes his sense of self if he finds his life already blending and blurring with theirs.

So the flaw in Badr's resurrection is one that wouldn't affect Marc at all, since he's never been connected to his predecessors. It's theoretically irrelevant now, since Khonshu supposedly can't do any resurrections unless they get him out of the Asgardian Hoosegow (and really, how hard can it be to escape that bunch of mead-drinking meatheads? Loki does it all the time.)

I do wonder what the issue would have been for Marc if it had been his resurrection that was imperfect. The most likely is that now all of the guys would make it back, with one of Steven or Jake being the likely unlucky one. End result is much the same, a less-effective Fish of Khonshu, since MacKay's made some effort to show what each of the three bring to the table.

Sunday Splash Page #282

 

"Cold Day in Hel," in Journey Into Mystery #646, by Kathryn Immonen (writer), Valerio Schiti (artist), Jordie Bellaire (color artist), Clayton Cowles (letterer)

So Journey Into Mystery was re-titled Thor, due to limits on how many different books Marvel could actually publish a month back then, and went like that for decades. The title was revived briefly in '96 when I'm guessing Thor was supposed to be dead (or in Heroes Reborn, same difference), continuing the numbering. It was an Asgard book, then Shang-Chi's, then Black Widow's. That ran to #521. 

In 2011, it returned again, as a Kieron Gillen-written book starring Kid Loki for 24 issues (which Marvel of course shipped over 18 months.) Then it became a Sif book, as part of one of those Marvel NOW! things they were doing in the early-to-mid 2010s.

Kathryn Immonen got 10 issues all told, 9 with Valerio Schiti as artist, one with Pepe Larraz, and Jordie Bellaire as color artist throughout. I don't really know what the status quo was with Asgard at that point. It's still in Oklahoma, but now it's Asgardia. Odin is nowhere to be seen, but I'm not sure who is actually running the place.

At any rate, the place had been attacked and severely damaged - again - and Immonen plays up Sif's frustration with this. She's a warrior, but she keeps failing to protect her home. Asgard(ia) is supposed to be great, but it keeps getting burned to the ground. I thought that whole cycle was kind of the point, but I can see how it would wear on you after a time.

The first arc is Sif looking for an ancient power that will help her make sure she can protect her home, and finding. . .not that. Something Heimdall knew of, but kept secret, and when he learns Sif knows of it, sends her away in an attempt to protect their home from. Immonen's version of Sif and Heimdall are not particularly close, though I've rarely seen them written that way by anyone else, either, so no quibbles there.

When Sif eventually concludes she wasn't looking for power so much as a chance to just stop caring about consequences, the second arc has her trying to protect in other ways. Gaea is trying to regrow a garden in Asgardia, without much success. Sif is trying to help, also without much success. Eventually they end up in space, Beta Ray Bill shows up.

Immonen writes Bill as kind of a moron. It's not great. Like, yes, he's very earnest and in the "noble hero" image, but that doesn't make him stupid. But Immonen's Sif is also very, "hit things first, hit things second, take a breather, hit them some more," type. There's even a set of panels in one of the issues of Sif just hacking away at a blue-blooded '60s Marvel sci-fi monster, pausing in the middle to wipe some of the blood from her eye, then resuming hacking. Nobody's really demonstrating much in the way of brain cells.

It does allow Schiti to show off some excellent physical acting in the characters. Sif is expressive, not necessarily with large gestures (Bill definitely talks with his arms and hands, though), but with a particular glance or the tilt of her head. Lots of shadowing of Sif's face in the first arc, when she's under the effects (or thinks she is) of the incantation, a lot of close-ups on the uncomfortable looks of everyone else around her.

Bellaire saves the brighter shades and more unusual colors for the stranger things. The sci-fi monsters are vivid oranges and greens. The mysterious living ship that attacks Bill and Sif is a bright, bloody red. The interior is aglowing orange, but a different shade from Bill or Ti Asha Ra (the alleged Korbinite Galactus restored in Beta Ray Bill: Godhunter). Makes a nice contrast from the Avengers space base Stark built they're using, which is all dull gunmetal grey. Enhances the otherworldly aspect of those elements, or Gaea, whose skin is a light, brighter, cleaner shade than Sif's. Something more than even a god of Asgard.

Saturday Splash Page #84

 

"Into the Hulkiverse," in The Thing (vol. 2) #2, by Dan Slott (writer), Andrea DiVito (artist), Laura Villari (colorist), Dave Lanphear (letterer)

The Thing didn't get another crack at a solo book for 20 years. To be fair, the '90s weren't a great time for the FF overall, but even the Human Torch got a brief ongoing series a couple of years before Ben's next turn. This time, it was Dan Slott as writer, with Andrea DiVito as artist (to start.)

In some manner owing to Ben only just learning one-quarter of the FF's money from patents or merchandising or whatever is his, he gets big-time rich. The first few issues are Ben letting the money go to his head, dating an actress, throwing cash around, while his friends tut-tut. Ben and Alicia are on the outs again, as she's dating some milquetoast architect guy who conveniently goes away at the series' conclusion. The actress girlfriend goes away even quicker, after a delightful journey to Murderworld.

Ben doesn't go broke or anything like that, but does decide to spend his money in more community-oriented ways after Reed uses Franklin to teach some sort of lesson on how meaningless it is to just spend money on personal pleasures. Reed's looking at it the wrong way. Ben buying customized SUV limos and whatnot keeps him in a better mood, and therefore less like to use Reed like a particularly annoying piece of dental floss.

DiVito's version of the Thing feels in the vein of George Perez's. Taller than most people, broad, but the features are rounded or smoothed rather than squared off. But the shading gives him a gritty texture that I don't see a lot of artists use. Like grains of sand would come off on your fingers if you ran them along his arm.

Kieron Dwyer's version is in that "squared off" style. Walks a bit hunched over, head broader, eyes bigger. The brow ridge sticks out farther, allowing for more expressive faces. The last two issues are humorous one-offs - a time travel birthday trip for Alicia gone wrong and a big superhero poker game - and that look works better for those than I think DiVito's would.

After 8 issues, the book ended with Ben and Alicia back together. Less than a quarter of what his first series got, and less than one-twelfth of Marvel Two-in-One. But it's a different time, plus this was during Straczynski's time on the main Fantastic Four title, and Aguirre-Sacasa's Marvel Knights FF book, so they might have been overloading the market.

Also, the book started just a few months before Civil War kicked off, so perhaps not the best time for it in terms of tone.