Pyramids - Terry Pratchett

Always remarkable to me that, among all the Tom Clancy knockoffs, books about paranormal detectives and their werewolf/vampire/changeling boyfriends, and books about cats solving memories, the Dollar Generals will have Discworld books for 3 bucks.

Teppic has just passed his test to become an assassin, despite realizing he doesn't want to actually kill people. Before he can come up with a creative bit of thinking to excuse the taking of lives, he's visited by a seagull. because his father, who is the pharaoh of a once prosperous, now increasingly broke kingdom on the banks of a river. It's broke because they keep making increasingly elaborate pyramids for their dead rulers. 

The pyramids also collect time energy, somehow, and when you make too large a pyramid, bad things happen. I didn't really understand that part, when Time becomes width and whatnot. End result, they end up where all their many contradictory gods exist and it turns out once you're dead, being stuffed in a giant rock tomb isn't all that great, either.

The plot's not really that interesting to me, and Pratchett keeps jumping around between characters I don't particularly care about. The architect and his two sons, the embalmer, the whole thing about camels being Discworld's greatest mathematicians. I was mostly wanting to follow Teppic and the high priest Dios. The way things have become so set in stone in the kingdom that the ruler really can't change anything, even when he desperately needs to.

"There's something really weird going on over there," he said. "They're shooting tortoises."

"Why?"

"Search me. They seem to think the tortoise ought to be able to run away."

"What, from an arrow?"

"Like I said. Really weird. You stay here. I'll whistle if it's safe to follow me."

"What will you do if it isn't safe?"

"Scream."

Reflections of a Teenage Bat - Mad Stan

It's been almost exactly three months since the first of these looks at Terry McGinnis' recurring enemies and what they reflect about him. I started with Spellbinder, and as promised, we're moving to Mad Stan today.

 

(Artwork by Norm Breyfogle and Andrew Elder) 

Stan might be a bit of a cheat, honestly. He's rarely the main villain. In one case, Spellbinder uses him as part of a plan to turn the police against Batman by making it appear Terry killed Mad Stan. In another, he's really just the excuse the plot requires for Terry to miss a date with Dana, so she can be approached by a mutated guy that lives in the sewers.

And that's because Stan's not a particularly varied character. He's always out to tear down the government or elements of bureaucracy, and he always takes the same approach: Blow it up. He reminds me of the Evil Midnight Bomber, What Bombs at Midnight from The Tick, although I think Stan is slightly more focused. Only slightly, as he was prepared to blow up a Department of Health building because they were going to raise the fee for licensing pets. Although I'm surprised Mad Stan would risk his chihuahua, Boom-Boom, being logged in "the system."

Stan doesn't have much of a backstory. He never got an origin episode or issue of the comics, so we don't know what, exactly, made him hate and decry governmental systems and their effect on people, or why he decided the best solution was high explosives. Maybe there's a tragedy, Maybe he read a book that really spoke to him. Maybe he just enjoys it.

Like Terry before he became Batman, Stan's anger is unfocused. Terry would lash out at Jokerz, his father, school bullies, whoever. Stan ostensibly targets "the government", doesn't there's no real plan behind it. No, "take this out first, to cripple response when I target this other thing." Across his appearances he tries destroying a library because there's too much information for people to process, then targets a re-election fundraiser for the district attorney, and the aforementioned attack on the Department of Health over pet licenses.

Stan is the adolescent who can see that there are things wrong with society around him, but can't see how to fix them. So he decides the proper response is to just destroy them instead. Maybe Stan has some big plan to build things back up properly after, but more likely he's not given it any thought. Or he hasn't since he decided tearing everything down was the best first step.

That's possibly the path Terry was on before his father died. Going through life angry for reasons he couldn't really explain, picking fights to give an outlet to that anger. Now he. . . gets to put on a strength-augmenting costume and beat people up. Typical caveats about vigilantism aside, Terry is generally trying to protect people from those intending direct harm. Stan probably thinks he's helping people by attacking the structures he believes are strangling their lives, but he doesn't seem terribly concerned if any of the people he intended to help get blown up in the process of him helping them.

At the end of the day, Stan decided to just indulge his anger to its full extent. His dog is safe, but anyone and everything else is shit outta luck if he decides to blow something up while they're nearby.

The Empty Man

The description said it was about an ex-cop investigating a series of disappearances, so I was very confused with the first 20 minutes taking place in the mountains of Bhutan, where one of a quartet of hikers finds a bizarre shrine/skeleton in a crevasse and ultimately brings about the death of the other three.

Then, the movie shifts to St. Louis, to an ex-cop who agrees to help a friend locate her missing daughter. His search leads him to something called the "Empty Man", which is one of those urban legends where you summon it by blowing through a bottle on a bridge while thinking about the Empty Man. It would seem difficult to accomplish since no one seems sure what the Empty Man is, but it works somehow.

Honestly, I'm still not sure what the Empty Man is after the movie was finished. Some other-dimensional thing that wants in to our reality is the best I can figure. Why it wants in, I'm still not sure. Why, once summoned it does the whole bit where you only hear it the first night, then see it the second, then it takes you on the third, I don't know, either. It would seem to deflate the threat because that means you as the audience know the first two times it appears are ultimately just a display. Nothing is going to happen, yet. 

In practice, I actually did get spooked when it rushed towards the camera, so I guess it's effective in spite of the apparent rules. Not like you can count on eldritch horrors to follow the rules. Plus, the movie likes creating the sense that something could happen at any moment. Lot of shots peering into an indistinct distance. Poorly lit hallways or foggy bridges, seemingly empty forests where you think something might happen. Although the best part was when he finds a bunch of cultists dancing around a huge flame and they notice him. Wouldn't have minded that chase going for a bit longer.

The movie is over two hours, and it does drag at points, but I'm not sure what to cut. There's a lot of him running from one place to another, but it's part of his journey deeper into the mess and confusion as the clock ticks away towards the third night. The scenes with the police are mostly irrelevant, other than I guess we'd expect the police to be making some token effort to investigate a bunch of disappearances turned apparent suicides.

Eye Contact is Overrated Anyway

So do I. It's called alcohol.

Volume 5 of Kino's Journey: The Beautiful World takes a different approach from the earlier volumes. Whereas most of the earlier volumes were focused on Kino's briefs visits to different kingdoms, this one focuses much of its pages on just one land, where the people can't look at each other.

Iruka Shiomiya (or maybe that's how it went in Keiichi Sigsawa's light novel originally) takes the approach of having Kino visit the kingdom, and find everyone wearing masks that can be adjusted to show expressions. Then there's a flashback to when the woman who taught Kino how to shoot, who insists she be referred to as "Master" (that's her with the dark hair up there), visited the country with a previous apprentice. What Kino finds is the end result of Master's solution.

After Kino departs, the prince from volume 3, Shizu, arrives some time later. He responds somewhat differently to what he finds than Kino did, which is nice. Kino tends to go with the flow. Unless someone or something directly threatens her life, she lets people live their lives as they wish. Shizu, maybe because he spent years exiled from his kingdom and determined to come back and set things right, can't help getting involved. And his attempt to help ends, well, it's either hilarious or creepy depending on how you look at it.

Then there's Kino's teacher, who we get our first real glimpse of here. She's willing to get involved, if you pay her, and she's very morally flexible. One of the other chapters is her some years ago, telling Kino about a visit to a land where a sniper lurks in the woods and kills people for money. Some people hired her to kill him, but other people hired her to leave him be. He settles disputes, so really, he's like a community service. Like a garbageman.

The other major story in this volume, which leads it off, is about Kino visiting a land that is supposedly incredibly unfriendly. Yet Kino is greeted warmly, so you know the other shoe is gonna drop. I already knew what was coming because this was story they used for the 13th episode of the anime, but that didn't make me any less sad when it played out as it did. It cast a pall over the rest of the volume.

Sunday Splash Page #183

 

"Two Kinds of Hunger," in Excalibur #61, by Alan Davis (writer/penciler), Mark Farmer (inker), Glynis Oliver (colorist), Chris Eliopoulos (letterer)

Sorely tempted to go with the page of Kylun barging through the bathroom door on a very surprised Nightcrawler from issue 46, but the Phoenix vs. Galactus throwdown here is too nice to pass up.

I've not read any of the earliest Excalibur, with Claremont as writer and Davis on art. From reading online, I know there was a Cross-Time Caper storyline that went on far too long, and that Davis departed around the time it ended. Replaced by a number of artists who were Not Alan Davis. Claremont left, there were several issues written by Scott Lobdell (never a good sign) and then Davis returned in issue 42, as writer and penciler.

The run lasts 26 issues, concluding with #67, although there are several issues in the 50s that are either only written by Davis, or lack his involvement entirely. Most of those are also written by Scott Lobdell, but are included in the Visionaries collections Marvel did for Alan Davis' stint on the book. Which is how I collected the run, most of a decade ago.

Davis' run feels like it's about identity, or maybe free will. Self-determination? The initial storyline, which runs up to #50, is about how Excalibur came together as a team in the first place. Whether they have any control over their lives at all, or if they're just puppets of higher powers. (The answer would seem to be, "You'll never know for sure you make your own choices.")

Captain Britain in particular has to struggle with feeling manipulated, since so much of that story revolves around Roma and Merlin, who created the Captain Britain Corps. He can't figure out why he was so much better at being a hero on his own than he is in a team. Even after that, he has to decide who he wants to be, and what's important to him. If he's going to be Captain Britain, then that's what he has to do, he can't half-ass it. If he's going to be in a relationship with Meggan, then he needs to amek sure she knows how important she is to him.

Beyond that, Rachel Summers has her own struggles with identity, not aided in the least by the Phoenix Force's sentience hanging around. If Rachel's mind withdraws, the Phoenix can take control of her body, and the Phoenix likes being around on this plane of existence. And Rachel likes having its power, but it messes with her mind, costs her memories of her life before reaching this time period. The Phoenix has to make a choice, and then Rachel decides she has to go back to her time, at least long enough to make it a better place. 

Meggan sets out, with Rachel's assistance, to learn more about her origins, and grows more confident in herself. Nightcrawler struggles with being team leader, a role that didn't usually go well for him in his X-Men days. Between adding interstellar traveler Cerise and sheltered wizard Feron to the cast, both of whom don't know much about the world they inhabit, Shadowcat's the most stable member of the team. Kitty doesn't seem to really go through any major trials or tribulations. I don't know if Davis just didn't have anything in mind for her, or figured Claremont put her through enough of a wringer it was someone else's turn.

It's not all deadly serious stuff. For a few issues, periodic foe/annoyance Technet ends up living in the team's lighthouse and are briefly molded into a team by an injured Nightcrawler when the rest of Excalibur's elsewhere. One issue is set in another universe, where reptiles are the dominant force, so their Excalibur are talking, costumed reptiles. Davis' first issue begins with the team being attacked by an angry baby chick named "Hawd Boiled Henwy". Which immediately blows up. So that part's not so funny.

Davis is working with Mark Farmer as inker, and Glynis Oliver as colorist, and so the book just looks lovely. Most of the characters are very pretty people, especially the heroes, but there's just a variety of looks and styles. All of Technet are wildly different looking beings, for example. Even when there's more than one version of the character, their body language and expressions can tell you how the personalities differ. He's capable of body horror when it's needed (within reason, we're not talking Junji Ito here) for the Jamie Braddock issues, and he has to sense of timing and small details needed for humor. I'm particularly fond of the three-panel bit where Cerise investigates "lip massage" with Nightcrawler, and Kurt's tail is making these loops and twists while the clock in the background shows they've been at it a while.

Farmer is able to lend a weight to Davis' work to keep things from looking to sleek all the time. Oliver's colors are brilliant. The psychedelic look she gives everything when we see the world the way Meggan can, as energy, or Jamie does, as all these threads he can pull on. Or during the battle between Galactus and the Phoenix, the use of white space to make the battle almost blinding to represent the amount of energy these two are throwing at each other.

When Davis left, Lobdell took over as writer for over a year, with a run that I'm pretty sure is beloved by no one. He threw Rachel Summers somewhere off into Limbo, and decided Cerise was actually some sort of Shi'ar war criminal. Then came the Warren Ellis run, which I bought the Visionaries collections of the same time I bought Davis'. I don't own it any longer; removed it from the collection within a year or two of buying it. I didn't know about him being a creep, so I can't claim it was some moral stand. I just didn't enjoy it very much. Constantly shifting art teams (and very Nineties art most of the time), more Pete Wisdom than I required, some Hellfire Club machinations I wasn't interested in.

What I Bought 9/8/2021

I joke at work my allergies are a psychosomatic response to being at work, but I really wonder. My allergies are fine at home, and as soon as I get to work, nose starts running. It's clearly a sign for me to run away from that place, but I want to save my vacation days for a better time.

In more relevant, but probably no more interesting news, I went to the store hoping for four comics. Five, if I was really lucky. I found two. Oh well.

Defenders #2, by Al Ewing and Javier Rodriguez (storytellers), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - They only had the Quinones variant with Strange and Masked Raider looking at the tarot deck. Man, we could have had Valkyrie or Beast on this team instead of the Surfer and friggin' Cloud? Well, OK, Beast is a morally compromised trashfire at this point, but if he dies while they're in another timeline, we might get a non-fucked up version back in Krakoa's resurrection protocol. And Valkyrie is still good.

6th Universe's version Galactus is a problem, especially since Strange can't trust his magic to do what he wants. I feel as though I did not understand the whole "letting magic do as it will" thing from the first issue. 7th Universe Galactus' mom has a Mother-Cube (slams head repeatedly against desk) that will help Omnimax feel things, and hopefully make him stop eating their planet. If the Surfer can keep his herald occupied. That herald being the evil scientist guy they're after. The Surfer tricks him and steals his power, but gets sent home in the process. Meanwhile, the rest of the team, plus Galactus' mom, is sent back to the 5th Universe, which appears to be a Lovecraftian horror show. I thought that was the Cancerverse. Everything old is new again is old again, or something.

Interesting the Surfer's the one not coming along, since he apparently knows who the Masked Raider is, and knows the Raider has somehow anticipated everything Strange has done. Ugh, I hope the Surfer is wrong about that. I hate those, "I knew you would do exactly that thing, no matter how risky or imbecilic," type characters. And unlike the Surfer, I have no idea who the Raider is, so I don't have any particular reason to give him benefit of the doubt, or not hate him on principle.

Not ecstatic Taaia is going to be tagging along either, since that means more of the "Kirby Speak". It still just feels so forced and needlessly meta-referential. But what the hell, they're going to throw her into a universe dominated by magic, so we'll see how she takes to that. Plus, her baby boy is alone back at her place now. I hope he doesn't get hungry.

At least the book looks gorgeous. The color work Rodriguez is doing looks fantastic. The battle between the Surfer and Carlo Zota is particularly nice, but also the way Omnimax' face is always in shadow, matching the Surfer's musings that this Devourer lacks the reluctance and regret in his feeding that marks Galactus' feeding. Granted, I've never cared much for Galactus' excuses that he only does what he must, or he is of cosmic consonance or whatever bullshit writers handwave for why characters shouldn't kill Big G when they have the chance, but I suppose him feeling bad about all those lives he snuffs out counts for a tiny bit of something.

Deadbox #1, by Mark Russell (writer), Benjamin Tiesma (artist), Vladimir Popov (colorist), Andworld (letterer) - Where are the custodial staff? How am I supposed to check to spinner rack with all that warm, blood-flavored corn syrup on the floor?

Penny is running her father's convenience store because he's taken ill, and she can't afford to go back to college. So she spends her evenings at home, watching movies out of the mysterious "Deadbox", with films no one has ever heard of. In this issue, the movie is about the humans sending a perfect representative to an alien world we've befriended through long-range communication. But it's a long voyage alone for the human, and by the time he arrives, he's not what his hosts expected.

Considering her father appears to be wasting away, and we see a DVD called "The Vanishing Man" in the panel just before, I'm assuming the two are related. Which means the film Penny watched is related to her fate somehow. The person who stays behind in a community she doesn't have a lot of love for, the whole God n' guns thing, but maybe she can't get back, either. Whatever she had in college, she's not getting back to it, and it's already forgotten about her. On to the next person hoping they can get a degree that will get them a useful job without falling too deep into the debt hole.

Tiesma's art has a scratchy, rough edge to it. Makes everyone look a little threadbare and weathered, while Popov's coloring is mostly a muted, muddy tone. It's a dying community most likely, at least economically. Hard to say about it socially, so far. It's not changing, it just settled at a certain point and began to decay. Although even the coloring for the movie is kind of odd. The representative (or "volunteer", as the movie keeps calling him) looks a greenish-grey even before his physical and mental state begin to decay, and while Earth is comparatively brighter than everything else, it's not blindingly so.

The Machinist

That movie where Christian Bale emaciated himself for the role of a machine shop operator named Trevor who's been struggling with insomnia for a year. He doesn't know why he can't get any sleep, and each time it looks like he's close, something wakes him up. He has two people he confides in, a sex worker named Sheila and the waitress at an airport diner. Sheila harbors hopes of maybe having a domestic life with Trevor, while the waitress is a single mom, just like Trevor's mother was.

Trevor unravels increasingly fast over the course of the movie. He makes a mistake, costing a coworker a limb and gets paranoid the other guys are out for revenge. He's sure there's a mysterious coworker named Ivan everyone insists doesn't exist. Someone leaves a post-it note on his fridge. He keeps forgetting to pay his utilities bill, even though he's always on time with his rent.

It took me two-thirds of the movie to piece together what was going on, but at a certain point, about the time Trevor lets himself be hit by a car, it becomes pretty clear what the deal is. Which is OK, the movie does some fun stuff with Trevor's perceptions as he gets increasingly shaky and paranoid. I did get irritated with the frequent shots were the camera is looking at Trevor, and then he suddenly spies something over our shoulder. He always leans and cranes his neck like he has to peer around us, and the director seemed to enjoy dragging out the reveal of whatever it was (usually another post-it or Ivan). I don't need to see Christian Bale act confused that much.

In some ways, the movie feels like a bit of a throwback. Mostly in the music cues, which feel very on the nose and a bit like something out of a '60s suspense/thriller film. But also in some of the symbolism, with the left path/right path choices. The contrast between the impeccably clean living of the waitress, or how nice the diner looks, and the dingy, sickly look of all the flourescent lit places. The machine shop, his apartment (until his power is cut off), Sheila's place. The lighting really enhances the sunken cheeks and bony limbs Bale's rocking (seriously, that could not have been healthy for him.) 

Some of the scenes of Bale chasing after Ivan's car in his truck, peering through the windshield while tense music plays, reminded me of Janet Leigh's flight away from the city with the stolen loot in Psycho. Maybe the music, or the tension in Bale as he's staring so doggedly out the windshield while cars rush past going to other way. Where he's chasing, but really he's running away.

Thankfully, Things Get Better in November

After the disaster that was the October solicitations, November's are a real improvement. Even if a lot of the things that interest me are larger graphic novels I probably won't buy for months. Might as well start with those.

Image releases the first volume of Shadecraft, by Joe Robertson, Lee Garbett and Antonio Fabela. About a young woman who thinks shadows are trying to kill her. I couldn't quite commit to buying it when it was coming out, but maybe as a trade, I'll be able to pull the trigger. From A14 Books, there's Martin Stiff's Tiny Acts of Violence about a schoolteacher in late-1960s East Berlin being pursued by something. That one's $35, so it might be a while unless I win one of those $10,000 prizes Missouri's awarding for being vaccinated and just go nuts with the money. Volume 1 of Steve Orlando and Matthew Dow Smith's Dead Kings is out through Aftershock, about a man enlisting the help of an old soldier to rescue his younger brother from a work camp in some dystopian world.

Is that all? Not even close! 1903: Manhunt is about a sheriff and his deputy trying to hunt down a killer who escaped prison to take revenge on his gang that betrayed him. Judging by the mouth on the shadow in the background of the cover, the killer is either Venom or Killer Croc. Anyway, that's by Federico Galeotti and Francesco Mazzoli, through New Friday (or Lev Gleason - New Friday). Magnetic Press has Carbon Silicon by Mathieu Bablet, about two robots designed to care for humans who are separated for 100 years. We get to see the fall of humanity through their eyes.

What do you mean I need to pick less depressing books? OK, how about this, Genghis Con by Oliver Ho, Daniel Reynolds, Ruth Redmond and Chris Peterson, about a grifter trying to help her sister by winning a rally race from England to Mongolia. Maybe there'll be Vikings with beehive catapults like Speed Racer! Probably not, but there could be. Or the second volume of Strange Adventures of a Broke Mercenary? I'm sure a down-on-his-luck merc taking a job from a mysterious princess can lead to nothing but good times!

OK, that's all the collected edition stuff. Single issues, Moon Knight is up to issue 5, Defenders up to issue 4. Giant-Size Black Cat is going to be the culmination of MacKay's time writing the character. And Walter Mosley and Tom Reilly are working on a Thing book. I'm not clear on if it's a one-shot or an ongoing, though. I'm not going to buy this, but I'll mention Marvel decided the proper writer to follow Al Ewing on Incredible Hulk is Donny Cates. Cripes, why not just bring Howard Mackie back?

Source Point has the fourth issue of Yuki vs. Panda, but that's of no concern to me now. Besides, the solicit says the panda might make a friend, and that is still not what I wanted. There's also Tales from the Dead Astronaut. I assume Jonathan Thompson and Jorge Luis Gabotto are using the astronaut corpse as the storyteller or narrator for a bunch of unconnected short stories. Like the Cryptkeeper.

Vault didn't have Deadbox listed, but the first issue was supposed to ship in August and I haven't seen any sign, so maybe that's why. There is issue two of Rush, and the first issue of a book called Lunar Room, about a former werewolf bodyguard being hired by a mage. Judging by the main character's clothes, it's going to be more of a present day setting than medieval, which suits me fine. Finally, from Image is Grrl Scouts, which is a series of mini-series Jim Mahfood's been doing since the late '90s, I guess. I should probably try to read some of the earlier ones before I commit myself to buying the newest one, but he did the cover art for Alex' album, so I ought to at least keep an eye out for this.

The Addams Family (1991)

I decided to watch this again for the first time in a couple of decades because of a post I saw online with an excerpt from a screenwriter's notes about how they wanted Gomez (Raul Julia) and Morticia (Anjelica Huston) to give off demonic levels of horniness in every scene they were in together. I was curious to see if that came off in what is basically a family comedy.

Of course, I Googled it last week trying to find that post, and it turns out the person who originally tweeted it made it up as a joke. Well, shit. But what the hell, watch the movie anyway and see if it's an accurate description.

I'd say, yes, pretty much. Maybe not every scene they're in; but the exceptions are understandable. When Gomez is depressed and lost over the betrayal by Fester, for example. Not really appropriate to the mood the movie is going for then. Otherwise, yeah, those two are pretty much down to fuck all the time.

It's fun to watch Huston and Julia flirt and swoon over each other constantly, though. Gomez is much more over the top, while Morticia is very composed, with a dry sense of humor. Huston lets a bit of the emotion out as needed, just glimpses to hint at what's lurking underneath. Meanwhile, Raul Julia's over here looking like he's having the time of his life leaping around with swords and doing Cossack dances.

The movie does, as far as I know, capture the feel of the old TV show and the New Yorker cartoons that, for all they're a little kooky, the Addams are a close-knit loving family. It's just that their idea of siblings playing together involves electric chairs and meat cleavers. And the actors play it all perfectly straight, because it is normal to their characters. 

Really, even the other characters don't act like it's too weird. Like the judge doesn't hate the Addamses because they're weirdos. He hates them because Gomez keeps hitting golf balls through his windows. Which is, frankly, kind of a dick move, and also kind of stupid to piss off a judge. Tully accepts Gomez wants to swordfight whenever he visits. It annoys him, just like the Gate catching his jacket, but he's used to it. When Gomez and Morticia get in a bidding war over the Chinese finger trap they put up for the charity auction, and it practically turns into foreplay, nobody in the audience blinks an eye. That's just how Gomez and Morticia act. (There's one notable exception, but I'll get to him.)

Which lets the audience react on their own terms rather than nudging them and going "eh, eh? Pretty weird, right? Bet you'd like to laugh at it, huh?"

The plot's kind of an odd duck. Not the part about someone trying to steal the family fortune and their home. I feel like 75% of all family movies in the '80s and '90s involved someone losing their house. Ah, for the days when people could actually dream of having a house to get stolen/robbed/bulldozed as part of a major commercial development. 

The bit where Fester's been missing for 25 years, and returns is a little more unusual. Fester's the one who does react to the oddness of the family. Which, since he's supposed to be an imposter initially, and isn't from around there, makes perfect sense. But even then Christopher Lloyd doesn't play Fester as grossed out, so much as just confused. Because Gomez keeps expecting him to remember things, and he doesn't know them. He gets scared when they travel down an unexpected slide, but it's because he was caught by surprise. Understandable reactions, especially if you factor in the eventual amnesia explanation, and figure some part of him feels this is normal.

I'm not sure why Christopher Lloyd decided to wear a "I just pooped" look through most of the movie, but he does. Interesting choice to be sure.

God, the Devil, and Fashion

Behold the Staff of God. *snorts and snickers*

I said I'd review the first volume of Eniale & Dewiela soon. Well, it's soon.

The chapters are a mix of the duo getting into trouble while trying to do their respective duties (saving souls for Eniale, buying them for Dewiela), and the two of them getting into trouble while just running around having fun. All the chapters are standalone, although a few of the characters will make a return appearance in volume 3.

Most notable of those is an Interpol agent who is also a trained exorcist. Unlike everyone else, he's convinced a giant poodle appearing in the middle of a city causing and calling forth for "mother" can only be the work of demons. He stumbles across Dewiela's possessed motorcycle while she and Eniale are loose in Paris replacing their wardrobes. He's hard to take seriously, not the least for the fact his robe makes me think he's some dropout from Harry Potter school. Oh, and he chases Dewiela and her blonde "hostage" across the city on a Segway. What a putz.

The other, and more touching, chapter with an eventually returning character involves Maria, a little girl whose mother is sick and dying. The girl has called on any higher or lower power she can, which brings our protagonists to her door. This was one where I really thought Dewiela was going to win, as Eniale admits that she is not an angel with sufficient power to actually do anything. All she can offer is to live a good life and maybe someday God will smile upon blah blah blah. You know what I'm talking about.

That's not how it goes, as Eniale cheats to sort of perform a great miracle on behalf of Maria and her mother, granting them a boon from the Archangel of Death. It's a clever move, but more than a little dishonest. I felt bad for Dewiela. Sure, she took advantage of desperate people in exchange for their souls, but those people made those bargains knowing what they were giving up. It's restraint of fair trade is what it is. Which means God's a socialist, which, yeah, that tracks, contrary to what Fox News and those mega-church dipshits say.

Sunday Splash Page #182

 

"An Old Woman, a Devil, and a Girl with a Tail," in Eniale and Dewiela vol. 2, chapter 8, by Kamome Shirahama

This is a 3-volume manga series that was released here in the States over the last year, and which I picked up over the last six months (next manga review I do will be volume 1 of this book, actually.)

Eniale's an angel. Dewiela is her best friend, who happens to be a demon. A fair number of the stories revolve around Dewiela trying to convince a mortal to give up their soul, and Eniale trying to stop her. Probably an equal number of stories are simply the two of them getting up to various hijinks and rapidly escalating things by calling on the resources of their respective realms. The very first story is the two of them fighting in Rome about clothes until they find a baby abandoned on a park bench and both deciding to help reunite it with its parents.

Which eventually involves a leviathan-sized poodle stomping through the city. That sort of absurdity is fairly common. Eniale tries some rejuvenating lotion of Dewiela's she finds, but it causes her to sprout multiple extra sets of wings, which would elevate her in the Heavenly Host. Right into a position where she'd been stuck behind a desk forever. The struggle over a priest who has potential to be an angel, but desires to be a devil leads to a full-on zombie outbreak.

In practice, the two of them just seem to be the sort of friends who enjoy squabbling. The fact they're on opposing sides is part of the fun for them, maybe. Like those cartoons about the sheepdog and the coyote. Fight tooth and nail while they're on the clock, go clothes shopping or hang out at the beach when they aren't. I don't know if Shirahama really likes drawing clothes, or just likes drawing the two of them in different outfits, but they don't tend to stick to one look for very long.

There's a fair amount of invoking classical painting styles in Shirahama's work, especially in the full-page splashes that involve one the two leads really using their powers. So naturally that's not what I used. The kind of painting with fancy borders meant to evoke a scroll or a tapestry, with smaller imagery in the corners and characters in poses evoking The Last Supper. The light of God shining down from the top of the painting to backlight the character. That kind of thing.

One thing I didn't expect was that, even when Dewiela wins, she ends up losing. Not that Eniale's doing great at her job, but when the two of them are pitted against each other over someone's soul, it's always the angel that wins out. I know Christianity is part of the religious landscape in Japan, but I wasn't figuring a manga to be so hung up on Hell not prospering.

What I Bought 8/27/2021 - Part 3

Since I'm writing this Tuesday evening, hopefully I got through my two days in the field without incident and am right now enjoying an early start to my weekend. Fingers crossed! Here's two issues of one comic I've been quite enjoying.

Midnight Western Theatre #3 and 4, by Louis Southard (writer), David Hahn (artist), Ryan Cody (colorist), Buddy Beaudoin (letterer) - It's funny to me how Andrasofszky's covers make Alexander look alternately dangerous or suave, when he's actually a bit of a goober. Not an unpleasant one, but still kind of a whiny, sheltered young man.

As with the first two issues, 3 and 4 both start in the 1840s, with Ortensia and her father in Oregon. This time, we learn Ortensia's father wasn't nearly the judge of men he claimed, and what that got both of them. Him killed, her used as a virgin sacrifice by some schlubs hoping for immortality. I'm going to assume by her continued unusual existence they didn't get it.

Past that, both issues spend most of their pages in the 1860s. Issue 3 fragments itself a little further by positioning that part of the story as being told by a Native American named Ata'halne to his grandsons in the 1890s. About how he didn't go along with mass relocation of his people, and found a man wearing one of those plague masks who told him, if he hunted down and killed a "skinwalker" that was terrorizing people, he would find his destiny. He does not kill the Yee Naaldlooshi, which looks like a stag on two legs with a wolf's face and its chest cavity open, because he took Ortensia's advice and ran. Which he argues was the intelligent decision, because he's alive to have made a home, and have children and grandchildren. That seeking your destiny is foolish because it will find you. Sounds like an excuse to sit on the couch and eat snacks all day.

The flashback is presented as all full-page splashes with a particular border. I don't think Hahn changes his art style in any substantial way, but the shading is definitely different. In issue 4, a lot of the shading is masses of little black dots, which is not the case for issue 3. And the coloring on the full-page splashes has a certain weathered look to it. Irregular splotches that almost look like water stains. I don't know why that shift in approach at all, I just know I see it.

As for issue 4, most of the action takes place the year after Ortensia and Alexander saved Ata'halne. This time around they're hunting down some misshapen creature that can Hulk out when angry or threatened, and it's not going well. Alexander's had enough, and wants to quit this fighting monsters stuff. Ortensia storms off without him to finish the job, but returns to the town when it's over to find him in the bar. Apparently she's not quite willing to go on alone, and she does still own that land. . .

I think next issue is mostly going to cover how they met, but I'm curious if we'll see how that future goes. Alexander seemed to think Ortensia was searching for something that could actually kill her, but maybe she just needs to let it come to her instead. Building a house doesn't mean they have to stop roaming entirely, or that there won't be any trouble.

The conversation between them is awkward, but in a cute way. Alexander's always nervous around her, but he can't conceal how happy he is she's actually taking his concerns to heart. And Ortensia shifts between being defensively aggressive, leaning forward and jabbing her finger to make absolutely clear about certain points, but Hahn makes sure you can see uncertainty in her eyes when she explains she just wants him to understand. Kinder emotions are harder for her, but she doesn't want Alexander to be disappointed in what she's offering. Alexander seems to be assured enough not to let it phase him. Willing to put a reassuring hand on her shoulder. Even when she's insisting it's her land, not their land, he just lets it roll off and defuses it.

Congo

Yet another movie I watched far too many times in the '90s. Which is funny, because I did not enjoy the book when I read it in junior high during my Michael Crichton phase. Took too long to get to the stuff I wanted to read, which was about struggling against the killer apes. I only decided to watch this again because in my Adventures of Brisco County Jr. set, there's a note for one episode from Bruce Campbell about getting to work with his buddy from Congo, and I was like, "Bruce Campbell was in Congo?"

A communications company sent people into the Congo looking for blue diamonds, which could be used to focus or improve their telecommunications satellite. The team, including the company owner's son, lose contact, so Laura Linney, as a member of the company (and former employee of the friggin' CIA), is sent to find out what happened. Quietly, so she latches on to an expedition by a behavioral scientist (Dylan Walsh) to return his gorilla, Amy, to the jungle where she grew up. The expedition runs into all sorts of problems, including political upheaval, border patrols, nighttime hippo attacks (I had completely forgotten that scene), unstable volcanoes, and, eventually, killer apes.

A lot of focus in the movie goes to Amy, who was taught sign language and outfitted with a glove that translates those signs into speech. Everybody repeatedly makes fun of Peter for interacting with Amy like they're married. Probably says something about those people's marriages, since the interactions come off as much more of a parent with their child. Peter seems to feel like the best thing for Amy is to return her to the jungle, that being isolated from other gorillas isn't healthy for her, but he still has that watchful air of a parent worried about sending their child off into the unknown. He has to trust she can look after herself, or learn to fit in.

Linney's arc is, I'm not sure. She explains at one point she left the CIA because she was tired of working for horrible people. By the end of the movie, she seems to realize her boss is also a horrible person. The leader of the first team he sent in was his own son (played by Bruce Campbell, which is why I didn't remember him), who was her fiance at one point. Linney wanted assurances she was going to make sure Charles was OK, not to secure the diamonds and learns, nope, her boss is a heartless asshole. Or a big spoiled baby. Early on, he gets angry and smashes a monitor in their communications center, then tells her to put the fire out. Kind of said everything right there.

I'm just not sure where she ends up, though. She very effectively filed her resignation, so maybe standing up to her evil boss on the way out the door rather than just leaving is an improvement, but I don't know what comes next.

It's one of those movies with no real star, just a lot of characters actors. Lot of That Guys. Bruce Campbell, of course (and it's such a waste he's only in the movie for like 10 minutes), but Ernie Hudson's in here as their guide. Tim Curry plays a crazy Romanian hoping Amy will lead him to King Solomon's diamonds. Hudson's character actually led his last attempt, yet he somehow doesn't recognize him until they've been traveling for over a day. The idea you wouldn't recognize Tim Curry speaking with that accent when you literally carried him out of the jungle once seems farfetched. Joe Pantoliano and Delroy Lindo are both uncredited according to IMDb, which is bizarre since they both have multiple lines of dialogue.

It's kind of nice actually, because no one gets to suck up all the oxygen. In Delroy Lindo's one scene, he's the one in control. The focus is on him, not the star. Everything moves off his demands. Sometimes Walsh and Amy are the focus. Sometimes it's Linney and her grey morality. Sometimes it's Curry hamming it up. Hudson is the sort of calm, faintly amused center of it. He bounces off all of them. Punctures Curry's nonsense, makes Walsh see sense, has enough experience doing unpleasant things he can coax some real answers out of Linney.

You never feel like there's only one character you're meant to care about, although I probably worried most about Walsh and Amy. Walsh is a generally decent guy in wildly over his head. He just wanted to take Amy home, and everyone else has used him for their own selfish purposes. Granted he would never have made it without them, but there's a lot of shit going down he didn't ask for.

What I Bought 8/27/2021 - Part 2

I'm ready for summer to be over. Pity it's probably only going to get longer in each successive year. For today, there's one comic wrapping up (for now), and another almost to the end.

Jenny Zero #4, by Brockton McKinney (writer), Dave Dwonch (writer/letterer), Magenta King (artist), Dam (color artist) - Don't do it Jenny! He has the high ground!

Jenny's doing pretty well against the rank and file. Helps when you're big enough you can toss a tank around like a Nerf football. So they send down the big mech on the cover, who proceeds to mess her face up until we find out the dog can also grow to kaiju-size and rips its arm off. Jenny finishes it by smashing the skull with its own metal fist. Which also kills the pilots, because she thought they'd be in the torso. 

I feel like there's a joke there I'm not getting. Is it referring to a difference in where American and Japanese fiction depict as the traditional cockpit location in giant mechs? Or was Jenny just shitfaced? She did ask the dog for his opinion, which could be taken any number of ways.

Jenny still loses to the old "we have a alien smart gun pointed at your friend's head, surrender or else," ploy. So she works for the corrupt security agency after all. Which is headed by a woman who is part of a hive mind with the thing Jenny's father died trying to stop. Since the comic ends on that reveal, I guess the follow-up will have to come in another mini-series.

That's a little frustrating, but I guess it makes sense. It didn't seem likely winning one big fight was going to get these people off Jenny's back for good. And while she's learned about her ability and maybe how to really use it, there's still the matter of her actually using it. She really does not want to be like her father, but it doesn't appear she's going to get that choice. I don't love that aspect of it, that's she ultimately going to be forced to do the world defender thing. I imagine she'll ultimately embrace it, but it feels like putting the best spin on a bad situation.

But I'm criticizing stories that haven't been written yet. What a foolish endeavor, especially given my piss-poor track record predicting what's going to happen in stories.

King's scratchy, loose lines work really well for people getting beat up. It easily translates into someone looking ragged or battered, like they've been knocked off-model a bit. The characters can get hurt, even if it doesn't seem to slow them down much. "Mayo Boy" was moving around pretty good after Jenny flicked him over the horizon. Jenny shakes off getting her face punched in once she's got a minute, too. They both probably have advanced healing, though. On a coloring note, there's one page where Dam gets Jenny's uniform entirely the wrong color scheme. Only for that one page, though, which makes me wonder how nobody caught that before it was too late.

Everfrost #3, by Sami Kivela (artist), Ryan K. Lindsay (writer), Lauren Affe (colorist), Jim Campbell (letterer) - Took me a couple of looks to notice the creepy smiley face.

Van does talk her way out of trouble, by showing the clone had a transmitter they can use to access the Ward's island. So they do, and the Ward are long gone, leaving only an immense computer brain (with a smiley face) and some clones. Who kills a bunch of the people in the Bloom, meaning they were clones of people other than Van's son (based on something Van says about how it not being able to kill her means she's not a clone.) 

The computer separates them and tries to bargain with Van for information on the giant alien thing she's been trying to resurrect. Van takes the opportunity to learn some things, though I'm not clear what good they do her. She continues to refuse to play ball. I feel like she keeps changing her mind about what her goal is, but the consistent theme is she doesn't want to let anyone else be the one who changes her mind. She works with the Bloom, but there's no real sense she cares about their goals, and if they interfere with hers, well too bad for the Bloom. 

One person's way to save the world is another's way of burning it down. Or, it may not bring someone much consolation you're going to save humanity, if you get them killed in the process. It's kind of funny that Van is the sort of person who will do something that affects you without consulting with you first, on the grounds she's sure she knows better, while simultaneously being the type of person who would never tolerate someone else doing that to her. I feel like I just described Tony Stark.

There's a two-page bit where the computer shows the surviving member of the Bloom this idyllic landscape, which is then subsequently destroyed by Van, as a way to set the two of them against each other. I'm curious why that would work, when I don't think that lady has ever seen the world look like that. Hasn't it been a mostly frozen wasteland for most of her life? But it does also show her friends and allies being killed by Van's path of. . . whatever you'd like to call it. Vengeance doesn't seem quite right. That part is certainly accurate. Van leaves a real trail of bodies in her wake, and since I can't see her letting this thing about her son's DNA go, I suspect there'll be a few more in the final issue.

Major League: Back to the Minors

The third, and as far as I know, final, movie in the Major League series, shifts the focus to minor league baseball, as the title suggests. Scott Bakula steps in as the veteran whose career has run out, a long-time pitcher offered the chance to coach the Minnesota Twins' AAA team. The Twins are owned by Roger Dorn (still played by Corbin Bernson). Kind of interesting since Major League 2 partially revolved around Dorn retiring and buying the Cleveland Indians, then being so low on cash he had to let the previous owner buy back in.

I would say that should preclude a guy from being approved to buy another franchise, but having seen some of the jackasses Major League Baseball has let own teams (the McCourts with the Dodgers, the dipshits that owned the Mets and got Ponzi schemed, literally anyone who has ever owned the Florida Marlins), it's not farfetched.

The movie revolves around a rivalry between Bakula and the Twins' manager, played by Ted McGinley (aka the second Mr. Darcy on Married with Children). I'm not clear on what the rivalry is about other than McGinley's character is an obnoxious, condescending, short-tempered prick, but maybe that's enough. So there end up being two games between the big league squad and the minor league team, one in each team's park, which is, fine. Whereas the first two movies established a team opposing Cleveland as the overwhelming bully that must be overcome, this one takes the approach that the two teams are basically even, because the minor league club plays together and the big money guys do not.

I would think not wanting to lose to a bunch of minor leaguers would be incentive enough for the Twins to run roughshod over the Buzz, just to keep the other major league teams from laughing at them. But maybe they enjoyed watching their manager spaz out about it too much.

They brought back some characters besides Dorn from the first two movies. Bob Ueker's there as the Buzz announcer, apparently off the sauce now. Dennis Haysbert hasn't gotten to play the President in 24 yet (jeez, remember when that show was such a big deal?) so here's Pedro Cerrano. He seems to just show up wanting to play, and they let him join. I guess it's veteran leadership, although they already seemed to have that. They bring back the Rube Baker and Taka Tanaka characters from the second movie as well which is fine, whatever.

Then they try to fill in the gaps with some new characters. A third baseman that's a converted ballet dancer. A pair of twins for the middle infield combo. Another lifetime minor leaguer everyone calls "Pops". Seems odd to have another character like that when that's pretty much what Bakula was, but I guess they figured they needed a player version and a coach version.

The two that get the most focus are a young goofball hardthrowing pitcher everyone calls "Hog", and a highly regarded young slugger, played by Walton Goggins. Yes, the guy who goes on to be on The Shield, Justified, multiple Tarantino films, etc. That guy. Really weird to see him in this role. Not that there's a lot to it. He has to be arrogant and not listen to the voice of wisdom, then get humbled in the majors and return ready to learn from Bakula how to Play the Game the Right Way.

What I Bought 8/27/2021 - Part 1

Last Friday I managed to get all the books I hadn't so far for this month, plus a couple from last month I hadn't managed to pick up. It's a mixed bag, some good, some that we'll have to wait and see, some I shouldn't have picked up. So let's start with the last category first!

Yuki vs. Panda #3, by Graham Misiurak (writer), A.L. Jones (artist/letterer) - The rare and cunning Box Panda, lethal ambush predator.

Yuki and her friends make it to school, where the principal is both excited at the possibility of Yuki winning trophies for the school, and terrified about "Coach Sayjack". OK, Double Dare reference, fair enough. But there's a distraction to Yuki in the form of cute boy new student Zach Slater. OK, Saved by the Bell reference, less encouraging. Meanwhile, the panda returns to its temporary dwelling beneath a bridge to find hoodlums wrecking his shit, including his bamboo plant Lucy. So the panda whoops their butts. Finally, some violence! Then the final page cuts away to some mysterious masked figure with antlers who has seen something concerning.

Here's the thing. I bought this on the promise of the panda fighting or otherwise attempting to take revenge on the girl that hurt it. Instead, we're getting nearly blind (I think) Jewish teachers who talk about how the War of 1812 is correlated to Onyx's debut album Bacdafucup, and angsty teen romance. Also, I'm almost certain "putz" is not spelled "puts." But OK fine, setting the parameters of the fictional universe, and I'm sure the creepy janitor perving on high school girls, and the high school girl with the tarantula in her locker will both be important to the plot at some point, but it's not what I'm here for. 

Also, they've now explained the panda can move around in public because it somehow looks like an old man to everyone else. Actually, they didn't explain it so much as there was one panel from the perspective of the hoodlums where the panda is clearly an old man. At least we can say Misiurak and Jones aren't holding the reader's hands.

The brief fight was enjoyable, and there were a couple of panels that were funny. And the story might get somewhere interesting eventually, but I won't be there if it does.

Batman: Urban Legends #5, by (deep breath) Chip Zdarsky (writer), Eddy Barrows, Eber Ferreira, Diogenes Neves and Marcus To (artists), Adriano Lucas (colorist), Becca Carey (letterer) "Cheer"; Marguerite Bennett (writer), Sweeny Boo (artist), Marissa Louise (colorist), Becca Carey (letterer) "Wildcard"; Meghan Fitzpatrick (writer), Belen Ortega (aritst), Alejandro Sanchez (colorist), Pat Brousseau (letterer) "Sum of Our Parts"; Matthew Rosenberg (writer), Ryan Benjamin (artist), Antonio Fabela (colorist), Saida Temofonte (letterer) "The Long Con" - Yes, I know. Terrible idea to buy an oversized comic of four stories based on the presence of one story, even at the somewhat reduced price I got this at, but here we are.

Let's dispense with the everything I don't care about quickly as possible. Rosenberg and Benjamin have a story about Grifter using Leviathan (ugh) to trick Lucius Fox into granting him access to all of Batman's files so the WildCATS (hangs head) can have them. For only the best of reasons, no doubts. Or the stupidest, given Rosenberg's typical level of writing. Zdarsky and the shitton of artist are on the penultimate chapter of a Batman/Red Hood team-up against some guy who used his wife's research to make a drug that makes people hallucinate stuff that makes them happy. Fitzpatrick and Ortega are on the story that, in its next chapter, reveals Tim Drake is bisexual. Good for him. I mostly noticed his old private school roomie Bernard doesn't look a thing like Pete Woods used to draw him. Assuming I'm remembering correctly, and Bernard was the one with a drinking problem who hid liquor in mouthwash bottles. He's a generic blonde kid now.

Which leaves us with the Batgirl & Spoiler story. They're playing video games, which Cassandra is apparently bad at. Barbara asks them to look into a case she'd been working on, about someone who erases evidence of crimes, but leaves a burning red card. Red card means you're out of the game in soccer, right? They travel to a hurricane ravaged convention center, and find the person. Spoiler immediately attacks her, while Batgirl plugs a flash drive she spots into her suit (?) and learns the young woman was investigating the murder of someone who emigrated here that was covered up. Since the Gotham police are useless as always, the "Wildcard" has left it in the hands of the Bat-family.

It's a weird sensation, to lose track of a couple of characters for a few years, and when you come back around, you don't entirely recognize them. Not so much Spoiler, who still seems reasonably upbeat and energetic, but also impulsive. Batgirl, though? Watching Cassandra Cain call someone else brash and bare-knuckled, while at the same time, pausing to check out a random flash drive is a little strange. Not quite, "Captain America kicking a puppy," but it's definitely unexpected.

I mean, I can make an inference. I'm a fan of serial American comics; we're always willing to do the work to try and explain/excuse stuff like that. No-Prizes and all. It's been a while since I've read anything new with Cassandra in it, so she's had time for growth. Bennett writes her as clearly much more comfortable talking and teasing Stephanie and using phrases like "brain worms". She's even trying to stretch the reference, when she remarks that "bee in your bonnet" is close to "brain worms", a "centipedimeter". I think it's a reach, and feels like Bennett trying too hard to be clever more than anything, but taken at face value, represents major progress for the character in her grasp of the language. So, other aspects of her personality could change as well.

Or, Cass was able to read the woman's body language and understood she wasn't a threat. Although in that event, wouldn't she have made more of an effort to stop Spoiler from attacking?

Boo's art is nice. Very expressive, kind of like a looser version of Amanda Conner's work. It works better in the talking parts than the fighting parts. I don't understand, for example, how Spoiler punches a computer monitor, but ends up with glass in her palm, rather than her knuckles or the back of her hand. But the body language when the two of them are just sitting around teasing each other and playing video games is good. Those first couple of pages were easily my favorite part of the story. Just Steph and Cass, hanging out and being pals.

Sunday Splash Page #181

 

"If Anyone's Earned the Right. . .," in Empowered: Pew Pew Pew, by Adam Warren

As I understand the story, Empowered started from somebody commissioning Adam Warren to make-up a superheroine and basically draw her in a lot of bondage stuff. Said person never coughed up the cash, Warren was left with this character he created who gets their costume strategically torn up and winds up captured a lot, and went from there.

The title character has an extremely powerful, but also extremely fragile, skin-tight supersuit. The more it gets damaged, the less powerful it gets, and flying glass can be enough to damage it. And super-battles are full of flying glass. So even though Emp is actually an intelligent, careful superhero, she tends to get captured a lot and has a reputation as a joke, even when she routinely bails out her more popular, dumbshit teammates on the Super-Homeys. She does end up with a small crew of good friends, mainly an alcoholic lady ninja and a former henchman called "Thugboy", so that keeps it from being too much of a downer.

Warren released, I think, 10 manga-sized volumes, although I think now he's moved to publishing it a page at a time online. Probably will collect that work eventually, too. Besides that, there were a lot of one-shots (like the comic above) and a few mini-series. Those were nice, because you usually didn't have to be reading the main story to follow along. Anything you did need to know, Warren would fill you in on. He understands the need for a little exposition and flashback on occasion. Most of those were drawn by other artists, like Takeshi Miyazawa, Carla Speed McNeil, or Brandon Graham, among others. I don't know why Warren decided to draw this one himself, although it might be the last of the one-shot issues he released.

For me, Empowered is one of those books where you can see the skill and craft put into the book, but it doesn't quite connect somehow. I like Warren's art, it's got manga influence, but it's still it's own thing. Heavier lines and more frenetic energy than most manga I've seen, but also more clarity than some of the mangas that come close. The difference in trying to follow a fight scene in Empowered versus Trigun Maximum is night and day. The writing can be funny or touching as needed. Warren plays up the notion that a lot (but not all) of the heroes are really just dumbass high schoolers that got older but no wiser or mature. Which makes them predictably idiotic in ways that can be entertaining or infuriating.

Yet, it doesn't click. I enjoy the one-shot stories, and the two mini-series were fine, but even having bought the first volume of the series, I never felt compelled to keep going. I imagine if I came across it in a library I might read through it if I had the time, but I don't have to know what happens next.

Just the way it goes sometimes.

Random Back Issues #68 - Amazing Spider-Man #351

Another day, another issue of Amazing Spider-Man in the Random Back Issues series. Today's the first of Mark Bagley's run as series penciler, taking over from Erik Larsen. Bagley'll be regular artist on the book for at least the next 65 issues, minus sporadic fill-ins when the series is shipping twice a month.

Maybe to make Bagley, coming off his New Warriors run, feel at home, Michelinie uses Nova in this two-issue arc. Nova's chasing a laundry truck he got into a fender bender with earlier. The driver was very eager not to exchange insurance information, and he had a gun inside his jacket, which always means trouble. Maybe on the East Coast. Around here it just means they spent the money that should have gone to car insurance on a concealed carry permit.

The truck pulls up behind a building at Empire State University that was wrecked during some mess that took place in that year's Spider-Man Annuals, but even with Spider-Man's help, the thieves escape with the help of a sonic grenade. Spidey manages to get a tracer on the truck, but Nova's not happy with the interference. He thinks to himself it might be because he was without his powers for so long, he's self-conscious about looking helpless into front of another hero. Or, wild idea, you're kind of a dick, Rider.

The truck escapes, but Spider-Man remembers the lab was experimenting on artificial Vibranium. Experiments that made it into Antarctic Vibranium, which melts any and all metal, rather than the stable version you find in Wakanda. Questioning one of the grad students, he learns the guy was trying to figure out what went wrong using a piece of real Antarctic Vibranium, but sold it when he got a good sold it. He then asks Spider-Man, 'you'd have done the same thing, right?'

I guess being married to a soap opera actress, Peter forget what it was like to be a broke-ass grad student. It wasn't fun in a relatively cheap Missouri town, I can't imagine what getting by in New York City would be like. Then again, this guy found enough money to buy Antarctic Vibranium, so maybe he was doing just fine.

But later for such nonsense, Peter and MJ are due at Aunt May's for dinner, then they're going to be meet two friends for dancing! That's what we're all here for, right? Peter's distracted, and when Nova zips by, ditches MJ. Who is not pleased and goes to meet their friends herself. Peter reflects something's been bothering her for weeks, but that the damage is done. Naive of him to assume it can't get worse. Also, I think this leads into the whole subplot with MJ taking up smoking due to stressing over him.

Catching up to Nova, Spider-Man explains the truck had Jersey plates, and by flying, they could search the state quickly. Nova states he's already got a team (one he hasn't called for assistance, though) until Spidey admits he needs Nova's help. Things still aren't smooth sailing, as Spidey complains about Nova's flying, and Nova says Spidey needs to lose 30 pounds. His Marvel Universe Series 2 trading card (which came out in 1991 like this comic) says Spider-Man weighs 165 pounds. I'm pretty sure he can't spare 18% of his body weight.

The spider-tracer leads them to a mountain, and they locate an armored rear entrance. Nova, proving even when he's trying to be a team player he's a jerk, asks if Spider-Man needs some help. Spidey calmly wrenches the metal grate off, then keeps Nova from triggering a tripwire without explaining how he knew it was there. Nova's left to reflect flying and being strong are reasonable powers, but 'this Spider-Guy's downright spooky!' Usually the younger heroes just look up to Spider-Man, but depending on their powers, his could seem weird. Although Nova's on a team with a lady who can melt into shadows.

Splitting up, Nova finds two scientists conveniently waving around a demonstration disk, right before they leave to go get some coffee. Nova immediately trips a silent alarm getting in, and is eventually brought down by an electrified net. Spider-Man's got much bigger problems. The Life Foundation, which builds 'secret survival condos for the rich and famous', somehow reconstructed the Tri-Sentinel Spider-Man destroyed at the end of Acts of Vengeance. Whoo, Acts of Vengeance callback! They think a 100-foot tall, triple-faced killer robot is the perfect protection for their clients when the world economy collapses. The Antarctic Vibranium is their failsafe, placed inside the brain and designed to be remote released to melt the machine if necessary.

I find this entirely believable, except I'm sure the techbro billionaires would build their own. Which would at least just be a danger to them, unlike the Tri-Sentinel. Despite an attempt at reprogramming, Loki's directive reasserts control the second it's activated. Meaning, head for the nuclear plant it tried to send into meltdown last time. The remote activation of the failsafe, er, fails, meaning it's up to Spider-Man, with no Enigma Force backing him up. Just Nova.

He might be better off with Power Pack, honestly.

[1st longbox, 72nd comic. Amazing Spider-Man #351, by David Michelinie (writer), Mark Bagley (penciler), Randy Emberlin (inker), Bob Sharen (colorist), Rick Parker (letterer)]

Project Almanac

David's a brilliant high schooler, but he needs to find some way to pay for college without his mother selling the house. Then he finds out his dad was involved in an attempt to build a time machine at some point before he died. So he and his younger sister and his two friends manage to make a working time machine. Of course they all agree to follow strict rules about not going back alone, and recording everything. And, of course, those rules eventually get broken.

I definitely did not watch closely enough to catch how their actions caused the ripple effects they did. I just kind of assume all of them (especially Quinn) making themselves more popular threw off the social climate in the school and things spiraled from there. I don't see how that explains the fires in Brazil, but the basketball star getting hit by a car at a party, or the mean girl's father dying in a plane crash, maybe.

Actually, I think it'd be funny if the fires in Brazil happened originally, it was just none of them noticed because they were caught up in their own lives. Then they're already panicking about other butterfly effects, so they just assume their going to Lollapalooza caused forest fires thousands of miles away. Something about adolescent arrogance, I guess.

Two things I like about the effects of time travel. The way they jump back to the present and don't know why things are different. They've created changes, but skipped past all of them, so David gets congratulated on a party he threw last week that he has no memory of it. Like they've stolen the lives of another version of themselves.

The other bit was just a visual effect. How they would almost lag, or glitch out, if they met another version of themselves. The way each version would start to repeat words in an echo. It just looked cool, while I know it would be terrifying to actually see that happen to your friend. I especially like that the movie establishes this by Quinn pulling a dumb prank on himself. Even though they said they were going to be careful with this, and they do try, with David warning them not to hold their breath, and keep their eyes shut against the UV, they're still wielding an incredible amount of power they don't fully understand. 

They went along with the prank because they didn't see the harm. Because until they've actually seen what happens when your past and present self see each other, they don't know there's a danger. Sure, practically every time travel movie ever suggests it's a dangerous thing to do, and unlike a lot of zombies movies that pretend zombie movies don't exist, this movie does acknowledge that time travel is a concept people are familiar with, but those are just movies. What do they know, right?

I'm a little surprised we never got a moment where they time traveled, and one of them ended up partially merged with a wall. After showing it happen with the toy car, and the fact that when they use the machine themselves, they end up thrown apart, I felt sure we'd see that. Especially as David grew more desperate to fix things.

What I Bought 8/18/2021 - Part 2

So, a book from two weeks ago I did not expect to find at any of the local stores around here. But sometimes life hands me little surprises. Pleasant surprises, I mean. Unpleasant surprises are a much more frequent occurrence.

Count Draco Knuckleduster #1, by Peter Goral (writer/colorist), Joseph Schmalke (writer/artist), DC Hopkins (letterer) - I bet his subordinates all want to play a game of Simon on that chestpiece of his.

The title character is a scientist who basically embraced a mixture of science and sorcery until he could find some fabled child with a 'heart of stone' that would grant him immortality. The Phantom Starkiller one-shot from last year involved a friend of his, now a resurrected corpse, seeking out the child and finding her. But, he caught feelings in his lukewarm, reanimated heart and doesn't want to hand her over. That does not end well for him, as you will see in the selected panel below. He doesn't stay dead, thanks to the kid gifting him a bit of a magic crystal. He can pay her back by rescuing her from Count Draco, in the next one-shot whenever it comes out next year. 

The way this seems to work is each one-shot focuses on a specific character and their backstory, while also advancing the overarching plot, which revolves around the Cyptocrystalline Stone. I think Goral and Schmalke do a solid job of balancing the two goals.

The whole thing is like Star Wars, but reconfigured to look cooler spray painted on the side of somebody's van. More emphasis on sorcery and magic that requires a sacrifice of lives or souls to use Half-living hunters. There's definitely a sense of a lawless frontier, full of hives of scum and villainy. Count Draco turned to some powerful sorcerer overlord for the help he needed to stay alive long enough to find the kid, and you can see how he ends up looking after that process is done.

What's weird, it's simultaneously brighter and more vivid than Star Wars, but also more dreary and depressing. Draco's life-support system is purple and yellow, rather than shades of black. Phantom Starkiller is a neon-green skeleton wearing a bright orange cloak. But the surroundings are variations of dull greens, greys, and blues. The one town we see looks like a Wild West mining town that's falling apart, the only real color the blood Starkiller and the kid spilled. The big fight takes place in a spaceship graveyard that's mostly vague grey outlines and haze. It does help the characters that matter seize your attention, since they're the only things that really pop.

Knives Out

Thought I would try watching something good on a streaming service for a change. And this is pretty good. The family of the deceased are all a bunch of total grasping scumbags. Not just how readily they throw each other under the bus, and in such a way I'm not sure they even know they're doing. It's funny at times, watching them snipe and bicker, curry for favor, but unsettling, too. It probably depends on how much you enjoy watching family drama play out before you. But also how quickly they turn on Marta (Ana de Armas). That they can pretend to be compassionate and that she's part of the family when they have the upper hand, but once that's lost, well, the knives do come out.

Even Meg, who seems like the most decent member of the family and probably the closest to a real friend to Marta, other than the deceased, Harlan Thrombey, can't keep from telling Marta she ought to give the inheritance back to them. At the end of the day, she wants that money, too.

Speaking for myself, I'd give them the publishing company in an instant, because who wants the hassle of running that? Really, the whole issue of the inheritance was such a mess, I began to suspect Harlan had arranged his own death as part of some elaborate scheme I couldn't see, and Marta was just his patsy. Because it sure seemed like his act of kindness towards someone who cared for him, was only making her life hell.

Which, of course, made me suspect Marta. She seems so kind, so genuine, so motivated by fear of her mother being deported, the whole thing felt ripe for the twist that she's actually a manipulative schemer. Even the thing about her throwing up if she lies, I half-expected to learn was a false tic she concocted as part of her long-range plan to get that fortune. You can't tell me you haven't seen more bizarre last-second reveals in mysteries. Either way, it's a good performance by Armas. She's stressed and panicked, doing everything she can to try and not go to prison for an accident and hating herself.

Chris Evans seems to be having fun playing a shit-stirring prick, while he still makes Ransom capable of turning on the charm when necessary. I mean, we want to believe Captain America isn't that big a jerk. Jamie Lee Curtis' character kind of grated against something in me. She's meant to, so that's good I guess, but she reminded me a little too much of certain relatives of mine. Daniel Craig is, I assume, having fun with his accent. He mostly avoids being too folksy with the character, minus the whole spiel about the doughnut and the doughnut holes. I was disappointed he didn't grab at his suspenders more when he took off his coat during the big explanation scene at the end.

The one thing that paid off the most for me at the very end was Noah Segen's Trooper Wagner character. He plays this kind of goofy, gushing mystery fan the entire film, and it's annoying and a little embarrassing. Like, what do we need this character for? When things move into the climax, his role as audience stand-in is actually entertaining. How he gets so giddy when Benoit Blanc takes off his jacket and begins to describe the scene of events the night of the murder, the "Oh, I know what this, yay!" Then his reaction to Marta's last bit of projectile vomiting (and LaKeith Stanfield's reaction to that reaction) cracked me up. 

I mean, I knew Marta was going to need to puke, the moment she got that phone call you know what she's going to hear. I wasn't sure what direction the movie was going to go with it. Thought they might go with her managing to overcome it entirely, or long enough to get the murderer out of the room. Instead they went for hilarious comeuppance. Which is kind of like revenge, so you know I'm in favor of that.