Blogging About Writing, Part 2

I'm back with another 10 of these questions because I can!

11. Do you believe in the old advice to, "kill your darlings?" Are you a ruthless darling assassin? What happens to the darlings you murder? Do you have a darling graveyard? Do you grieve?

Well, originally I thought it meant specifically killing favorite characters I created and the answer would be, no. I rarely kill off any character I liked creating, because I might want to use them again some day. The one time I really did it, I wrote the story with two endings where they only all died in one of them, and most survived the second one.

But apparently it actually means to more generally kill of pieces of your writing that you might be really impressed with, but don't fit what you're writing, for whatever reason. The answer to that, is probably also no. I'll find a way to make it work if I like it enough.

12. If a genie offered you 3 wishes, what would they be? No wishing for more wishes, or all your works in progress get deleted.

To win a lottery so I could acquire enough money I no longer needed to work. Then I can spend my time doing what I want, like writing. To be physically the age I was 20 years ago, but not mentally. So I have more time of being physically capable of doing things I want to do. Third wish, um, well, it's either to remove enough greenhouse gas from the atmosphere to offset the global warming pattern (and move the excess gas to Mars because I'm curious what would happen), or for a sort of dictionary that I can vaguely describe the meaning of what I'm looking for, and it automatically finds me a word that means exactly that.

13. What is a subject matter that is easy for you to write about? One that is incredibly difficult?

Biology-related topics are pretty easy, or what you think about when you're on your own. I'm good at fight scenes and snappy dialogue. What am I not good at writing about? How much time you got? Describing architecture, clothing, food, music. Romantic love.

14. Do you lend books to people? Are they scared to borrow from you? Do you know where all your lost books are? Will you ever get them back?

My dad has a couple of mine, and Alex has all my Dark Tower books. No, they aren't scared. Obviously I know where they are. I will get the books from my dad eventually. At the latest, when he dies. I don't really care if I get the others back from Alex. I read them, that's good enough.

15. Do you write in margins of your books? Dog-ear pages? Read in the bath? Do you judge people for these things?

I dog-ear pages with passages I like, and then I the outline passages because sometimes I go to the dog-eared page and wonder what the hell I thought was so interesting the first time through. I take showers, which are not conducive to reading. I don't care what you do with your books.

16. What's the weirdest thing you've used for a bookmark?

A Chinese buffet fortune cookie fortune. I usually have bookmarks around, so improvisation is not required.

17. Talk to me about minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me lore, history, detail that won't make it in the text.

What did I say about killing darlings in question 11? If I went to the trouble to come up with it, I will damn well reference it somewhere in the story.

18. Choose a passage. Tell the backstory. How you came up with it.

From Sept. 30, 2008, "Middle-Aged Professorial Guy: Plethodon corrodious, the Dissolving Salamander. They measured 1.4 meters from nose to tail, and excreted a slime from their skin which first rendered their victim stuck in place, be it to the ground, a chair, another person. Then, as the slime reacted with the air, it ate away at the victim, until they melted into a lump of decomposing organic matter. This was most commonly created by the males, who then built the piles into nests, to entice females to lay their eggs there. When they emerged from the Potomac River on the eve of Andrew Jackson's 1828 inauguration, they caused quite a stir all along the Atlantic Coast."

I was drunk when I wrote this. OK, that's a lie. That entire post came about because I was working that job in the boonies and we caught a shrew we couldn't identify. So we needed to take it back to the office. The guy I was working with cut the top off an empty Vault soda can, dumped the shrew in, covered the top with some mesh screening and duct taped it in place. We drove to the office, i.d.'ed it, and I drove the shrew back to the woods and let it go.

While we were at the office, I envisioned trying to explain to our coworkers why we had a shrew in a soda can. Then I pictured some Abe Simpson style geezer going on a spiel about some ludicrous reason and things snowballed from there. I added the Professor guy because there were bits I came up with I didn't think the old lady would know, but I wanted to use (see also, my answer to question 11). We were dealing with salamanders that got really slimy when they were wet, and while the slime helped them slip from our grasp, it would make your fingers stick together after. So I modified that.

The thing about Andrew Jackson was because it was all the rage in comics at that time to do stories that said notable historical figures were involved in weird science or mystical crap. I know Fraction had some creator owned book about Tesla like that (Five Fists of Science), but I was probably mostly thinking of Atomic Robo.

19. Tell me about your writing journey? Where did you start? Why? Were there bumps? Where are you now and where are you going?

I am unclear on what this is supposed to mean? Why did I start writing? Well this blog started because there were opinions I had that were bugging me, and I needed an outlet. Something with some level of permanence. Writing stories is the same thing. I had ideas I wasn't seeing elsewhere, so I did it myself.  Like Dr. Doom, I always find it necessary that I have to save the world. Bumps? I dunno, not really. I have a lifestyle that allows for time to write, and sometimes offers experiences that can be incorporated into my writing. I'm not going anywhere. The only goal is to write well enough I'm reasonably satisfied with the final product.

20. If a witch offered eternal happiness with your true love or the ability to finally finish, perfect and publish your dearest WIP, which would you choose?

The second one. I need the ideas out of my skull. Besides, you gonna trust a witch not to screw you over on eternal happiness with your true love? How many babies did you sacrifice for that?

The Belko Experiment (2016)

A bunch of people who work in an office building in South America find themselves sealed in, with a voice over the intercom telling them they must kill a certain number of themselves or even more of them will die. The tracking devices injected in the base of their skulls, ostensibly there in case they were abducted, are actually bombs. So if they don't comply, they really will be killed by the flip of a switch. 

Chaos ensues. Some people hide, others try to contact the outside world, and others decide very quickly that there's no way out other than to play by the rules laid out for them and set to killing. Justifications abound, of course. They have children, families who will miss them. Better the old or childless die instead. Of course, then there's John C. McGinley's character, who is just a violent incel shithead. Pretty sure no one would miss him, but he's willing to play along and shoot people, so he's OK.

I was particularly satisfied when he bought it, although that was at least 47% because I hated McGinley's character on Scrubs. Pretty much the same as when he got capped in season 6 of Burn Notice. McGinley's very good at playing grating assholes.

I did actually enjoy the varied reactions in the early stages. The maintenance guys trying tog et the AC working just to help calm people down. The guy convinced there was something in the water making them act crazy, so he goes around upending water coolers. The guy sobbing while he writes a letter to his loved ones. I feel like I would have been like Dani, sought out a quiet place and waited for it to end, assuming I couldn't find some way out of the building.

I was curious to see how this would play out, but having watched it, I'm not sure what point director Greg McLean or writer James Gunn might have been trying to make. Always read the terms and conditions? Corporations, which are now defined as people, in turn regard people as commodities to be exploited as is deemed most profitable (for however you want to define profit)? Shared bonds between people are illusory, as any high-minded ideals about working together will ultimately be pitched out the window in favor of beating a guy to death with a tape dispenser?

Because I'm not sure what to take from Mike Milch's arc. Insistent they shouldn't even consider killing each other, trying to get others to safety. But once he loses his girlfriend, fuck it, revenge killing time. And Gunn films the kill with Mike outlined by the light from a projector while some song or the other plays in the background (not sure what the point was of the Spanish language version of "California Dreamin'" either). 

I guess it's shot like some dramatic, triumphant moment as a joke, because it's really a failure. For all his talk, Mike resorted to violence. You could argue Mike acted not out of desire to live, but to make certain Norris died, but as Norris observed, Mike didn't change anything. A point emphasized at the very end of the movie, which shows this was just one test of many. His big play was the equivalent of wasting a middle-manager.

An AirBnB from Hell

Yeah, that never ends well.

I picked up Drew Zucker and Phillip Sevy's The House, because it has a basic concept that is apparently very appealing to me. A bunch of American GIs (and Nazi they captured) take shelter within a seemingly abandoned manor they find in the woods. They soon find the house is much stranger than they thought, but by then, they can't find a way out. Pretty much what I thought the plot of Ghosts of War was, and not too dissimilar to R-Point. It's a good starting point, to throw a bunch of guys who have been through some shit (and dealt with it in different ways) into a location that preys on that part of them, and which they can't simply shoot.

Zucker and Sevy don't bother trying too hard to introduce us to the GIs. We get their names via some caption boxes spread out over a few panels, but that's about it. I pretty much had to i.d. them based on if they wore anything distinctive. The sergeant has a full beard, Garcia wears glasses, the medic wears a red cap instead of a helmet.

But the story focuses on Private Harker, who Zucker draws as a slump-shouldered, shell-shocked looking guy most of the time. Harker's got something bad in his past, something to do with a him driving a car one night in the rain, but we don't find out the specifics of that until near the end. It's not really clear why Harker is the one most readily able to accept that things are messed up, once the house starts changing dimensions and stairs and doors start disappearing, but he is.

Zucker doesn't really draw the house in a way where there are many distinctive rooms, other than the one with the stairs. When the soldiers start searching the house, he tends to draw the panels tight around them. It limits our view of their surroundings, but also keeps the audience from developing any sense of where they are, or where they're supposed to be.

The horrors that house sends at them are a lot creepier looking the less distinct they are. When it gets left to Jen Hickman's coloring to show them as dark shadows with grinning teeth, they are really creepy, and it nods to the insubstantial, nightmare nature of them. When they take a more solid form, Hickman tries to color them differently, giving all the nightmares this sickly yellow-red that is stark contrast to the soldiers in their drab uniforms and their pasty faces. But I'm not sure the monsters don't still come out looking more ridiculous than frightening or creepy.

It feels like, for the GIs, Zucker and Sevy establish one rule for how the house works, but that they show it working another way in an earlier time. The first few pages are of two highwaymen who stumble across it fleeing the law. They seem to be attacked by zombies, and that seems to be it for them. But Harker eventually figures out, and this seems backed up by how things go, that the house and what it conjures can't physically do anything. Instead, it has to goad or trick them into doing it to each other or themselves. Otherwise, it could have killed Harker easily a half-dozen times. I'm not sure how reconcile that.

Sunday Splash Page #233

 

"Contrary Concepts Attract," in Heart Hunter, by Mickey George (writer), V. Gagnon (artist), M. Hulbert, Kim Goon, Diana Sousa and Marcos Vink (flats?), Richard Starkings and Jimmy Betancourt (letterers)

I don't really have anything else to say about this I didn't cover in my review four months ago. An island of people who are immortal, until they find their soulmate. Or until someone destroys their hearts, which they carry outside their bodies. And since some people would rather be immortal than find a soulmate, some people make a living snuffing them out.

It's a very nice comic to look at, but the heart metaphors made literal and the soulmate stuff, both hit a point of view I strongly dislike. Which made it difficult to enjoy the comic. It will not remain in the collection past the annual culling next January.

Saturday Splash Page #35

 

"Crash Position," in White Lily #5, by Preston Poulter (writer), Jake Bilbao (artist), Kumar? (inker), Alonso Espinoza (colorist), Taylor Esposito (letterer)

The story of World War II Soviet ace Lilya Litvak and her friend/at least for one night love interest Katya Budanova, from their days as flight instructors for the male pilots, through their being assigned to combat units, their triumphs and losses.

Both Lilya and Katya are in an unpleasant circumstance. Lilya's a Polish Jew, so while she's got zero love for the Nazis, life in the USSR isn't exactly a bed of roses, either. Katya's Ukrainian, so again, someone who might not have a lot of love for Stalin or the Soviets. But, of course, they have to play at being loyal citizens, even when their superiors insult, degrade or generally act like they should be grateful living under Soviet rule.

Lilya is the main character, as even much of the time spent on Katya is focused on her attraction to Lilya. It's Katya who gives Lilya the white lily that becomes her call sign. And for the most part, Lilya is the one who drives the story. She's the one who mocks the male pilots they're training for being cowards or throwing up at the sight of Nazi planes, who out-flies her flight instructor when they're given the chance to fly real combat aircraft. Lilya is the one shot down over Stalingard and has to make it back to the base (though Poulter glosses over the particulars of that).

Katya is mostly carried along in Lilya's wake. Not that she isn't a good pilot herself, but the story doesn't give the impression Katya was excited at the prospect of fighting on the front lines, so much as she was good enough to get the opportunity and it would keep her close to Lilya. A lot of her page time is devoted to worrying about Lilya, or being disappointed that Lilya is attracted to the male captain that commands their squadron.

The first two issues were drawn by Lovalle Davis, who unfortunately passed away shortly after finishing the second issue. Jake Bilbao had been working on covers for the series, and took over interior duties as well. Both artists took an unusual approach during the air combat scenes. They essentially drew from the bottom of the page to the top. It allowed for more a widescreen feel, I guess, but you had to turn the book on its side. They also tended to intersperse smaller panels through the page, and often drew those in the shape of the plane's canopy or crosshairs. That was a nice touch, because it let them give a sense of the scale of the battle, just how many planes were up there at once, but made sure the reader didn't lose track of the main characters.

The mini-series could easily have been six issues, considering issue 5 is nearly 40 pages itself, but it fits with the overall arc of the story. When Lilya experienced a loss and considered ending it all, she was able to go forward out of desire to keep fighting Nazis. Once she's gone, Katya is basically playing out the string.

What I Bought 8/24/2022

The local comic guy got shorted everything other than Marvel or DC this week, so no A Calculated Man. Just have to make do with the comic we've got. His store's also moving locations in the next month. It wasn't exactly an inconvenient location before, so hopefully the new spot is OK.

Damage Control #1, by Adam Goldberg, Hans Rodionoff and Charlotte Fullerton McDuffie (writers), Will Robson and Jay Fosgitt (artists), Ruth Redmond (colorist), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - Why would Damage Control make people stand in a police lineup?

The main story, the one by the TV writers, is focused on Gus, the new intern at Damage Control, who on his first day, nearly gets the Earth destroyed by Skrulls because he didn't deliver a memo to Stanley Forbush, Underwriter. Gus also gets lost in the pocket dimension that serves as the 13th floor so long he's late delivering a birthday ice cream cake to Albert Cleary (the guy who once made sure Doom paid his debts). Which makes Albert pretty angry, even before he realizes Gus is going to destroy the multiverse for failing to deliver the mail. So Will Robson's ability to draw people looking really angry pays off here.

I think Goldberg and Rodionoff are going for a workplace comedy here. One that just happens to get cameos from Nightcrawler, Nick Fury, Quicksilver, and so on. Cameos can be fun - I laughed at Moon Knight's irritation that his name was written on his coffee as "Moob Knife" - but it's not enough to carry a mini-series. Show how that aspect introduces conflict or complications. Like the Kingpin at one time being a major stakeholder in Damage Control, so the Punisher shows up looking to start some shit. Or heck, Robson drew Man-Thing hanging out in the lobby in the splash page, at least make a joke about  putting down flame retardant flooring as a precaution!

I guess they're taking the approach that as an intern, Gus doesn't know any of this stuff, so the chain reaction he started by failing to deliver mail all took place somewhere outside his perception. I'm just not sure whether that's an approach I like. They do introduce the notion that Damage Control now holds on to objects of incredible importance, in addition to fixing stuff that gets broken in battles involving superhumans, which may pay off down the line. I'm not so sure Gus' tendency to stress eat isn't going to end up being more pivotal, though.

The back-up story, by Charlotte Fullerton McDuffie and Jay Fosgitt is about Bart's mom coming to visit, inadvertently buying the Reality Stone while visiting the gift shop, and then scolding Thanos into mending his ways. Fosgitt's art really reminds me of '90s Disney cartoons, like The Goofy Movie or something. It fits the tone of the story, which is broadly comic. Sight gags of people's heads being turned into a jar of pickles by the Reality Stone, or John Porter warning Bart's mom not to use "Mom Smash!" or she'll get in legal trouble with the Hulk. That seems to be what Fullerton's going for, so call it a success.

Silverado (1985)

I'm not typically a fan of movies with Kevin Costner in them, but as my father observed about The Untouchables, it's not too bad when there are other people carrying the acting load. So we got the four cowboys who over the course of the first 45-60 minutes, cross paths, help each other out a little, then part company. 

Scott Glenn narrowly avoids being killed in ambush at the start of the movie. Along his way he finds Kevin Kline in his long underwear in the desert. They speak up for Danny Glover when he has to fend off some racists in a tavern. They can't keep him from being told to leave by John Cleese, but he didn't get lynched. Then Glenn rescues his hotshot kid brother (played by Costner, who I can not see as a young hotshot, even standing next to Scott Glenn who always looks about 65 years old), and during the escape, Glover provides some covering fire.

All roads lead to the town of Silverado, though, and all of them find problems there. So they have to team-up a little more formally, after each of them has it rather painfully hammered (or stomped in Glenn's case) home that they can't handle this solo.

It's nicely set-up that while each of the four sort of has their own nemesis, it all dovetails back to one overarching problem. The classic Western problem of the big cattle rancher who thinks everything is theirs. Glover's parents are run off their farm, Glenn and Costner's friends are threatened on their land. Kline is an old bank robbing buddy of the sheriff (Brian Dennehy). Although I'm not entirely clear on how Jeff Goldblum's character (a dandy named Slick) is tied in, other than his connection to Lynn Whitfield, playing Glover's estranged sister.

There's nothing flashy about the movie (other than one shot early on where Glenn tips a table so his rifle flies across the room to him and they clearly tried to shoot it in a way that would look cool, but just looked really cheesy), but it's solidly made. Takes the time to build the characters, establish the stakes, lay out what side everyone's on, then let lead commence to flying.

Course Correct Into Fall

I originally intended for this to be a post about my trip to a Double-A baseball game over the weekend, but it turns out a lot of people wanted those Adam Wainwright or Yadier Molina jerseys, so no dice. Pivot to the November solicitations then.

What's ending? Blink is, as I suspected a 5-issue mini-series, and issue 5 will be out in November. Likewise, the fourth and final issue of Locust: Ballad of Men will be out as well.

What's new I might buy? Marvel has 3 things I am sort of considering. Ryan North is taking over Fantastic Four with Iban Coello. I have never bought FF as a monthly thing, always came back around to various runs well after the fact. Will this be the trend-breaker? Alyssa Wong and Martin Coccolo are working on Deadpool, though I'm unclear if it's the first issue of an ongoing, or a one-shot. Wong's Iron Fist mini-series didn't exactly knock my socks off, but if I buy this in November, Deadpool can show up for Blogsgiving! Hmm, decisions, decisions. Thirdly, Emily Kim and Creees Lee (Marvel's solicit uses 3 e's twice, so I assume that's the correct spelling) are doing a five issue mini-series on Tiger Division, that Korean super-team that showed up in one of Jed MacKay's Black Cat Annuals. I mean, the characters looked kind of cool, and I don't want to be one of those stuffy fans who won't give the new characters a chance. I can still be cool!

(This is a lie.)

Among other publishers, Mad Cave Studios has the first issue of Nature's Labyrinth, a 6-issue mini by Zac Thompson and Bayleigh Underwood about an island where criminals are offered fantastic wealth to fight to the death. Over at Scout Comics, Karl Kesel and David Hahn have an Impossible Jones holiday-themed one-shot. TKO Studios has collected editions of Sara, Garth Ennis and Steve Epting's story about a bunch of Russian lady snipers killin' Nazis. I don't usually fall for Ennis' war comic stuff, but maybe this time. . . Ize Press has volume 1 of The Boxer, which I don't think is a comic about the Simon & Garfunkel song, but about a boxing prodigy who seems largely disinterested in life. Image has Two Graves, by Genevieve Valentine, with Annie Wu and Ming Doyle drawing the story from different viewpoints. I don't think I'll end up trying this, but I might, and it seemed interesting enough to be worth mentioning, at any rate.

A few new things I definitely won't be buying, but felt like mentioning. Geoff Johns is back writing stuff at DC, with JSA books and Stargirl books and whatnot. You can either celebrate or dive for cover, as is your preference. Or yawn. Yawning is acceptable. The other thing is Bash, a sci-fi basketball GN from Titan Comics, which is apparently written by new Minnesota Timberwolves' center Rudy Gobert. Mostly, I just laughed at its description of Gobert as a, "basketball superstar." Just because the T'wolves traded 9 first-round picks for a guy, does not make him a superstar. It means the Timberwolves have poor impulse control. 

I kid, I wish Gobert the best. Hopefully his teammates in Minnesota are better on defense than his teammates in Utah were. Wasn't his fault Donovan Mitchell and Jordan Clarkson treated defense as the time to practice their matador impressions.

What's out I will (probably) still be buying? West of Sundown is back with a new arc which might be bringing in Dr. Moreau? I never read that book or watched the movie, so this could be a problem, but I still need to see if the fifth issue is going to make any sense to me. The fifth issue of Ice Canyon Monster got solicited, but I'll still be taking the book one issue per month if I stick with it, so I'll be a couple behind. DC has the third issue of Sgt. Rock vs the Army of the Undead. Marvel has She-Hulk 8 (if I'm still buying it), Moon Knight 17, the re-solicited X-Men Legends 4, and the fourth issue of Damage Control. Viz Media has the 8th volume of Zom 100, about the people trying to do their bucket lists during the apocalypse. I've bought the first volume so far, and it might be a while before I get volume 2. Lot of other manga on the list to try first.

Project A Part 2

A sequel to Project A, the "Jackie Chan fights pirates" movie that involved surprisingly little of Jackie Chan fighting pirates*. This time, Dragon (that'd be Jackie Chan) gets transferred from the Naval Infantry to the police to expose an inspector who's been paying people to commit crimes for him to stop so he looks good. Then he busts out the old ley de fuga** on them afterward so there's no chance of anyone finding out.

Except, the movie is not content with that. Or it doesn't think that's enough plot to provide opportunities for good fight scenes and chase sequences. Dragon not only finds the entire precinct, save one rookie, is crooked, he also gets tied up in the plot of a group of people looking to end control of the Manchu Dynasty over Hong Kong. Meaning there are also agents of the Empress running around, mostly in suits and bowler hats, looking for a book that would outline the rebel network. Plus, a small group of survivors from the pirates he took down in the first movie are moving around, trying for revenge on the guy they hold responsible for killing their captain.

In practice, the pirates are mostly comic relief, as the one time Dragon fights them, he's handcuffed to the bent cop. So there's a lot of gags about them getting tangled up taking different route around obstacles, or Dragon throwing a punch, but it causes the inspector's hand to punch Dragon, that sort of thing. There's also a brief scene where Dragon helps them out, which the pirates have to decide how to interpret. 

The movie is rather open that a lot of the populace don't trust the cops, believe them to just be bullies who abuse their authority. Of course, the movie also takes the "few bad apples" approach, that this is due to guys like Inspector Chun and his precinct accepting bribes and overlooking crimes. This seems difficult to argue when the bent cops in the precinct outnumber the honest ones at least 2-to-1 (and that's counting Dragon and his four buddies from Naval Infantry on the good side, otherwise it's closer to 10-to-1).

But it does feel like Dragon's assignment gets lost in the shuffle for a long stretch in the back half, once he gets tangled up in the rebel stuff. It's initially related to his job, since the rebels work with Chun to discredit Dragon because it gets them money, but you could be forgiven for forgetting how Dragon got tangled up in this in the first place.

Let's talk interesting fights or chase sequences. I don't think there's anything on par with the bicycle sequence in the alley from the first movie, but the ending is an extended, running battle between Dragon and 3 of the Empress' agents across a series of bamboo scaffolds. This includes a part where Dragon, in desperation, chews up a bunch of hot peppers, then smears the juice on his hands so he can fight by smacking the guys across the eyes with it. Gross, and not hygienic, but creative. Early on, when Dragon decides to start cleaning up the precinct by hitting the biggest crime boss, there's a lengthy fight in the guys gambling hall that involves some long odds. So long that even Dragon trying to use a ladder doesn't help! When Jackie can't triumph, even with a ladder, you know it's trouble.

On the negative, there's a long bit in the middle of the movie where Dragon and the rookie visit a girl they know who's cousin is supposed to be missing, and who is connected to the rebels. In fact, one of the rebels is there at the same time. Along with two of the Empress' guys. And the bent inspector. And the Commissioner. So it's a whole thing of people scrambling around, trying to hide from each other under beds or inside closets while the Commissioner is trying to be charming and fix a leaky faucet. Yeah, I don't know. It can't all be backflips and face kicks, I guess.

* I tried looking up "hong kong pirate movies" online, and all I could find was one called "The Pirate" from 1973. There's gotta be something other than that, right?

** Shot while escaping, essentially. Or rather, "escaping". I'm reading another book on the Mexican Revolution, the phrase comes up a lot.

Sibling Differences

We talked a bit about volume 2 of Mariko Tamaki's X-23 series back in Sunday Splash Page #21. Where the first six issues larger focused on Laura and Gabby's connection in terms of them working together and looking out for each, this volume (which consists of the remaining 6 issues) concentrates on their differences.

Tamaki brings back Robert Chandler, the villain of the first six issues of Tom Taylor's All-New Wolverine, and the one responsible for cloning Gabby and her sisters from Laura's genetic material. Since that went poorly, Chandler is taking the approach of making cyborg Laura clones from damaged genetic material. No healing factor and seemingly no natural claws, but I assume they have her other natural athletic abilities, as well as being more docile, loaded with weaponry and armor. Best of all, the lack of healing factor means people will have to keep buying them!

This whole scenario does not end well for Chandler, which, is fine. It also doesn't end well for the first of the "X-Assassins" Laura and Gabby encountered, who Gabby had grown fond of and wanted to help make a life for herself, as Laura had for her. Laura dismisses X-Assassin as just a weapon, which is a harsh assessment coming from her. While Gabby spends most of a night singing to the X-Assassin and telling "her" stories, Laura keeps insisting X-Assassin is an "it".

Of course, Logan never shied away from acting like he was better than Deadpool or any number of other victims of government experimentation, so Laura comes by that hypocrisy naturally.

The X-Assassin never speaks, other than with simply gestures, but Diego Orlotegui's art would seem to lean towards Gabby's point of view. The X-Assassin never shows any hostility, spending most panels with either a vacant look, or one of vague sadness and resignation. But there are a few panels where Gabby does or says something, and it's followed by a silent reaction panel from the X-Assassin. her watching the young girl thoughtfully. It's enough I understand Gabby being sad over how things end.

That covers the first four issues, with the remaining two trying to deal with the fallout. Gabby is processing her grief and shutting Laura out in the process. Laura, as her internal narration notes, doesn't know how to deal with this delicately. So it turns into a shouting match where Gabby accuses Laura of just making the decision on her own that no one else gets the chance the two of them got. Which leads to Gabby storming out (and taking Jonathan the Wolverine with her), and trying to rescue a bunch of turkeys that have been spliced with X-23's DNA as well.

Yeah, I know. It's kind of hilarious in its absurdity, and maybe Tamaki means it as a sign of Gabby's general youth and way of looking at things, but I'm not sure it lands. Turkeys might be a bridge too far of a connection to insist on. Although the idea of trying to use the healing factor as a method for organ replacement, and trying it on turkeys to start, actually makes some sense. It's essentially what Butler was doing with Deadpool in Duggan and Posehn's run. Either way, it does highlight both some similarities and differences in the sisters. Laura is focused on finding the people who do these experiments and stopping them, while Gabby seems more concerned with helping their victims.

But both of them demonstrate very black-and-white views for most of the volume. Gabby says she wants to help all of them (though she had no problem fighting the other X-Assassins swarming Laura), while Laura seemingly is fine not worrying about any of them after Gabby. 

Orlotegui's art is well-suited for the story. His lines aren't overly busy, but he can be detailed when he needs it, and it's the little details that help highlight the differences in Gabby and Laura. Gabby wears a hairband with some little monster face on it all the time, and favors pajamas and baggy hoodies with X-logos, while Laura, when not in her mission outfit, goes for very plain tank tops and the like. Gabby carries nunchaku with her on missions. Why does she need them? I assume because it's fun to hit people with them. Especially if you have a healing factor, so there's no permanent damage when you accidentally smack yourself in the face. 

That helps add some levity to the story, keeps it from being too depressing. It also helps to demonstrate why these two live together. Tamaki mentions things in passing about how they argue and fight like sisters, with it being cranked up to 11 because they're both Wolverines. But there's still affection, and this version of Laura's apartment looks much more lived-in than it did at the beginning of All-New Wolverine.

Sunday Splash Page #232

 

"Luchador Punisher Claims Another Victim," in Hawkeye vs. Deadpool #0, by Gerry Duggan (writer), Matteo Lolli (artist), Cristiane Peter (colorist), Cory Petit (letterer)

Released in late 2014, by which time Hawkeye was barely showing up (3 issues in the last year of its run), the book is, despite the title, more of a team-up between the Merc with a Mouth and both Hawkeyes. The dead guy above had a list of every SHIELD agent, and realizing this was dangerous information, tried giving it to Clint. Who was in a bad mood because everyone (including Deadpool, out trick-or-treating with his daughter and Agent Preston's family) was complaining about him not handing out full-size candy bars and blew the guy off.

Duggan makes a few nods to each characters current status quo. Deadpool having a daughter and a couple of SHIELD agents for friends (and that Preston is inhabiting an Life Model Decoy of herself). Clint owning a building, having a hearing aid and knowing sign language. There's one two-page sequence where Duggan and Lolli mock the Pizza Dog issue of Hawkeye with a bunch of bubble panels showing symbols representing the hunt for clues. Except Deadpool's banging on one of them asking what the hell is going on while a couple of old ladies discuss what being in the "Revengers" did to that poor man.

It does feel more like a Deadpool story that happens to involve both the Hawkeyes. So we get gags about Deadpool using the "Ooper" app to get around town and making unreasonable demands. He pulls Clint's old sky-cycle (and one of his old costumes) out of mothballs to do an airborne drive-by. He gets to be a bad influence on Kate by handing her a rocket launcher and encouraging her to commit acts of domestic terrorism. Relax, it was for a good cause. America needs to be reminded of the weaknesses in its critical infrastructure! No, wait, that was Timothy Olyphant's argument in the 4th Die Hard movie.

In the third issue (which is issue #2 because Marvel started with issue 0 for some reason), Jacopo Camagni joins Matteo Lolli as artist on the series. I can't tell there's any real pattern to when one of them draws. Camagni's work is looser, more exaggerated than Lolli's but it's similar enough (and Peter's colors maintain a consistent feel) there's no whiplash when it shifts.

I'm honestly surprised this is still in my collection, considering the villain is the Black Cat during her "Queenpin" phase. She's employing a scientist using mind control on people that makes them commit suicide if they're about to be captured. She employs Typhoid Mary, she kills a few people herself. It's stupid, because the villain could be Madame Masque, or Typhoid could be the boss, or whatever. There's nothing about the evil scheme that uniquely requires the Black Cat, so why use her? The story says nothing about her character. But that's true of that entire phase for her character. Cast aside everything interesting about the character in favor of generic superhero comic mob boss bullshit.

Saturday Splash Page #34

 

"The Ineffectual Arm of the Law," in Wicked Things #4, by John Allison (writer), Max Sarin (artist), Whitney Cogar (color artist), Jim Campbell (letterer)

Like I said two weeks ago, there's a tug of war between what fits and what looks cool when it comes to picking splash pages. With WildCATS version 3.0, I went for cool. With Wicked Things, where there was only one full-page splash, but the main character was barely visible in it, I went for more representative.

So, Wicked Things. Coming off the conclusion of Giant Days the year before, the Allison/Sarin/Cogar/Campbell team produced a 6-issue mini-series focused on Charlotte "Lotte" Grote (who once described herself as 'Esther concentrated'), the younger sister of one of Esther's friends, and in the running for Teen Detective of the Year (age 16-18). Lotte finds herself accused of attempted murder of one of the other nominees at the awards banquet.

While her friend and sidekick Claire tries to find the real killer, Lotte is granted the "honor" of helping the London police. In practice, this involves fetching coffee, being forced to wear an ankle bracelet, and having her insights largely ignored. Do these cops not watch TV? The quirky smart-asses are always unsurpassed geniuses! Yeah, the cops don't know she's innocent like we do, but knowing this does not make me any more inclined to care about them. I greatly enjoy her smug needling of the cops who didn't listen to her until it was too late.

I like the people Lotte shares housing with a bit better, although we only really get to know one of them. But other than Lotte and Claire, there aren't many characters in the six issues that are very likeable. Probably because this is a murder mystery, and most of the other characters are potential killers. It's the grand tradition followed in all those British detective series my dad loves so much of giving the audience as many people they wouldn't mind seeing sent to the gallows as possible.

The humor is a mixture of Allison's knack for finding the absurd in otherwise mundane situations (such as one of the older cops failing at social media when trying to track down the people who stole a bunch of new phones) and Sarin's expressive art. Lotte, much like Esther, is a very dramatic character. She talks with her body a lot, and Sarin's great at capturing her dejection, glee and irritation.

While Lotte does help the cops with a string of casino robberies, and is eventually cleared of the murder, the true culprit is left unknown. I'm pretty sure Allison has continued the comic online, handling writing and art chores, but you know I'm not big on reading comics online. Maybe there'll be another trade, like we've gotten for Steeple.

What I Bought 8/17/2022

The weather's actually been quite nice this week. A pleasant change. I was even able to keep my air conditioning off for a couple of days. I found both books I wanted that came out this week. If it weren't for work, and, you know, the general state of the world, things would be sunshine and unicorns.

Above Snakes #2, by Sean Lewis (writer), Hayden Sherman (artist), Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (letterer) - that's a suitably scowly-looking person.

Dirt goes on a date with Annie, the lady who last issue proclaimed that they were the only two of the vengeance-seekers that had the guts to actually take vengeance. I guess everyone needs a holiday, so they have a talk and some drinks on a grassy hill overlooking a town. A talk about who they've killed, or will kill, and why. Sherman uses a lot of purples and blues, cooler colors for that part. Dirt and Annie are glaring from beneath hats. It's all sort of mellow and playful.

Wouldn't you know it, the guy Annie wants to kill happens to be exiting a place at the bottom of the hill. She chases him into a stable, Sherman shifting to a more natural color scheme. No heightened blues or reds, just a lot of dark shadows and dull browns as Annie learns her father tried to sell her to buy drugs from the guy who killed him. She gets him down, and finds she can't pull the trigger. So Dirt does it. Which suits Speck the vulture just fine, but apparently is a mood-killer for Dirt and Annie.

So Annie's vengeance wasn't so clean cut, surprise surprise. Though a drug dealer's claims that he provided a service killing the man is a bit much. But is that why Annie didn't finish it herself, or is that saying you'll kill someone is easy, but actually doing it is hard? 

Assuming that's true, of course. It is easy to say you'll take a life, but the mechanics of the act aren't all that complicated, in that human bodies will fail pretty easily if damaged in certain ways. It's willfully doing causing that damage which is supposed to be the catch. Doesn't appear to be bothering Dirt much. He didn't even have any personal grudge against this particular guy, and he blew the guy's brains out without flinching.

Iron Cat #3, by Jed MacKay (writer), Pere Perez (penciler), Jordi Tarragona Garcia (inker), Frank D'Armata (colorist), Ariana Maher (letterer) - This is not the kind of catfight that's going to get the big internet search traffic.

Tamara dives right into the yacht party, where it turns out all the guests are heavily-armed LMDs planted by Stark. Good plan, except that Madame Menace is in Tony's systems and easily turns the LMDs against him. As Tony observes, now his ex is trying to kill him with super-science.

I would ask when Tony dated Sunset Bain, but I don't actually care. I'm reading this for Felicia's relationship drama, not the ongoing disaster that is Tony Stark.

In more hilarious news, Felicia's guys, Bruno and Dr. Korpse, infiltrated Stark's place as janitors and hijacked his plant to build Felicia another suit, this one in traditional Iron Man colors. I gotta be honest, red-and-gold Iron Man armor with cart ears looks kind of dumb. Tamara clearly got the good armor in the break-up, and proves it by still kicking Felicia's ass. I guess most of Felicia's experience was piloting the thing remotely, she's not used to actually dealing with the g-forces. Also, she's probably not fighting to kill, only to stall long enough for Stark to handle the LMDs.

Plans within plans. The back-and-forth between Felicia and Tamara, knowing each other and being able to anticipate one another is kind of lovely. And Perez does a nice job with the two pages of armored fighting, having Felicia's maneuvers lead from one panel to the next. Then Tamara slams her through a wall and the page fragments into a bunch of small panels of them fighting up close.

Unfortunately, Tamara decides that rather than accept defeat, she's going to let Madame Menace off the leash entirely. And the AI immediately declares she's going to make every Stark reactor on the planet go critical. Gee, who could have guessed a grief-stricken person teaming up with a megalomaniacal AI would have dire consequences? That's how you do a story about the dangers of vengeance.

I'm joking. Somewhat. I don't know for sure that's the point Lewis is trying to make in his book, after all.

Blogging About Writing, Part 1

I saw this list of questions about writing on tumblr, and I'm a little bored, so here we are. I think technically you're supposed to encourage people to ask questions they want answers to, but nerts to that. There were 40 questions (really a lot more than that) and I'm not doing all that in one go, so I'll just take it 10 at a time whenever I need a post.

1. What font do you write in? Do you care, or is it just the default?

I think Blogger's in Arial. My Microsoft Word is on Calibri. Either way, it's the default setting.

2. If you had to give up your keyboard and write by hand, could you? If you already do, a) are you a wizard, b) pen or pencil?

Yeah, although I don't know how it would get on the internet where anyone could see it that way. I write some stuff by hand now, when I really want to get it down and there's no computer handy. While i have been accused of being a robot-wizard, I usually write in pen.

3. What is your writing ritual and why is it cursed?

These days, I work on stories as the last thing I do before I go to bed. If it's cursed, it's because then I'm rewriting things in my brain when I should be sleeping.

4. What's a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

I don't know what they're looking for here. "Exaggerate", because I usually misspell it on the first try?

5. Do you have any writing superstitions?

No.

6. What is your darkest fear about writing?

I'm going to die before I write everything I want to, although that's tied to larger issues with mortality independent of writing.

7. What is your deepest joy about writing?

When I get a nice bit of dialogue, or a good descriptive paragraph down on paper. The ones that make me feel pretty slick. I'm still fond of, 'Sentiment's for the guys who can afford it. I'm just cheap.' from The Ink-Stained Trail.

8. If you had to write an entire story without action or dialogue, which would you choose and how would it go?

When they say "action", do they mean fighting and car chases, or anything more than sitting in a chair talking? I've probably written a few of both. The one about getting out of the damn airport, most recently. I'd probably prefer to write without dialogue. I don't want to do the equivalent of a movie about two people sitting in a room talking for 90 minutes. Like Sergio Leone said, it's gotta have tanks!

9. Do you believe in ghosts? I just wanna know.

Sure, why not?

10. Has a piece of writing ever haunted you? Has your own writing haunted you? What does that mean to you?

Ghosts, superstitions, curses. Cripes, it's over 2 months to Halloween. Anyway, I don't know what haunted means to the person asking, but with other people's writing, I've read some opinions that were so stupid they wouldn't leave my mind. With my own, not so much, unless we're counting my annoyance when I re-read it and see typos.

Naked Singularity (2021)

John Boyega plays a public defender who gets caught up in the theft of a lot of heroin from a SUV in an impound lot.

It's more complicated than that, of course. Casi is getting exhausted fighting an uphill battle against the U.S. legal system. Boyega's good at that part. He mixes this very glib, quick and confident manner of speech with a weariness in his step, a slump in his shoulders that makes you think he's glib because it's all he had time for. He didn't have a chance to properly prepare with the client who doesn't speak English and got arrested for selling batteries on the subway because he has 80 other clients who also need a public defender. All he can do is talk fast and try to keep them out of jail, but the system's rigged. Poverty is an illness, as one of his fellow public defender Dane (played obnoxiously by Bill Skarsgard), and Casi's infected. Which is how you wind up with the two of them try to swipe the money that will pay for all that heroin.

That part is fine, as far as it goes. Casi knows about the deal because a former client (Olivia Cooke) of his who now works at the impound lot got roped into the mess, then got busted by the cops and is trying to play both (all?) sides. Casi and Dane are equal parts brilliant and completely unprepared. Casi took fencing in school, but the only sword he owns is a katana, which you don't use the same way. Dane somehow procured one of those giant tear gas guns with the barrel clips, but is yelling about Colin Powell ("clear objective, decisive firepower, exit strategy!")

But there's this whole other thread about the other guy who lives in the building with Casi, a physicist named Angus who is certain the universe is collapsing from too much mass and it's causing "ripples". Ripples that Casi notices the effects of - a temperature display that reads 150 degrees, his entire body momentarily floating - but everyone else seems unaware of. There seems to be something about either taking the chance because everything could be gone tomorrow. Or the universe collapsing is a metaphor for how unbalanced the justice system has become, and the only way to correct it is with something big. Like stealing a crapload of drug money. Because money talks.

Ultimately, it's an interesting idea, but the pieces don't all hold together.

What I Bought 8/11/2022

And we're back. It did turn out to be a good vacation. Saw a lot of interesting things. Weather was warmer than I would have liked, but not awful. Low humidity. Driving was exhausting, but I knew that was gonna be the case. Whoever puts up billboards in Kansas sucks at math. So many times a sign would say, "x miles to exit insert number," but when you compare against what mile marker you're at, they're off by 4 to 6 miles. Thank you for confirming stereotypes, Kansas! 

I even found a little time late in the week to hit a comic store in the area. It didn't work out for me great a couple of years ago, but I found two things I wanted this time.

Slumber #6, by Tyler Burton Smith (writer), Vanessa Cardinali (artist), Simon Robins (colorist), Steve Wands (letterer) - Everyone feels that way when they have to use gas station bathrooms.

Stetson seems to be going along with Valkira, but it's really just to give Finch the chance to toast them both with the flamethrower. Except he's a little slow to react - Stetson again not realizing not everyone is on her frequency - and Valkira gets free. More fighting ensues, but eventually Stetson and Valkira end up in the real world. Where Stetson shoots Valkira, seemingly killing her.

Just a few problems with that. One, Jiang killed several cops before being arrested by Finch's partner. Two, Finch is trapped inside Ed's mind and all the equipment is trashed. Three, Valkira lives on because the nightmares Stetson kills in others' minds stay with her.

In a flashback, Stetson told her daughter hearing a voice was something that ran in the family. She tells Finch that Valkira is the last part of her daughter that's left. Valkira's vague about what she's trying to do, other than that she was created because of something done to a particular soul, and is trying to reunite and fulfill her purpose. It feels like she's saying she was supposed to exist as part of Lyla, but with nothing else left, she wants to enter the physical world and be Lyla. But she's also telling Finch this while sneaking up on him, so, pass the salt. And I don't think they've explained how Valkira could hear Stetson's thoughts in previous issues, unless this is something that goes back further than just Lyla.

I feel like Cardinali going for the empty, cartoon-style hole in the chest when Stetson offs Valkira was kind of a mistake. It almost feels like a gag from Looney Tunes. Daffy Duck yelling, "Shoot the rabbit," while not realizing he's got rabbit ears on. Like all the over-the-top killing of spider-chickens in earlier issues that was kind of absurd because it was all in someone's mind. It didn't have to be grounded in reality. You could argue it fits here because, like when Daffy gets shot in the face by Elmer Fudd, it didn't really accomplish anything.

Stetson had to realize this was how it was going to end, right? Nightmares she kills stay with her. If she kills Valkira, then Valkira will stick with her even if everyone else is free. Would it have been different for Finch if he succeeded in killing them? Is he going to see all those manifestations of Ed he torched in his sleep? Can he even sleep while he's in someone else's dreamscape?

I wondered if there was going to be a second arc to this, and I'd say there will have to be. What exactly happened when they tried to use this technique to treat Lyta is still up in the air, not to mention what's going to happen to Finch, Ed, Jiang, or Stetson who is, after all, wanted for questioning in connection with several murders.

She Bites #1, by Hedwig Hale (writer), Alberto Hernandez R. (artist), Dave Lanphear (letterer) - Walking around neighborhoods alone in the middle of the night is pretty fun. I used to do it all the time when I was a kid.

Like the solicit said, Elsie is a 134-year-old vampire who was turned as a child. This keeps her from buying smokes when she wants. So she puts up an ad for a babysitter, and Brenda applies. The interview reveals that Brenda tends to quickly reveal too much about her life, but also that she needs the money badly enough to take the job even after she sees the two corpses hanging in the shower.

There's not too much else to this issue, as it's broadly focused on establishing the two characters so they can play off each. That Elsie is very sarcastic and profane, almost always sporting an intense expression. Even when she smiles, Hernandez always makes sure her teeth are sharp and prominent. Elsie also enjoys messing with Brenda, such as letting her go into the bathroom, when there are corpses (naked corpses!) in there. Brenda tries a cheerful face at first, makes glib comments about how she's even kept most of her past babysitting clients alive, or joking about how she can handle a kid who thinks she's a vampire. But Brenda also can't help immediately laying out the unpleasant circumstances of her life at home. 

Which seems like an odd thing to do when speaking to what you believe is a child. Like Hale was not certain we would pick up from the brief glimpse earlier in the issue that Brenda's home life is, as Ally Sheedy put it in The Breakfast Club, "unsatisfying." I mean, they went to the trouble of having a panel to show Brenda keeps a scrapbook for, 'Dream Suicide Locations.' Even the convenience store clerk seems worried about her!

I did like having both characters visit the same convenience store as a way to compare and contrast. Hale and Hernandez have both scenes mirror each other in page layouts and how the panels are staged, but Elsie's eyes might be visible between the shelves, showing her sharp gaze, while in Brenda's version, the upper half of her face is above the panel border, so we're left to infer from her slumped shoulders and the way her face is aimed towards the floor. They might both be on a mission, but one is considerably more focused than the other.

Sunday Splash Page #231

 

"Winter's Soldier," in Hawkeye (vol. 4) #6, by Matt Fraction and David Aja, Matt Hollingsworth (colorist), Chris Eliopoulos (letterer)

Oh. This series.

Fraction and Aja's Hawkeye seems to get a lot of credit for Marvel realizing fans might enjoy books with consistent creative teams granted the freedom to tell their stories without being stuck constantly tying into Big Event stuff. Those couple of years of Marvel Now! that produced the Soule/Pulido She-Hulk, G. Willow Wilson's Ms. Marvel, so on and so on. I think the Mark Waid/Paolo Rivera/Marcos Martin Daredevil book that started a year earlier really deserves the credit, but Hawkeye sucks up the oxygen in the room because Fraction and Aja did an issue from a dog's perspective.

To be clear, I was excited for this book when it started! Expected Clint Barton to get to do a lot of cool stuff. And I maintained that excitement for the first 7 or so issues! Clint makes the impulsive decision to hand a bunch of Eastern European mobsters in tracksuits a duffel bag of cash for an apartment building so the tenants don't get kicked out, and this (among other things) puts him in the crosshairs of a bunch of crime families.

It's a solid premise, what Hawkeye gets up to when he's not being the best Avenger. Fraction filled it with a lot of snappy dialogue and banter, especially between Clint and Kate Bishop, the other Hawkeye. There's potential to introduce a wide cast of characters as tenants to get us more invested in the conflict. Aja knows how to lay out pages in a brilliant way, whether it's doing a series of quick panels of Kate speaking in slow-motion in parallel with Clint releasing an arrow, or weird diagrams to emphasize how Pizza Dog perceives the world.

Although I wonder if those pages are where Jonathan Hickman got the notion for all those text pages and charts he's so fond of. If so, it may have been a real Pandora's box.

But after they killed off "Grills" one of the few tenants given even the tiniest hint of depth, it started to slide. The book spent five issues essentially replaying the time before and after Grills' death, but from different perspectives. Here's what Kate was doing, here's what the sad clown killer guy was doing, here's what the dog was doing, and so on. Combined with David Aja's inability to maintain even an every other month schedule (Francesco Francavilla and Annie Wu drew some of the issues in that stretch), and the five issues of Clint Barton moping around and being useless dragged on for nine months. Contrast that with the Gruenwald mini-series from two weeks ago. Clint is out-of-sorts at the start of issue 2 over being played by his girlfriend, and even though he remains angry and distant with Mockingbird, he still gets off his butt and does something. It was exhausting and frustrating, and if I had any sense, I'd have pulled the rip cord.

The delays themselves were a whole other thing. The book started in August of 2012, and actually shipped 6 issues by the end of the year, though two of those were drawn by Javier Pulido. Counting the Annual that came out in 2013 (also drawn by Pulido, but lacking a splash page), the book shipped 17 issues the next 30 months before it concluded in June/July of 2015. The pace slowed the longer it went. At one point, Marvel shipped issue 16 (focused on Kate) before issue 15 (focused on Clint), because Annie Wu (Kate's adventures in L.A., which were pretty enjoyable) had been done for a while and there was no telling when Aja would actually, you know, finish issue 15.

It was difficult to square this version of Clint Barton with the competent hero we see in the Avengers. The guy who was a good leader for the Thunderbolts, who took down two Elders of the Universe, can't master the drawstring on his sweatpants all of the sudden. I understand this is supposed to be Clint during off-hours, and there's no team (unless you count the dog and his brother) backing him up, but I've seen Hawkeye handle threats a lot worse than a bunch of morons in tracksuits solo. I expected there would be some rough patches for the character in the book, but I also expected those to be interspersed with moments of him doing cool shit. This did not happen. In practice, it was other characters taking time out from yelling at Clint for fucking up to do cool shit.

(There was also the whole thing about Clint cheating on Spider-Woman, which is an Oliver Queen thing. Clint's the one who says dumb hurtful shit without thinking. Sigh, still better than Bendis repeatedly writing Clint as kill-happy, but that's a very low bar.)

The book finally wrapped up just as Marvel was (temporarily) canceling all their ongoing titles for a few months because of Hickman's Secret Wars. The ending was as satisfying as it could be, but by that point I was just glad it was over. It felt like a book that had been style over substance for a while. Very stylish, to be sure, but Fraction, Aja, and Hollingsworth proved they could still make it stylish while actually advancing the story, they just went through long stretches where it felt like there wasn't much interest in doing that. 

The catch to a creative team being allowed to cook their way is, there's still no guarantee I'll like what they put on the table.

Saturday Splash Page #33

 

"Into the Storm," in Wild Blue Yonder #4, by Mike Raicht (story/writer), Austin Harrison (story), Zach Howard (story/artist), Nelson Daniel (colorist), Jolyon Yates (ink assists), Thompson Knox (letterer)

I think I saw the hardcover of this listed in Previews and without knowing much of anything about it, decided I had to buy it. A dystopian future story with an emphasis on air battles instead of car convoys and forever trains. Road Warrior in the sky? Sign me up.

So, an Earth scarred by radiation and pollution. A few people are able to survive in airships, what's left of everyone else toils away on the surface, hoping they'll get a chance to live in the clouds. There's one airship everyone is after, The Dawn. Solar-powered, so it doesn't have to worry about fuel like everyone else. Raicht lays all this out in the first few pages, as well as that the greatest threat to the Dawn and her crew is the "Judge", commander of a fleet of ships.

The two main characters are Cola, a hotshot pilot who flies that orange plane in the lower right, and Tug, a miner she recruits as a "gun". "Guns" are people who use very-limited fuel jetpacks to land on enemy craft and wreck stuff up close. Not a great survival rate, hence the vacancy that got Tug the job.

A lot of the story deals with the differences in perspective at different levels. Cola's mother is the Dawn's commander. She and Cola butt heads, or more accurately, Olivia yells at Cola for not following orders. Frankly, her threats to ground Cola seem like a bluff when she's yelling about them being down a plane. You're going to put yourself at even greater disadvantage? But the point is supposed to be Olivia is thinking of a big picture, of trying to keep the Dawn airborne, while Cola is more focused on the dogfight she's in, or on protecting her gun or her friends.

Likewise, the story spends time with the Judge and his crew. Why he takes the approach he does, what he hopes to accomplish. He's contrasted with a young doctor on his ship, Dr. Stephens, who struggles to understand a man who in one breath, punches a pilot in the stomach with a broken glass for disobeying orders, and in the next tells her to make sure the pilot doesn't die because they already lost three pilots today. All lives, including his ultimately, are worth burning up for this goal.

It's a little funny they're fighting over the Dawn, because honestly, it doesn't look like much. Howard and Daniel take the approach towards the airship and technology in general that suggests improvisation, or maybe practicality is the word in this world. Kind of like the Nostromo in Alien, the Dawn isn't built for comfort. It's a lot of hard edges and halls lined with dirty pipes. Reminds me of the interior of a battleship or aircraft carrier (on purpose, no doubt). I like the designs for the planes - bit of a mixture of WW2 prop fighter and more recent jet attack planes - but again, they're well-worn. The paint's chipped off in places, it's basically a matter of keeping the functional. No time or resources to waste on "pretty".

Likewise, the characters themselves are scuffed up and dirty. Granted, it's movie dirty. The day-old stubble doesn't look like a mess and the clothes might be dirty but they still fit and make people look cool, but you can see the years on some of them. This life, whether stuck down in toxic air mining, or up on a solar-powered airship everyone wants, is a constant fight to survive, and it burns them out.

Random Back Issues #91 - The Legion #2

Shikari, artists don't like it when you point that out.

The Legionnaires who got tossed across the universe in Legion Lost are back on Earth, with a disbanded Legion, a new president of the United Planets, a new team acting as protectors (including their buddy Mon-El), and someone trying to kill them.

That someone is the new team. Who could have guessed characters called "Brainstorm", "Repulse", and "Abyss" might not be on the up-and-up? Despite having the numbers advantage, the Legion doesn't know the powers of their opponents and get their butts kicked, necessitating the ol' strategic withdrawal.

President McCauley, the one behind this, is busy making sure Mon-El sticks close to him, and away from his old friends. The Legion are wandering through tunnels with technology even Brainiac-5 can't analyze. Umbra's also worried because her shadow powers cut out halfway through the fight.

Mystery for another issue, the bad guys caught up again, with reinforcements. The Legion are still doing better, except for the mysterious Venge. He acted like an aide to the president earlier, but he's strong enough to toss Ultra Boy around, immune to Saturn Girl's telepathy, and all Wildfire can manage is to ruin his suit. Quantum's able to slow his 'personal time field,' and the Legionnaires make their second strategic withdrawal of the issue.

Into a sewer tunnel. A sewer tunnel that serves as outflow for a major reactor. Kind of sad that even in the 31st Century they're still using polluting energy sources. But at least the administration recycles, because the outflow tunnel is also where they dump bodies. Like. . . President McCauley. So, who's hanging out with Mon-El? I'll give you a hint, he's a villain from the 20th Century with strong facial hair game. (I do not, however, remember off the top of my head who Venge is.)

The team seems caught between a lot of gallons of ultratoxic coolant water and a long fall without flight rings - although between Ultra Boy, Wildfire and Chameleon, shouldn't they have enough fliers to carry the rest? - but it seems not all the Legion have retired.

[6th longbox, 140th comic. The Legion #2, by Dan Abnett (writer), Andy Lanning (writer/inker), Oliver Coipel (penciler), Tom McCraw (colorist), Comicraft (letterer)]

What I Bought 8/3/2022

Sure hope I'm having fun on this vacation. If not, it's going to be all the worse going back to work and all those e-mails. In the meantime, here's Moon Knight!

Moon Knight #14, by Jed MacKay (writer), Alessandro Cappuccio (artist), Rachelle Rosenberg (color artist), Cory Petit (letterer) - Mr. Knight's a couch hog.

Moon Knight is busy getting his ass kicked by the two new villains from last issue. Much better intro for them, even if I'm still largely unclear on their abilities. Nemean seems very tough, kind of a brawler, while Grand Mal is either one of those pressure point focused fighters, or she has a paralytic touch thing going. Not helping Moonie's case is Marc's busy having an internal conversation with Steven Grant and Jake Lockely. Steven's sitting in a high-rise office, in a suit. Jake's in a strip club, sporting a horrible looking mustache. Is he a porno star pretending to be a cabbie?

Marc is busy insisting he can't appear crazy to everyone else, and so the other two have to stay locked away inside their head. Steven and Jake, I guess accurately, point out that all the stuff that makes people say Moon Knight is crazy is stuff Marc did.

Just as an aside, Marc says the Punisher calls him crazy. Who gives a fuck? That's like Deadpool questioning someone's mental health, or Tony Stark questioning someone's judgment. Stones, glass houses, all that shit? Besides, if Frank is calling him crazy, it's probably for the same reason he calls Spider-Man and Daredevil crazy. That their notion criminals shouldn't be executed on sight is stupid and naive. He probably think Marc should stop cutting people's faces off and just slit their throats.

Digression over. Steven and Jake keep pushing, Marc keeps making excuses,and keeps losing the fight. Finally, about the time Tigra and Hunter's Moon show up to save his butt, he admits he likes having Reese around as a friend who is normal, and that he does need people. Progress, I guess.

For the conversation, Marc's wearing the mask throughout. I thought maybe he's take it off during his confessional at the end, but I guess he's not at that point. Cappuccio arranges the pages and the players in different ways. They're always in their own panels, but sometimes the page is arranged so Marc and one of the two are facing off in consecutive panels. And it alternates, the two of them stepping in to support each other. Steven points out Marc is the one who fucks up his own life, Marc yells at him. Steven yells back, then it switches to a panel of Jake cutting in. Then the next two panels are Jake and Marc arguing. Other times, it's presented so that Steven and Jake are on top of Marc, the weight of their arguments pressing down. Also, it seems like the view closes in on Marc as the issue goes along. he's losing this distance he's trying to put up.

The Deep House (2021)

A compact (85 minutes) little horror film about Ben and Tina, a young couple who like to record their explorations of abandoned places. Tina seems interested in history, Ben wants their videos to go viral so they can make money. Pretty sure no one who tried to go viral has ever actually done it. Also, he likes to pull pranks on Tina to scare her while they're shooting the videos, because he's kind of an ass like that.

Ben learns of a perfectly preserved abandoned house off in a little corner of a lake in France. So he and Tina go scuba diving into it. Yes, this was a bad idea.

They quickly find that when the guy said "perfectly preserved", he meant it. All the possessions are still there. Including lots of police fliers for missing children pinned on the walls. Like mysterious Super 8 camera footage. Like two dead bodies dangling from chains in a basement that was blocked off behind a big crucified Jesus.

It's fairly predictable from that point. Tina wants to leave, Ben keeps promising they will, but keeps wanting to explore, 'just one more room.' The underwater drone keeps shorting out. Tina goes from thinking Ben is messing with her, to increasingly frantic as she figures out he isn't. Which is bad since, you know, they're underwater and have limited air supply. Then the exit is mysteriously bricked shut.

The air supply works as sort of a time bomb for them, but it's really secondary as a source of tension. The matter of whether they can even find a way out is more pressing, as is the limits on their mobility and visibility. 

That's where the underwater setting really shines. When Tina is being pursued, you know that on land, she would be running full-out sprint. Underwater, even in scuba gear, the best she can manage is awkwardly kicking and flailing through the water. The movie uses first-person perspective a lot, so those scenes feel like being in one of those nightmares where you're trying to run but you're stuck in slow-motion. Maybe it's just me that has those. Their lights can only illuminate so much, and combined with the face masks, their field of vision is very limited. Great for the jump scares when they're looking around frantically and the light is wobbling all over the place.

And the movie effectively kept me in suspense as to whether Tina was going to make it out alive. Ben was always fucked. The stupid guy who thinks it's funny to mess around with stuff like this never makes it out alive. As it should be.

What I Bought 7/30/2022 - Part 3

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Blink #1, by Christopher Sebela (writer), Hayden Sherman (artist), Nick Filardi (colorist), Frank Cvetkovic (letterer) - Inside every person lurks a camera and a bunch of creepy hands. It's remarkable how life works, when you think about it.

Wren's a freelance journalist. As a child, she was found wandering a street with blood on her. No one knows what the blood was from and she couldn't lead them back to where she came from. She's been trying to find answers ever since, while dealing with the fallout the experience made of her life. She gets a clue, a brief glimpse of a website with a bunch of camera feeds of a place that looks familiar. Wren and Joel find the building and sneak into the basement, but it's not as deserted as it first appears.

Sherman uses a lot of panels that overlap just a little. Like tossing out a pack of playing cards on a table and drawing the arrangement. It makes a cluttered, untidy feel that mirrors the fragments of memories Wren has, or thinks she has. Sebela has Wren acknowledge that she's been trying to piece things together so long, she's not sure what she remembers that isn't actually something she made up. 

Lot of using camera views as panels, and some of those show the past, some the present, some just static. Gaps in the recall that Wren can't abide. Which is another thing I appreciate about the writing. Wren has a husband, partner, person she lives with named Nico. She knows or fears she's messing things up with Nico by getting sucked into this. But while Nico thinks things were fine, thought she was fine as she was, it's different for Wren, viewing it from the inside. While they're having that conversation, the panels are set against a backdrop of electronic static. Wren's need for answers is a backdrop to their lives together whether Nico realized it or not.

So, yes, I'm very intrigued by the first issue. I like these stories about exploring creepy places and trying to piece together a past.

Iron Cat #2, by Jed MacKay (writer), Pere Perez (artist), Frank D'Armata (color artist), Ariana Maher (letterer) - I don't like the gold shoulder pads on the Iron Man armor. Too much uninterrupted gold, I think.

A lot of the issue is focused on Tamara, Felicia's ex and the one running around in the Iron Cat suit. How she and the Black Fox first met, her perspective on Felicia and how they're different as thieves, the start of their relationship. D'Armata again using that softer shading on the colors for the flashback parts.

Also explained, how Tamara was able to steal the armor from Stark. The answer is she made a copy of Sunset Bain, who is apparently now an AI called Madame Menace. This also explains the problems Stark's having with all his systems, because the Madame is running amok in there. Perez chooses kind of an interesting angle for the panel that introduces her, where we seem to be looking down slightly on her. It makes her eyes seem unusually far apart, and the straight ahead look (not at us, but at Tamara who is positioned somewhere lower than our viewpoint) and the grin make an unsettling combo. She never looks quite as inhuman as in that panel.

As for our two leads, Felicia convinces Tony to set a trap by having a big public party on a yacht to draw Tamara out. But it's one of those, "your trap has fallen right into my trap," situations. Exactly how that works will wait for next issue. There's not much else to it, since MacKay focused a lot on Tamara. Which makes sense, as she's the new character in this and the one whose desire for revenge is driving this whole thing (although I won't be at all surprised if she decides Madame Menace has gone too far at some point.)