What I Bought 3/21/2018

Found two of the books from this week, which was one more than I thought I would. In other news, I've felt very scattered lately. Pulling in a dozen directions, and I can't decide which one to commit to. There hasn't been time to stop and figure things out. It's frustrating.

Cave Carson Has an Interstellar Eye #1, by Jon Rivera (writer), Michael Avon Oeming (artist), Nick Filardi (colorist), Clem Robins (letterer) - I think Cave may have taken the same cavalier attitude towards cosmic rays as Reed Richards did.

Cave pays a visit to a musician friend of his, who is growing at an increasing rate, and ultimately will implode. They try taking him into space to allow him to do so without endangering anyone. But Star Adam passes on faster than they expect, and they don't get far enough away from his implosion, which is going to send Cave, Chloe, and the Dr. Bartow they picked up jaunting through dimensions in the previous series across the universe.

Negative: No Wild Dog. His presence as the guy not used to all this weird crap, but with a ready-made response was one of my favorite parts of the previous series. That and his slowly-developing friendship with Chloe. He made a good sounding board for her. She and Cave seem to be getting along, so maybe she doesn't need someone to listen to her fears and resentments. Rivera did a good job of explaining a few things that carried over from the earlier run quickly, to get it out of the way. Still, once I thought about it, this issue was all just set-up to get to the point where Cave can begin to go interstellar. Which annoys me, a little.

Oeming's panel layouts and Filardi's colors made a great combo in Cave Carson has a Cybernetic Eye, and that continues here. The page where Adam tried the night pudding, and realized he had an unusual origin, Oeming draws the panels as different part of Adam's body, with the central panel focusing on Adam, who is struggling to grasp this greater self he has. Filardi makes the background a neon green web, and the panels are deep shades of blue and lavender, with Mazra's hair as this luminous silver in the panels she appears in. It's really eye-catching. And then the next page, we're back in the present, and the panels are more straightforward, but much smaller and slanted, closing in from one way or the other, Adam barely managing to squeeze in. The reality of what he learned he was, against the limitations of his surroundings and physical body. He can't fit in that reality any longer. If I stick with this book past the initial few issues, it'll probably be due to the art.

Ms. Marvel #28, by G. Willow Wilson (writer), Nico Leon (artist), Ian Herring (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - I don't think the outfit really works on Carol.

Naftali finds Kamala, hiding out at a private school. I thought she'd gotten herself a job. Also, I'm surprised it was that easy for her to just switch schools like that. Meanwhile, Carol Danvers and the Legion of Substitute Kamalas are trying to stop the Inventor, and doing a pretty poor job of it. Carol did not bring her "A" game today. Kamala, inspired by Naftali to not just bail when she could ask for help, returns and fights the Inventor's Mega-Reptile Zord. The day is saved, he goes to jail, she and Carol have a heartfelt conversation, and none of Kamala's friends think anything of her reappearing at school right after Ms. Marvel made her triumphant return. This is what happens when you keep cutting spending on education.

I still feel bad for the giant screaming turtle. I think it's just in a lot of pain. Turtles are not meant to be that large! I don't feel bad for the guy driving a monster truck on the boardwalk, though. I mean, what the hell are you driving that thing around in public for anyway?  But as always, the little details Leon adds are a treat. The person on the first page vaulting a car while holding their pet under one arm. The teens taking a taxi because they couldn't keep up with Carol. I also enjoy that the Inventor's creatures did the badass pose thing, and the Subs responded with their own cool, if less intimidating poses in the next panel. Just needed some random dude to yell out, "POSE-OFF!" Then get stepped on.

Also, I think Herring softens the tones on the colors for the quiet, civilian talking scenes. Or maybe it's just that people aren't wearing bright primary color superhero costumes during those scenes. But I'd swear the colors are more varied, but also just not quite as bright. More relaxed, soothing, let's you just read the words, maybe. Between this and the story about the runaway train, I've been enjoying these last couple of stories quite a bit. Nice breather from dealing with HYDRA crap.

Get Out

I watched this with a friend who didn't know the reveal, while I had read about it online last year. It worked really well for both of us. I want to try not to spoil too much about this in case you haven't seen it.

If you know what's coming, the way things keep getting progressively stranger and more ominous has you sitting there dreading the moment it stops being odd and starts being deadly. If you don't know, the things are sufficiently weird that you know things are going to go badly (plus the title of the movie is Get Out, so. . .)

Daniel Kaluuya did an excellent job as Chris. He's already uneasy, meeting his white girlfriend's family the first time, and things are awkward. But awkward in a way that Chris is unfortunately used to, so you see him trying to put it aside, while also trying to find anyone that he can feel more comfortable with. Which only proves to create more strangeness, and makes him even more uneasy. Kaluuya conveys that sense of isolation that produces nagging uncertainty, that distinct awareness that he's vulnerable.

And I like how the movie handled LilRel Howery's character, Rod. It would have been easy for him to just be the goofy best friend character, and Rod is the source of a lot of humor. But he isn't only that. I feel like we're supposed to underestimate him, but he tries to be smart about things and help his friend, even though he's operating in the dark about what's really happening.

The film builds the tension well, and just in general, the threats and tools are presented in an intelligent fashion. I never felt like the movie was cheating. It sets up our expectations, then twists them or blasts them to pieces in ways that work. It's a very well-done film.

Planetary Volume 1

Rather than shell out for those big collections of Planetary I saw in the solicits a few months ago, I bought some of the trades they released 15 years ago, since used copies were so much cheaper. I'm not too worried about missing out on the various crossover mini-series that I don't think are included in these. Do I really need to see the main cast interact with the Justice League, when Ellis and Cassaday are using various knockoff versions of them already?

(I was going to call them thinly-veiled, but in some cases the veil is practically diaphanous.)

The first trade, containing the first six issues, pretty much set the tone for the book. Planetary investigates strange things, all of which are variations on stuff from our popular fiction. A team of pulp heroes, kaiju, superheroes, etc. Usually things have gone disastrously badly, machines that create universes to search for answers before destroying them, or an endless cycle of murdered Hong Kong cops who become spirits of vengeance.

The book is entertaining. The stories have all been done-in-ones, with a larger subplot taking form in the background. I like the strange ideas in the same way I enjoy them in Atomic Robo (although with a very different tone), and with each issue being a different adventure, it creates its own momentum as I want to see what the next issue will bring. The writing isn't bad; I knew Ellis could do snappy, sarcastic dialogue already.

But it feels light. Like I'm just skimming the surface, playing "spot the reference" and seeing how John Cassaday draws weird stuff. The answer to that second part is, "better than I expected". I thought his style would be a little too stiff or realistic to draw things other than extremely good-looking people, but that actually seems to work in his favor. When he draws the corpse of a giant monster, it stands in stark contrast to the people around it. He can draw gleaming alien structures, and decaying ruins that suggest a long (and probably dark history). Laura DePuy's colors suggest things so bright they're blinding at times, but goes dingy or faded when needed.

The are and the general concept of the book are carrying most of the water. I wouldn't say I particularly care about Elijah Snow, Jakita, or the Drummer. I don't dislike them - well, the Drummer annoys me a little, but he also seems to have gotten the least focus so far - but they mostly serve as a way to get the story to the weird stuff. Maybe provide exposition for what take Ellis is going with as necessary.

It's working for me as an adventure story, which is fine. A good one of those is a pleasure to read.

Man Vs.

A horror movie about a guy on one of those survival TV shows. He's left in northern Canada, and starts to feel as though something in the woods is messing with him. Robbing his traps, stealing his satellite phone. His crew had been giving him a hard time, because he's kind of a prick, and the crew is hoping their show gets picked up by a major network. And he was kind of a prick to their guide when they first met, so he can't rule out that one of them is playing a joke.

We can, because something fell out of the sky nearby his first night there, and we know how these things go, but Doug doesn't make the connection for a long time.

Like a lot of horror movies, this one works best when it only shows hints of what's after him, or shows its handiwork. The way it's copying his survival techniques. Near the end, they start showing a lot more of it, which is not to the movie's benefit.

It wasn't clear what its motivations were, even once the film unveiled its surprise twist at the end. I wasn't sure why it didn't just kill him, or why, if it wasn't going to kill him, it kept after him, even once he decided it was time to get the hell out of there. The surprise did solve my concern about how Doug, if he survived, was going to explain his dead crew. You can never rule out the cops (or Mounties, I guess) showing up and gunning down the "dangerous maniac" in these things.

The first hour plus wasn't bad on the suspense, the last 10-15 minutes kind of flubbed it.

Catch a Demon By His Heartstrings

In the last issue of Demon: Hell is Earth, Jason Blood and Madame Xanadu had a conversation in the lull in the middle. Jason admits to fearing that Etrigan is going to overwhelm him, which isn't a new for him. He mentions that the two of them - Blood and Xanadu - seemed to drift apart after he stopped letting Etrigan out, and her response is essentially that yes, that's true. Because she saw it as Jason not trusting that the two of them could control the Demon. Jason was treating it as his burden to bear when, if they were a couple, it was a responsibility they'd share.

Although I figure there's a decent chance Jason was worried she'd decide she liked Etrigan better and Blood would become the third wheel. You know Etrigan would try his damndest to make that happen, just because. Which makes me envision Jason and Etrigan as Betty and Veronica, which leaves Madame Xanadu as Archie, my apologies to her. Which makes Merlin Reggie Mantle, or Jughead?

That wasn't really where I was going with this. A less charitable interpretation of Xanadu's comments would be she liked having both boys interested, and resented Jason for cutting Etrigan out. Seems unlikely, but as Drax might say, it might sound like the Madame Xanadu I know. I haven't read that many comics with her in them, and DC characters are an unfathomable mystery!

Shortly after the conversation, as Etrigan tears apart mutated horned lizards, Jason and Xanadu observe and discuss how a sword is never safe, but it can be managed, controlled. Tying in to Jason's concerns of losing control, and Xanadu's remarks that the two of them together could handle the situation. That's a dangerous assumption to make.

Setting aside that Jason can't count on Madame Xanadu always being there to help him, Etrigan is not a sword. Swords can't think for themselves, don't have their own motivations. Etrigan is no genius, but he's old, and cunning, and spiteful. You can't rely on the situations where they need Etrigan being ones where he'd always want to help, or have no choice but to do so. And as long as he has to option to refuse to help simply for the sake of being difficult, or out of spite, "controlling" him is going to be hard to do. A sword, when you go to draw it from its scabbard, doesn't typically refuse to be drawn. But Etrigan might. He might simply repeat the phrase and revert to Jason Blood, or turn around and go do something else.

Granted, if Blood dies, Etrigan dies, but underestimating the demon's potential for spite seems dangerous. The two of them have both certainly contemplated doing that often enough. Madame Xanadu could try using approval/disapproval as a carrot/stick situation, but that's only going to sour things over time. Unless demons enjoy being played with like that, and assuming she's actually willing to do so (doesn't really seem like her style, but like I said, it might be).

There are going to be times they need Etrigan, and it would certainly help to be able to convince him to help. But thinking they can control him just seems like the first step in setting themselves up for an unpleasant surprise down the line. Still, seeing if the can pull it off for the duration of this adventure is the main thing keeping me invested in the mini-series.

Sunday Splash Page #12

"A typical Tuesday for Spider-Man" in Amazing Spider-Man #231, by Roger Stern (writer), John Romita Jr. (penciler), Jim Mooney (inker), Bob Sharen (colorist), Joe Rosen (letterer)

The Roger Stern/John Romita Jr. run on Amazing Spider-Man is a little before my time, so I've doubled back around to it after the fact. I generally like Stern's writing, and Romita Jr. is drawing in a style more similar to Romita Sr. still at this stage, which is fine. 

(How much I like Romita Jr.'s later work seems to depend heavily on the inker, colorist, and just the project in general. Some books it works better to my eye than others.) 

I own bits of this run. This two-parter against Mr. Hyde, and the two issues before that, the iconic fight with the Juggernaut. Two issues when Stern brought back the Black Cat (although it seems like they mostly left that relationship to be handled in Spectacular Spider-Man). One issue where the Mad Thinker takes an interest in Spider-Man. Stern's last few, when the Hobgoblin tries a major extortion scheme and neutralizes Webs' spider-sense. Stern didn't get a chance to finish revealing the mystery of who the Hobgoblin was before he was off the book, though. 

Stern and Romita Jr. work the Spider-Man formula pretty well, mixing and matching the romance/job/school troubles with the superhero fisticuffs. I'm a fan of stories where Spidey has to punch out of his weight class, and they added a couple of solid entries to the list, the Juggernaut story being the more well-known. Romita Jr. knows how to draw a fight scene cleanly and with impact, and show off Spider-Man's combination of speed and agility.

What I Bought 3/14/2018

Two books this week, both from Marvel, both wrapping up storylines. And for one of them, it's the end of the line for me. At least for a couple of months. Gee whiz, I wonder which one that is?

Deadpool #296, by Gerry Duggan (writer), Matteo Lolli (artist), Ruth Redmond (colorist), Joe Sabino (letterer) - I would say Wade should be careful what he asks for, making the "bring it" gesture, but even if Cap pummels him into the ground, Wade would be OK with the pain.

Wade fights with Captain America, yelling at him and blaming him a lot. Cap grows increasingly frustrated, playing into Deadpool's hands. Most of this is Wade coming up with ways to make Cap look bad in front of the public, which I love. I laughed at least three times during this issue. They end up in Deadpool's subway hangout, where Wade makes a request/demand of Steve, escapes by threatening civilians, and vows to continue pissing off the entire world.

I know Deadpool needed Cap alive to make that request, but I also like to think he knew killing Captain America wasn't happening, so he might as well crap on his rehabilitation tour. Steve Rogers gets to play the "it was an evil doppelganger" card, and it's three cheers and second chances all around. Wade can't play that card, and combined with the crapstorm his life has become, that has to be maddening. I wonder if he also left Rogers alive to annoy Stevil Rogers, since the reverse is true.

It's an interesting fight, with Cap holding back (except maybe when Deadpool suggests the evil Cap is the one who really represents the U.S.), while Wade is using it as another chance to air grievances. Lolli tells it in a straightforward manner, the flow from one move to the next is easy to follow. Plus, he made sure people were looking in the right direction for Wade's first trick to work. Wade looks left while Steve looks down, and it's only when Cap finally looks to his left he realizes he's been played. That's basic stuff, but we've all seen miscommunication between the creative team ruin things like that. It was a good gag, so getting the set-up right was important.

I do wish Lolli wouldn't draw Cap's eyebrows as being visible in the eye holes of the mask. I suppose they would be, and he's hardly the only artist who does, but it's always bothered me. Ruins something about the mask somehow.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #30, by Ryan North (writer), Erica Henderson (artist), Rico Renzi (color artist), Travis Lanham (letterer) - What is everyone looking at? It must be something sorta cool, but not that cool, since Drax is ignoring it.

Our heroes avoid death from the missiles and then Doreen is able to figure out how to fix all the old beefs the various ripped off alien species had with each other. While all that is happening, Nancy and Tippy get the bit of Power Cosmic the aliens were using for their weapons to try and deal with the grifters. Tippy's attempt to make it so no one believes anything they say has too many loopholes, and the grifters' utter lack of remorse nearly gets them killed by a cosmic-powered Nancy, only for Doreen to give her a big speech about not being a bully by beating up these guys just because she can and wants to (and they deserve it).

Ehh, I don't know if I agree with that, but I'm a grudge-holder.

Until the book screeched to a halt for that discussion, I was enjoying it. Henderson and Renzi make a cosmic-powered squirrel look cool, and the panel of Tippy's impressive landing on the planet Chitt-crrt. I imagine it might have looked less impressive if we had seen the feet of the various characters standing there, but they were smart enough not to include that detail. And the blur lines on the "KRA-KOOM" sound effect were a nice touch.

Doreen and Nancy not letting the Surfer off the hook with his "it would be impossible to describe the Power Cosmic to those without it" was amusing, and Doreen trying to figure out how to solve all the aliens' conflicts with white boards and markers as well. Although my favorite moment was the excuse Nancy was forced to us as a distraction for Tippy. And that North had it work, but in a way that mortified Nancy even more. I hope she didn't touch anything in that restroom, though. Both for her benefit and the other species. You can't tell which way the War of the Worlds effect is going to run.

Churchill

Of course my dad wanted to watch the other Winston Churchill movie that came out last year. Unlike Darkest Hour, this one is set in the days leading up to D-Day, when Churchill (Brian Cox) is trying his best to scuttle the Normandy invasion. He sees it as helping to prevent a massacre, as Gallipoli looms large in his memory. Failing at that, he tries to get himself on one of the landing ships, partially because he doesn't like sending men to their deaths while he sits at a desk in London. And partially because he thinks of this as his war to run.

So it's a lot of him acting a bit like a petulant child. Storms off when Eisenhower and Brooke tell him they are not wasting forces on diversions in the Aegean Sea or Norway. Yells at his wife, berates his secretary for not double-spacing a draft of a speech. To the extent this is him dreading what he fears is going to be massive casualties, it's understandable. He's under a lot of strain, it's taking its toll. To the extent he's just mad because he's WINSTON CHURCHILL, damnit, and that means he should be able to have his way, it's not a good look.

The movie doesn't take the creative liberty Darkest Hour did with that scene where Churchill decides to use the subway to poll the regular Joes on their thoughts, but it does have a scene where he prays at his bedside for a massive storm that will cancel D-Day. I'm guessing that didn't really happen. There's a few things like that, probably not accurate, but they make for entertaining dramatics.

The two movies make for an interesting contrast. Darkest Hour has an uncertain Churchill being undermined by Chamberlain and Halifax, whereas Churchill has Winston certain that Operation Overlord in a mistake, and he's trying to interfere with them. The former movie references Gallipoli, but Churchill is more defiant about it, still just angry at the Navy for half-assing their side of things. This movie paints it less as something that makes others doubt him, and more something that haunts him and influences his judgment. Churchill spends a lot more time on the interaction between him and his wife, Clementine, the sometimes strained nature of their relationship, whereas Darkest Hour spent a lot of energy on him and his secretary. Darkest was trying to play with the idea Churchill isn't sure how much he can ask of the populace (the whole uncertainty of his position), which she represents. While Churchill is him having to accept that his place in things is changing and he has to move forward, and the person who's been with him that whole way has to help him, if he'll stop being such a mule about it.

Darkest Hour had a few more bits that made me laugh, but I don't know which I'd say was better. Should have asked my dad, as the resident Anglophile.

What I Bought 3/9/2018

Someone at work is stealing my writing utensils. A pencil Monday, a pen yesterday. It's very annoying. Yes, I considered the possibility I left them somewhere, but I checked everywhere I had been, and they weren't there.

Giant Days #36, by John Allison (writer), Max Sarin (artist), Whitney Cogar (colorist), Jim Campbell (letterer) - Just sittin' and thinkin' on a box, nothin' unusual at all. No sirree, she and her friends didn't strangle a classmate and toss her in a trunk as some sort of test, ala Hitchcock's Rope, nope.

Daisy breaks up with Ingrid, during an art exhibition Ingrid was having in the dilapidated warehouse she lives in. The bus drivers that were admiring her work get some performance art to go with it. Daisy then sinks into a depression for two weeks, emerging just in time for the girls to move out for the summer. Unfortunately, Daisy's return home is going to be a little awkward since her grandma found out about Daisy dating Ingrid from a heartbroken Ingrid (and it had to be an extra, final gutpunch for Ingrid to realize Daisy never did tell her grandmother about the two of them). Well, I was wondering how Daisy was going to end up talking about her sexual orientation with her grandma if she and Ingrid were breaking up, since I didn't see Daisy broaching the topic otherwise.

Kudos to Allison and Sarin here, for actually making me feel bad for Ingrid. I haven't really liked her, because she seems exactly the sort of person I would hate and avoid in real life, but that may just be her loud personality. And because Daisy's kept her doubts from Ingrid, preferring to pretend everything is fine, it came as a blindside. The range of emotions Ingrid goes through in a few pages, even just in one page, from stunned, to quietly asking Daisy to leave, to going nuclear at Daisy's platitudes. Still the right move for Daisy; being with Ingrid was making her miserable, but I had been anticipating the break-up almost as gleefully as Susan and Esther, so I didn't expect to feel sympathetic.

Sarin actually inks himself this issue, rather than Liz Fleming acting as inker. I think people looked a little rounder, possibly. Mostly I thought that with Esther, she normally has a bit of a rough edge, especially around her eyes, and it wasn't present. That might have been because it's going into summertime, people are feeling cheerful and upbeat, relaxed. Look, I'm the wrong guy to describe to you the value of inkers. I know it's definitely a thing, I just stink at perceiving it.

Also, I wonder if, having seen her dad and McGraw together, Susan notices disturbing similarities in them. I'm not sure what I expected her father to be like, but that wasn't it.

Atomic Robo: The Spectre of Tomorrow #5, by Brian Clevinger (writer), Scott Wegener (artist), Anthony Clark (colorist), Jeff Powell (letterer/designer) - That's the most peculiar Atomic Robo cover I've ever seen.

Robo tries to elude Helsingard's creatures to destroy the giant computer brain Helsingard has taken control of. Robo is actually the decoy to let his little pink robots reprogramming the computer to eat itself, essentially. Another Helsingard bites the dust. Wonder how many that leaves. Bernard snaps out of his funk long enough to save Foley, steal Helsingard's jump jet, and get the three of them back home. Where Lang and Vik's extortion of Elon Musk has gotten their building permits reinstated! They have a functioning toilet now! Which Robo has probably never seen, because he went back into his basement lab again (also, he doesn't need a bathroom). That is not at all concerning (the returning to the basement part, not the lack of need for a bathroom)!

Not a bad conclusion. Clevinger and Wegener set up a couple of things for future stories, although I have a hard time getting interested in yet another mysterious, quasi-government organization. I can't keep track of all the ones they've introduced in the past. As for the unexpected side effect of Robo's little bots interacting with ALAN, maybe Robo can teach them? Though I recall he said the more of them there were, the more they link up and increase their intelligence. Which seems ominous, given what ALAN was up to when he and Robo first crossed paths.

The art is variable from one panel to the next. I still think the coloring is overwhelming Wegener's linework, and the colors being duller and muddy - at least on paper, maybe it looks better online - doesn't help. It makes things seem murky, or at times like they were hastily drawn. The panels above aren't the worst by any stretch, but the idea of the creature being unable to see Bernard because of how muddy he was amused me. The page of Robo dropping in among the Praetorians and throwing haymakers looks pretty good, but then the next page, the first panel looks like Robo was only partially sketched in and the colors are trying to suggest the rest of him. It's frustrating, because it could, and has, looked better in the past.

Invitation to a Gunfighter

This is a bit of an odd Western. Set after the Civil War, a Confederate soldier named Matt Weaver (George Segal) comes home to the New Mexico territory and finds his farm was bought and sold by the local big shot, Mr. Brewster (Pat Hingle). Matt's told to leave town, but the man who bought his home turns up dead the next morning.

Brewster hires a gunfighter, Jules Gaspard d'Estaing (Yul Brynner), to kill Matt Weaver, but Jules seems more interested in making said Brewster humiliate himself. He's also interested in Ruth Adams (Janice Rule), who runs a general store with her drunken, one-armed, bitter husband, and who was engaged to Matt before the war. When Jules shows no interest in killing Weaver, the Brewster hires Weaver to kill Jules, in a plan that has no chance of backfiring whatsoever.

Surprising amount happening in this one. Ruth claims she married Crane because Matt needed to understand how irrevocable his decision to fight with the Rebs was for her. She is strongly anti-slavery, as was the entire town apparently, except Matt and his father. They joined the Confederates, the entire rest of the town went on the Union side. At least on the white side of town. The large Mexican population seems to have been segregated. Of course, Matt and his father were the only white folk to treat the Mexicans as equals, so who are the real racists here? Also, it's claimed Matt only joined the South to be contrary, I assume out of disgust at the hypocrisy of all the other white folk. Which doesn't really change the fact that he did fight for the Confederate Army, regardless of what his reasons were.

Into this, you throw Jules, who we're told is one-quarter black (he uses the term "quadroon", which I've never seen outside a history book). I think they darkened Brynner's skin, or maybe they used lighting to achieve the effect. Seems in poor taste either way. Watching him lead the big shot around like a docile puppy is one of the high points of the film (there are three wounded Union soldiers in town tickled by it each time, including one who can't see and has to listen to his friends' description).

In some ways, it reminds me of High Plains Drifter, although this film predates that one by almost a decade. Mostly in the way the town (part of it anyway) is so terrified of this one tired, unhappy Reb soldier, that they bow to this call for a gunfighter, and then let the gunfighter walk all over them. He cheats at cards in the most obvious, lazy way possible, and no one even thinks to try and call him on it. Brewster wants Jules here to kill the gunfighter, Brewster owns most of the town, so they all go along with it. He's the bank. So Jules punishes them for their weakness, and out of his own, understandable anger and bitterness. He shows kindness at times, mostly restricts himself to punching up, rather than down, but the longer he stays, the more frustrated and torn he gets.

Jules becomes interested in Ruth, initially as a way to bring Weaver to him, but later out of some possible romantic interest. Ruth is polite, somewhat friendly, but mostly is trying to get him to not kill Weaver. Their mutual curiosity leads to a scene or two where everything stops so they can lay out their backstories and motivations to each other. Which is awkward, but it doesn't seem like the movie was going to explain certain things any other way. I'm not sure there needed to be any hint of attraction from Jules towards Ruth; the movie already has Ruth married to Crane but still caring about Matt. Is it necessary to complicate things further? There are a few scenes where Jules interacts with some of the local Mexicans, including a good friend of Matt's. I wouldn't have minded more of that.

As it is, the mere suggestion something might be happening between Jules and Ruth is what Brewster uses to get Weaver to face Jules. Weaver is smart enough to realize it would be dumb to fight someone on Brewster's behalf, especially someone Brewster hired to kill him. But Brewster mentions Ruth went into her home willingly with Jules, and maybe there's a reason Jules hasn't tried killing Matt, wink, wink, all sense flies out of Matt's head.

I read once that you can make white working class folks eat any amount of shit from the wealthy if you convince them minorities are going to take their stuff (and thus ignoring the wealthy have already taken a lot more). Matt proved it, Brewster wanted him eliminated as a threat, and then tried using him to eliminate someone else who was a threat. The threats are all things Brewster's either created or made up, they're his own doing for being a terrible person, but suggest this gunfighter "took" Matt's woman, and off he goes.

It was a more interesting movie than I expected. It needed either more time, or a few less threads so it could have let some things play out more naturally.

What I Bought 3/7/2018 - Part 2

I've seen these posters online for Ready Player One, and then I've seen a bunch of mock-posters people made for it, and I can't tell the difference. I had never heard of this book before all this stuff about the movie, and now it sounds like it was another of those big nerd things I missed out on, thankfully.

Demon: Hell is Earth #4, by Andrew Constant (writer), Brad Walker (penciler), Andrew Hennessy (inker), Chris Sotomayor (colorist), Tom Napolitano (letterer) - I like the touch of having Jason's immaterial leg partially phased through Etrigan's.

The entire issue is spent trooping to the gateway to Hell, with brief stops for Etrigan to kill mutated giant snakes and lizards. Xanadu and Blood talk a little, mostly Jason bemoaning still being chained to Etrigan. And the Demon talks with Merlin a bit, mostly about why he's been off sulking in a corner of Hell like a guy from Chile, er, I mean, Achilles. They reach the gateway, there are many enemies visible, and the issue ends.

The characters keep wondering how long it will take to reach the gateway, and Merlin keeps saying that the land is part of Hell, and so they'll get there when it allows it. I know the feeling. Constant is meandering his way through. Maybe because there isn't enough story for 6 issues. At this stage, maybe one issue spent getting past the horde/being captured by Belial, and another to defeat him/deal with the fallout? It's been a small cast, but it doesn't feel like much is being done with it.

On the plus side, Brad Walker draws a cool giant, demonic rattlesnake. Etrigan tends to dominate the panels he's in. He either looms over the other characters, or he's the only one in the panel and he fills it. When he interacts with Merlin, the wizard usually has his back to us, and he's in shadow a lot. Not sure of the significance there, unless it's that he has motives we haven't seen yet. Maybe he's planning to become ruler of Hell himself. He's standing between Etrigan and what he wants, but so is Blood, in a sense. Blood tried running from Etrigan, while Etrigan rages at the one who shackled him to Blood. Constant is probably heading towards them realizing they need to come to some sort of agreement, but I don't know if it's going to happen.

Mata Hari #1, by Emma Bebby (writer), Ariela Kristantina (artist), Pat Masioni (colorist), Sal Cipriano (letterer) - It says something she doesn't think she has to bother to conceal the knife or the possibly bloodstained silk curtain any better than that to lure whoever it is to her. Or it's all an act, and there's no danger at all.

The story opens on the day of her execution, then backtracks, moving from her various travels through Europe, her farce of a trial (the French judicial system works as fairly for her as it did for Alfred Dreyfuss), her childhood, the time of her arrest (which is conducted by Monsieur Bouchardon, who is also the prosecuting attorney, one of those quirks of the French legal system I forget sometimes).

In this chapter at least, there are two narrations almost competing. One is Margaretha's story, the one she wrote and hoped would be published (Bouchardon scattered it to the wind, so no luck there). The other is Bouchardon's testimony at the trial, which contrasts with what we see in the panels. He's made his mind up on her, and every word or action simply confirms it. If she says she's innocent, it proves what a liar she is. If she asks for help getting dressed, it's her immodesty, using her body. Maybe he's right, but most of his assumptions are based on limited information from what we know, as well as judgment of her character based on her careers.

It's hard for me to see this trial as much other than the French military trying to cover their guilt in getting a lot of their soldiers killed by being incompetent fuck-ups. Sure, let's ride our horses directly into the machine gun fire, what could go wrong? But perhaps they have some evidence that will be shown in the next few issues.

Kristantina has a light line most of the time, but covers a wide range of expressions and looks for Margaretha, depending on the circumstance. The one that's most striking to me is how much she appears to have aged by the day of her execution, even compared to how she looks during the trial. Whether it represents the harshness of her conditions, and the strain wearing on her, or simply her not having any access to cosmetics or decent shower facilities (they put her in a prison/convent thing for prostitutes), it makes for a severe contrast, even as she gathers herself.

During the early stages of the trial, there are panels showing her from some performance, where her character is beseeching Shiva for a boon, namely revenge on her enemies. Which raises the question of who her enemies are. Is she thinking of this as the crowd bray at her and call for her death, or are we supposed to keep it in mind as we learn about her alleged activities in later issues? The panels get larger over the course of the scene, and Masioni gives them a much brighter color scheme than the panels of the trial. The trial is mostly dull greys and browns, the judges and spectators are varying degrees of faded colors as well. While the panels showing the performance have a gold ring around them and a light lavender background, and Margaretha's wearing a bright red dress, maybe a kind of sari.

Beeby mentions in the afterword that she has taken some creative liberties, although I'm not likely to recognize them, but her mentioning that Mata Hari apparently lied constantly was good to know. I was letting my own irritation with the French legal system influence my perspective more than I should. But Beeby, with Kristantina and Masioni's work, is really effective at evoking sympathy for the subject. So now I'm curious to see if she turns that on its head, makes the reader feel the fool for buying in.

Sunday Splash Page #11

"Doc Ock Teams Up With The Overwhelming Title Banner", in Amazing Spider-Man #90, by Stan Lee (writer), Gil Kane (penciler), John Romita Sr. (inker), Sam Rosen (letterer), colorist unknown

I hope you're ready for several weeks of Amazing Spider-Man, but we're going to be hitting several different eras and creative teams.

This is the only Spider-Man comic that was in my father's collection by the time I found it in my grandmother's basement. It's most known as the issue that kills off Captain Stacy, Gwen's father. In my younger, stupider days, I would look at the price guide in the back of Wizard Magazine and get excited when it listed this comic as being worth $90. Of course, I was entirely ignoring that being the mind condition, best-case scenario price, while the copy I have doesn't even have covers.

The issue itself has Spidey narrowly escape Ock in the first half of the issue, then come up with some way his webbing can jam the signals from Ock's brain to the tentacles, which causes them to go berserk, leading to Stacy's death (which explains why he doesn't just try that every time, having multiple super-strong metal tentacles flailing around wildly is dangerous!). There's also a brief section where Peter declines to attend a protest rally on campus about pollution, to the disgust of Randy Robertson and his friends, who decide Parker is just a self-interested tool.

The issue is no great shakes; I keep for the sentimental value as much as anything.

What I Bought 3/7/2018 - Part 1

They build vending machines now to recognize if your selection didn't actually drop. When it senses that, it makes the little coil spin again, and then you can get two bags of Skittles for the price of one. It's a nice bonus that happens every once in a while. Some days at work, I take what I can get.

Tick 2017 #3, by Cullen Bunn and JimmyZ (writers), Duane Redhead (artist) - Welcome to the X-Men, Tick and Arthur, hope you brought enough pie for everyone.

Spotted Fever saves Arthur from the clowns and ninjas, and smacks some sense back into the Tick. She takes them to La Chambre Rouge where they find the newest batch of prospective heroes being twisted by Dr. Daedalus. Their attempt to escape runs them smack into an army of ninjas and clowns.

I feel this was a play on Larry Hama's Wolverine run, when Logan finds the Weapon X facility they staged a lot of his and the other victims' memories at. Mostly it was the scene when Tick wanders into a room he swears is Arthur's living room (although Arthur doesn't see it). I don't know if that's what Bunn and JimmyZ are going for, but given the Tick originally played a lot with spoofing Miller's Daredevil, it wouldn't surprise me. They've given the Tick a backstory of a nefarious doctor trying to turn him into a weapon, plus a lost love he didn't remember, plus speaking French all of the sudden. OK, that last one isn't a perfect comp to Logan's connections to Japan, but you get my point.

Redhead's artwork fits the story. It's still, at this point, a fairly straightforward superhero story, and Redhead has a clean, straightforward style. He can make the evil Doctor look sinister when he needs to, and the Tick is very expressive, and it seems like all the information that is supposed to be on the page is there, presented clearly. I would like a better look at the designs on those other heroes that showed up, especially The Gesture. I feel like his costume ought to evoke the era his moves supposedly come from, but the little bit we see of it doesn't suggest that.

I'm not sure if I'm planning to stick with the book going forward, though. Still not convinced we really needed the Tick's origin, assuming this doesn't wind up being some sort of fakeout or a false memory. Also, they write the Tick as very stream of consciousness. Was he always like that? Maybe it's all the buried memories. I guess we'll see.

Empowered and Sistah Spooky's High School Hell #3, by Adam Warren (writer), Carla Speed McNeil (artist/letterer), Jenn Manley Lee (colorist) - I'm glad my high school bathroom experiences were not like that.

After surviving a sing-off against in the music room, Spooky and Emp wind up in the ladies' room, where Emp finds herself stuck in a stall that is filled rapidly by her own tears, and Spooky's being torn apart by cutting words from another girl as it cracks her reflection. But Emp has dealt with enough cruel taunts that she's able to bust out and kill both their tormentors. That's six more down, total.

Last issue, I wondered why no one was trying to backstab the Queen Bee, Ashley. I guess it's because she's more powerful than the others, with her Absolute Solipsism Field, and they're just terrified of her. It's seeming more and more likely she expects our heroes to kill all the others so she gets all of Spooky's power, and it might be interesting if that didn't go as planned. I can't shake that feeling Spooky's going to be offered a chance to rescue Hannah if she'll just betray Emp, and I'm not sure how that's going to play out.

The other part that's come up again is how for the most part, these girls are stuck in the same patterns they had in high school. They haven't changed their tactics, and think their targets haven't either. Spooky was nervous about singing, but the shit the girls hurled her way only irritated her. The insults Olivia whispered to Emp might have worked when the series started, but she's come far enough to know it's not true and not surrender. Brooke's insults didn't start to have the maximum impact until she attacked who Spooky is now, as opposed to how she looked back then. Attacking her survivor's guilt, her regrets, that seemed to take Spooky's will to fight.

McNeil and Lee did a heck of a job on that bit with Spooky trapped in front of the mirror. The way the cracks show in her reflection as these red voids, and then appear as cuts on the real her. The way the red that saturates those panels contrasts the blue that's threatening to drown Emp. Hannah's image appearing in the mirror, but mostly not showing the red hue, even though it's supposed to be part of Spooky's torment. The panels that have Spooky in them keep moving in closer as her situation goes downhill, even as Emp's move back as she takes control of hers. And the number of panels per page goes up a little near the end of it. Not a lot, from five to seven over the course five pages, but it works. Time is running out, the tension goes up. Surprise, Carla Speed McNeil is good at this drawing thing.

Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow

I saw this in the theater with my dad when it came out, and hadn't thought about it since then. As far as movies meant to evoke old adventure serials from the '40s go, I'd stick with Indiana Jones or the Rocketeer.

The heavy reliance on CGI runs up against the limits of that technology in 2004, so sometimes it looks pretty good, and other times there's just too many robots, or the interactions between actors and CGI looks off. The designs on the robots seem appropriate for the era; the giant robots in the initial attack on New York wouldn't have been out of place in one of those Fleischer Superman cartoons. And there was one shot of the flying machines before they swoop down on the Sky Captain's base that I would have sworn was drawn. It looked like something out of an old Disney film. Might have been my favorite looking scene in the movie. The soft focus gets old after a while. Maybe they were doing that to help cover some of the CGI's weakness?

As action heroes go, Jude Law is. . . OK. He has a good enough smug grin you don't mind when he gets shown up. He's very much in that Han Solo school of guys who think they're a lot more slick and competent than they are. Not that Gwenyth Paltrow's reporter, Polly Perkins, is an ace. She opens the film meeting a scientist who explains he was part of a team hired by a mad genius, and all the members of the team are being abducted. He says there is only one left, and Polly asks who it is. After he just told her he was one of the scientists and he is standing there, not abducted, but terrified. Like perhaps he expects to be abducted himself, maybe.

Paltrow and Law do alright as an uneasy duo forced to work together. They squabble and snipe at each other well, frustrate each other. The movie got a couple of laughs out of me there. I didn't buy simmering romantic tension that was supposed to be there, but you can't win 'em all.

I appreciate the attempt at what the film was going for, I'm not sure it was able to pull it off, though.

Justice League 3000 Volume 1 - Yesterday Lives

Justice League 3000 started near the end of the New 52 era, and the follow-up series, Justice League 3001 actually carried over into that DCYou thing they did in 2015. It seems like DC was thinking two things: One, that they wanted to do a book in the future, but they couldn't get the Legion of Superheroes to sell, so slap "Justice League" on there instead. And two, that they'd try to serve that
portion of the fanbase that loved the Giffen/DeMatteis JLI.

So you get this, a "resurrected" Justice League trying to free the galaxy from the control of a group called "The Five", who have one member called "Persuader", but otherwise no real resemblance to the Fatal Five I can see. The process was imperfect, and so are the heroes, so they bicker and squabble, and behave stupidly, and die, and get brought back again. One of them does, at least.

There are a few jokes or gags that get run into the ground. Superman forgetting he can't fly, characters acting incredulously when someone refers to Ariel Masters as the team's "mother". That second one is made especially annoying because whenever it happens, no ever bothers to just explain it then, because that would possibly stop them from using it again 10 pages later.

There was potential to the idea. An inexperienced, wobbly Justice League trying to overthrow a powerful, entrenched dictatorship in a time they don't really understand. By the end of issue 7, which is the last one in this trade, you can see the team making halting steps in the direction of their old selves. They aren't their original selves - they still lack pieces, notably when it comes to strategy - but there's a hint they could form into an effective group.

But they still aren't a group you care much about. Beyond the fact it's established they can just be brought back if they die, and the question of whether they should even exist at all, they're an annoying group. A Superman who won't stop announcing it, no matter how many times nobody is impressed, his skull apparently only invulnerable to insight. Flash keeps dying, but pointlessly - such a poor copy he can't even get the only thing Barry Allen does well right. On and on. It might be funny if they didn't belabor the point.

One thing that's influencing my outlook is I found two-thirds of JL 3001 in some dollar bins right before this tpb showed up in the mail. I know the rushed, inconclusive ending this book ultimately gets. I was looking forward to seeing Blue & Gold running amok in this dystopia, but, knowing they're going to vanish early in the next series, without enough time for them to make a dramatic last-minute (possibly accidental) rescue takes a lot of wind from those sails. 

Howard Porter's art doesn't help. It has more energy to it than his work on those Superman Beyond stories that ran in Batman Beyond Unlimited did - or maybe just more effects to show movement or action. And the Batman costume isn't bad, and I quite like the Green Lantern one (pity he mostly stops wearing the cloak three issues in). But his work is still overly busy, lots of lines trying to create depth or detail, but often just muddling or confusing things. That guy in the panels above, possessed by one of the Five, in a couple of the panels you might think he had some sort of rectangular facial markings, but no, they aren't there in other panels. Porter just felt he needed those lines there for some reason.

Keith Giffen handles the breakdowns and manages to avoid reverting to 9-panel grids all the time. Porter's work needs more space than that. A lot of 5-panel pages, usually with one panel stretching across the page at the top or bottom, and then two pairs. That part works fairly well.

That's the book overall. Some good pieces, but it doesn't come together into much of anything.

Slack Bay

It took me three tries to finish this movie, because I couldn't watch more than 45 minutes at a time. The aggressive stupidity of the main characters would get to be too much to bear.

The film is set on the coast of France in the early 20th Century. A wealthy family of high-society idiots come to this bay every summer. They're a bunch of inbred morons. There has been a rash of disappearances of tourists in the area, being investigated by a pair of cops who seem like a take on Laurel & Hardy, except not funny at all. And there's a local fishing family who live and work in the area and keep interacting with the other two parties. The patriarch is called The Eternal, because he's saved so many endangered sailors off the coast of the years, and his tall, awkward, sullen oldest son is Ma Loute. They make some income ferrying people across the tidal pool, either by rowboat, or by carrying them when the water is low.

Their family are responsible for the disappearances, because they're also cannibals. The movie reveals this twenty minutes in, very casually and plainly, so I don't feel bad spoiling it. Also, this movie is terrible and you shouldn't waste time watching it.

There's a burgeoning romance between Ma Loute and Billie, the son of some combination of the wealthy idiots, who sometimes dresses as a woman. Ma Loute thinks Billie is a girl who sometimes dresses as a boy, which causes problems when he learns the truth. She drives him crazy, like the fine young cannibal he is. God, that's a terrible line, but this movie deserves it.

The problem is Bruno Dumont (who is director and wrote the screenplay and dialogue) has certain bits or tics for the characters he thinks are funny, so he keeps using them. But they fail to land. The fat inspector keeps laying down on the sand to inspect bodies, but can't get up without assistance. I think it's supposed to be funny, but there's nothing to it, and it just keeps happening. The behavior of the wealthy family is bizarre, but so exaggerated that it's just irritating. I don't really want to root for the cannibals, but I wouldn't have been sorry if they killed and murdered the family.

The romance between Billie and Ma Loute was not badly done. There's an awkwardness to it that felt genuine and touching. They don't necessarily understand each other, and Billie's family doesn't help with their patronizing attitude towards him (and the fact they're afraid to even shake hands with Ma Loute's parents), but they seemed comfortable with each other. Until things went south, naturally.

I've been considering whether Dumont was doing a satire of an American slasher film. We have movies where stupid horny teens go to the dark, scary woods to smoke pot and have sex, only to be murdered by feral, cannibals hillbillies. Dumont sets it on a bright, sunny summer beach, the family is mostly old people who are detached from any sense of reality outside the strange world they occupy, and the cannibals are a hardworking, tightly-knit working class family (we first see the entire family harvesting mussels off the rocks during low tide). Instead of some hick cops, you get a couple of inspectors in nice black suits, who are dedicated but nonetheless useless.

I don't think that's the case; it's just the most charitable interpretation I can muster.

Deadpool's Not Leaving Without Killing Or Exploding Something

{When we left off, the Blender Furby arrived to try and calm things down. Or that was Pollock's plan. Instead, it began fighting with Deadpool and trying to kill him for some unkind words during a previous meeting I made up on the fly while writing this. Finding Deadpool difficult to kill conventionally, the Blender Furby (now called Stefan) has opted to use its disorienting voice to incapacitate Deadpool until Stefan can twist his head off.}

*Pollock's fist lashes out against the side of Stefan's head, cracking it. He staggers from the impact and releases Deadpool. We see that Pollock is wearing a set of brass knuckles spelling the word "POOL". Obviously they fell out when Deadpool fumbled reaching for his gun moments earlier.*

Stefan: So, funny story, the people who created me weren't as sadistic as you, so I don't feel pain and, wait, you aren't falling over.

Pollock: The crack has ruined that wonderful resonating effect your head normally has.

Stefan: *bats eyelashes in a remarkably adorable fashion* The panda isn't going to approve of you punching me.

Pollock: You cutting Deadpool's head off won't win you any rounds of Applause, either.

Deadpool: *hops up abruptly* [Because I'm America's sweetheart, no matter what Catherine Zeta-Jones claimed!] *Wade cuts the Blender Furby off what was once the Predator Drone's body. Pollock catches the Furby*

Stefan: *looking up at Pollock* You're never going to get anywhere this way.

Pollock: Enough of you for now.

*Pollock removes the batteries from the back of Stefan's head. Stefan sticks out his tongue before his eyes shut.*

Pollock: He's probably right, though.

Deadpool: [Maybe stop giving inanimate objects souls. Haven't you seen the Child's Play movies?]

Pollock: I have actually, but I just want toys that love their kids as much as the kids love them.

Deadpool: [Have you seen how kids treat their toys? Were you ever a kid?]

Pollock: I don't sit in on the focus group testing so no, and no.

Deadpool: [Well just sit here on Santa Deadpool's lap and he'll see if he can get you a copy of Toy Story for Christmas.]

Pollock: No.

Deadpool: [I'm just trying to offer you a seat since all the chairs are blown up.]

Pollock: *responds with a silent, stony glare*

Deadpool: [Fine, can I go back to blowing stuff up? I need explosions to drown out the unpleasant sounds in my head.]

Pollock: Well, I'd offer you a mixed drink and hope it calmed you down, but, *hefts Stefan's head* my drink mixer has a crack in it.

*At that moment, Androzier arrives, pushing some large weapon on a cart with cords trailing behind it*

Androzier: It took time to find enough extension cords. We need to talk to the lab staff about putting equipment back in the proper cabinets and - step away from the Commandant!

Deadpool: *rolls eyes* [Sure thing Sergeant Schultz. Damn, I'm really not funny today. Can I cut this one's head off, too?]

Pollock: No!

Deadpool: [But he's brandishing - sort of - a clunky and ridiculous weapon! A small child or elderly person with a weak heart my be frightened!]

*The captain grits his teeth*

Androzier: If you're too stupid to know when to quit, I'll show you what it can do!

Pollock: Captain, that's enough! Deadpool, don't piss off yet another of my employees after the last one nearly killed you! I'm trying to make it through this without any explosions and we're almost there!

Deadpool: *rubs the back of his head* [Uh, about that. . .]

*A large explosion rips through a lab two stories down. The three of them all feel the vibration.*

Deadpool: [I mean, didn't you notice I wasn't carrying my bag full of explosives in here?]

*Pollock turns her back and begins walking towards Androzier and the Wave Beam*

Deadpool: *holding his hands up, palms out* [In my defense, you hadn't told me I didn't need to blow things up!]

*Pollock subtly shape-shifts to add some more muscle and hefts the Wave Beam*

Deadpool: [Say, which way is the staircase?! You really need to mark your emergency exits better, that's a safety hazard!]

Pollock: *quietly* I won't tell the panda you tried killing the Blender Furby, and you won't tell the panda I did this. Agreed?

*Pollock flips a switch and a wide beam of energy is emitted. It's purple. It drops towards the floor, then rises sharply, brushing the ceiling. Then it crashes down on Deadpool, slamming him into the floor before pushing him into and through the wall, raising him up through the ceiling as it does. Then it drops again before smashing through an outer wall and launching the mercenary into the open air as it rises a third time. Pollock toggles the switch back and the energy disperses, leaving Deadpool to arc across the skyline.*

Deadpool: *distantly* [Agreeeeeeeed.]

Androzier: Wow, that was pretty impressive. I wasn't expecting that.

Pollock: Well what did you think the Wave Beam did?

Androzier: *pushes up cap, scratches head* I don't know. I was hoping it would disintegrate him.

Pollock: Pfft. Disintegrate him? That would be a little crass. Also, it would bring that panda down on us like an annoying, furry sledgehammer. *sighs* You better issue an all-clear to the panic rooms while we figure out which lab was destroyed.

Androzier: At least it's just the one lab. *looks around* Well, two labs.

*Pollock winces, as if expecting a punch, but nothing happens*

Pollock: Perhaps he used all the explosives on that one room. Yes, I suppose this was not a massively debilitating setback.

*Androzier raises his eyebrows quizzically*

Pollock: I'm not going to make the mistake of asking for another punch in the face from the universe.

*a voice crackles over the radio*

Voice: Captain, we investigated the site of the explosion. The crazy man blew up a bathroom!

Pollock: A bathroom?

Androzier: *stricken look* A bathroom?

Voice: Oh, sorry, ma'am, I didn't realize you were there! Uh, yes. I think there was a gas line nearby he might have been trying to damage, but this was the bathroom for the people who agree to test new food and cosmetics, so it was reinforced. Because of the, uh, problems. So the blast didn't make it through the walls.

Pollock: Oh, well that's a lucky break.

Androzier: But that was the nicest bathroom we had! The water pressure was good, and the lighting was pleasant, and there was always a variety of air fresheners!

Pollock: Captain, how much vacation time do you have saved up?

Androzier: *oblivious* I swear I'll get you for this, Deadpool. I'll get you!

{Uh, wow, OK. That's not how I thought I'd end that story, but there you go. A new arch-rivalry!}

Sunday Splash Page #10

 

"Friday Casual Spider-Angst", in Amazing Spider-Girl #2, by Tom DeFalco (writer), Ron Frenz (writer/penciler), Sal Buscema (inker), Gotham (colorist), Dave Sharpe (letterer)

In summer of 2006, Marvel canceled Spider-Girl after 100 issues. It had narrowly avoided the ax several times before then, but not this time. But since this is Marvel we're talking about, the book was relaunched three months later with the same creative team, a slightly different title, and a brand-new first issue that boosted sales for, oh, two or three whole issues. The book did run 30 issues before being canceled again.

You pretty much know what you're getting with DeFalco. He has a very old-school style of writing; expository dialogue, big speeches about not giving up, the phrase "hoo-boy!". But he did at least try to not only build a supporting cast, but give them their own subplots that would eventually get the main stage. He and Frenz certainly tried to give the reader their money's worth. Whether a Clone Saga of her own, and the entirely unnecessary return of Norman Osborn (sorta) accomplished that is up to you. Wasn't what I was looking for.

Frenz had, in the previous series, been experimenting with what I think was meant to be a more modern style, maybe trying for a manga influence. It didn't go well. He moved back to something closer to his earlier style, especially with Buscema's inks. Late in the series, when Frenz was often credited with breakdowns while Buscema was credited with finishes, the art began to resemble Sal's art even more. The art was solid, clear, and easy to follow, not particularly flashy.

What I Bought 2/28/2018

Everybody out of the 'Pools! Or something to that effect. Gwenpool's coming to an end, and this Deadpool storyline is almost there, too. So let's check in.

Unbelievable Gwenpool #25, by Christopher Hastings (writer), Gurihiru (artists), Clayton Cowles (letterer) - So that's what happens to all the characters whose books get canceled: they get to hang out at the pool. I'd expect it to be more crowded, given the rate Marvel gives books the ax these days.

Gwen encounters an older, good version of herself that tells her the story isn't done just because the series is canceled. That people will be buying and reading the stories again for years after they were initially published. And there'll be fan art, cosplay, maybe someday another writer that loved Gwenpool when they were younger and gets to write her into their book. While this conversation is going on, Gwen is also hopping through a bunch of snippets of adventures that clean up (or at least nod in the direction of) various plot threads that hadn't been resolved yet.

It reminds me of the last issue of Bryan Q. Miller's Batgirl series, where the last few pages were dedicated to showing all the future adventures Stephanie might have had if the series had continued on. I'm still sad we never got to see her fight the Royal Flush Gang at her college graduation. Those weren't unresolved points, but it has that same feel. The creative team at least getting to hint at what might have been.

The back-and-forth nature of it feels a little jagged, and the long-winded explanation of why this isn't really the end drags things to a halt, but I appreciate the attempt. Of course, the back-and-forth at least serves to break up the long-winded exposition. The stories we only get hints of looked like they would have been pretty fun (team-up with Squirrel Girl to rescue Gwen's brother from Mephisto!), and it lets the Guruhiru team illustrate a whole mess of other Marvel characters (including Fin Fang Foom!) Can't complain about that. It ends on fairly upbeat note, which is better than the alternative.

I'm surprised the book lasted this long, but I'm glad it did.

Despicable Deadpool #295, by Gerry Duggan (writer), Matteo Lolli (artist), Ruth Redmond (colorist), Joe Sabino (letterer) - The first page says Koblish is the artist, but that's definitely not the case, and the cover agrees.

Deadpool chases Evan and shoots him, despite some well-meaning bystanders. But he actually shot him with a bullet that suppresses his X-gene, so Stryfe just thinks Evan is gone. Unfortunately, the X-Men aren't impressed by this so Shadowcat and Colossus whoop the shit out of Deadpool, with Kitty criticizing Rogue for making out with Deadpool. You know, Kitty, you did it with Pete Wisdom and Peter Quill. A chain-smoking, cynical, antisocial asshole, and an idiot man-child. You combine the two and you basically have Deadpool. Basically, she slept with half of Deadpool, twice. So there. Also, Kitty telling Wade he's a wanted murder and can't just 'walk away from this,' rings hollow given all the times the X-Men looked the other way for their hairy Canadian murderer.

Hmm, I seem unusually hostile towards Shadowcat today. Just kick his ass and throw him in jail Kitty, spare us the cheap moralizing.

Wade escapes with the power of endangering innocents, and kills the last person Stryfe had on his list. But he's sad about it! Then Captain America shows up, day late and a dollar short, as usual.

Marietta Nelson took Deadpool appearing in her bedroom to murder her better than I would. I wouldn't expect her to believe him about his daughter, either, or else not care. Which would be fair, since she could assume (correctly) that Eleanor was in trouble because of Deadpool's fuck-ups, and why should she die to fix that? Maybe she was resigned from the moment she saw him, or maybe it was his demeanor. Lolli draws Wade with slumped shoulders and narrow, downcast eyes for most of the issue. The only time that drops is when the X-Men show up, and I assume Wade is playing at being a loon for their benefit. Just crazy old, amoral Deadpool! Killin' people for shits and grins! Tacos! Play down to their expectations.

Or maybe he's nostalgic for the old days when the heroes just beat him up for being a creep.

I have to think Deadpool is running out of explosives to use as cover for these narrow escapes, so I don't know how he's going to manage to elude Cap. Shooting at bystanders is only going to make Cap angry.

Fire In the Sky - Eric M. Bergerud

Fire in the Sky focuses specifically on the air war in the South Pacific from early 1942 until around the end of 1943. Bergerud explains that he focused in on that stretch because it was a period of time when the Allies and Japanese forces were on roughly equal footing in both numbers and technology to start. He figures there's more to investigate there as being keys to victory than in subsequent years when the numerical and technological edge held by the Allies grew enormously.

Bergerud focuses strictly on the aviation side of things in this volume (he's done an earlier volume on the ground campaign), and he goes into greater detail on almost all aspects of it than I can recall in any other book I've read on WWII aviation. Basically all those other books will mention many Japanese warplanes lacked self-sealing fuel tanks and that this made it easier for them to be set ablaze from relatively few bullets. This is the first book I remember that bothers to explain how self-sealing fuel tanks work.

Bergerud talks about the planes involved, their strengths and weaknesses. He talks about pilot training, before and after pilots entered the combat theater, as well as morale and the policy for rotating pilots and ground crew off the front lines (the Navy and Marines apparently had a better established system than the Army Air Force, but the Japanese tended to just keep their best pilots flying until they were killed or severely injured). He spends time on engineering in terms of constructing an airfield and maintaining it, on radio communication, the respective search-and-rescue efforts of the two sides (or lack thereof in Japan's case), the development of tactics in fighter combar, bombing, ground attack, even resupply. Apparently prior to the war, the U.S. had no guidelines for how to airdrop supplies to ground units. Which turns out to be kind of crucial when the troops are fighting in the middle of a hellacious jungle on New Guinea and the nearest airstrip is several days trek away.

Bergerud interviewed a lot of veterans as part of his research, and their remarks, as well as transcripts from missions, diaries, or interrogations of Japanese airmen after the war are used liberally throughout. The section of air drops, for example, has a lengthy quote from a cargo plane pilot who discusses the approach they initially tried, before they figured out it was a bad idea and had to try something else.

There's a wealth of information in this book, but at times it's easy to lose track of how it relates to the actual fighting. Until the last two chapters, when it begins to detail the struggles between fighters, and then the bombing and anti-shipping campaigns, there's not much discussion of the campaign in terms of something enabling an Allied advance in one place or another. The attempt is to help lay the groundwork for why things turned out as they did. If the size of forces were not so different, and the Allies were only just starting to gain an edge in the abilities of their aircraft, then what were the key factors?

The first 400-500 pages are all about that, the mistakes and innovations that made the difference, and then for the last 150 pages, he deals with how it actually plays out. It's not a bad approach, but there were more than a few times I wondered what the hell was the point of some of what he was discussing. There's a lengthy digression into the development of the Spitfire and Me109 that I think is meant to detail the major leaps in fighter design and performance they represent, but it felt unnecessary. There's a bit of that in here, but overall the details are relevant and interesting.

'Consequently had one side or the other occupied every square inch of this huge area, it would have helped itself not one iota and done no harm to the foe. The strategic importance of the theater lay entirely in its geographic relationship to other areas. A key by itself is of no value, but what lies behind the locked doorway might be precious indeed.'

A Not-So Fresh Start

The May solicitations bring yet another ultimately futile rebranding attempt from Marvel, "Fresh Start". Oh goody. And this fresh start is going to involve a bunch of tie-in mini-series about looking for Infinity Gems and/or Wolverine! Hooray! Also, Bendis is wrapping up his time on Iron Man and with Miles Morales, Dan Slott's getting ready to stop writing Spider-Man, and Gerry Duggan's ending his stint on Deadpool.

Maybe the actual fresh start begins in June. In the meanwhile, there isn't a hell of a lot on their plate I'm interested in. Maybe I'll still be giving Domino a go, and maybe I'm going to try the Darkhawk mini-series they're releasing (even though it's an Infinity Countdown tie-in). I'm not familiar with Gang-Hyuk Lim's artwork; a quick Internet search pulled up a few things that don't look bad, but we'll see.

DC is somehow still spinning things out of that Metal event. I feel like that thing has been going for a thousand years now. I had the same reaction a few years back when they had that Trinity War story, which then ran directly into that Forever Evil thing (where Dick Grayson go unmasked, so he became a spy for a while instead). At a certain point it becomes, 'Holy shit, is this thing still going?' DC drags it out, while Marvel runs around like a blinded meth addict, just crashing into trees.

So just Cave Carson from DC, then.

OK, if those two are largely busts, what about the other publishers? High School Hell and Mata Hari are both wrapping up. Still no sign of The Seeds anywhere. Giant Days continues to chug along and the girls continue to get cold feet about going their separate ways as roomies.

Copperhead's back, and so is original artist and co-creator Scott Godlewski! Things are looking up, finally. I'm hoping this next arc ramps the weird stuff up a bit, if only for a change of pace. Throw something outside the character's experience at them.

They finally posted a cover for the Bubba Ho-Tep mini-series, and based on it, I'm really starting to think this whole thing is some drug trip going on inside Elvis' mind. But maybe that's the only way to get at Cosmic Blood Suckers. Hopefully the series makes more sense once I'm actually able to read it.

The only other thing that interested me was Coda, a 12-issue series by Si Spurrier and Matias Bergara. Spurrier wrote Spire, a different mini-series I bought in back issues in 2016 I think, as well as that Marvel Zombies Secret Wars mini-series I enjoyed back in 2015*. Anyway, Spire was very good, and a bit of a fantasy setting, so that bodes well. And it seems to be a post-apocalyptic fantasy setting. I am a sucker for post-apocalyptic stories, or maybe survivalist stories is a better description, even though I often feel let down when they don't go the direction I want them to. But those disappointments were written by other people, no reason to hold it against Spurrier. I don't know Bergara's artwork, but he drew the cover and that looks pretty cool. The color work is nice too, a good contrast. So that's one new entrant at least.

* I think he's also writing a Star Wars book with Kieron Gillen right now, but if John Ostrander couldn't get me to read Star Wars comics, Spurrier is shit outta luck on that score.

Monsters

A space probe took samples from a rock that passed near Earth. Then the probe fell apart on reentry, and whatever was in it has infected live on earth and created all sorts of giant creatures in Central America. The situation is scene from the perspectives of Andrew and Sam. Andrew is a photographer, Sam's dad owns the "publication" Andrew works for. Her pop has tasked Andrew with getting her to safety. Complications arise!

The movie tries to build a romantic relationship between the two main characters. One of them is feeling isolated, the other is in an engagement they don't seem happy about. But it doesn't carry it off. Maybe it needed to put more focus on it, rather than trying to weave it into this perilous journey story. I don't think that would have made it any more enjoyable of a movie to me, but it might have helped that particular thread work a little better.

The parts of it that look at the lives of the people living in or near the "infected zone" work better. The people who exploit the situation and peoples' desperation. The ones who have nowhere to go or no means to move. The futile attempts of the United States to keep all this at a distance (with a big, useless wall, no less). The small bits that combine for a larger picture of a world that's changing in ways humanity is only slowly grasping, that part is sort of interesting. Overall, it's not a good movie, but it isn't awful. It's just kind of there. It couldn't keep my attention.

Can You Outsource Magic?

I started thinking about this during last week's post on Jamie Madrox. Can one of Madrox' duplicates learn magic?

My guess is most living beings in the Marvel Universe have at least some small amount of magical ability inside them. Which would include Jamie Madrox. The question is whether whatever that force is, their soul, bio-aura, whatever, transfers or duplicates itself. Physical objects Jamie is wearing or holding duplicate themselves along with him - or else there'd be a lot of naked Jamie Madroxes running around. The duplicates can think and act for themselves, can learn and grow. And if they die, Jamie can't reabsorb them. Which suggests there's a certain something within the duplicates lost when they die.

It seems like they should be able to learn magic, at least some of the basics. Dr. Strange was split into three separate people once, and each of them was still able to use magic to varying degrees. It's not quite the same thing - Strange knew magic already by then - but it might point to the ability for someone to still use magic even having fragmented or duplicated their soul. It might also prove a cautionary tale, considering Stephen had some difficulty getting himself together again. If one of the duplicates figures out magic, Jamie might have a hell of time getting him back in. He might even struggle to avoid having the tables turned and being absorbed himself.

Sunday Splash Page #9

"Guess the Fire Burned Away the Belly of Her Outfit" in Amazing Fantasy (vol. 2) #9, by Fred van Lente (writer), David Ross (penciler), Kevin Conrad, Jonathon Glapion (inkers), Guru eFX (colorist), Rus Wooton (letterer)

This volume of Amazing Fantasy started in 2004, and seems like it was a series designed to pitch new characters, or revamped versions of existing characters, to see if they'd stick. This was the series that introduced Anya Corazon (Arana, later Spider-Girl), and Amadeus Cho.

In between those two stories was this six-parter, which introduced a new version of Scorpion. A teenage girl whose body can absorb toxins and then use them as a weapon, and is being chased by SHIELD and AIM. Thasanee's left unsure of anyone's motives, unsure of her own origins, trying to figure out how to make it through this and which way she wants to go. Leonard Kirk shares art duties with Dave Ross. Kirk's work is more simplified, smoother, Thasanee looks younger in the issues he draws. Ross makes her look older, makes the costume more like a second skin.

The story also introduced SHIELD agent Derek Khanata, who Jeff Parker went on to use in all his Agents of Atlas work, and Monica Rappacini, who is AIM's Scientist Supreme (and maybe was MODOK's ex in his more human days). Scorpion's gone on to some scattered use here and there, mostly in books Fred van Lente was writing or co-writing. Ditto for Rappacini.

The series ends with Khanata selling Fury on the supposed value of a SHIELD agent posing as a superhero to infiltrate the superhero community. But I'm not sure she got used enough in other books for the idea to really take root. The constant upheaval within SHIELD related to all the nonsense about who gets to be Boss of All Superheroes that's been going to for the last 15 years doesn't help.

This is the only story from this title I bought, picked it up in a manga-sized digest version a few years back. Marvel doesn't do those anymore, does it?