Blinded By The Twilight

On the side I work in Champaign schools. I work with grades 6 to 11, and despite the differences in age, there are similar things about these kids - like gossiping during class, trying to sneakily use cell phones and getting distracted by all sorts of shiny objects. One of the current distractions (in a good way) is Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series, the four part book franchise that some have called the new Harry Potter. The series focuses on teen Bella and her romance between vampire Edward. The past two weeks female students have brought up Twilight in some way in almost every class. Since South Park made fun of it, this book is a genuine phenomenon, and with last Friday’s release of the movie adaptation, it seems one that will be around for awhile.

Of course, the question is “does Twilight deserve this much adoration?” Read the rest of this entry »

Christian characters in modern comics are jokes. This can be debated, of course, but the general attitude towards these token characters tends to be hostile. The secular mindset prevails in most comics and gets the last word over Christians that may be in any given book. Other religions are another issue - non-Christian religions are usually respected, yet when secular or atheist negativity appears it is usually directed towards the Christians. Every once in awhile a writer will throw in what they feel is a genuine Christian character, you know to be nice to that minority, and it usually comes off as a flat representation of what people think Christians are.

courtesy DC

Alan Moore’s Top 10 was a fantastic series, not just because of the crazy homages to super hero and comic conventions, but because its characters where fully developed in the short time they were introduced. Peregrine is a super hero who flies using a wing suit, happily married to her husband, and a member of the Top 10 police force. She also happens to be Christian. Moore handles this character with respect, putting her in a faith questioning situation in the original comics, and reinforcing her beliefs even though Christianity is in disagreement with Moore’s practice of magic and belief in a Roman snake god.

Let’s jump forward to the first “sequel” to Top 10, Top 10: The Farthest Precinct. Here writer Paul Di Filippo was just mean to the character Peregrine. He has Peregrine see Jesus drunk in a bar, having been called in to deal with his disorderly conduct. This sends her into a faith questioning spiral that was handled without regard for the way Moore had already set up the character. Likewise, this recent issue of Top 10 Season Two, not written by Moore, has Peregrine’s husband cross dressing into other costumes, a socially unacceptable practice, especially for this conservative Christian. In fact, the couple goes to Premise Keepers, clearly a parody of the Christian men group, the Promise Keepers. Read the rest of this entry »

Oh My Gog

This single issue is a tie-in to the Kingdom series, the “sequel” to Mark Waid and Alex Ross’ masterpiece Kingdom Come, which featured a futuristic DC Universe driven mad by its heroes, beautifully rendered as lifelike paintings. Recently the series Justice Society of America, the precursor team to the Justice League, has been involved in a Kingdom Come crossover, where the Superman from that alternate reality has come to the main DC universe. In the course of uncovering his purpose and the mystery in the series, the god known as Gog has appeared to usher in a better tomorrow for the world.

courtesy DC

Branching away from Justice Society, three single issues have come out to expand and/or continue that storyline - Kingdom Come Special: Superman, Kingdom Come Special: Magog and Kingdom Come Special: The Kingdom. The Magog issue specifically focused on a new character, Lance Corporal David Reid, the great grandson of FDR who was given super powers during a mission in Iraq. As far as the character goes, he’s not the only new character. DC and JSA in particular have become saturated with new heroes with manufactured legacies that confuse and sidetrack the story and readers, and Magog is one of them.

I can respect this character as he is allegorically meant to be a hero of our time, a soldier who volunteers for the armed forces after 9/11 and fights in current, real-life conflicts. But as far as that goes the purpose of the character is pretty straightforward - he is allegorically meant to be a hero of our time, a soldier who volunteers for the armed forces after 9/11 and fights in current, real-life conflicts. The idea of respect and honor of our armed forces is there, but not really - how can it be when that very character who is meant to be a positive American role model is statically portrayed as a “conflicted” and stereotypical soldier?

That aside, the story was decent. While the whole tie-in nonsense and this ploy to get more money is evident, this specific story did have an engaging story, the only problem being it was constructed of the above flaws. While Final Crisis is dying down and all the DC crap is getting straightened out, JSA is sadly still askew. The writer who prompted this stuff, Geoff Johns, is Mr. DC right now, writing several titles, and because of this he is given what seems like total creative autonomy (unless some of the titles are ghost written). Johns is a great writer, but that doesn’t mean he shouldn’t be kept in check. Every cool idea, like making up 3 new characters an issue, or making a sequel to a perfect title from over a decade ago, should be shot down by the water cooler.

The new trailer for 2009’s Star Trek is online, appeasing angry fans who were appalled at the film’s continuing backpedaled release date. The film will explore the early years of the original Star Trek’s cast, focusing mainly on Captain James T. Kirk and the emotionless Vulcan, Spock.

While the movie may not appeal to non Trekkies, this film is designed to appeal to a wider audience, hopefully revitalizing the franchise in ways the recent and canceled TV show Enterprise could not. To do this, mainstream flavor of the month actors were cast in the lead roles, Heroes‘ Zachary Quinto as Spock, Hot Fuzz’s Simon Pegg and Harold and Kumar’s John Cho as Sulu.

I already have an opinion about the film, as you can probably tell. I’ll hold off from bashing until the movie rears it’s ugly head, but until then form your own opinion after watching a young Kirk jump out of a car and slide to the edge of a cliff…

Get Me My Toga

Jay and Silent Bob’s Kevin Smith is a passionate film-maker, and from seeing movies like Chasing Amy and Mallrats, it is apparent that Smith is also a passionate comic enthusiast. Smith has even written comics, and not just View Askew related. Smith headed the relaunch of Marvel’s Daredevil and DC’s Green Arrow a few years back, giving a fresh take and new look to series that would have died, and still influence writers of the current series today.

courtesy DC

At San Diego Comic Con Smith announced his three issue Batman miniseries, Batman: Cacophony, illustrated by View Askew cult favorite Walt Flanagan (see Walt Flanagan’s dog). And unlike some of Smith’s comic projects in the past, where publishing schedules were delayed by late scripts, this short mini was almost completely written before it was released, assuaging the fears of all us nerds in the crowd.

So now that the first issue has hit stands, does it live up to the hype? Smith does a good job subverting our expectations - Batman’s role, while prominent, is downplayed. The focus of this issue is on Joker, Maxie Zeus (see Batman: the Animated Series) and the Smith created villain of Green Arrow fame, Onomatopoeia, who says the sounds the environment make instead of speaking. This comic was a darker version of Batman, which included several (crying) children held hostage at knife point, the Joker depantsing in eager anticipation of sex and a pair of bloodied corpses (the parents of said crying children).

The comic was well written, set up a compelling plot, yada yada yada. I hate that this good writing had to be shrouded in juvenile “dark” and “mature” gimmicks like death and trauma that were without purpose or reason. There is a legitimate point going to be made with the violence against children and parents, paralleled against Batman’s past, especially knowing Onomatopoeia tries to kill the kids of super heroes.. probably… I hope. For that, I can excuse Smith’s choice of the graphic, for now at least, but knowing there’s these so far unnecessary “realistic” elements present, you can decide for yourself if you want to read this book.

courtesy Wizards
of the Coast

Magic In The Air

Christmas is in the air and there is money to be made with gifts for the masses. Following last year’s successful Goblins and Elves box set, this year’s theme starter Magic: the Gathering set features the newest card type, the ever powerful planeswalkers, Jace and Chandra.

The decks are 60 card decks theme based on the planeswalkers’ colors - red for Chandra and blue for Jace. Chandra’s deck focuses on direct damage and burn spells, while Jace’s is draw and counter deck. Both decks are playable out of the box and fairly balanced. The inclusion of more uncommons and rares than usual theme decks makes these decks easier and more fun to play.

Featuring new artwork for some cards, including reprints of cards from older sets, this box set is a must have for Magic fans. Not only do you get two powerful planeswalkers, you get classic Magic cards in decks that best demonstrate their colors. The sad thing is was once I got this set, I wanted to see what set would be released next year!

I think I misjudged this series earlier. I mean, it’s understandable when the comics was promoted as an Ape version of the Marvel Universe and that was it. But the series was actually a lot better than that initial gimmick.

See, what this series did was present an initial premise and then after a second issue, sort of toss that premise out of the window. The Apes were still there, but the comic was redefined with the inclusion of vampires and alternate events, including an original character not found in mainstream Marvel. With a limited miniseries, the writer needs to realize there are no holds barred. They need to do as much with the series as they can, and if that means dropping, downplaying or subverting the gimmick they’ve already put forward, then so be it.

Marvel Apes was sort of cartoony, sure, but I think had this had Alex Ross art, people would see that this was a great book that was quite deeper than many people could give it credit.