Me Geek, You Geek

I do like Bendis.  I do.  My love shows throughout this blog.  I have been critical before of course, what relationship doesn't have low points?  But the critiques (here, here, here, here, and here) never kept me from enjoying the Bendis-ride overall. 

The Bendis-ride. Carrot Sticks!

But the events are getting to be too much man.  Settle down.  Let the characters recover.  Let them be "normal" again.  Let's have at least 6 months of regular books, no tie ins, no crossovers, no grand schemes.  Please!

If you don't know what I am talking about yet, I am talking about the recently released news on Marvel.com regarding Dark Reign, the follow up event to Secret Invasion.

I sort of feel used.  I listened to Bendis talk about how Secret Invasion had been in his mind since the beginning of Avengers Disassembled.  And how everything would be explained in Secret Invasion and there would be no dangling plot lines.  And that the characters would be given a "breather" (my quote not his). 

But here we go again! 

Hey Marvel!  We love these stories, we really do.  But give us a break (which means giving the characters a little relaxation time) to let us keep everything in perspective.  And more importantly, when the events come one after the other like this, they don't feel important anymore.

We are asking to be teased!  Tease us.  Tease us with the Bendis-ride!

Carrot sticks!

What do you all think?

Labels: Comics, Marvel Comics

Posted by Jon at 10:40 AM | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

So Twentieth Century Fox had a self proclaimed summer of discontent.  I guess you can look at it and say it was more of a break since the last umpteen summers featured Marvel characters making them buttloads of money hand over fist.

But like any good multi-billion dollar conglomerate they didn't make enough money this summer so they are going to make sure next summer goes more smoothly in terms of profit margins.

Now, the "hater" in me wants to start excoriating Fox for "leathering up" my super heroes, producing less than average movies to us comic book fans, and screwing up the Elektra film (Jennifer Garner + skin tight outfits + violence = kick ass movie...in theory anyway...how did this formula not work?  Oh yeah, script and plot are important too.) but I have to give them credit for taking a chance on X-Men and kicking off what continues to be a great thing for comic book movies.

So apparently they are looking toward summer 2009 to recapture some magic.  Magic which will be more difficult to capture due to the success of Dark Knight, Iron Man, etc.  The bar has been raised as we anticipate XO: Wolverine.  But anyway, this is what the Variety article reads in regards to comic book movies at Fox:

Though Fox has no plans for a major overhaul, the studio has scheduled a strategy meeting to assess the status of its superheroes, a group sorely missed this summer. On the agenda, Fox will mull the possibility of more "X-Men" spinoffs, including a young-X-Men project as well as "Deadpool," based on a character played by Ryan Reynolds in "Wolverine." The studio is even considering reviving the "Daredevil" property.

A Daredevil revival?!  Woo hoo!  Okay.  Let's get this right this time.  Let's get an actual action hero to play the part.  Let's keep everything faithful to the comic book.  Let's not try to tell the origin of Daredevil again, just come up with an original story to tell.  Let's "Batman-Begins" this Daredevil movie...do it gritty...do it right.

And the idea of a Deadpool sounds cool.  Unapologetic violence.  Over the top humor.  Could be and should be a hit.

But then again, so should have Elektra!

Labels: Comics, Marvel Comics, Movies

Posted by Jon at 10:22 AM | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Has anyone else noticed that comic books have "died" over the last couple of months?

Going through the assortment of blogs and news sites that I go through on a daily basis it's evident that there hasn't been much written in terms of opinion or news coverage since the Comic Con. 

Being a comic book reader for years now I don't quite recall there ever being such a lull after the summer months, even though summer events have always been around.  There are all these blogs and sites and really no new material praising or complaining about comic book stories.

For instance, this is the news today:  Will Smith may star as Captain America.  Or how there is some cussing in DC comics that weren't covered up properly so they had to do a recall.

Not exactly news that gets us fanboys/gals fueling with happiness/rage.

Are you guys seeing the same thing?  Am I missing something?  Is there a conspiracy to keep the good comics from being seen by me?  Am I being paranoid again?  Do I need to get back on my meds?  Did they give me the wrong meds?  Are you looking at me?  Do I have something on my face?

Labels: Comics, DC Comics

Posted by Jon at 4:40 PM | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

Labels: Movies

Posted by Jon at 2:13 PM | Permalink | Comments | links to this post

I do have to admit, I have a man crush on Google.  Always have and most likely always will.  I think part of it, in all seriousness, is that I love companies that become so respected, so popular, and so widely known for what they do that the the name of the company becomes the verb of their respective business "action".

"I don't know man, why don't you google it and see?"

I guess this is why I love Kleenex and Tivo too.

So when Google came out with their beta version of Google Chrome, which is their answer (and in my opinion the correct answer) to web browsers, I was there on day one to check it out.

Now, this isn't a tech blog so I won't go into the specifics of Chrome or how a blog tested that it is at least twice as fast as anything you have used before, but there is a connection to our hobby.

Google being Google, they found an innovative way to tell their story about building Chrome from the ground up and not making it boring as all hell. 

The innovative way?  A comic book.

Woot!  Carrot Sticks!

So I am reading this thing and since I was at work, my mind was only half into it, but I had a strange awareness of "being here" before.

By the end of the comic book I came to realize I was reading a Scott McCloud production and it reads entirely like his three books on the topic of comics in which he uses sequential story telling to teach.  And of course, since we comic book readers are trained to instinctively understand the comic book page, learning about Chrome was easy and enjoyable. 

What other medium could teach you about web site permissions, javascript handling and sand boxing code and keep your interest?

So check out the free Google online comic and download Chrome now!

On a related note, I have been working through my copy of Scott McCloud's "Zot".  (Also check out his free online comics, they are rad dude...)

576 pages! 

This is the complete set and so far I have really enjoyed it.  As Scotty says in the intro, he told me I could call him Scotty, some of it is dated since it ran between 1987 and 1991, but all in all it does hold up well. 

He also throws in commentary throughout the book between issues, which is very cool to read.

I recommend it.  It's better than most of the current crap, er, I mean, stuff that is out there.

Labels: Comic Blogs, Comics, Digital Comics, eComics

Posted by Jon at 5:37 PM | Permalink | Comments | links to this post