The Decompression Project - Teenage Wasteland

Okay I guess I got a little bit confused between collections I was reading in yesterday's post.  It seems that the scene with Spider-man and the police officer was in the Hobgoblin collection and not the Superstars collection.  My comments still stand, that I think it is a solid bit of development and it's a refreshing change to see Peter being reluctant to accept a mentor, and more so that there is what appears to be a decent mentor figure being developed for him.  They're not quite colleagues but they certainly are aiming for the same goals and with somewhat similar attitudes although she is able to better express herself.

 

Now, I know the Harry Osborn story and most people had exposure to a version of it in Spiderman 3.  This Ultimate version is done exceptionally well.  Whenever Peter fought Norman it was completely one sided, in that one figure was superior in all regards but was constantly defeated because of his pride in his science.  Peter's strength isn't from his person or even from his belief in himself but his ability to consider others no matter the cost.  That is what helps him win the day, along with a few well timed kicks and webbings.

 

With Harry, things are different because Peter is being forced into a situation that isn't just personal but also one of equals.  Both Peter and Harry are victims of circumstance and end up clashing because of outside influences.  Neither of them want to do it, which makes the situation entirely tragic.  They are characters without the freedom to avoid this clash.  It is tragic because it is simply unavoidable no matter how hard both try to avoid the situation.

 

And there is major heartbreak here too as Peter starts to actually react to the death and violence that has occurred simply because he exists.  Yes, his actions ultimately led to Uncle Ben's death but it was his existence that led to Gwens, and really, in both cases he was never directly responsible.  Here we see a teenager begin to grieve by simply not being able to process his role or accept that he was entirely helpless.  He's terrified for his loved ones and the art and dialogue capture that sentiment note perfectly here.

 

Now the Harry Osborn story is also captured quite well in that it is never quite clear what is real and what isn't.  Yes there were hypnotherapy sessions, but what is S.H.I.E.L.D.'s role in all of this?  Did Harry bring it on himself or was he programmed by his father?  Was he exposed accidentally to be latently activated or did he experiment upon himself?  There are no answers here and while it helps enforce how scary dealing with mental illness can be it also makes Harry a sympathetic character as well.  He is dealing with demons just like Peter is, but this is the result of having (letting or being programmed to) the demons win.  It moves him to embody rage and destruction of anything connected to him, which is what Peter is feeling but he manages to embody the sadness and grief that is required to process these situations.

 

This collection ends with a MJ centric issue that manages to hit all the notes that the Aunt May issue flubbed.  She is given believable situations to react to, rather than talking to a therapist about seemingly random fears that have no bearing on her day to day existence.  It's about MJ and why she loves Peter and in the end it is a solid issue offering a fly on the wall point-of-view for a day in the life of a superhero's girlfriend.  Suddenly, I feel like MJ has a bit more depth, which is what I needed from the series quite a while ago so it was nice to see it here.

 

*sent via e-mail

The Decompression Project Cuts Loose and Has a Bit of Fun

This volume is all about the guest stars.  There is Wolverine, The Human Torch, Dr. Strange and The Ultimates.  And, you know what?  It's a solid volume nonetheless.  I think it's because the stories managed to change their pace a bit and while some were relatively forgettable you actually get to read a fun little caper involving Marvel's two guest stars – Spidey and Wolverine.

 

Yes, it is very easy to be cynical about these two characters.  They're completely over used and exploited to the point of ridiculousness but Bendis manages to create a story that is very much in the spirit of yesteryear Marvel hijinx.  You get a story that Bendis introduces as himself with a rather wry sense of humor, and he goes on to poke fun at his own creations during the intro to the second part that even he couldn't force three issues out of this story.  And, well, the story is that Wolverine and Spider-man swap minds.  That's pretty much it.  There is no explanation, they just wake up and deal with each other's reality.  It's hackneyed, it's been done to death, but it hasn't been done since probably the early seventies with any sense of humour about the whole thing and it's just a fun little break from the bleak seriousness.

 

The Human Torch story is slightly forgettable but it's a decent riff on the friendship between the two characters of relatively the same age that has been in comics for quite some time.  And the Ultimate Dr. Strange was a decent enough, trapped in your own nightmare scenario that seems kind of like Peter is just going through the physical psychokinetic nightmare version of a recap of his comic up to now.  It's kind of like a visually interesting take on what he discusses anyway, so decent but somewhat unnecessary except for the intro of the good doctor and another interesting step towards a budding relationship with a police officer.  Not romantic but I do like how it is developing as it's a nice change of pace from his normal interactions.  Kind of a mentor relationship is being put forth, which I have to say is something I can't really remember from Spider-man 616 but I'm no authority on the matter.  I know he had Dr. Curt Connors and some people at the Bugle that were decent colleagues but nobody he really had as any sort of mentor role, and I guess I'll see how it all goes down.  With my luck it all happens in the Ultimate Team-Up book or something.

 

And that would be my only complaint about this collection.  That while I could certainly read the stories on their own and follow the action there was enough of a sense of being lost because I don't read all the Ultimate titles to be distracting from what is here in these stories.  I could sort of get a feel for what is happening in the FF book but I had no idea how many times Peter met Logan other than that one time he went to Westchester in his own book, and whether Wolverine was even there.  Still it was a very slight story and very upfront about it, which is very welcome in my book.  Yes, it's a cheat in the end but it wouldn't have been as good if it wasn't.

 

Now, in the end, I think where the story is going with the internal struggle Peter is facing is a very good setup for some good melodrama.  Spider-man is a character tuned into the proper "life gone awry and I don't know how to handle it" vibe.  The character is just as well suited for that as the silver-aged flavoured silliness here.  I think the continued fall out from Gwen, uncle Ben and the rest of it is spot on.  Peter is a character full of pathos and he reacts like a freaked out teenager would act in the final story here.  If there is one thing I consistently enjoy in these books, it's that Peter is constantly fighting with the control of himself and his emotions.  He wants to lose control but he won't let himself, and it's handled in these books extremely well.  He has highs and lows and they all bring him back to the character he is – responsible and surrounded by tragedy.  He is heroic because of his actual deeds but more so because of his inability to stop despite what happens that is out of his control.  It is taking it's toll on the kid and it was nice to have some stories that let Peter just be the goofy version of Spider-man because I see the return of Harry Osborn is coming in the next collection, so that should be a full on matching of psychological misery matched with physical violence.

 

*send in via e-mail.

Bloody Cold Nights

30 Days of Night

by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith

 

When the movie came out I remembered that I had been meaning to read 30 Days of Night for a while now.  I finally got around to it after not going to watch the movie.

 

In many ways I feel this is a dark coffee table art book with some words attached.  I really like Templesmith's artwork and it really does fit the genre.  It's always dark, it's unclear at points but it's frightening on a core level.  The somewhat unfinished, unpolished look helps it terrify the reader.  I'm using unpolished here to mean that there isn't a lot of tight linework with colouring precisely defined by those lines.  Nope, here colours, textures and art materials are used to bleed into one another making things beautifully muddled.  The bones are loose but the colour is tight.  I really love what he manages with such a limited palette of colour.

 

Sadly, I found that it was the art to be partly problematic to the actual plot.  While the art is so bloody cool the plotting and characterization needs to be next to perfect.  With the art being kinetic and emotional I found that jumps in story and characterization to be slightly confusing.  In fact I got lost a few times.  It starts out strong but by the time the plot is halfway through there seems to be one too many massive jumps in plot that were kind of frustrating to read while remaining artistically strong.

 

It starts strong, the idea is sound, the art suits it perfectly, the pacing and narrative sort of falls off.  I guess that's the sum up.

 

I hate criticizing works that I actually enjoy, for the most part.  I think I'm getting slightly more curmudgeonly as the snow continues to pile up here in Ottawa and I'm suffering from sleep deprivation because of the stupid hour change being moved.  Reading about a bunch of vicious beasts on a murderous winter rampage is a little too close to home as people are starting to crack because their sidewalks aren't cleared and pedestrians are forced to fight traffic in the streets.  Winter madness is setting in with the approach of Spring and 30 Days of Night captures the feeling of it a bit too precisely in that respect.

 

sent in via e-mail

Comics Just Aren't HD

No comics reading since I picked up a new TV and my friend left his X-Box 360 at my place.  Too much time has been spent trying to kill the Locust in Gears of War, Nazis in Call of Duty 3 and awesome drum fills in Rock Band - all in glorious High Definition.

 

Now if I could only figure out how to CBC HD from Rogers Digital Cable I'd be set.  Man, if you want a lesson in a website design that shows your customers how much you loathe and despise them then head over to theirs.  That thing is full of something that has the appearance of information but is next to incomprehensible and is generally useless.  I have no idea how to find out if I already have one channel included in my current package, and if not which package is it actually included in.  Thankfully it is in my wife's name so she gets to call them about this today.  The last time I called, they tried to blame me for a pay-per-view hockey game losing its feed.  Seriously.  It was batshit insane, not simply bad customer service.

The Decompression Project - Oh the Carnage!

I should seriously consider just changing the name of this blog to Jon's Once a Week Thoughts on the Ultimate Spider-man Trade Collections.  But I'm not totally into the whole, overly descriptive thing.  If you've read any of my posts, you'll most likely agree.  Anyway, I do have some Corto Maltese comics at home but reading in French takes a lot more effort than I'm able to give these days (new job, started yesterday) and I've been slowly enjoying the first Essential Avengers collection – more marvelous marvel machinations soon!  Ugh, too much Stan Lee in my brain.

 

So, on with The Decompression Project.  You know, I have to say that for the most part I've been enjoying my time spent with Ultimate Spider-man.  I think this is a great interpretation on both Spider-man and Peter Parker.  It works well with him as a high-school student although it would be nice to have him a bit more science geeky and just once I'd like him to remain confident and non-emo for one entire story arc.  Okay that's probably not ever going to happen, since that is the core of the character.  Bad things happen, he feels bad and perseveres simply because it is the right thing to do no matter how much he tries to dress it up with recurring inspirational quotes.  He almost can't help himself and that point is brought home in this story where we have the Ultimate version of Spider-man No More for about a half issue or so.

 

I do find this a weird series though because while on the one hand it is very slow on the other hand it is guilty of skimming the surface of the conflict.  Yes, I like the character moments but there needs to be further examination into the conflict as well as the personal.  The formula appears to be spend a lot of time with Peter and MJ (as well as the rest of Peter's personal life cast) then the same amount of pages only with big splash fight panels for the villain of the week.  I have no problems whatsoever with the villain of the week approach, in fact I quite like it.  No, I just find that each issue feels like wasted opportunity to really delve into the differences, themes and metaphors presented by each conflict as Spider-man.

 

This book is obviously about Carnage.  Now, I'm lucky in that I managed to never read a Carnage comic.  I mean, Venom I can handle but giving the suit to a maniac, okay more maniacal maniac, was just a bit too much.  It always felt like, hey kids, Carnage, the new Spidey villain is like Venom only more extreme, to the max!  And in that regard I do like what they did with the Ultimate Carnage.  Simply removing any humanity from the character helps make it actually somewhat terrifying and moves it into Dr. Frankenstein territory for Dr. Connors.  That is not such a terrible move.

 

Having Curt Connors as a sympathetic character was a decent break from the Ultimate villains as actual scary threats.  It allows Spider-man to not only have a scary brainless thug to beat on, in the doctor's monstrous creation, but a victim of circumstance for Peter to interact with.  It's never a bad thing to add a bit of humanity to your villains when you are exploring potential for conflict.  The good doctor is trying his hardest but is fated to fail because he cannot see beyond himself and his own beliefs in what he is doing, in his own reasons for acting.

 

And then we have the death of Gwen, which cheapens the whole thing for me.  Okay, I don't need total rehash of the original story, but why the heck was Carnage the villain to do the deed?  I guess it should work because it is a creation of Peter in a certain sense.  That Peter's life has a direct effect on those around him is probably what the driving idea was but it just felt like the book was required to set Carnage up as a major threat and since everyone knew Gwen was fated to die anyway….. So it goes.

 

It's too bad because I think it should have all been handled a bit better, and could have been within the story.  There were some great aspects that simply weren't connected as well as they should have been – Peter giving birth to a perverted image of himself and his father, Dr. Connors in the role of Dr. Frankenstein, and well just evil genetic stuff.  There was some very strong stuff to work with but in the end it rang hollow to me.  I won't presume to be able to do a better job or anything but while the connections are there under the surface of the story, I may just be seeing things that were never intended and that's where my criticism comes in.

The Boys Need Pegg

So with Garth Ennis's The Boys being picked up for Hollywood, how long before the internet campaign to get Simon Pegg attached starts? Oh wait, I think it just did!

The Rebirth of Superman

Supreme – The Return

Having read and loved Alan Moore’s Supreme: The Story of the Year collection it was a No-Brainer Supreme for me to pick up this follow up collection. You know how I really like Grant Morrison’s All-Star Superman? Well, Alan Moore did something rather similar with Superman a few years ago, only he didn’t exactly have Superman so he called his character Supreme. Everything is the same but different in the mythos, but talk about your love of silver-age goofyness. It permeates these stories to the point where the goofy stories are actually the driving conflicts of the plots here.

Supreme and the supporting cast jump through time to old Supreme adventures that visually manifest themselves as if they were old comic books. Why try to erase the goofy past of comics rather than accept and celebrate them, seems to be the message here. Goofy stories do not preclude bad stories or take away from the kewlness of the nineties, or anything else for that matter. So rather than reinvent bits of Supreme from square one for a new generation of readers, Moore is basically showing how you can restart a character by accepting all iterations before the current one. These are comics, have fun with them for a change.

The Decompression Project - Hmm, do you think we could place MORE products in that shot?

Ultimate Spider-Man: Hollywood

I swear I am reading comics other than Ultimate Spider-man (okay, not really), but I’ve been managing to get these all in a row so the project continues. This is the collection that shamelessly plugs the Spider-man movie. A lot. It feels a bit too much like Avi Arad’s Spider-man Unlimited compared to the Spider-man cartoon that preceded it. And guess who is one of the guest stars? I can just imagine what fandom was like when this was just hitting the shelves. Heck, it annoyed me a bit, I can only imagine the mouth frothing that occurred during the actual release of the comic.

I guess in some ways this is the Ultimatization of Marvel’s tradition of shameless hucksterism. Only rather than Stan Lee show up or an editor’s note telling you about something related to another series, it’s a plug for their Spider-man movie. It’s all a bit distracting when the real world crosses over into the fictional one in ways that don’t particularly contribute to the story. This is the dark side of Grant Morrison talking to Animal Man, in that it doesn’t really do anything but plug the movie. Sure there is a connection to the plot but it’s a real MacGuffin in that regard. The movie could be anything to get Dr. Octopus and Spider-man to showdown and get Gwen involved in Peter’s secret life.

I do have to say though, for shameless plugs it is slightly charming. I like this version of Peter Parker quite a lot and having him generally annoy the filming but be taken in by big bad Hollywood is perfect for this universe. Then there is the new Dr. Octopus. I do quite like his connection to the arms and having them act as two separate characters. It moves him out of any possible sympathy or goofy villain of the week syndromes he suffered from previously. Yes, he’s still the chubby goofball that gets beaten up but when he’s in full moustache twirling mode I like the Ultimate Dr. Octopus quite a bit.

He’s more of the brilliant doctor that is unable to deal with everyday things like combing hair or using manners, but he’s also a much scarier and formidable threat with his consciousness split between his human and robotic side. He’s part symbiotic, part Two-Face, part mad scientist and just perfect for slightly undercooked plans of destruction. All in all, he’s just inhuman enough here to really remain someone you don’t feel sympathy for in any regard. He’s creepy, he’s violent, and while he’s really a sad case you really want Spidey to hit him a few more times for good measure because he’s the underhanded small man.

And, while all this is a decent little bust up between Spider-man and Dr. Octopus the real crux of the story was getting Gwen to put the pieces together to move her from outsider to insider in Peter’s secret life. I do like Gwen in this series because to me this character is much better set up than Mary Jane to be the girl with problems but is working them out partly because of the naivety of youth and partly because she is simply put into a tough spot and has the strength to simply continue. Whereas the conflicts in Mary Jane’s backstory seem somewhat tacked on to give her some more depth, Gwen’s were created to serve a story. This, to me, is what helps her fit into the Ultimate Spider-man milieu better than MJ. Yes, MJ is now integral to Spider-man (although the current run of reportedly good stories after the impish annulment would point to this not being completely true), so she had to be involved but Gwen feels more like a creation than an addition if that makes any sense.

Her confidence feels slightly more real, her independence is more understandable and her blame laying is also something that works within the universe as it has been created as opposed to Aunt May suddenly expounding about how she’s freaked out yet obsessed with Spider-man. Gwen’s life was directly affected by Spider-man and it was inevitable that she would piece it all together. I think her personality is a good counterpoint to Peter’s and their relationship together is one that feels better than the Peter and MJ duality that feels more reflective than anything else. And at the same time I find it completely ridiculous that Gwen is living with the Parkers. It’s like they needed her to be in Peter’s life somehow so voila, she’s been taken it. Then again, that’s probably why I like it so much – because it is simply the most comic-booky of all relationships.

So this is a lot of reflection upon a decent villain vs. Spider-man story that leads to Gwen’s somewhat rushed entry into Peter’s private life that is distracted by the fact Marvel was making a Spider-man movie in the real world (and they really wanted you to know that Avi Arand was important). In the end I’m glad they’ve gotten Gwen involved but because it felt rushed I feel myself being slightly suspicious of her behavior. I do think the revelation works and fits both characters but I can’t help but feel this would have worked better if it was the first time Peter’s identity was revealed to anyone (whether it was MJ or Gwen). I can’t help but think that a bigger build up would have helped set up the Ultimate world a bit more. Then again, the way things have been up to know I think that going against expectations for that type of thing has worked out quite well.

Batman Beyond

I never watched this cartoon when it originally aired and it's next in line of the Bruce Timm animation collection, so I popped it in and was pleasantly surprised. I've only watched disk one of the first season but I'm thoroughly impressed so far. I guess when you don't hold onto any expectations it is much easier to be impressed or let down, but still, it's good stuff.

It works for me because they keep the core that made the animated Batman and Superman stories so good. They focus on simple capers and well told stories rather than recreate point for point the comic books. Whereas the Batman and Superman cartoons would plunder the characters' deep histories for stories to retell, that gets left behind so far in this series. It's sort of freeing in that way I suppose in that telling Batman of the future stories you don't have the mythos to rely on and the writers get to stretch their own minds for a bit. There are still some homages for the long time fans such as Bruce Wayne's dog Ace, and the Oracle face showing up in advertisements, which are fun to spot but not occuring often enough to be distracting.

The villains tend to be riffs on Batman's rogue gallery but not too sexed up as to feel hacked out. I think the aesthetics of the Bruce Timm style go a long way to help that. There's Inque who is kind of like Clayface mixed with the Shadow Thief and that Bic pen mascot, as well as some classic Bat-foes like Mr. Freeze and the Royal Flush Gang. The classic villains, even if appearing for the first time, are all managed in a way that makes sense. Plus, there is crusty old Bruce Wayne who is a great character idea and would be better used if he did more than tell the new Batman to "get out of there!"

At first I thought the music and the sort of now outdated computer animation would be distracting but they lend a certain charm to the place. Whereas the original animated series was sort of like Batman crossed with Chinatown, this is like Batman crossed with Blade Runner. The original series felt more retro-sci-fi-noir, this series is very much futureshock-sci-fi-noir. The simplification of the colours and the experimental use of shadows and colour on the characters really help move this series into something familiar but different territory. The visual cues remind you of the setting that needs to be foriegn to the viewers but with enough visual pop as to keep you engaged. I think it works, if not only for the advances in the animation itself that help give the characters more fluid and quick movement onscreen.

Like the other series, it can stumble into goofball territory, but in the end I like the freedom of the series. It shouldn't work because of the changes they made but in the end it works precisely because those changes are really just minor tweaks. There is a hook and point of familiarity for the audience but the rest is more or less all new. And really, how many dystopian sci-fi cartoons are there?

Daredevil and The Flash

You know what? I don't think I have ever read a single Daredevil comic. Ever.

I mean, I'm sure I did at some point because I know the score on the character but I can't recall any single comic that I read. Perhaps I only read guest appearances.

Also, I can't recall ever reading a Flash comic. I think I've only ever read him in team books.

Weird.

My Secret Invasion

With Marvel gearing up for The Secret Invasion of the Skrulls and with their push to get Marvel characters closer to their roots, I'm hoping they decide to go full bore here. I of course mean that the Marvel heroes, in particular The Fantastic Four, defeat the Skrulls using comic books.

The Decompression Project - The Ultimate Five, sorry, Six

What to say about the Ultimate Six? There were really on five of them? Sure, I know what they were going for with the Spider-man connection but really, there should be six villains if you’re trying to make the Ultimate Marvel version of the Sinister Six. I guess they didn’t create Ultimate Chameleon or establish Black Cat as more of a villain or something. And I guess Mysterio and Vulture just didn’t want to be involved, although I can’t recall seeing Ultimate Mysterio – doesn’t mean I haven’t read a very obvious story in one of the first trades, but I honestly don’t recall him appearing in the Ultimate Spider-man stories at the moment.

Again, this is a story with a lot of good bones and decent structure but lacks any sense of urgency when being told, or simply lacks any urgency to be told at all. I guess I’m hitting the point where I’m no longer seeing a re-imagining of Spider-man so much as rehashing the Spider-man shared mythology with minor changes. The Sinister Six was a fairly neat idea that allowed itself to have a rotating cast of Spidey villains, so why they couldn’t come up with a sixth member here seems slightly wonky to me.

I do applaud the attempt at connecting the creation of the genetic anomalies from the villains to Peter Parker. I get that they are two sides to the same coin and how minor differences can create major diversions in outcome. This aspect felt slightly glossed over to me and could have been a much stronger element of the story. The story is set up as a villain showpiece and a decent caper revenge heist type of plot, with a much better handling of Civil War type activities thrown in for flavour, only to kind of lead to a confrontation that felt more like a bunch of adult villains lecturing Peter Parker about how he’s from the same formula that created them, and some vaguely motivated attack on the White House. Once again, great set up, great potential and not so great ending. It didn’t leave me wanting more, it just sort of left me.

The story is set apart from the rest of the Ultimate Spider-man trades by the art as much as the focus. It was a bit odd to suddenly not be seeing Bagley’s art, and to have the youthful vibrancy of his art not present meant the tone of the presentation changed with it. This is stiffer, darker stuff that seems to help root this story into the bigger Ultimate universe. There is more SHIELD and the Ultimates here than normally found in Spidey’s solo Ultimate adventures. I think the art change helps reflect that change in focus but I’m not sure if it’s a benefit to the Ultimate Spider-man stories on the whole. I think that the tenuous connections work best and I believe this was originally a miniseries outside the main book so that would work for me, but in trade format it feels like a bit of a departure. It feels like the flow gets interrupted in order to follow up with a few villains and remind Spider-man fans that there is more to the Ultimate Marvel Universe – which I suppose the X-women showing up would have managed previously. Whereas their appearance felt like guest star showing up, this story seems to focus more on the interconnected Ultimate setting more than on Spidey himself, and that’s sort of missing the reason people will buy Spider-man books.

But did I enjoy it? Yeah, I actually did. I don’t think it’s groundbreaking or does anything to profoundly update any of the ideas found in the characters and the reasons for bonding into a villainous group, but it’s a decent caper and goes a long way to reminding me why I first found Dr. Octopus so threatening or Electro so uniquely terrifying. Kraven is the character I am least familiar with and I think making him some rage induced werewolf was kind of nifty. So the villain showcase aspect worked well, and the story worked best when focused on them. When the story strayed away from them, it started to fall apart at the seams.

Boing Boing link

Wow, I got a post on Boing Boing. So to all you Boing Boing readers that may have shown up here, thanks for reading and welcome.

For non-Boing Boing readers, I basically sent along a link to a news story about the employee only CSIS museum. CSIS is the Canadian version of the FBI and CIA - more or less. Well, it turns out they run their own spy museum that is sadly, only open to employees. This was discovered by a report given to parliament or some other government committee. Well, it was just recently discovered that they run a gift shop as well. Again, it's only open to employees but the employees can buy anything in the museum. Okay, maybe only things for sale but it's never made clear that there is a distinction between for sale and not for sale items.

The kicker is that you write down what you want to buy on a blank sheet of paper, put the proper amount of cash into a blank envelope and deliver it to the museum. I'm assuming they will contact you on how to pick up your item once payment is received.

It sounds like a lot of fun for the spies, but seriously, who wouldn't want some cool cold-war era spy gear?

They do have a small virtual museum.

The Decompression Project: Cats and Kings

Something Plok wrote sort of stuck with me when I was thinking about this collection. Pay off. While reading it, I enjoyed it. While thinking about it and reflecting upon it, there’s kind of little to talk about.

It’s all about character creation, and while the characters are great while relating to one another the actual plot seems to become secondary. And I have to say that for genre fiction, plot tends to be a major player although a good balance of characters and plot is essential. When one takes over then the resulting work seems somewhat skewed and hard to talk about other than in a purely craft based manner. I don’t need to talk about why I think the dialogue is so well done seeing as anyone who picks up the book can get that as well.

In comics, obviously the character creation has a heck of a lot to do with the artwork. The emotions and positioning of the characters adds a much more solid dimension to any character dialogue. In some ways, it takes the interpretation away from the reader but on the flip side it really helps reinforce what the characters are doing, thinking and feeling. And the art is still entirely fitting here, although the amount of fake boobs is starting to get silly proportions.

Basically this is a long intro for me to say that I liked most of this story and the beginnings of the relationship between Peter and Felicia. Of course he’d be attracted to her, he’s fifteen and she’s showing more boobs than Janet Jackson at the Super Bowl. The subplots connecting the various characters together is all very neat and tidy, but somehow it feels like I should know a bit more about everyone at the end of it. There was some neat revelations about Wilson Fisk, and I like how Ultimate Elektra is used but for the most part the motivations seemed slightly missing even though the relationships all felt real. Again, great characters but little pay off.

So I’m finding it hard to put my finger on it but this stuff is good to read but hard to talk about is all I’m coming up with at the moment. It sort of frustrates me that I can’t come up with much of a reason as to why it seems so hard to talk about other than that’s simply a flaw of genre fiction that is happy to be really successful at the genre and only the genre. It really does feel like a very long single issue. That really the extra reading is an expansion of the whitespace between the panels that gets expanded in the Ultimate universe. In the end, the story is simply stretched over multiple issues with the same payoff, hooks, cliffhangers and setups of single issue storytelling.

What are we left with? In the end I think it can be something extremely positive. New readers can pick up any trade of Ultimate Spider-man and not really be lost by the story presented therein. That is a good thing. You get about six issues with no advertisements and you don't need to buy them in order - at least it doesn't feel like you need to at this point. Let's see how things develop from here.

Magpies and Rock Band

First I'd like to follow my idea of the last post for a moment. Please indulge me. I compared the idea of running the big two comic book companies to a sports team that constantly sells out games but never delivers a good product. I then thought up two possible outcomes - one is the quick fix that really doesn't do anything and the other is to get someone who knows what they are doing and takes the time to figure out how to fix things making a much stronger product in the end.

I used Newcastle United (the soccer team I'll be forever dedicated to) as an example of the second tact. They've recently hired a beloved former manager who had the most success with the club in the modern era. Well, I watched the game on Saturday and if I'm going to follow my metaphor then the part I need to add is that having a good manager is one thing but not having any talented contributors is another big problem. Yes, you could see them doing certain things better and different from how they were recently, but in the end the product still stunk. It's not to say there isn't any talent there at all, there certainly is. There is a lot of top drawer talent but the team has never gelled into something that works like a well oiled machine. The problem I see is that the players don't recognize what their role is and are comfortable in doing that thing well with the trust of their teammates doing the other roles well. The same goes for the comics. If there is a trust that the different books in different genres achieve their own goals well, they all play their own role, then the over all product is improved. If they are all trying to be the goal scorer then there are no goals scored. If the comics are all trying to be a part of crossover madness then no stories are told.

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In other news I played Rock Band this weekend. It is phenomenal. It is probably some of the most fun I have ever had sober in my adult life. My friend bought it and he invited me and my wife over to start a band. We went on Friday and I have to say I really can't carry a tune. I might know all the words but I have zero pitch control. I could fudge my way through most of the songs and actually realized that songs with long sustained vocals allow you time to correct your pitch. So I could sing Radiohead's Creep or The Yeah Yeah Yeahs Maps quite well. Trying to be dead on for the stacatto Blitzkrieg Bop was zero fun even though I love The Ramones.

I was slighly less crappy on the drums. Heck, his six year old son was better than me on the drums. I've never played any sort of percussion instrument before and I have to say that if you really want to take some beginner lessons then this is probably the funnest place to start. I did find that I was getting better the more I played, but I found the game a bit unforgiving in that I would manage to catch the beat but I was hitting it between the notes scrolling down. So being slighly off was killing me. I still liked it more than singing, which, while I sucked at it, was still kind of fun.

So the first night my wife and his wife would alternate between bass and guitar and me and him would alternate between drums and vocals. Things went so well that we got a few calls the next afternoon trying to plan us coming over again. So we did and took up some similar roles, but I ended up pulling a Pete Best and took up my place in a long line of replaced drummers. His wife took over vocals, I picked up a guitar and my wife requested bass because she found it way more fun to just hit all the individual notes (something she discovered was a heck of a lot of fun in guitar hero - moreso than the serious guitar shredding she like the beat and riffs)

And on our first song we rocked the hell out of it. His wife was almost perfect on the vocals and we were all kind of shocked. So we tried another one to see if the first was a fluke and she was better. We played a few gigs and then agreed we had found our sweet spot. So we made a new group and rocked it out on medium from there on in. And now I dream of streaming notes and ache to play again.

I did find the game a bit less forgiving on missed notes than the guitar hero series. It could just be that it's all about the perceived aesthetics - Rock Band used scrolling rectangles where guitar hero uses these oblong (forced perspective) dots. But I think guitar hero is more forgiving on hitting the notes while the guitar hero 3 songs in themself are simply harder to finish. It just takes some getting used to more than anything.

The only majorly annoying aspect of the game was the band management. It really didn't make a heck of a lot of sense. We had one band but wanted to start another, so we thought we could just juggle our characters onto the new instruments. Turns out you can't. Or, if you can, there was simply no way we could figure it out. So from my understanding each X-box live account has individual characters assigned to separate instruments per X-box account. So you might make a drummer called Mr. X but you want to play guitar. Well you can't just sign into the guitar and select Mr. X, you need to make Mr. Z. Now if someone else signs into the drums and wants to play with Mr. X, tough luck he's only available to you.

It would be nice to see a common pool for the created characters, or at least the option that lets you make your character available for other players and instruments. I understand that certain people would rather keep their own characters out of the hands of other players, but when you're trying to find out what you like to play it would have been nice to not be required to create a totally new band - well except for my wife who got to keep her original character and thus had twice the amount of cash for outfits and instruments. Although, it is great that you can use the same character for solo play and multiplayer games. And the customization aspects are a heck of a lot of fun. Hell, I would have been happy to just sit there and make tattoo sleeves on my characters for hours.

And really, in the end, it's all about getting together with a few friends and doing something together. It really shouldn't be as fun as it is to sit in a living room and play karaoke on little plastic toy instruments but sweet baby Jesus it was a shitload of fun! I mean, they have The Pixies on there - The Pixies!! That's pretty much the best thing ever as far as I'm concerned but then they added The Clash, The Ramones, The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and have CCR and The Buzzcocks available for download. It's like they beamed radiowaves into my head via my fillings and made a song list just for me. Now if they would only make Drunk Teenagers and Nowhere With You by The Joel Plaskett Emegency and Don't Walk Away Eileen by Sam Roberts, I'd be exceptionally happy with the Canadian Rock content.

Well this is even MORE unfortunate

Well the Spider-man marriage thing was finally picked up by the CBC website so that means I got an e-mail from my wife asking about it. Do you know how hard it is to explain this to someone outside the medium? It starts with, no I haven’t read it and probably won’t ever read it unless someone gives it to me and I have a lot of free time. Then you sort of have to explain the nineties and the whole Death of Superman really screwed up people planning to retire on their comic book collection money and how this is more or less the same kind of mentality here but with a bit less media attention or actual glut of buyers so the effects won’t be as huge. And then explaining how this was a quick fix and the writer didn’t want his name attached to it because they’re going for sensation more so than actual good story telling.

I made a comparison to the Toronto Maple Leafs (yes, it’s spelled incorrectly, and yes, it’s okay to laugh at it) and Newcastle United. Both are in trouble in their respective sports and have rabid fans – I’m a toon army member myself. So in order to fix their problems the teams have two options, spend money to bring in some temporary help and maybe turn things around although that rarely ever works. In the end bringing in a quick fix just prolongs the problem you’ve started with. The second option is to bring in someone in charge who not only has a proven success record but the fans respect and trust, and, most importantly, is someone who is willing to spend time to improve upon the core product that you have. While taking longer and less flashy it does managed to build a stronger base and more rewards come from it.

So, Newcastle United went back and got a well respected coach who knows the team and the fans will, more likely, be patient with in order to turn their collective fortunes around. And while they won’t win this year they will all feel they’ll have a better shot at simply doing better next year. The Maple Leafs just aren’t doing anything differently since they are still selling out the arena each game.

Marvel is operating like the Maple Leafs. They never break from the cycle of screwing up and while it may frustrate some fans, they still make money hand over fist so there is no real incentive to change. A quick fix here, a big trade there, an unmasking here, a metaphysical divorce there and things just keep going.

That’s a long way and a weird metaphor to go with, and I was hoping to avoid talking about this all together, but my real point that I was making to my wife was that it simply didn’t look like a good story to me so on a basic level it held no appeal. That’s what gets lost in all this. Sure it’s a news story and it smacks of sensationalism, but not once in any of the news stories is there any mention about whether or not this thing was actually any darned good. Heck, when the writer doesn’t like it, I’m thinking it’s not the best written story out there. But that’s just me from the outside looking in.

Well that is kind of unfortunate

I read the last issue of The Spirit by Messrs Cooke and Bone and with it goes my habit of buying floppies. Or, at least, what was left of that habit. And I have to say that reading this story, which I loved by the way and think the tone of lost love is incredibly appropriate for thier last issue and Cooke's view towards big two comic creating, was distracting. I've come to notice that ad placement is really starting to get on my nerves as I become a crusty old dude. Well, crustier old dude. When something about a video game interupted the flow of this fine story a thought that I should have waited for the trade popped into my head because at least then the story would be allowed to take prominence.

You know how there's a saying about how it's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all? That's sort of how I feel about this book's short life with these creators. I also think that saying is complete bullshit because if I never saw just how good corporate owned comics could be then I wouldn't be so bored by the rest of them and be completely enamoured or at least pleasantly distracted for a little while. As it is, I'm just a bit sad to see this fine run end.

What impressed me most was that I was a bit trepidatious for the first issue since Eisner's Spirit rose quickly in my esteem when I finally discovered it. I had no idea how anyone could duplicate that verve and dreamy flair. Boy was I wrong to worry. Know I can't think of The Spirit without this take coming to mind in much the same way I can't think of Batman without the Animated Series in mind. It's not the primary thought of the character but the new version is hard to beat in terms of overall quality.

I wish the new writers and artists a lot of luck, and if it gets a lot of good press I may even pick up the trade. As for now, I'm totally done with floppies for now. Huh.

Weirdness

I got a phone message a couple of days ago from the comic shop I had a subscription at, asking if I wanted them to continue to hold books for me. I cancelled it in August and got my deposit back. Now I feel a bit guilty if they've been holding books for me for so long, but on the flip side they need to, I don't know, pay attention to their business.

Sheesh.

The Decompression Project - Irresponsible

Yes this is the collection that contains the issue where Aunt May goes to see her therapist. That issue isn’t so great is it? I mean it starts out okay. I like the idea of looking into the character of Aunt May a bit more but then it just starts to feel a page, then two, then three, four pages too long. I found the longer that particular scene dragged out the weaker it got. Which is unfortunate.

The rest of the story has Peter trying to come to terms with his inability to make or keep his costumes. It’s a cute little sub-plot and probably the strongest aspect of this collection. Much like the previous trade about the Venom story I felt that this collection had some great basic plots but it tended to focus a bit too much on the least interesting aspects. Spidey spends a lot of time dealing with a teenage possible mutant that can make things explode – kind of like Nitro, I believe? I do love that he’s named Geldoff.

The play between Peter Parker trying to learn responsibility and express that message to this kid who really just wants to be accepted so tends to act like a reckless teenager is a decent conflict, but like the Aunt May talking to her therapist scene, the interplay tended to feel a bit too drawn out. Extended scenes are fine but this one never developed beyond, be responsible, I’m a teenager, well try to be responsible, I’m a teenager. It made me feel sort of teenagerish towards them and just want to go “pfffff” roll my eyes and ignore them until they went away.

Then the Ultimate X-(wo)men show up. There’s a funny bit with the attractive mind-reader and then your standard X-men plot where their plane blows up. I bet their airplane insurance is out of this world the way they destroy Blackbirds. Anyway, I was looking forward to a bit more interplay between Spider-man and the Ultimate X-men but again I felt a little let down by it all, although I’m happy to know that Kitty Pryde does come back to the series because I honestly think that’s a great Mary Sue relationship.

So while I just don’t quite like the choices made here on what to focus I can’t really criticize anything too much. The art is still fun and the characters really try to express themselves, the actual focus just wasn’t what I wanted to know more about or see explored. I got the point, I wanted it to move on. There were, however, two major things that I just didn’t understand. One: Why was MJ dressed like she was going to a Tarts & Vicars party or was in costume for Pretty Woman? Maybe I just didn’t go to that type of high-school but it just didn’t seem to fit in with the rest of the setting and character design which all looked their age. Two: Was there any consideration for issue breaks? It felt a lot like they reached the page limit and just stopped until next month without any attempt whatsoever to have some part of the story conclude. I know it happened in the other issues but this arc really stuck out for me, probably because I wasn’t totally engaged in the story. The name of the collection is either appropriate or unfortunate.

Mildly Informative Review - Laika by Nick Abadzis

This is a very good comic book. I am late to the plate and just the latest in a long line of people to really like it. It's about the first dog to go into orbit and it is beautiful, heartwarming and heartbreaking all at once. From inspirational greatness and indominable spirits to the utter futility of doing things because of politics.