A multi-topic post with words, not deeds. Consider it like Megaforce in reverse. (Negaforce?)
Comments Off | Posted: September 24th, 2007 | Filed under: UncategorizedMark Evanier has put together the entire Steve Ditko special on his website as well as let me know that I won’t be seeing his Kirby biography soon. I’ve been I foolishly anticipating its delivery since pre-ordering it three months back.
I three-quarters watched that Family Guy season premiere where they basically remade Star Wars in the space of an hour. It suffered heavily from being a fully authorized “parody,” with long stretches that basically just showed off how ILM or whoever can superimpose Family Guy-styled spaceships over the original material. Here’s when I laughed out loud:
- “John Williams and the London Symphony Orchestra!” (Even though that gag went on far too long and had a later payoff I missed because I was in the other room.)
- “Great, Kid! Don’t get penis-y.” It was idiotic but it worked.
- “Red Buttons, standing by.”
- The final payoff on the tremendously beaten-into-the-ground couch gag.
I really, really, really actively disliked the child molestor in the Obi-Wan role, but I’ve always thought that particular character was remarkably unfunny. Points are also deducted for the racist humor around Artoo. I’m not a prude about having a good laugh with people, but man alive, when the whitest writer’s room in the world drops dope-smoking, drive-bys, and more dope-smoking clumsily onto a character in order to remind the viewers “OH HEY, WE MADE THE DROID INTO A NEGRO,” I bristle a bit.
It looks like the XKCD meetup happened over in North Cambridge, a tiny piece from my house. I didn’t attend because while I like the strip 50-75% of the time, I tend to not enjoy the company of the people that like it 100% of the time. Does that make sense? It’s the same logic that keeps me from most comics conventions, book signings, and White Power rallies. I do believe that one of my associates was supposed to attend, so I’ll have to check in with her on such things.
A third bout is coming. Are you ready?
Finally, I want to admit that I was fully and totally wrong about Jonathan Hickman’s The Nightly News I had dismissed it as a screeching polemic comic that followed in the well-worn path left by Brian Wood’s Channel Zero work. Instead, it’s a well-designed, tightly-written screeching polemic that beats its own path.
My only problem with the work is Hickman’s insistence that this story doesn’t necessarily reflect his views while simultaneously injecting himself with parenthetical asides, commentary, and an afterword that struck me as ill-advised, especially in a first-time work. I’ve always been of the mind that if you believe in the power your story, even a politically-charged tale like this, then let it stand on its own. Ellis, Moore, and Morrison have done that, and last I checked (which was, admittedly, two years ago,) Brian K. Vaughan did the same with Ex Machina.
