Monday, February 28, 2005

Bastard Sockhop

and with those two words Gail Simone became my favourite comic book writer also wrote my epitaph.

Read them in context at her interview on Villains United at:

http://newsarama.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28500

Ten Things Meme

Ten Things I've Done That You May Not Have:

1. Recorded a full-length synth-based heavy metal album.
2. Performed with said synth-based heavy metal band wearing clothing made of duct tape.
3. Wrote a term paper titled "Pink Floyd's 'The Wall' as Modern Epic."
4. Had the Bat symbol shaved into the back of my head (I was 11).
5. Drank absinthe in Prague.
6. Listened to "Delirium Cordia" by Fantomas in one sitting (it's 70-odd minutes of scary postmodern jazz-thrash!).
7. Met Slayer.
8. Saw Nine Inch Nails perform with David Bowie.
9. Ate Korean food whose name translates to "decay." Its name is indicative of its taste. Ick!
10. Taught English to people of 9 different nationalities (1. Scottish, 2. Korean, 3. Japanese, 4. Chinese, 5. Turkish, 6. Brazilian, 7. Mexican, 8. Thai and 9. French)

Sunday, February 27, 2005

And now, your moment of Zen...


It speaks for itself... Posted by Hello

Saturday, February 26, 2005

Oh for Christ's Sake!

I just spent half an hour writing a review of the Earth's Mightiest Heroes miniseries from marvel and my comp crapped out!

Do yourself a favour and don't buy Earth's Mightiest Heroes when it comes out in trade. There. You got the gist of it.

Wednesday, February 23, 2005

Wifey Wednesdays: Week Won

As promised in response to a naggy comment in one of my posts, one post a week dedicated to the peculiarities of wifedom. And so, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you my wife. Megan.

Top Ten Reasons Why I'd Be a Bad Nursery Teacher
by Megan, current Practicum student at --- --- Nursery...

10. I won't let the children play with my puppet
(he's mine and he pretty, and he doesn't like kids touching him!!)
9. I don't wipe the bums of others
8. I like clean clothes
(as in, free from grubby hand prints especially those caused by paint or mud)
7. I forget the actions to nursery rhymes

6. I'd rather cut for them than look at those jagged edges
5. It takes me 3 hours to prep a 3 minute lesson
4. I have a snot phobia
3. If I have to brush another tooth I will shoot myself
2. Snow-days are my worst enemy
(think changing 40 kids back and forth into inside/outside clothes-- that's 40 PER class)
1. I hold grudges against 4-year-olds

Star Wars Episode III pics!

Major Spoilers for those who don't have any idea what happens but God it looks much better than the 5-odd hours of utter shite that was Episode 1 and 2...

The link is the title.

Monday, February 21, 2005

RIP Hunter S. Thompson

Well, it has been much more eloquently put by Warren Ellis and Davinder (Broken Glass Makes Me Laugh, see link) on their blogs but since I just heard about it from Warren's Bad Signal mailing list I thought I'd add a few thoughts.

I was never much of a Thompson fan. I always preferred William S. Burroughs for my junkie hipster journalist fix. I've read Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas but that's it. I would never claim to be a fan of him other than the movies about his life (go rent "Where the buffalo roam" with Bill Murray right now).

Without trying to sound harsh: it is because of these reasons that I was more surprised to hear that he had recently been alive. I am constantly astonished at the amount of abuse one can put their body and mind through and still live until a relative old age. Burroughs was one and, if I'm not mistaken, so was Allen Ginsberg. The fact that he lived that long should be applauded.

While, again, I was not much of a Thompson fan I truly believe that society needs people like him. People who look through the bullshit and give us a close semblance of the truth, be it drug-addled or not, make me smile. People like Thompson, Burroughs, Bill Hicks, Lester Bangs and the, thankfully, still among the living George Carlin and David Cross. Writers, comedians and visionary maniacs all.

I tip my hat to you Mr. Thompson.

Sunday, February 20, 2005

Big Thanks to Alan Grant!

Just got back from listening to Alan Grant give a talk on comics at the writer's festival "Aye Write" here in sunny Glasgow this afternoon.

Alan talked mostly about 2000AD stuff and Batman. He remarked at how much easier it was to write Batman a few years ago as he was trusted to treat Bats right and thus left alone. He also told us about how he will probably never write Batman again as he had submitted a proposal to DC and while doing an interview was asked about the readership of Batman going from 500,000 to 50,000 since he'd been writing it. The interviewer asked him how he would rectify the situation and Alan remarked : "I'd fire the Senior Editor." Needless to say, there is little chance of that proposal ever seeing the light of day. He told us that the future holds some collected editions of Middenface from the last 20 years or so as well as new stories involving Bogie Man from 2000AD.

After the talk Alan was nice enough to give me advice as an aspiring writer for 10 minutes or so. Among one of the questions I asked was on the likelihood of successful self-publishing. He let me know that Shit the Dog (published by Alan, John Wagner and Simon Bisley) although being published by three substantial names in the industry at the time lost $6000 over 4 issues. (Looks like that path is a no-go Dav). Alan also shared his dislike of Dan Brown's formulaic writing (DaVinci Code et al.) with me and noted he was working on what he deemed a "Scottish DaVinci Code" centering on Rosslyn Chapel and other areas of Scotland.

He was a gentleman and very supportive with his advice. Thank you Mr.
Grant.

More about Grant and his work here:

http://www.alan-grant.com/

http://www.411mania.com/comics/columns/article.php?columns_id=2769

http://www.2000adonline.com/

Saturday, February 19, 2005

Whah?

I'm sorry but if you say you predicted this you are a damn filthy liar:

http://comicbookresources.com/news/newsitem.cgi?id=4838

More from me tomorrow after I listen to Alan Grant give a talk on comics.

Travis Charest X-Men art...

Friday, February 18, 2005

My 100 things I love about comics:

1) Batman
2) Geoff Johns
3) Die-cut holofoil glow in the dark scratch and sniff double gatefold covers
4) Bendis and Maleev on Daredevil
5) Frank Miller on Daredevil
6) Killing a character only to bring them back by the end of the year
7) Stilt-Man
8) Ostrander's Suicide Squad
9) Alan Moore
10) The entire library of Justice League by Giffen et al. best embodied in Justice League Antarctica
11) Teen Titans
12) Ben Grimm's sweet Aunt Petunia
13) Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
14) The Joker
15) Sandman: Endless Night
16) Okay, the entire run of Gaiman's Sandman
17) Captain Britain
18) Alternate histories/timelines/what if?s/elseworlds/days of future....
19) That really bad Justice League TV pilot from the early nineties
20) Wolfman and Perez on the New Teen Titans
21) Wolverine jumping, claws extended, directly at the reader
22) Wolverine continuing to beat up the bad guy while the captions tell us that he is "the best at what he does," that he has "adamantium bones, indestructible claws and a healing factor" every time he makes an appearance
23) The time Magneto actually made himself useful and pulled the adamantium from Wolverine's skeleton
24) The fact that there is a country in the DC Universe called Qurac
25) Excelsior!
26) Alpha Flight
27) Death in the Family
28) A Lonely Place of Dying
29) Hal Jordan
30) Kingdom Come
31) Watchmen
32) Grant Morrison
33) Puck (hehe)
34) Doc Frankenstein by Skroce and the Wachowski Brothers
35) Shaolin Cowboy by Geof Darrow (all the violence of Hard Boiled without the story)
36) Justice League Unlimited
37) That odd hairdo shared by Wolverine, Oberon, Troll and Owl Man (don't they all smoke cigars?)
38) The fact that Cyclops got over the death of Jean Grey by marrying and having a child with her clone. And, no one said a thing! "Gee Scott, don't you think she looks and awful lot like..."
39) Hellboy
40) JSA
41) Warren Ellis and John Cassaday on Planetary
42) Mark Millar and Bryan Hitch on Ultimates
43) The Authority (pre-Robbie Morrison)
44) Preacher
45) Ennis writing Punisher
46) Superman and Clark Kent looking exactly the same and being the only "two" men in Metropolis with blue hair and not even Lois could figure it out!
47) Johnny the Homicidal Maniac
48) Power rings, utility belts, capes, grappling hook guns, smoke pellets, batons that bounce back at the thrower, berserker rages, tights made from unstable molecules, web-spinners and mystical amulets.
49) Mole Man
50) Gabrielle Dell'otto's [sic] painting
51) Dave McKean
52) Really, really fat guys getting steady work
53) Morrison's Animal Man
54) Ellis's Apparat line
55) Killing Joke
56) Alex Ross
57) The Green Lantern Corps
58) Steve Ditko
59) G'Nort
60) Blue Beetle and Booster Gold
61) Batman punching out Guy Gardner
62) Rock N Roll Comics
63) Valiant
64) Pariah from Crisis of Infinite Earths
65) Blue Devil
66) Etrigan, but only when he rhymes
67) Deadman. Coolest. Character. Ever.
68) Neal Adams
69) Savage Dragon
70) Dark Horse Comics
71) Millarworld
72) Alan Grant
73) Flash and his Rogues
74) My Secret Identity
75) The Flash television show starring Dawson's dad
76) Seth Cohen
77) Post-Crisis DC continuity
78) Overtly patriotic (racist) covers from the Second World War including those where Batman, Robin and Superman urge you to buy war bonds
79) The Summer Blockbusters
80) Stand alone character development issues
81) Amanda Waller kicking the shit out of the Blue Beetle and, later, intimidating Batman
82) Cosmic Spider-man
83) The Hellfire Club
84) Dark Phoenix Saga
85) Legends
86) Black Orchid
87) Red Son
88) World's Finest
89) Pretty much all of DC's 3-part prestige format books
90) Excalibur
91) Lex Luthor
92) Longboxes
93) Deathstroke the Terminator (so bad he needed 2 villain names)
94) I am Legion from Humanoids
95) Kid Flash
96) Green Arrow and his attitude
97) JLA dog-piling Deathstroke in Identity Crisis
98) Brian K. Vaughn
99) Gaiman's Midnight Days
100) They taught me to read.....and fight crime.

Hello out there!

ahem.....is this thing on?

My name is Des. Mr. Reddick if you're a high school student currently in the Glasgow area.

This blog has been created out of jealousy...go see Davinder's blog (link will be posted soon). If he can have one then I can too dammit!

Anyway, this is here to discuss comics, movies, books and things that fascinate me or piss me off. More importantly, things that both fascinate and piss me off.

More to come....