Great job on this one. Usually I find these parody videos cute for a second and the quality blows and nobody’s mouth matches the dialogue, etc. But this one is damn sharp and beautifully edited. And pretty damn funny.
Best Superhero Movie Never Made
I would so pay good money to see this flick if it ever came out. Stick with this preview trailer till near the end, it’s worth it. And fairly short overall.
30 Essential DC Graphic Novels
DC Comics has listed 30 Essential Graphic Novels on their website. But based on the list and the explanation that these are the “best-selling titles that you must read,” this sounds more like a popularity contest mixed in with some quality measurements. I certainly agree with about 60% of this list. Watchmen. Dark Knight. Y the Last Man. Fables. V for Vendetta. League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Sure, those are all super solid picks, as well as some of the straight superhero fare like Identity Crisis and JLA.
But how on Earth (or any one of countless Earths…) can they seriously justify saying any of the following books are part of the 30 MUST-READ books for comic fans old and new alike:
Superman/Batman: Public Enemies – I know this was a huge seller, but the storyline was so godawful it was beyond laughable.
- Batman: Arkham Asylum – Oh, it’s by Grant Morrison, so it has to be on the list. Bull. It’s a gorgeous book to be sure. Beautiful Dave McKean painted art. But come on, the convulted storyline was average at best.
- Batman: The Dark Knight Strikes Again – Uh, the original series is one of the greatest comic stories of all time. This sequel was one of the worst sequels of all-time. Miller’s art deteriorated into a caricature of itself. And that story? What the hell was it all about? I can quote you pages of dialogue from the original series and point out 97 different amazingly awesome moments. This sequel? I can’t even remember one single thing that happened.
Hellblazer: Original Sins – I loved this Hellblazer series. But I didn’t realize how boring and mundane Jamie Delano’s run was until Garth Ennis came onboard. Granted, this isn’t a horrible pick for the list, since it really introduces Constantine as a character and sets up the series, but going with Ennis’ “Dangerous Habits” graphic novel would be a far better choice. It’s also easily accessible and a really well done tale.
There are a couple other books on here I haven’t had a chance to read, but I may pick up just based on their recommendation (and then I’ll curse the list out even more). I’m thinking about Superman: Birthright and Green Lantern: Rebirth in particular.
The Liefeld Lowdown
Let me start by saying, I seriously enjoyed Rob Liefeld’s art on his original “Hawk & Dove” mini-series for DC. It was fresh, crisp and energetic. Real good storyline too courtesy of Karl Kesel. But then something happened. Liefeld got onto New Mutants and his art starting changing. Muscles grew exponentionally. Pouches started appearing at a Tribbles-type rate. And everyone started carrying around guns the size of houses.
I could go on and on about Liefeld’s art (Don’t get me started on his “no more A on Captain America” era…), but instead, I’ll just point you over to The 40 Worst Rob Liefeld Drawings courtesy of Progressive Boink. They did a bang-up job not just showing off some great, er, bad examples from Liefeld’s career, but the detailed commentary really gets the point across. Here’s a few of my favorite drawings to mock:
Beatty’s Boy Toys
Scott Beatty‘s got a brand-spakin’ new book out and this spiffy looking hardcover hits two of the things closest to his heart: DC Comics characters and action figures. I know first-hand what an insane DC trivia geek Scott is, and he certainly knows his toys as well. In fact, he generally won’t shut up about them once you get him going.
The DC Comics Action Figure Archive retails for $40 (yeowch), but you can snag at at Amazon right now for just $24. Support a true fanboy and get yourself a nice big book full of cool trivia and lotsa pics, all wrapped up and disguised as a coffee table book. Me? I’m still waiting very very patiently for my Ambush Bug action figure to come out, complete with sidekick Cheeks the Wonder Toy…
Super Hanger
Not exactly sure where or how to get one of these, but this would certainly encourage me to actually buy a suit, or some nice shirts at the very least. According to the Design Spotter site, this Hanger Super is:
Super is a coat hanger which shape is connection between classic hanger and sign of superman. This hanger will be hidden under your favourit jacket or shirt. It is made in typical red, blue and yellow colour or in black and white.
Designer: Roman Ficek
Made in Slovakia
It’s made by Comunistar, yet I can’t find it on their official site anywhere for some reason…
Posted in Merchandise
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Stan Lee Art Tribute
LA Weekly has a really cool slideshow covering the Stan Lee: Under the Influence art opening featuring some 41 photos from the event. The art tribute was held at L.A.’s Golden Apple Comics.
Here’s a few of my favorites from the show:
Dan Goodsell’s Mr. Toast
Green Tee, Desiree Fessler
Artist Mark Bodnar with his painting, The Hopeful Bite.
Thanks to Rob for the heads up!
Lando vs. Shaft
Matt Haley‘s a pretty talented artist. Heck, I’d read the phone book every month if it were sequential art and Matt drew it starring any one of his female characters. (Particularly Ghost.) But he’s also always up for some fun, and just for kicks, he mocked up this fake Lando movie poster based off of the original 1971 “Shaft” movie posters. I would so go see this one in a heartbeat.
Matt Haley’s “Lando” movie poster:
And the original Shaft poster just for comparison’s sake:
Comics Directory
I’m doing a little clean-up on the site. I still need to tweak the background a bit on the sidebars (gonna remove that shaded grey, at least on top). But I added a full links section to the right sidebar. That’s an ever-evolving Comics Directory of official links, broken down by categories. You can still click the word balloon topics in the header and get the same results, but I thought it’d be nice to also have all those links in one place.
I also just created a new links category to start collecting links of Creator Blogs. So if you’re a creator and you blog semi-regularly, please let me know and I’ll add you a.s.a.p.
Posted in CBM News
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Not so super heroes
This week Bob over at Bobbarama published a refreshing and pretty damn funny write-up on his post Where have all the superheroes gone?
I’m always fascinated to read anything about comics or superheroes when it’s written in a more mainstream or completely non-comic arena. Granted, the articles generally start with the same ol’ “Pow! Bam! Zap! Holy comics are growing up, Batman” type of intro and go on to say that comic books are more adult these days. Uh, yeah. They’ve kinda been like that since the mid-’80s. 1986 in fact when Dark Knight and Watchmen came out and kicked the entire industry in the nuts. But in a good way. (If there is such a thing.)
Anyway, Bob writes a highly entertaining blog that’s pretty much all over the place and he does bring up superheroes once in a while. The post starts off based on a conversation Bob had with a co-worker about Batman not being a real hero… and evolves into Bob giving his opinion on what other costumed characters should fall into the non-hero role. Wonder Woman, Elongated Man, Green Lantern to name a few.
Heck, the guy even mentions Ant Man and shows the cover to the Batman: Son of the Demon graphic novel, so you know he’s a legit fanboy. Anyways, just wanted to send Bob some link love and give him an additional 2 or 3 eyeballs on his site (assuming the 3 readers I have actually listen to me)…
Posted in Funny
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