One of the comics I miss getting to read is Scooby-Doo Team-Up, where Scooby and the gang join forces with DC heroes and other Hanna-Barbera stars. One of the best team-ups are with Batman. During The New Scooby-Doo Movies Batman and Robin appeared twice, going after the Joker and Penguin. Now there’s a new team-up coming, but instead of Batman showing up on Scooby-Doo (despite what the title is), Scooby’s showing up on Batman. Batman: The Brave & The Bold to be exact.
The Smurf armor.
Voltron: A Legend Forged #3
Devil’s Due (August, 2008)
WRITER: Josh Blaylock
PENCILER: Julia Bax
COLOR ARTIST: Wes Dzioba
SELECTED COVER ART: Tim Seelyey & Jose Aviles
LETTERER: Crank!
DESIGN: Sean K. Dove
EDITOR: Mike O’Sullivan
While I think too many stories give too many flaws or think flaws themselves make for a good character, there has to be at least something to challenge the hero. No matter how powerful Superman is, he still has to deal with Kryptonite, magic, and the weaknesses of his own personality at times. I also hear that about Optimus Prime, but I can refute that rather easily just in the original cartoon. Nobody is perfect, but while there is nothing wrong with making a character really good at dealing with a given situation you can also make your heroes too flawless as to be unrelatable. (And no, I don’t see Superman as unrelatable. Optimus maybe but I can still connect with him. He’s just not Bumblebee.) James Harrington makes the case as to why at least one flaw the hero has to overcome, even if he or she still has it at the end, is important.
Inspired by the classic sci-fi serials and Akira Kurosawa movies, George Lucas created Star Wars. Nobody thought it would be as big as it became, but now it’s part of pop and geek culture if not culture in general. It’s responsible for launching the blockbuster and creating a merchandising sensation. And it nearly destroyed the man who created it. You really should check out SF Debris’s various videos on the backstage history of the movies. As of this writing we have the original movie, the sequels, and he’s just starting the prequels (or at least the first one).
Ahh, the prequels, which somehow gets LESS praise than the Star Wars Holiday Special. It led fans to demand the franchise be “rescued” from the very man who created it. I protested that line of thinking then and I stand by that, especially now that I know what Lucas went through and sacrificed for these movies. Although I am curious to see when SF Debris gets to how Lucas felt about that. Personally, having my biggest creation pulled from my hands would make me miserable. But we have what we have, the new sequels directed by J.J. Abrams, expanded tales like Rogue One, and another set of sequels already being created before this one is finished. I worry it’s a bit too much, that Disney is pushing quantity over quality.
My friends and I didn’t get to see The Force Awakens, the first of Abrams’ trilogy, in theaters. One friend was dealing with his mother’s passing, the other was sick, and I ended up in the first of four hospital stays. It wasn’t a priority for any of us, but with The Last Jedi hitting theaters we decided to check it out, so one of my friends borrowed the movie from his local library and we got to finally see it on DVD. Was it worth the wait?
RELEASE DATE: 2015
RELEASED BY: Disney-owned Lucasfilm
RUNTIME: 136 minutes
STARRING: Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Adam Driver, and BB-8, plus guest appearances from Harrison Ford, Peter Mayhew, Carrie Fisher, Anthony Daniels, and Mark Hamill
SCREENWRITERS: Lawrence Kasdan, J.J. Abrams, & Michael Arndt
DIRECTOR: J.J. Abrams
GROSS REVENUE: $936,627,416 from an estimated budget of $245,000,000
IMDB SCORE: 8.1 out of 10
ROTTEN TOMATOES SCORE: 93% (Audience Score: 89%)
“Come back with m..Mr. Stark’s ice cream!”
Iron Man vol 3 #1
Marvel Comics (February, 1998)
“Looking Forward”
WRITER: Kurt Busiek
PENCILER: Sean Chen
INKER: Eric Cannon
COLORING: Liquid!
LETTERING: Comicraft
EDITOR: Bobbie Chase
It’s that time again, as the North American Aerospace Defense Command (shouldn’t that be NAADC then?) continues the annual mission of ensuring Santa Claus is safe during his holiday run. After years of getting calls from kids wanting to make sure Santa is okay, NORAD took time out to do something fun for the kids while not taking time away from the important job of keeping the US and Canadian airspace safe from attack. NORAD Tracks Santa is a website full of Christmas music and games, and on Christmas Eve both the website and the app (which will hopefully work better this year than last year) to follow Santa’s trek across the globe. It’s a little Yuletide fun for your kids.
So far the padding has been a mixed bag. On the one hand there’s been some good character development, but it’s been at the cost of the sense of urgency the movie had. Benes is dying and he’s the most important person in the world right now but it feels like everyone is dragging their feet. Yes, they need to plan their actions but the planning was pretty much done before Grant got there and there’s more evidence that they’ve practiced with at least the fundamentals of what they’re planning and they’re still going to be in over their heads.
And then there’s Peterson. No, I’m not going to call her by her first name. She wants to be treated as well as the males yet she’s the only character who is referred to by their first name. The rest are Grant, Michaels, Owens, Duval, etc. I’m also worried we’re getting the “warm a cold heart and start a romance” thing the movie avoided. I mean, she was played by Rachel Welch, one of Hollywood’s biggest sex symbols at the time, but at no point is she anything other than a competent assistant and the tension with Grant was not there. I’m really hoping I’m wrong about the path we’re taking.
The previous chapter was all about preparing the ship for miniaturization and what I’m hoping is final character development even though the movie waited for a necessary quiet time to do so. My big worry is that the miniaturizing process in the movie took time and it made sense to do so since there was a multi-step process to shrink the Proteus and get everyone safely into the saline solution for injection. I’m hoping this chapter doesn’t feel like it’s dragging and that it ends with the injection. Let’s find out.
The Clutter Reports (my other site) Atop The Fourth Wall Crisis On Earth Prime Lean Into Artcast Bully Says “Comics Oughta Be Fun” Siskoid’s Blog of Geekery
Cartoon Hero’s Lair SF Debris Four Million Years Later
