“Don’t hit delete or you’ll turn into Freakazoid!”
Superman Adventures #7
DC Comics (May, 1997)
“All Creatures Great And Small” part 1 WRITER: Scott McCloud PENCILER: Rick Burchett INKER: Terry Austin COLORIST: Marie Severin LETTERER: Lois Buhalis EDITOR: Mike McAvennie
Fantasia soundtrack album, picturing Mickey Mouse as the sorcerer’s apprentice. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Harry Potter has come with a curse of his own. J.K. Rowling created a six (?) novel story of a boy who learns he is not only a wizard but has a great destiny before him. It garnered so much fan love that movies followed, and from there Rowling lost control of her creation. Now there are amusement parks, an “expanded universe”, video games…all of which she isn’t a part of anymore. Cracked writer Amanda Mannen thinks this sounds familiar…Walt Disney!
And you thought “Kirk versus Picard” arguments got ugly.
Superboy #8 (Zero Hour tie-in)
DC Comics (September, 1994)
“Big Trouble In Smallville!” WRITER: Karl Kesel PENCILER: Tom Grummett INKERS: Doug Hazlewood & Dan Davis COLORIST: Tom McCraw LETTERING: Richard Starkings & Comicraft EDITOR: Frank Pittarese
With a name like “Dirk Slade”, I’m thinking dentist.
I’ve been catching up with videos I missed during my time off and there was a re-posted episode of The Spoony Experiment where the hero in the movie being reviewed was named Jackson Blade or something like that. Spoony states that some names determine that the character HAS to be badass, and he has a point. In 80s action movies and comics the names the characters have just seem to match where they are in life and what side of the good/evil scale they’re on. Heck, “Dirk Slade” is a name I came up with for a bounty hunter who goes after superhumans back in the 90s. I just wondered how true that would actually be.
Well, one more week until what’s left of my colon is reconnected. I’m a little nervous but hopeful. So before I got taken out of the game again I decided to do some minor clean-up projects in this week’s Clutter Report.
I’m going to try to have some articles scheduled for the week of my surgery, which means extra work, but as I have to talk to medical people in preparation my time is limited, so hopefully I’ll have a week where stuff still gets posted just in case recovery is shorter this time. However, I do need to focus on this week so I know I have something. Ninjak volume 2 is coming to an end although I did snag a few post-comic cameos from other Acclaim Comics/Valiant Heroes titles so we’ll see them when I get back to work. The last of the Free Comic Book Day comics I was able to get, Rom, will be coming up so I can start Saturday’s fresh when I return. I will also be finishing the last of the Star Comics run on Thundercats that I have left to review…at least until I get more to complete my collection, so we’ll be starting the Wildstorm run when I get back. (By the way, I just heard Mattel is releasing classic Thundercats toys, so I’m guessing that’s why we’re getting a crossover. with Masters Of The Universe.)
Speaking of He-Man and friends, I may end up leaving you on a cliffhanger from that series during my time off, but I’m hoping to make it quick compared to a whole season off. It will be the same with Darkhawk, since next in the Marvel section of my longbox is a War Machine comic, while the final issue of Transformers Universe Featuring The Wreckers comes this week, 3H no longer running the official convention after that. (Who IS running Botcon now? From what I hear Fun Publications just lost the licence this year as well.) There may be one or two more but the sooner I’m back the sooner they’ll be resolved. I want to be at 100% or close to it, so please understand if I take time away again.
And that’s all. One more week of BW and possibly a review for The Clutter Reports before I learn my fate. Prepare for…more of the usual, really.
Hasbro is doing something right with their Transformers toys right now. You have a line for the youngest kids (Rescue Bots), one of the older kids (Robots In Disguise) and one of the long-time fans (the “Prime Wars Trilogy”). If only DC and Marvel would think this way. Hasbro is getting kids into Transformers just like my generation did, though toys marketed to them as a “gateway drug” into what those of us who remember the first Optimus Prime on store shelves for the first time, not a new body or reissue.
Unfortunately that’s where it ends, as the media for these lines hasn’t been too good. Actually Discovery Family still treats Rescue Bots well from what I can tell and hopefully I can get to see this show again. However, Robots In Disguise is being horribly ignored by Cartoon Network despite the effort to get it back. The show should have stayed on Discover Family, where Transformers Prime, the first part of this continuity, got its start back when it was The Hub, and Discovery Networks had teamed with Hasbro. And not only does it not have it’s own comic (except for Free Comic Book Day), the actual Robots In Disguise comic is more for adults, which shows a mistake on somebody’s part, but I don’t know if I should blame Hasbro, IDW, or both, because you can see in the adult-marketed toys that they take their influence from IDW’s designs of the G1 characters. So the older kids are getting short-changed because comics is abandoning the kids while Cartoon Network is more interested in their homegrown short episode series.
Adults are getting one larger break thanks to the internet and Machinima, the website that used to be about indie productions using the titular machinima (using elements of game characters to create new animation, either with the game itself or an external program) to create fan productions or just silly shorts. Instead they’ve been doing regular CG work as well, such as tonight’s Showcase, Transformers: Combiner Wars. I don’t know how much influence the IDW comics has on this series, although I can tell that it’s very much there. The first chapter of the “Prime Wars Trilogy”, Combiner Wars the toy hearkens back the Combiners figures of previous lines, while the current “Titans Return” focuses on the “city-sized” (for the “minicars” maybe) Transformers as well as playing up the Headmasters of yore.
Tonight you will be seeing the first two episodes, which sets up what the series is about. The rest of it is technically on YouTube officially, but I’ll get to that afterwards. This intro is long enough as it is.
“I really have to be locked in here with these three twats?”
Doctor Who Free Comic Book Day
Titan (June, 2014)
LETTERER: Jimmy Betancourt 12th Doctor: “Robo Rampage” WRITER: Robbie Morrison ARTIST: Simon Fraser COLORIST: Gary Caldwell 11th Doctor: “Obsessions” WRITERS: Si Spurrier & Rob Williams ARTIST: Leonardo Romero COLORIST: Marco Menyz 10th Doctor: “Lady Of The Blue Box” WRITER: Nick Abadzis ARTIST: Eleonora Carlini COLORIST: Arianna Florean 9th Doctor: “Hacked” WRITER: Cavan Scott ARTIST: Mariano Laclaustra COLORIST: Carlos CabreraAs you can guess this is a short anthology featuring all the Doctors Titan Comics currently publishes for, which means no classic Doctors, just the ones from the new show. While I don’t mind spoiling a Free Comic Book Day comic these are short adventures so it would be hard not to.
So far Ninjak hasn’t won me a single vote, but with theme fights you work with what you have. And it so happens I have a ninja at my disposal. And this time the fight is a little different. Town is getting involved. Sort of. And it’s in the style of those old kung-fu movies with the laughable dubbed dialog and over-the-top fighting moves. Ric Meyers would be proud.
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
