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Yes, it’s that time of the year again. Pine trees are decorated with lights and little art pieces of Christmas symbols. Gingerbread Houses are built but never eaten because the only thing harder are fruit cakes, or so the lore goes. Children wait for Santa Claus with the hopes they were good enough to get presents. Christians honor the birth of their Savior, the reason we actually have a Christmas, which is why the Christmas haters hate Christmas. And moviephiles take to social media, podcast panels, and the occasional physical gathering to debate the big question: is Die Hard a Christmas movie?
Loosely based on the 1979 novel Nothing Lasts Forever, the sequel to Roderick Thorp’s The Detective, Die Hard follows NYPD police detective John McClane, in Los Angeles to spend Christmas with his estranged wife and hopefully see their young daughter. Meeting up with his wife at an office Christmas party, trouble arises when crooks posing as terrorists try to rob the building’s vaults. During a party. With a lot of people. This seems like a very dumb idea, but I’m not a psychotic crook posing as a terrorist. It’s up to John the police everyman to get past and take down the bad guys and rescue the hostages despite the police being of little help and having to gather his resources along the way, like weapons and combat skills. Originally panned by critics, today’s critics praise it for pretty much the same reason: the action and characters. While the novels and the story of Joe Leland end here, McClane would continue through a series of increasingly panned sequels.
It also the source of a huge debate as film geeks argue every December whether or not the July released movie (long before the whole “Christmas In July” sales campaign) qualifies as a Christmas movie. It’s a huge, fiercely argued debate. Well, here’s my opinion: I DON’T CARE ANYMORE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I don’t mean “I don’t care” in the same way I don’t care about the Superman Vs. Batman debate as to who would win (I want to see the heroes fight VILLAINS, not each other) or Unicron Vs The Death Star (Unicron at close range, Death Star at a distance, now shut up). I mean the level of rage and insistence of being right that I see has gotten me to the point that I don’t want to even hear the debate. I don’t even want to watch the movie when it isn’t Christmas, nevermind when it is, to protest both sides. Now for the record, I do have a definite opinion, and maybe it will leak out in this commentary to anyone not fixed on their view as “the absolute truth”. However, I’m not going to state it here officially because doing so will miss the point that I’m sick of both sides of this argument, both from the pro-“Die Hard is a Christmas movie” and the anti side. You’re both draining the fun out of it and now taking other movies with you, and I just don’t want to hear it anymore. I stopped listening to a livestream recently as the host argued with his audience, allegedly in good fun but at this point I’m not convinced anything about this debate is fun. Rather than discuss my reasoning for whether it is or isn’t a Christmas movie, let me instead go over why I want this debate to die…and I will be taking both sides on for this because you’re both the problem!
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Sometimes I wonder what these characters are looking at.
Sonic Universe #4
Archie Comics Publications (July, 2000)
“The Shadow Saga” part 4: “The Ultimate Lifeform”
WRITER: Ian Flynn
PENCILER: Tracy Yardley!
INKER: Jim Amash
COLORIST: Jason Jensen
LETTERER: Teresa Davidson
EDITOR: Mike Pellerito
From the original review: Shadow and Rouge are sent into the Special Zone to get another Chaos Emerald. There they come upon the god-like Faust, who makes them take part in a challenge to get the Emerald. They lose, and Shadow isn’t happy about it. After failing to “save” Metal Sonic and Gamma, he isn’t feeling like the “ultimate lifeform” he was created to be. However, a pep talk by Hope and adding Omega to “Team Dark” sends him back to try again. Faust again gimmicks the game, only this time “Team Dark” tricks Faust into giving up the Emerald and return home. Then we shift 30 years into the future to tease the next story arc, with Knuckles’ daughter.
Additional summary: Okay, they don’t so much “trick” him as Omega shoots him in the face while Shadow grabs it.
What they got right: A nice finish to the “Shadow Saga” arc, as Shadow finally finds himself challenged by something other than a certain blue hedgehog. Shadow’s not the kind of guy to have a crisis of faith (in himself, anyway), but even he has a breaking point. And when he reaches it, how he recovers from it may not only make him a better person but a better teammate. Also, Hope is just a great character, the little scientist girl done right. The whole arc was really good, although the side-trip with Sonic previously now feels out of place in retrospect.
What they got wrong: In the original review nothing came to mind. In this re-reading, I would have liked to have seen Team Dark manage to overcome the challenge. Maybe I’m just bored of “gamesmen” who cheat to win because they’re bad losers. It might be a nice change to see one more interested in the challenge than the victory but still playing to win honestly and fairly. Or maybe creating a challenge hoping to see somebody win for once because watching them lose was getting boring.
What I think overall: I enjoyed these second two stories more than the first two, but they do play a part in Shadow’s character arc. This is the strength of this series, to give the rest of the characters in the franchise a chance to have their own shining moments. I honestly enjoyed the arc, and I’m not even a huge Shadow fan.
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I’m guessing the Jean/Logan kiss was for the shippers of those two characters that hate Cyclops and wants Jean and Logan to be the couple. I’m one of the biggest supporter of the comics being adapted properly, there are some things that shouldn’t be because they were always bad ideas. Meanwhile, this is supposed to be a continuation of the Fox Kids series. They adapted the “important” parts of the characters and even some stories reinterpreted to their continuity and that was fine. Making the cartoon more like the comics is the same mistake the DCAU “Adventures” comics made by dragging in comic elements into the DCAU.
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It’s time again to visit the world of Swordquest, the contest that never finished. You can get the full story from this site, but here’s the highlights: Part of the “Adventure” series, the four games represented the four elements of Earth, Wind, Fire, and Water (the forgotten disco band member), with a prize of $50,000 US tied to real life versions of the items you had to find in the game and a sort of early ARG to find the final sword of the name. The games looked like this.
Isn’t that exciting, kids?
This gameplay is from Waterworld, and I will not make any further Kevin Costner references after this sentence. Not sorry. This is the third and final game in what was supposed to be a four game series, so we are heading straight off the cliffhanger on this one. For those of you who missed out on Earthworld and Fireworld (Airworld would have been the final game), the tie-in comics would introduce characters not really seen in the games. The players are represented by twin thieves Torr and Tarra, who learn they’re destined to bring down the evil ruler Tyrannus, who killed their parents because of the prophecy that their kids would kill him and end his reign in the future. Thus creating the very prophecy he sought to avoid when they came after him for revenge. Nice going, idiot!
Although their real target is the tyrant’s court wizard, Konjuro, aka “we’re not even trying to hide that these are the villains”. Our blonde twins have been bouncing through other worlds, and this is their latest stop, after drinking from a chalice that turned into portal to the next questing dimension. They’re also trying to beat Herminus, who just wants to steal the sword at the end of the game quest so he can have a gold sword. He’s a simple thief and I’m not convinced he’s even needed. That’s where we are headed into our next and unintentional final chapter.
Where’s Aquaman when you need him?
Swordquest #3
DC Comics/Atari (1983)
Waterworld: “Powers Of Prime”
CREATORS/WRITERS: Roy Thomas & Gerry Conway
VISUAL CONCEPTS/ART: George Peréz & Dick Giordano
DESIGN: Neil Pozner
COLORIST: Adrienne Roy
LETTERER: John Costanza
EDITOR: Dick Giordano
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“You know, maybe civilization isn’t so bad after all.”
Thunderbolt v3 #58
Charlton Comics Group (July, 1967)
“Encore: The Hooded One”
CREATOR/WRITER/ARTIST: PAM
Sentinels: “Into The Lair Of The…Mind-Bender”
WRITER: S. O’Shaughnessy, which Comic Book Plus claims is Denny O’Neil
ARTIST: Sam Grainger
LETTERER: Bob Agnew
EDITOR: Dick Giordano
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