January 23, 2024

The Many MANY Intros Of Spider-Man> Go, Webs, Go!

You aren’t seen this in the preschool show.

This is the last entry in this series…at least for now. It’s hard to be done talking about a very long franchise that has had numerous versions and not expect another coming down the line. I am all caught up, though, as we talk about the current Spider-Man cartoon.

Spidey & His Amazing Friends is not a perfect adaptation by a mile. Not to be confused with the similarly named 80s cartoon, everyone is de-aged into kids because that’s how Disney Junior “adventure” shows work right now. I don’t think they’ve had a hero old enough to drive since Elena Of Avalor, and she might still have been 15 for all I know. They don’t have cars in Avalor so it’s all guess work. The exceptions are Aunt May, who is the same age as her MCU counterpart, and Iron Man, who was Peter’s mentor in the MCU until he sacrifices himself to save the world. They also went with the girl version of Doc Ock, a girl version of Electro who is just looking to be flashy and electricity filled, and other changes that make sense when your heroes and villains are no longer adults. Somehow having Green Goblin tossing people off of bridges doesn’t work on the preschool show.

On the other hand, it’s their only show with a white male main hero outside of PJ Masks right now, keeps Spidey and Ghost Spider similar to their counterparts, and gave Miles Morales the closest thing he has to his own identity instead of Black Spider-Man or just…Miles Morales. They call him Spin because when they were setting up the playset headquarters computer it couldn’t grasp two users named Spider-Man and he was working on a new spin move at the time. It’s why I’ve been suggesting Shadow Spinner as a name, along with his costume and cloaking powers.

Enough about the show, though. We’re here to look at one last intro, and unlike the last two Spider-Man cartoons under Disney Marvel, this actually has one. Preschool kids are really lucky these days.

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Posted by on January 23, 2024 in Animation Spotlight, Marvel Spotlight, Television Spotlight and tagged , , , , , , , , .

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January 23, 2024

“Yesterday’s” Comic> Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1 (Dreamwave)

“Hide, before that Bay guy comes back wanting a third movie.”

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #1

Dreamwave Productions (June, 2003)

“Things Change”

WRITER: Peter David

PENCILER: Lesean

INKER: Erik Sander

COLORIST: Rob Ruffolo

FLATS: Kenny Li & Sigmund Torre

LETTERER: Matt Moylan

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Posted by on January 23, 2024 in Animation Spotlight, Television Spotlight, Yesterday's Comics and tagged , .

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January 23, 2024

BW’s Daily Article Link> The Justice Ducks Finally Get A Comic

One thing I’ve been wanting to really see when it comes to the Duckverse superheroes was for Gizmoduck to finally get his own comic. Barring that I wanted to see more of the Justice Ducks, the team of heroes from the Darkwing Duck episode “Just Us Justice Ducks”. They created two of them for the episode if memory serves, but it would still be cool if done right. Hopefully, Dynamite will do it right because they’re putting out a Justice Ducks comic, based on the original incarnation and with Roger Langridge on writing duties. If he adapts Darkwing Duck, Gizmoduck, and friends as well as he did the Muppets, I have high hopes for this one, and that’s nice to say with a modern adaptation. Please live up to that.

Posted by on January 23, 2024 in Animation Spotlight, Comic Spotlight, Television Spotlight and tagged , , , , , , , .

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January 22, 2024

Chapter by Chapter> Star Trek: The Vulcan Academy Murders chapters 3 & 4

Chapter By Chapter (usually) features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as a read-along book club.

Yes, two chapters this week because they’re both short, about 8 pages between the two of them. So in the interest of time we’re going to read them both. Will it be worth making two chapters? We’ll find out.

Last time we learned about most of our remaining guest cast (I think there’s still a young couple to be introduced as I remember one being prominent in the sequel) and everybody’s connection to the experimental nerve regeneration process. This book comes out before the transporter was practically turned into a medical device. We did have some accidents that split people in two or sent them to an alternate universe, but it wasn’t until The Next Generation that we would see it restore people afflicted by a rapid aging disease or restore adults from the child form they were put into by the transporter. I’m not even sure why you’d need doctors in their future. Just use the last pattern in the buffer and heal their body. However, the future could also be shown to regrow limbs, though apparently not fix eyes that no longer or never worked.

This is one of the problems with trying to create advanced medicine when you want to invoke a plot involving some medical condition. Why did Worf need experimental spine surgery? You could almost suspect the transporter could put it back, and nanites could fix everything back in place. They have to come up with some reason it can’t be done just to make a medical drama plotline. I think Geordi has normal (or normal looking) eyes by the time of Picard. Luckily they can’t cure the common cold in Kirk’s time, so it’s time to see the early days of a process they may not even need later on.

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Posted by on January 22, 2024 in Star Trek: Vulcan Academy Murders, Television Spotlight and tagged , , , , , , , , , .

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January 22, 2024

“Yesterday’s” Comic> Ultraverse Premiere #0

Didn’t I see this guy on Ultimate Muscle?

Ultraverse Premiere #0

Malibu Comics/Ultraverse (November, 1993)

COVER ART: Jim Lee

VOLUME EDITOR: Hank Kanalz

According to the recommended reading order I’m using, only the first story should be read now in continuity, with four others grouped later and the last one not even on the list that I can see. Since that’s a dumb way to review a comic, I’m going to do the whole thing now in a quickie review similar to what I’m doing with The Blue Beetle Golden Age comic. If we can handle the mess up in my reading order for Sonic and Knuckles comics, I think we can deal with this.

So we have six stories total: Prime, The Strangers, The “Making Of Rune”, Hardcase, Mantra, and Freex. Prime is one I’m interested and have enjoyed the previously reviewed Strangers and Hardcase stories. Manta and Run are ones I don’t care about but they’re here so I might as well let them audition for a spot in my comic reading, and Freex apparently isn’t what I thought it was (I was thinking it was one of the mystical comics like Rune and Mantra) so this is their first chance to get me to read the series. With that, let’s speed run…through the review, because I want to try to enjoy the story.

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Posted by on January 22, 2024 in Yesterday's Comics and tagged , , , , , , , , .

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January 22, 2024

BW’s Daily Video> MatPat’s Guide To Introducing New Gamers To Video Games

Catch more from the Game Theorists on YouTube as they count down to the new host.

 

Posted by on January 22, 2024 in Video Game Spotlight and tagged , , .

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January 21, 2024

Jake & Leon #586: Deleted Sensitivity

They didn’t get to the “strap on/in” joke yet.

Here’s the deleted scene from The Marvels, so we’re all on the same page.

Remember, Kamala Khan is SIXTEEN YEARS OLD! First off, the “strap on” joke (by the writer’s, not by Valkyrie) is already inappropriate for the teenage girl, a MINOR (you’d think with the claims that modern Disney are grooming teens they’d be really careful about stuff like that proving their critics’ point) who is supposed to come from a devout Muslim family, at least in the comics Marvel Studios no longer cares about, which is why I’m not going to watch the show or movie even if I had the opportunity to. On that note, I’m talking about this recently released deleted scene, not the movie itself. And yes, I’m calling non-Norse looking Valkyrie in a business suit cultural appropriation because it is. It’s not just for white people anymore, apparently…and there are still followers of Norse religion out there who probably hate Marvel to being with.

Culture war nonsense aside, in more strict (read “fanatical”) Muslim countries and communities, child brides totally exist, some brides being at least 13, possibly younger. I do not feel comfortable looking up when that stops but I know it’s way too young. Those same countries and communities will behead you for being a homosexual. If you’re surprised, look up the meaning of “fanatical”. So we have a culturally appropriated Norse mythological character accusing a white woman of having a lesbian Muslim child bride, then making a reference to sex toys. This scene should never have been written, never have been performed, never have been filmed, or at least deleted completely. Whatever else the rest of the movie does or doesn’t do as a movie or as an adaptation, this is in poor taste.

Moving on, this week’s Clutter Report has me building the Gunblaster Zoid after over a decade of only being a body. I’ll do a proper review once I’ve had time to mess with it.

I have two article series ending this week, as I complete (for now) the Many, MANY Intros Of Spider-Man and the Transformers: Beast Machines writing guides that were released to the public. Still going is the Chapter By Chapter review of Star Trek: The Vulcan Academy Murders with chapter 3. The rest of the week…who knows? Have a great week, everyone!

Posted by on January 21, 2024 in Jake & Leon, Marvel Spotlight, Movie Spotlight and tagged , , , , , , , , , .

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