We heard nothing about Batman: Caped Crusader or My Adventures With Superman for the next two years. Then yesterday a new tweet about the Superman cartoon came out, but not on DC Kids.
AC/DC is good. AS/DC is better. My Adventures With Superman starring Jack Quaid is coming this summer. pic.twitter.com/9MzRn66LKn
The real news isn’t that it’s finally coming out, despite some of the odd decisions being made lately concerning Warner Brothers Discovery’s animation library and projects, which is an article on its own, but where the show is going. Not to Cartoon Network or HBO Max as originally promoted…but Adult Swim, the Williams Street-run programming block (along with Toonami) on Cartoon Network. This is a very odd choice, taking a kids show and putting it on the adult show period. First let’s look at the actual teaser, then talk about the relocation itself and why it’s so confusing.
I first saw comics regularly at a local drug store when I was a kid. I bought comics from convenience stores, a smoke shop (and I don’t even smoke), grocery stores…all when they had newsracks and before comics eventually started going to a local comic store when those options started to dry up. I even picked up three packs of unsold comics at Sears, which is where I got the first three comics I owned, given to me as a gift by someone who knew I liked superhero shows, and was my introduction to this media. The fact that I can’t find them anymore except for one type of store but can still find books and DVDs/Blu-Rays in other stores means comics have lost an important outlet to stay in public consciousness. That’s what’s disappointing here.
Yes, I know the movie isn’t out yet. For all we know the movie will be Margot Robbie’s best work, will be hilarious, poignant social commentary I actually agree with, cure cancer, and make us forgive Robbie for the terrible Harley Quinn movie that screwed over Cassandra Cain and the rest of the Gotham ladies that were forced into that garbage.
Okay, we know that last part isn’t happening, but I want it to be clear I am NOT judging this movie on quality of the work. It hasn’t come out and I probably won’t go see it when it does. I am not telling you the movie is terrible and I’m tired of critics being accused of that when judging trailers. Trailers exist for a reason! They are supposed to get people hyped for the movie coming out and give you an idea of the tone and style of the film. It’s not supposed to ruin good jokes and shock moments but tell that to the marketing department. So no, I’m not telling you this is a bad movie.
I’m telling you that the trailer already shows signs of Hollywood’s continuing trend of bad adaptations. I’ve seen good adaptations that are bad stories and bad adaptations that are good stories. My favorite movie is in the latter category. Please understand the spirit of this article. I’m looking at what Warner Brothers thinks will get people to be excited for this movie. I’m not even a Barbie fan but the fact that I know more about Barbie than this trailer indicates the movie does should make them feel bad. It doesn’t and won’t but them’s the fact, kids! Now, if that is out of the way we’ll see who actually read this part when I get accused of “hating” something that’s not even released to the public when I’m talking about what they’re telling us we’re in for. With that….
How can you not know at least something about Barbie and her friends. Those toy commercials aired on my shows just as much as it did the girls shows because somebody realized girls might be watching, either to make their brothers happy so she can watch her show or because she’s not limited to “girly” TV. I know Barbie has multiple friends of multiple hair colors and races, that Ken isn’t the only dude in Barbie’s world, that she has two younger sisters (middle child Skipper is the only one I know by name), and that she’s either a model or can’t hold down a job.
Barbie’s purpose is to show girls they can be anything they want. There was even a tagline for awhile: “We girls can do anything, right, Barbie?” and the recent one is “You can be anything”. Of course the surface viewers just see her thin body and perfect bust and immediately go crazy, that it enforces bad body images or something. There is even a negative connotation around the name “Barbie”, applied to girls considered airheads, the same applying to boys and “Ken”.
So I’m watching The Masked Singer last night and finally see a trailer for the live-action take on Barbie and Ken (not to be confused with Ken Jeong) and my immediate thought was…”wow, this is actually stupider than I thought it would be”.
I want to make a joke but I’m too stunned by a title relaunch actually using a volume number instead of what year the new series starts. It’s like they didn’t want to confuse us or something.
Ninja High School volume 2 #1
Antarctic Press (July, 1999)
Note that the Comixology version I’m using is only 17 pages so if something’s missing I’m not aware of it.
Admittedly this article’s title is in error. As I’ve written before, “superhero fatigue” is a myth created by the anti-superhero members of Hollywood society in both the director’s chair and their willing accomplices in media. Nobody talks about action movie fatigue, war movie fatigue, romantic comedy fatigue, or horror fatigue. Only the superhero genre gets fatigue and we’re told should go away, which they failed to do with science fiction, and fantasy somehow keeps trying and may have gained a bit of ground thanks to the book adaptations like Harry Potter and Lord Of The Rings, provided they actually followed the franchise. Unlike a certain Amazon series we won’t mention.
I saw an article from website The Direct about how James Gunn was supposedly coming up with a plan to fight superhero fatigue, but it’s from a Rolling Stone article about Guardians Of The Galaxy volume 3, which is not a superhero movie despite being in the Marvel Universe, not about his upcoming run at DC Studios ruining running the new DC movieverse. In that article was linked another article, this time from the guy Warner Brothers is hoping Gunn can match, Marvel Studios’ Kevin Feige. I’m going to use their articles because Rolling Stone only allows so many free reads before you sign up and the Feige bit comes from a podcast. So what are these so-called plans?
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I first saw comics regularly at a local drug store when I was a kid. I bought comics from convenience stores, a smoke shop (and I don’t even smoke), grocery stores…all when they had newsracks and before comics eventually started going to a local comic store when those options started to dry up. I even picked up three packs of unsold comics at Sears, which is where I got the first three comics I owned, given to me as a gift by someone who knew I liked superhero shows, and was my introduction to this media. The fact that I can’t find them anymore except for one type of store but can still find books and DVDs/Blu-Rays in other stores means comics have lost an important outlet to stay in public consciousness. That’s what’s disappointing here.
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Posted by ShadowWing Tronix on April 7, 2023 in Comic Spotlight, DC Spotlight and tagged Comics By Perch, commentary, DC Comics, Walmart.
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