“I told you to bring a coat!”
Superman Adventures #49
DC Comics (November, 2000)
“The Challenge”
WRITER: Michael Reaves
PENCILER: Aluir Amangio
INKER: Terry Austin
COLORIST: Marie Severin
SEPARATIONS: Zylonol
LETTERER: Phil Felix
EDITOR: Joey Cavalieri
I’m not sure what’s going on with Dark Horse lately. I understand losing Star Wars to Marvel since Disney wants to keep everything in-house, and yet IDW is publishing the kid-targeted Star Wars Adventures comic. Conan The Barbarian is back at Marvel while Buffy The Vampire Slayer is now being rebooted by Boom! Studios. And now even the rabbit samurai has left them, as Usagi Yojimbo will now be published by IDW. This is the fourth move for Stan Sakai but I’m wondering what’s happening to Dark Horse lately and why so many creator-owned and licensed titles are jumping ship?
Since most of my effort was in trying to get yesterday’s BW Video Review ready for the premiere (which of course nobody showed up for and I still didn’t get the closed captions fixed on time) as well as putting some decent content out I didn’t think up a good Jake & Leon comic out. Also I seemed to be real tired last week. I didn’t even post a Clutter Report worth linking to since I just did some minor cleaning. At any rate I still have things to update you on for this week’s content.
First of all our really short Chapter By Chapter review of Transformers Armada: The Battle Begins starts up on Monday with the chapter-length prologue. I’m also hoping to get a Finally Watched out this week as well as at least start working on a Captain PSA strip. It’s been some time since I had a good idea for that comic, and this should be the first one created all-digital except the layout/thumbnail, so I really want to get this one done while keeping up on Jake & Leon and other projects. I’m also going to start my next video project because practice makes something people might actually tune in for. Maybe I’ll have enough feedback to consider rebooting my Patreon, but the goal should always be the content itself. That’s what draws the crowd ultimately. Or so I’m told. I have had a bunch of new subscribers lately so I must be doing something right.
So that’s what’s coming up this week. Hopefully our regular comic will return next week. Hope you had a good Father’s Day.
It’s been years since I’ve been able to do a BW Video Review. Between illness and other life issues there wasn’t time. As it is this one was supposed to come out before I started the first Robotech adaptation comic. At this point I’m just happy it was done before we got to The Sentinels.
Macross in Clash Of The Bionoids is a re-edit of The Superfortress Macross by Celebrity’s “Just For Kids” line. Superfortress Macross is the international dub from the 1980s of Do You Remember Love, a theatrical retelling of the events of the anime series Superdimensional Fortress Macross, or as us 80s kids know it, the first Robotech war, aka The Macross Saga. I hope you followed all that. Macross has become a franchise in Japan, with numerous series and movies to its credit. It also has fans in the West, who hate Harmony Gold from keeping the “pure” version away from them in order to hold on to the original series to keep Robotech alive. They even re-released all three Robotech wars as separate series, re-inserting the blood and nudity of the originals but using the old Robotech audio, which makes ME unhappy. I guess it was their attempt to please the Macross fans, although why they don’t just release the first Macross in its original form–you know, the logical answer–and still have their Robotech versions is beyond me.
There is also hate for Clash Of The Bionoids because it is in English (anime purists insist not that subtitled is the only version they prefer, which is fine, but should be the ONLY version PERIOD) and because of the heavy editing for the same target audience as Robotech. When anime is altered for the mainstream they get antsy. In this review I do bring up why mainstreamed anime is what led to the current state of anime release while going over the movie in the form I was first introduced to it as. Is this dub really all that bad, and can I determine anything about the original version from this? That’s what this review tries to uncover.
“Wait, did I turn off the barbecue grill before I left?”
Hope #1
Source Point Press (2019)
“The Day The World Went Away”
WRITER/CO-CREATOR: Dirk Manning
ARTIST/LETTERER/CO-CREATOR: K. Lynn Smith
ART DIRECTOR: Joshua Werner
EDITOR: Heather Antos
One of the big discussions right now in storytelling is about how political many stories, especially TV and comics, have been getting. I’m not talking about the behind the scenes stuff like diversity hires or anything. I’m talking about how some writers seem to be more motivated to discuss their sociopolitical beliefs than tell a superhero or sci-fi story. However, there’s a bit more to it than that, because as the defenders of this new wave of preaching over story have used as their defense, stories have had social and political messages for the longest time, even some we don’t realize because the message was a product of their time.
The difference is the good ones stand out on their own, so that years later when the message is meaningless a century later the story itself still entertains or maybe still informs in its own way. The more modern message tales are more a product of their time but goes out of their way to trash anyone who disagrees with them in the slightest or just wants to relax after a hard day at work and just enjoy a good story. The host of The Closer Look takes an unbiased look at the right and wrong way to explore a message without being a heavy-handed propaganda machine, even if you agree with that propaganda. Note that the host brings out the hard language at times.
Bubbles tries to one-up Squirrel Girl.
The Powerpuff Girls #1
DC Comics (May, 2000)
“Squirrelly Burly”
WRITERS: Jenifer Moore & Sean Carolan
ARTIST: Phil Moy
COLORIST: Dave Tanguay
LETTERER: Janice Chaing
ASSISTANT EDITOR: Harvey Richards
EDITOR: Heidi MacDonald
CREATOR: Craig McCracken
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
