December 28, 2018

Star Trek: The Next Story Bible Finale–TL;DR

Since August (with an intro in July) I’ve been taking a detailed look at the story bible for Star Trek: The Next Generation season one. The final draft is available online, but a later season draft is up on the official Roddenberry website if you want to check that out. The story bible reviews I’ve done so far are about comparing the original intentions to what actually appeared on-screen. It’s what I did with Batman: The Animated Bible and it’s what I did here. This is what I find fascinating going into these old story bibles for canceled shows and if I get to review another one that’s also what I’ll be looking to do. And if anyone knows a good one in my wheelhouse let me know and I’ll see if I can make something of it.

This last article is a wrap-up of my thoughts. If you want to go into more detail, feel free to check out the rest of the series. I’m going to summarize how I thought the Writer’s Guide did versus what we saw on-screen in that first season. Shows and characters evolve as a series continues on but how did it start off?

Continue reading →

Posted by on December 28, 2018 in Star Trek: The Next Story Bible and tagged , , , .

Leave a comment

December 27, 2018

Vertigo’s Potential Blasphemy

So how did Vertigo, DC’s edgy sci-fi imprint, decide to celebrate the Christmas season? By taking the religious icon tied to that season and make him look pathetic. Second Coming is an upcoming title, announced in December, that imagines God sending Jesus back to Earth to learn how to be a better messiah with Superman analog called Sun-Man. The fact that Jesus, the Son of God who was sent to Earth as one of us to teach us on a level we could understand and take the weight of sin upon himself to break the barrier between sinner and salvation with his death and resurrection, needs a not-Superman to teach him anything is already bordering on blasphemous right at concept. Of course we can assume they aren’t stopping there as you read the solicit:

Witness the return of Jesus Christ, as He is sent on a most holy mission by God to learn what it takes to be the true messiah of mankind by becoming roommates with the world’s favorite savior: the all-powerful super hero Sun-Man, the Last Son of Krispex! But when Christ returns to Earth, he’s shocked to discover what has become of his gospel—and now, he aims to set the record straight.

It should be noted that the writer of this story is Mark Russell, an atheist who wrote a book trying to tell Christians what their own Holy Book says, and it seems like he’s going to go through that again. To put this in perspective let’s look at the opinion of another non-Christian, Mim Headroom, and see what the problem is with this on a conceptual level. Note that he’s more willing to be vulgar than the BW norm but it does go into a bit of hypocrisy about this title versus other religions. Then read the thoughts of an actual Christian as I set up my thoughts.

Continue reading →

Posted by on December 27, 2018 in DC Spotlight and tagged , , , .

1 Comment

December 26, 2018

Chapter By Chapter: Tom Clancy’s Op-Center chapters 20 & 21

Chapter by Chapter features me reading one chapter of the selected book at the 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 read-along book club.

I may have chosen the wrong book to read this close to Christmas. One day out and we’re back to talking about a bombing. A fictional one thankfully, but it’s still an odd topic on December 26th. Happy Boxing Day I guess.

Frankly, our heroes are not getting the best showing. Op-Center’s director is going to be distracted by his son and one of its investigators has to deal with his wife’s death right in front of him. They are not going to be at their most effective and this is the first time we’ve seen them, but at least the latter is a problem that I can get behind for the sake of the story and the former is still a bad thing he has to deal with. Meanwhile, one of his subordinates thinks he’s sexually repressed, another wants to relive him of that despite him being a happily married man, and his second-in-command just decided to go off to play war hero, leaving a younger and more experienced solider in the tight unit behind just as someone seems to want to restart the Korean War (and not to bring M*A*S*H* back) and the still new Op-Center is 50/50 in results of previous missions, meaning the future of the whole operation is in serious jeopardy. I wouldn’t want to be in Hood’s place for anything.

Why only two chapters this week? Well, look at the page count:

  • Chapter 20: Tuesday, 6:25 AM, Op-Center: eleven pages
  • Chapter 21: Tuesday, 9PM, Seoul: three pages

Meanwhile, chapters 22 and 23 are kind of the reverse; a short chapter followed by a normal-length chapter. That means the best way to review these next four chapters is in two articles. This book is really weird with how it lays out chapters. So let’s see what happens in this section.

Continue reading →

Posted by on December 26, 2018 in Tom Clancy's Op-Center and tagged , , .

Leave a comment

December 23, 2018

BW Programming Note: Limited Run This Week

As you can tell there’s no Jake & Leon this week. My drawing time has been focused on Captain Yuletide and I’m still going to miss the deadline. Also I don’t think anyone will be reading on the 24th and 25th (Christmas Eve and Christmas Day) so no articles those two days. I won’t be doing the daily comic reviews this week, but I will try to get a few Morning Article Links in. the Chapter By Chapter review of Tom Clancy’s Op-Center will happen Wednesday, with the final thoughts on the story bible for Star Trek: The Next Generation on Friday as usual. I’ll probably post a filler video for Thursday. Next week we’ll resume regular content and hopefully by then Captain Yuletide #5 will be done.

For the rest I point you to the v-log I posted earlier this morning about what else I have planned. Have a merry Christmas or enjoy December 25th or whatever is it you do that day.

Posted by on December 23, 2018 in BW Progress Report.

Leave a comment

December 23, 2018

BW V-Log: Christmas 2018 Programming Update

What I forgot to mention is that one YouTube goal is to finish adding closed captions to previous BW videos. As of this description Challenge of The GoBots and The Little Drummer Boy have been captioned as test runs of the various methods I have available, but i want the whole library captioned by…let’s say April.

Posted by on December 23, 2018 in V-Logs and tagged .

4 Comments

December 22, 2018

Saturday Night Christmas Showcase: Christmas Eve On Sesame Street

Yesterday’s post about The Night Before Christmas On Sesame Street got me thinking of the Christmas album it came from, which I have somewhere around here. Then it got me thinking of the Christmas special that some of those songs came from, and after taking a look around YouTube I found it. Christmas Eve On Sesame Street is a 1978 Christmas special that aired on PBS, not to be confused with a CBS special that wasn’t as good. This one lacks the spelling and counting lessons but the comedy and stories they had back then are still intact. In fact one of them inspired my Jake & Leon Christmas special from many years back. I of course added it to my new Christmas special playlist.

Some of you younger readers who grew up with Sesame Street may not recognize some of the human cast. Gordon, his wife Susan, music teacher Bob, the then couple of David and Maria, Bob’s deaf girlfriend Linda (played by an actress who is actually deaf), and Mr. Hooper, who holds a strong place in the show’s history. When actor Will Lee passed away, The show made the rather balsy move (for a kids show) of having Mr. Hooper die as well, to help kids who may also have trouble coping with the death of a loved one at such a young age. I’m not sure how many of the others are left due to the new format giving the humans little to do when they’re on-camera, but I know the cast has changed over the years.

In the story Oscar tells Big Bird and his friend Abby that Santa Claus can’t possibly fit down the skinny New York chimneys and if he can’t there won’t be any presents this year. This panics Big Bird and while his friends help he has his own solution that could make an un-merry Christmas for everyone on Sesame Street. Even Oscar. There are also various hi-jinks with the characters at the skating rink, Cookie Monster trying to get a letter to Santa, and the aforementioned story with Bert and Ernie. Enjoy!

Continue reading →

Posted by on December 22, 2018 in Christmas Spotlight, Saturday Night Showcase, Television Spotlight and tagged , , , .

Leave a comment

December 22, 2018

“Yesterday’s” Comic> Superman Adventures #41

See, Superman has limits. Once he hits that 23rd story, he also hits wall.

Superman Adventures #41

DC Comics (March, 2000)

WRITER: Mark Millar

PENCILERS: Ty Templeton, Joe Staton, Neil D. Vokes, Bret Blevins, Min S. Ku, Cameron Stewart, Mike Manley, Craig Rosseau, Rick Burchett, Darwyn Cooke, Aluir Amancio, & Philip Bond

INKER: Terry Austin

COLORIST: Marie Severin

SEPARATIONS: Zylonol

LETTERER: Phil Felix

EDITOR: Mike McAvennie

Continue reading →

Posted by on December 22, 2018 in Animation Spotlight, DC Spotlight, Television Spotlight, Yesterday's Comics and tagged , , , .

1 Comment