News is not good today for the creators of the Marvel Universe. Steve Ditko passed away over the weekend and Stan Lee is reportedly ready to join him after mistreatment by his manager and being estranged from his daughter. What is even the hell?
It’s been so humid and hot this week that even with air conditioning the studio has been useless to me. I was lucky to get articles done at night. That’s why I didn’t get to work on the Worldbuilding Project, why this week’s Clutter Report wasn’t much of a report, and part of the reason I couldn’t get a comic up this week. The other part is EVERYTHING WANTED TO UPDATE OR NOT WORK RIGHT TODAY! Technology is great when it works. I’m rather pissed off about the whole thing, but it’s that kind of pissed off where trying to make me feel better is just going to make me angrier. Nothing you can say will help the situation so it’s best to just let me get over it on my own. To paraphrase a certain Time Lord “that just the kind of ShadowWing I am”.
So I could either toss together a last-minute crap comic or work on tomorrow’s articles since I’ll be busy tomorrow. All I’ll say is I’m starting to think teeth are overrated and I want this nonsense to be done so I can get on with my life. That won’t happen tomorrow. Again, just let me get over it on my own. I also have the first of the 90s DC “Secret Files And Origins” comics which as I’ll explain in my review has some comic stories but there’s a bunch of other stuff that demands extra time to go over and review. But now that Mega Morphs is done I need a new comic for Wednesdays and I have one. While I’ve reviewed all the IDW versions I have not review the Marvel US period of Doctor Who, so I’ll be starting this week with the short appearance in Marvel’s anthology Marvel Premiere. (Longtime readers may remember that I reviewed the issue debuted Dominic Fortune which also featured a pre-Life Model Decoy Dum Dum Dugan.) There were a few stories there, reprinting the UK comics to see if there was a market for it. There must have been because a 21 issue reprint run followed after.
As for the main articles…I don’t know. Given what’s happened I don’t even want to guess besides continuing the Chapter By Chapter review and BW’s Best Friday Night Fights, which I think will end this week or next. Yes I know what I’m doing next, no I’m not telling you. This week will hopefully be better than last so maybe I’ll even try to complete the Worldbuilding Project, but don’t expect it. I’m in that kind of mood and I’m just hoping for a better week.
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Some time ago I showcased Thunderbirds 2086 but I’ve never shown the original, and somebody out there might not have seen it. So let’s fix that tonight courtesy of Shout Factory’s YouTube channel.
In case you haven’t heard of it, Thunderbirds was UK based science fiction show created by Gerry Anderson. Instead of live-action or animation Anderson and his crew used a process dubbed “Supermarionation“, utilizing special marionettes as well as sets, miniatures, and the occasional human hand when necessary. Set in the year 2065, the show follows the Tracey family, who use advanced technology (including the title vehicles, the Thunderbirds) to form the emergency response team International Rescue. So advanced is this gear that bad guys occasionally try to swipe their secrets, like in tonight’s episode. It’s their first mission, involving a superfast airplane which their primary foe, the Hood, sabotages in hopes of drawing out International Rescue and taking images of their advanced aircraft. Are they prepared for their first rescue and their first threat?
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I see the brony wars haven’t changed lately.
Batman: Gotham Adventures #15
DC Comics (August, 1999)
“Cash ‘N The Hood!”
WRITER: Scott Peterson
PENCILER: Tim Levins
INKER: Rob Leigh
COLORIST: Lee Loughridge
LETTERER: Tim Harkins
ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Joseph Illidge
EDITOR: Darren Vincenzo
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Part 1|Part 2|Part 3|Part 4|Part 5|Part 6|Part 7|Part 8
We’re getting to the end of this tribute to the Friday Night Fights and the favorite entries I pulled from my comic collection. You know how sometimes these turn out to last longer than I thought? (Like that Seduction Of The Innocent debacle.) Well, this qualifies. I don’t want the pages to be too long and I keep an eye on the page count. However, it’s taken eight parts just to get from 2008 (when I started) to 2015. (BW Media Spotlight’s 10th anniversary is in November 2018.) Sometimes I forget how long I’ve been doing this considering it’s the longest project I’ve worked on outside of my last job.
The boxers celebrated in this next set of fights by Master Of Ceremonies Spacebooger includes the other fictional boxer in superhero comics, Ted “Wildcat” Grant, and real life boxers James Nathaniel Toney and James Joseph Tunney. I missed a good chunk of this one because it bleeds in to 2016, that month I lost my mom and this wasn’t that important. But when I was on I did pretty good.
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“Hey, check out that…pizza place down the street. I’m starved!”
Robotech: Return To Macross #19
Academy Comics Ltd (March, 1995)
“Sorry I Missed You”
WRITER: Robert W. Gibson
ARTIST/LETTERER: Sean Bishop
It’s amazing how small the creative team was on these comics.
Also, notice that we have black text on the nighttime sky for the issue number. I was right, this is a trend this week.
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It’s rare to see one of my articles used as a reference source but this was quite an honor. Specifically my article on Albegas, the Voltron that was left behind. (Here’s a link to my article if you’re curious.) The article is question goes into the history of Power Rangers, Voltron, giant robots, and even Gatchaman (Battle Of The Planets or G-Force to my generation) to see how Voltron ties to Power Rangers. It ends up being about the history of Super Sentai and the Giant Robot anime craze of the 1970s (or 1980s here in the US).
