As I scanned over Mike’s review of Michael Bay’s new — for lack of a better term — “film,” I lingered on his opening statement: “I am determined to give a straight up review of this film.” To him I ask, “Why?” Why should we treat this movie with a respect it never shows us? Well, I shan’t begrudge Mike for his effort, as I gave a stab at writing a serious(-ish) review for my school paper, an expanded version of which can be found on my blog here (shameless!). I suppose I should have been better prepared for this: I by no means loathed the first Transformers, but I was certainly bored stiff by its over-complicated yet skin deep plot, its wooden acting and confusing mish-mash of fighting robots indiscernible from one another. It favored its juvenile humor too much and the animation needed to be clearer, but there was conceivably a decent popcorn flick deep inside that, and guiding hands like executive producer Steven Spielberg could bring out the positive aspects buried within. Now, imagine the absolute opposite of that, and you’ve got this mess.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is a film whose most ardent admirers — of whom there is a tragically high number — insist should be accepted for what it is, not some trumped up wannabe critic’s notion of what is should have been. What they fail to grasp is that people like me and the vast majority of honest-to-goodness critics who are paid for their work did accept this movie for what it was: a piece of shit.

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Bullseye gets a Hawkeye mini, and Ms. Marvel’s title has been taken over by Moonstone. Ares is conquering various books and has his own three issue Dark Avengers tie-in on the way. Hell, even Wolverine Jr is series-jacking one of his old man’s titles.

the sinister spider-crotch

In all these offshoots, the titular hero saves the mission, if not the day, and makes the other Dark Avengers who show up in that scene look like chumps.

But what about poor ol’ Mac Gargan, aka Venom? He doesn’t have any beef with the jerks he works with; all he wants to do is punch who he’s told to punch and maybe do a little good in the world. Sure, maybe get the girl. Maybe show some people that you can’t keep a good Gargan down.

Maybe eat your face.

I’ve been too busy getting bingo on my celebrity death pools to watch the recent solicits, so Sinister Spider-Man #1 was a welcome surprise. Chris Bachalo’s cover really does drag your face in and nibble on it quit a bit. Once inside, it’s mean and fun mean and whispers creepy promises of fast, modern, pulpy goodness.

The first issue delivers the goods while still setting us up for the rest of the four-issue run. This oh-so-Sinister Spider-Man has all the set pieces of his Amazing counterpart – JJJ, Osborn, Six goons who are fairly Sinister in their own right, and lots and lots of girls.

Well, ok, skanks and whores. This is Mac Gargan, after all.
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I am determined to give a straight up review on this movie. I really am.

Tuesday night I went with a few friends to the midnight premiere in Grand Rapids, MI, of Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. We arrived around 11:15pm and managed to find four seats for all of us. Immediately I remembered why I hate the general public: non-stop douche-baggery for 45 minutes until the previews started, and then of the 560 people (not including myself and my three buddies) could not shut up even into the previews and through the movie. This is a major annoyance for me, but the atmosphere isn’t really the point here.

Coming into this movie, I had just watched the first Transformers movie about 8 hours before because I hadn’t actually sat down and purposely watched it in the past given my extreme disgust with Michael Bay. So, I had the plot in my head: Megatron was beaten, Shia LeBeouf proved he can scream a lot, there was a yellow Camero Transformer (Bumble Bee) that was pretty cool, and Optimus Prime was a totally awesome dude.

The movie began… and I cried. (spoilers abound)

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What’s Going On Here? Mr. Incredible has lost his powers, and nobody has a clue as to how it happened.

The Incredibles is, without a doubt, my favorite superhero movie of all time. It was easily a better Fantastic Four movie than either of the official Fantastic Four films. I was clamoring for a monthly comic that followed the exploits of the Parr family the minute I left the theatre.

5 years later, my wish was granted.

Licensed comics based on movies, cartoons, and TV shows can be a tricky proposition. Sometimes, they are just plain terrible (most of Marvel’s Star Comics line comes to mind). Sometimes, they are wonderfully subversive (Evan Dorkin got away with murder in his Bill & Ted comics). Other times, they stay on-model and competently work within an already established mythology. This comic has been an example of the latter. Writer Mark Waid (establishing yet another link between the Parr Family and Marvel’s First Family) and artist Marcio Takara are not trying to break new ground here, and that’s perfectly okay. The characters and setting established by Brad Bird and company in the film are absolutely perfect, and Waid and Takara treat the source material with the respect it deserves. Waid’s dialogue is consitent with the personalities as seen in the film. The new characters designed by Takara do not look out of place at all. And considering that PIXAR is giving us a sequel to Cars before producing a sequel to the studio’s second-highest grossing film, merely revisiting the heroes of Metroville is good enough for me.

Recommended for: Anyone who ejoyed the movie, Fantastic Four fans.

Short Pants No More!

For the past few years, the issues of Detective Comics written by Paul Dini were at the top of my “to read” pile the Wednesday they came out. Gritty, snarky, and new-reader friendly, Detective was everything that a comic book should be. As his run continued, he did have to accommodate the occasional editorially-mandated crossover (such as “The Resurrection of Ras Al Ghul”), but immediately returned to his previous “done in one” method of storytelling. During the “Batman R.I.P.” event, he had written the uncharacteristically long 5-part “Heart of Hush” arc, which I would have liked a lot more had it been two issues shorter and about anyone but Hush, a character that I have little to no interest in. Then the Bat-Titles took a break, in order to get back on schedule.
Anyway, despite shaking the Batman titles to their very foundation, DC decided to keep Dini and Grant Morrison around to write the adventures of the new Dynamic Duo. Can Dini get great stories out of Dick Grayson like he did out of Bruce Wayne?
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Oracle: Search for the Cure #1-3

Written: Kevin VanHook
Art: Don Kramer and Jay Leisten(1,2); Julian Lopez and Bit(3)

Issue 1

Cover: Guillem March

I’m not sure this is so much of a review as it is a rant.  The last issue of Birds of Prey saw Barbara Gordon leaving the team to take care of some personal business.  This personal business leads her to Gotham City and, conveniently, her part in The Battle for the Cowl.  Needless to say it seems that DC is also intent on taking a once brilliantly written character down a few notches, both in quality and characterization.  Only time will tell if the character will spiral further into cliche or once again rise to the status she once held.

If you are like me you’ve likely picked up a series or two not because they were great, but because you felt the need to have a complete collection.  I slogged through these issues because of that obsessive compulsive need and I’m here to try and talk you out of doing the same.  If you are curious about the story and want to pick it up: don’t.  If I can’t convince you to do that, at least try the following:

1.  Wait until the trade paperback.
2.  Let someone else buy it, read it, and then immediately take it back to sell used, probably swearing all the way.
3.  Pick up the copied used, after it has been reduced to a ridiculously low price and consigned to the ultra-bargain bin.

All told that if there is any justice in the world you should only have to wait a week for all of that to happen.

Slightly spoilerific review below

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Batman and Robin #1 cover

I’m not a DC fanatic. Not one bit. I read JSA a bit and I keep up with summaries of major events from what I read online or hear from Nick, but other than that I don’t know much about the DC Universe. Despite all that I did what many new comic fans do: I picked up a #1 of a comic, in particular Batman and Robin.

Without giving away spoilers of Final Crisis (which I assume most people already know) I had an inkling as to what this series was going to be about, but never did I think I would like let alone thoroughly enjoy this issue. I couldn’t name one thing about this issue that felt off, and I barely understood half of the references to characters in the issue. It could be Grant Morrison’s writing mixed with Frank Quitely’s art, but hot diggity damn this issue was good.

More after the break. (some spoilers)

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Faster than a Speeding Recap: Superman has moved to New Krypton to keep tabs on General Zod. He has been drafted into the Kryptonian Military and serves directly under Zod. Naturally, this is the kind of thing that the Green Lanterns of Space Sector 2814 would want to investigate. So here they are…

Let it be noted here that 3 June 2009 was a great day for comics. Aside from the comic I’m about to review, it also saw the release of Batman & Robin #1 (off to a great start), War of Kings #4 (some truly epic space opera), Mighty Avengers #25 (where Reed Richards & Henry Pym argue about whose… brain is bigger), and Secret Six #10 (Why aren’t you reading this title?!?).  Even in some lofty company, this comic is still my pick of the week.

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This seems to be a recurring theme with me lately. Runaways #10 is another mid-series break with a couple of small, character building one-shot stories, and I’ve once again been charmed all to hell by the offering.

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We’re getting close to the monumental issue of #600 in the Amazing Spider-Man series and boy oh boy is this new arc, titled “American Son,” creating some great building blocks and also tieing Spider-Man into Marvel’s Dark Reign.

The thing about Dark Reign that is bugging me the most is how addictive it is. Seeing the bad guys doing bad things (primarily Norman Osborn) and getting away with it and having the good guys (ie. Ms. Marvel, the New Avengers, etc.) unable to do anything is like crack to me. I can’t get enough of the stuff. Chances are Brian Michael Bendis will cause me to overdose, but nevertheless, Spider-Man getting added to the mix perplexes me as I wait to see what the brilliant Joe Kelly writes up for this arc.

More after the break.

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