Rant-Reviews: Monsters and Magic

Scary Spells and Mighty Monsters!

Putting aside the current monster in the White House who is oh-too-real, we as human beings often get excited reading about scary beasts, aliens, and the like. A good yarn about magic-spells can be a fun time too. I've read a number of comics that involve magic or horrific monsters and thought I would discuss them in a review-post. Shall we?

Comics with Creatures (and Magic)

Monsters Unleashed #1
This issue was gorgeously illustrated by the talented Steve McNiven and has some solid writing from Cullen Bunn, but it was annoying in that despite being bigger than a normal comic and costing $4.99 I feel less happened than in most cheaper books. It legitimately feels like they took what could have been less than half of a regular comic plot-wise and stretched it out to pad everything. Page after page features monsters falling to Earth on what look like shooting-stars and then getting into fights with heroes located in various places. This repeats over a bunch of gorgeous full-page spreads repeatedly. Seriously, again and again we witness some heroes saying they are going to fight a big monster, see this big monster get fought, rinse and repeat.

I'm not even too upset that so little happens, because McNiven is an incredible artist. The thing is though, he ain't illustrating this whole mini-series (that now will apparently then be followed-up on with an ongoing book). Next issue we get Greg Land's hack-work, and then some better folk come in differing issues. Therefore, this issue looks great, but besides monsters falling to Earth almost nothing else happens other than it being hinted a young boy drawing monsters is somehow, "Summoning," them. That's it though, a kid drawing and monsters falling to Earth, for $4.99. If this book didn't look great I would have felt incredibly ripped-off. As it is now, I just feel underwhelmed and will probably wait to read any other issues until they are collected in trade.
2 out of 5 stars.

Curse Words #1

Charles Soule has written great stuff and Ryan Browne is a talented artist, so it shouldn't come as any surprise that this first issue of, "Curse Words," is some delightful stuff. As a first issue this lays the groundwork for our world, making it clear an evil wizard came to this dimension with orders to destroy it, discovered he actually kind of liked it here, and chose to portray himself as a magical hero. We see these moments in flashbacks as well as the Wizard beginning to face struggles in the modern day as it becomes clear his evil past is coming back to haunt him. This makes things sound very dramatic, and the book has some harsh moments, but actually is loaded with humor as well. I mean, it opens with a rapper who literally wants to be platinum as opposed to just having his records go platinum--that is a good example of the zany nature of this book. I can't wait for the next issue!
5 out of 5 stars.

Die Kitty, Die! #4

The temporary conclusion of Kitty's story occurs in this issue, before another mini-series launches in a few months featuring her. This book, featuring writing and artwork by Dan Parent, has been highly enjoyable. Parent of course created Kevin Keller and has written a number of, "Archie," comics, but this book is all his own and features a somewhat more, "Mature," take on the concept of comic characters (more swearing and implied sex for sure than in the all-ages Archie stuff Parent has done). You see, Kitty is a real-life witch who also has a company that makes comics about her. They decide to try and kill her for real so they can sell a bunch of comic-book issues. This results in a book that is both meta in its examples of faux-historic stories, commentary on the nature of the comic-book industry, and features a number of great jokes. Sometimes the book can get a little too wrapped-up in itself, getting so busy telling in-jokes and winking at the reader it puts the actual story on a back-burner, but for the most part I really liked reading about Kitty and the evil comic-company out to put an end to her.
4.5 out of 5 stars.

Dollface #1

Dan Mendoza created the cult-comic, "Zombie Tramp," which isn't hugely popular, but has a highly-active base of fans who adore it and continue to buy issues as they come out. In an effort to make more money/further please fans he now brings us the somewhat-related, "Dollface," which features the Zombie Tramp as a supporting character but also has a cast all its own. This big introductory issue starts explaining where Dollface came from (she basically was going to be a realistic sex-doll), but leaves a lot of unanswered questions about how she acquired a soul, became equipped with a ton of weaponry, and why she has a desire to hunt witches.

If you like Zombie Tramp comics you know what you're going to get here too--exciting fighting scenes and a lot of T&A from large-breasted characters such as the Zombie Tramp and Dollface. It's nothing too thought-inducing but it is some good-natured fun. As someone who doesn't mind a good guilty-pleasure comic I can see the appeal of this comic and the, "Zombie Tramp," book it draws from.
4 out of 5 stars.

God Country #1
I've loved other works by Donny Cates and Geoff Shaw such as, "Buzzkill," and found, "The Paybacks," was quirky fun as well. Therefore, I was excited to read their first book being done with Image comics which has already gotten a lot of buzz and--thanks to selling-out due to all the buzz--is currently fetching a pretty-penny on eBay and other sites. Therefore, I had high-hopes for this comic and found that Geoff Shaw's artwork was amazing (as I presumed it would be) and Donny Cates sets-up some interesting story-beats, but as this is a first issue a whole lot scene-setting has to occur before things get interesting. When things do get interesting toward the end of the issue however I found my interest quite piqued. An old man gets a magic sword that used to belong to a God, fights a demon, and what at first seems like a quiet tale of a family struggling with an aged Father with Alzheimer's becomes an epic fantasy-yarn. It's strange, and I like it a lot. It just takes it a bit to get going, so I'm hopeful the 2nd issue keeps the momentum up!
4 out of 5 stars.

Moon Knight #10
I of course made it clear I've been loving, "Moon Knight," in my posts discussing the best stuff of 2016. This issue unfortunately dragged a bit for me, delving further into a concept that Marc Spector always suffered from some kind of identity disorder from childhood-on as opposed to past comics that gave more of an impression that these other identities were aliases Spector created in his fight against crime that grew into their own personalities. I mean, depending on who is writing the books it always has been a question of if Spector is in fact, "Pretending," to be other people, literally somehow, "Becoming," someone else, or if he is simply suffering from a personality disorder. With this issue focusing a good deal on Spector's childhood, giving us a story-line that Spector may quite possibly have a mental illness both provides opportunities for the book--e.g. exploring ideas of mental illness without stigmatizing it or simply writing it off as, "Being crazy,"--and can be a potential liability--e.g. it closes off other story-possibilities or can be offensive if done poorly.

Throughout the book so far it has felt more like an epic story is being told as opposed to individual story-arcs. I've loved it and hope this discussion of Spector's childhood ends-up helping the story instead of harming it. So far every issue has helped add to the Moon Knight mythos and this is the first to make me worry something might be subtracted, if that makes sense. For now I'll just need to wait and see where the book continues to go and hope it works out as superbly as everything else has so far.
3 out of 5 stars.

Closing the (Spell)book For Now
That was an interesting assortment of comics about monstrous and magical beings. I hope you found reading my thoughts about them interesting and that maybe I inspired you to check-out some books.

Things That I Found Interesting AKA Some Links to Inspect

What's up? Nothing much? Well, I've seen various things that I find pretty interesting and it makes sense for me to share some of those things with you!

Stuff to Read

Popular website Salon shares its thoughts on how CNN and its constant-stream of "news" about little more than disasters that fill air-time (such as the channel's obsession with the missing flight MH370) represents a missed opportunity to actually broadcast, you know, insightful news.

Caleb on "Everyday is Like Wednesday" always says what many of us are thinking when he reviews the Previews section of Marvel or DC, with this latest edition about Marvel's new solicits being as funny and clever as ever.

The story about the old E.T. Atari game selling so poorly that countless copies were buried in the Nevada desert was often thought by many to be little more than a urban legend. Well, the myth has recently been proven to in fact be true, with plenty of photos from an excavation showing that, incredibly, copies of the game really were/are out there under a bunch of sand and dirt.

I'm always fascinated by pictures of areas that were abandoned for one reason or another--seeing how nature has reclaimed an area otherwise frozen in time results in incredible images that also stimulate thought. The area impacted by the Chernobyl disaster is a popular example, but this article about Brother Island, located incredibly close to the extremely-populated New York City, shows that sometimes fascinatingly humanless areas are closer than we realize.

Coming to a movie theater near you soon!
Okay, maybe in four or five years.

I and everyone else have given DC a good ribbing for not appearing to have a solid plan for how to do their movies, but the recent announcement of a "Justice League" movie to come out quite soon after "Batman Versus Superman" along with other films maybe not in that super-hero Universe (such as popular Vertigo titles "100 Bullets" and "Fables") show that maybe the company has somewhat of a clue what they're doing...maybe.

I'm not sure I fully agree with the thinking in this article  that in the near-future movies will only be in theaters for three weeks before becoming available for home consumption, but the part proposing that depending on how people choose to stream their digitally-rented movies they may cost different amounts did capture my attention. Will we see a time where if you digitally rent a flick on a smart-phone it'll cost less than if you get it on your big-screen TV in a super-high resolution? What about people who download a movie to their handheld device and then just hook it up to a television, how will that be addressed? There are lots of things to ponder, as I think that could in fact become a trend.

I've read reviews of the new "Elder Scrolls Online Game" that range from slightly-positive to a bit more negative, but it seems everyone agrees that the game just doesn't measure up to the feeling of wonderment players would get in past Elder Scrolls entires. It interestingly seems the main culprit behind this lack of enjoyment is how through making this game an MMORPG (Massively Multiplier Online Role-Playing Game), the presence of all the other players ruins your feeling of being special, with that not being fully countered by the possibilities multi-player offers to enhance the game.

In case you had any doubt lately, Sarah Palin continues to be a moron.

I enjoyed the Paul Cornell-written solo-Wolverine series, but dropped it after the first issue of its recent re-launch (the whole "Wolverine is a villain now" thing just didn't get me pumped). Still, when I heard that the long-rumored death of Wolverine would be occurring I--and others, it seems--were surprised to hear that Cornell wasn't writing it, but instead Charles Soule was. This interesting article on Bleeding Cool helps explain why things turned out the way they did. With my talking about how I'm stricken with eventitis I of course won't be reading the series, but I'll stay up-to-date on what happens.

I found this article by The Atlantic about the lack of respect adjunct (non-tenured) professors receive extremely insightful. People don't realize that before you get tenure how teaching at a college or university can be a Hell of long hours, low-pay and even lower-respect from other professors and the college administration.

Lastly, try and follow my thinking here: Comics are magnificent, so therefore the latest upcoming Free Comic Book Day will also be magnificent. In addition, "Reading Rainbow" was awesome, and therefore LeVar Burton is awesome. This makes it so that LeVar Burton endorsing comics and Free Comic Book Day is something that is magnificently awesome. Don't question my logic, you know it is sound.

What's Happening In the World? Let's Use Links to Find Out!

Before I head off to the Wizard World Saint Louis convention today I thought I would share various interesting links or news stories that I feel are worth noting.

So, What is Happening?

Wow, Entertainment Weekly is definitely experiencing a fall from grace. First they cause a hubub with saying they want people to write for them for free, and then they lay-off a bunch of their paid employees as if to double-down on this, "Hey, write stuff for us and we won't pay you" plan they have. Now, I've done some writing for entities that paid me and entities that did not, but if I've done it for a place that lacked payment it was for a solid reason. Namely, they were too broke to pay for a guest article just as I would be too broke to pay any guest writer. If you're Entertainment Weekly however, I would imagine you should have enough scratch to pay people.

Marvel has tentatively planned out their movies into 2028. That is some long-range thinking. Meanwhile, DC announced this week that they might get a "Justice League" movie out sometime in the future, adding, "Maybe, who knows? We really have no clue what we're doing here."

You mean it "Begins Here...After Quite The Delay!"

Speaking of Marvel and planning, I kind of want to pick-up the first issue of "Inhuman" not just to read the comic, but also to see if it is a bit messy due to how Matt Fraction was on the book, left it, and then Charles Soule took over as writer and had to make due with some things that were already done while adding his own new stuff to what I assume was at least a partly-finished first-issue.

Our nation freaks out when someone foreign who identifies as Muslim is arrested for a terrorist plot, no matter how outlandish it is. Yet, as is pointed out here, when a  native-to-America and Christian extremist with a quite implementable plan is caught, it gets little-to-no attention. Is this down to some kind of xenophobia, fear of other religions, or what?

This show was/still is awesome.

This article about the old mature-viewers cartoon "Home Movies" really took me back to in the day when I would watch the show. True, I was catching reruns as the program had stopped making new episodes when I would watch in the mid-2000s, but that didn't make it any less of a quality program. It's absurd nature, snarky tone, and otherwise hilarious jokes make it quite the treasure.

The Fort Hood shooting incident is tragic and shows how Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (which the shooter was being treated for) is nothing to ignore or be too proud to discuss. Mental illness is still so stigmatized and can result in those needing help not always getting it. The odd thing is that the shooter had never seen combat, so was it truly PTSD or some other mental illness? That seems to be the question some in the media are asking.

To answer this question, no. No, I do not. Ever.

In-app purchases are something I generally despise. They also can be quite predatory and target children who don't realize they are spending real money for all those in-game goodies. This article breaks that whole issue down quite thoroughly.

Major League Baseball player Daniel Murphy took some brief time out from his career to spend time with his wife as she gave birth, and then be with her and their new child. Apparently there are people out there who find this outrageous and said things as stupid as that Murphy's wife should have had an elective C-Section so that her pregnancy wouldn't have "interfered" with Baseball season. Adding a child to your household, be it through birth or adoption is one of the bigger life events a person can experience, so I think Murphy was fully in the right to take some time to enjoy this major occasion. I say to all the men mad at him that they should skip their partner's next birth or not be present for an adoption and see how they feel then.

Even today the earlier Sonic games holdup well. 

This piece asks if Sonic The Hedgehog maybe never was as cool as we remember him being. I would say that I enjoyed Sonic's games back on the old Sega Genesis/Master System (it had different names in different countries) enough to conclude that he was indeed cool once, but yeah, he ain't that hip now.

The upcoming live-action "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles" movie sounds more and more like it might be an unholy mess.

"Yeah, odds are my new game is going to be awesome."

The new Batman "Arkham Knight" game from Rocksteady (the team behind "Aslyum" and "City") looks like it will be incredibly cool and finish out the trilogy of "Arkham" games wonderfully ("Origins" doesn't count as it was a different developer than Rocksteady and clearly a cash-grab in hindsight with this game's announcement). Plus, you finally get to drive the Batmobile, how sweet is that? Now if only DC could give us an awesome Justice League game (besides "Lego Batman 2"), then we would be all set.

David Letterman announced yesterday he is going to be retiring from his late-night show in 2015. With Leno gone too (for real this time) this kind of brings an end to an era of the late-night wars. I would say a new war is brewing though with all the current shows. Between Fallon, Kimmel, Arsenio (yes, he's back), Conan, and Colbert all over-lapping to some degree that is a lot of folk, and that's without even talking about the even-later-in-the-night guys. Then I hear rumors that Kevin Smith may be getting a late-night show on AMC and I think that something has gotta give.

Lastly, I've discussed my concerns with the CGC before and articles such as this don't inspire more confidence.

That's What is Happening.
That's a variety of stuff I found interesting enough to share with you, my dear readers. I'm off now to Wizard World Saint Louis and plan to see the new Captain America movie tonight, so expect things to be written about both sooner than later!