Monthly Archive: March 2014

Mike Gold: Who Is Peter Capaldi?

  • News
  • March 19, 2014

When Peter Capaldi was presented to us as the new lead in Doctor Who, a tiny bell dinged in the back of my brainpan. I recalled his appearance on Craig Ferguson’s show; he and Craig were in a couple punk rock bands in the 1980s and had remained very good friends. I thought that was amusing as Ferguson is a big Who fan – he’s had a TARDIS on his teevee desk for many years now.

Capaldi’s casting was praised from hither to yon, and initially I dismissed all that for typical showbiz “sincerity.” But this wave expanded and seemed genuine. Since I’ve had little I could do the past month or two outside of annoying my daughter (and I already was pretty good at that), I decided to track down some of his work and determine his worthiness for myself. (more…)

REVIEW: Cleopatra in Space

Cleopatra in Space: Target Practice
By Mike Maihack
169 pages, Scholastic Graphix, $12.99

cleo01_frontcover-e1395074030387-3389456The allure of Cleopatra VII has endured over the millennia and continues to be a source of fascination for people young and old. As a result, she is an easy subject to inject into novels, plays, and unfortunately, this graphic novel. What could have been a fun, interesting, character-driven fish out of water story became a by-the-numbers young adult graphic novel that bears no resemblance to the source.

Mike Maihack is a talent and clever storyteller and the art and color make the book a fun, if irritating, read. He has an open style that is expressive and a restrained color palette so you’re not overwhelmed. He’s been producing this as a webcomic since 2010 and the first cycle of stories is being collected by Scholastic’s Graphix imprint in April. A second volume is already promised for 2015 so they’re expecting great things.

Fifteen year old Cleopatra (or Cleo to her friends) is snatched from Egypt by a piece of technology that sends her far into the future where she has to attend an intergalactic school in order to fulfill her destiny of saving the universe. Her teacher Khensu, a talking cat, tries to mentor her, tempering her youthful exuberance and adolescent ways with exasperating results.

The future world is made up of species and races from around the galaxy, all of whom are looking to Cleo to save them from the Xerx War that threatens life as they know it. Additionally, they have no way of sending her home so she can fulfill her first destiny, to be the last great pharaoh of Egypt’s classic period.

History shows Cleopatra was fourteen when she was named co-regent with her father, Ptolemy XII, until his death when she was eighteen. So right here, the book makes little sense. Secondly, she arrives in the far future and at no point does she appear confused by the languages, the knowledge there is life beyond Earth, the technology, etc. Sher arrives, is assigned classes, and settles into dorm life where she is a slacker student but a deadly shot.

This is not the Cleopatra of history, the wily, tough leader who charmed two Roman leaders and oversaw her people after prolonged battle.  None of what we know of her personality is here, instead we’re given a modern day plucky teenager and we’ve seen that. We’ve seen the “savior” storyline, we’ve seen ti all before so plopping Cleopatra into this does nothing but trade on her name.

There is little explanation about why the organization that recruited her is acronymed .P.Y.R.A.M.I.D. or why there are Egyptian touches, such as her sphinx sky cycle, so far into the future on another world. Similarly, the Xerx is reminiscent of Xerxes, the Persian, conqueror of Greece as immortalized in 300 while their leader is Xarius Octavian (the surname being that of Caesar’s son who wound up with Egypt after Cleo killed herself).  The supporting cast is visually interesting but woefully under-utilized. What could have and should have been something different is a cookie-cutter approach to a young adult graphic novel, so it’s all the more disappointing that her 8-12 year old readers will know nothing of what the true Queen of the Nile was like.

The Point Radio: The Weather Channel’s New Morning Champion

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  • March 18, 2014

A morning TV show with news, sports and pop culture – on The Weather Channel? This week the network launched AMHQ and host Sam Champion tells us us what to expect in a different type of wake up show. Plus the Doctor Who family gets a new player and a deep freeze in comic store sales in February.

THE POINT covers it 24/7! Take us ANYWHERE on ANY mobile device (Apple or Android). Just  get the free app, iNet Radio in The  iTunes App store – and it’s FREE!  The Point Radio  – 24 hours a day of pop culture fun. GO HERE and LISTEN FREE  – and follow us on Twitter @ThePointRadio.

Michael Davis: Milestones at ComicMix

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  • March 18, 2014

I’ve been writing for ComicMix for the better part of almost 10 years.

I’ve been writing for Bleeding Cool for the better part of 10 months.

They are rival sites much in the way the Yankees and Mets are rivals, both play the same game but play it a completely different way.

Like the two powerhouse sites the history of the Yankees and Mets, their pedigree and reason for being are as vastly different as a crazy Right Wing Fanatic and a Tree Hugging Liberal.

I grew up hating the Yankees until that magical October in 1977.

That’s when I watched Mr. October, Reggie Jackson damn near all by himself SMOKE the hated L.A. Dodgers in game 7 of the World Series. I hated the Dodgers as a young kid in Queens, N.Y. I hate them still as a grown man in Los Angeles.

Why no love for the Dodgers?

Because my mom was a die-hard Brooklyn Dodger fan and when the ‘Bums’ left Brooklyn millions of fans left them, my mom being one of them.

Why the hatred for the Yankees before they bitch slapped the Dodgers?

The New York Metropolitans, a.k.a. the New York Mets, came along and won the hearts and minds of the lovesick fans of that team that must not be named. Hating the Yankees came as second nature if you rooted for the team from Brooklyn.

Becoming a Met fan gave your Yankee hate a new home.

Very, and I mean very, few people root for the Yankees and the Mets. I became one of the few when I watched Reggie Jackson hit three home runs on three pitches in that dreamlike World Series.

It was MAGIC— and just like that I was a die-hard Yankee fan.

In 2000 my beloved Mets and much-loved Yankees played each other in the World Series.

I rooted for the Mets. They were my first love and as much as I LOVE the Yankees I threw my alliance to the boys from Queens.

Very few people write for Bleeding Cool and ComicMix. ComicMix is my first love and what and how I write for CM is different than what I do on BC.

A few years ago I wrote a series of articles on Milestone for ComicMix.

A four part (maybe more I can’t recall) series which I thought (because I’m an idiot) would be the end all and be all to the millions of Milestones questions out there.

It wasn’t.

I’m writing another series but this time I’d like to answer questions fans want to know. As BC and CM are immeasurably different I’d like to open the forum to both sites because I’ll get greatly different questions I’m sure.

So-I’d like to know what you would like to know. I’ll try and cover as much as possible and unless it’s something I just can’t talk about I’ll give you the inside scoop. Feel free to present your theories, rumors any and all crazy shit you want to know about.

If you would like to know how I presented this at BC check out my article from last Friday, which I’m pretty sure, the good folks at ComicMix will post the link here.

I’m very interested what will come from each site and I’m sure if asked the right question I’m sure you will be interested in the answers.

Wow.

Will you look at that?

A well-written ( I think) informative and interesting article with nary a bad word or rant.

FUCK the Los Angeles Dodgers.

Ahhhhhhhh, that’s better.

Jen Krueger: Who Is The Most Intersting Character on “Shameless”?

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  • March 18, 2014

shameless-118-8090179

While certain aspects of Showtime’s [[[Shameless]]] have been hit or miss, there’s a character on it who’s had such a remarkable arc over the show’s four seasons that he’s become one of my favorite characters on TV. With a father who’s barely a father, and a poverty-stricken upbringing in a bad neighborhood in Chicago, he’s had to resort to violence and scheming to make ends meet. His romantic relationships are fraught with conflict because he’s never learned how to communicate well enough to tell someone he really cares, yet even if he could find the words to say how he feels, they’d still catch in his throat because showing vulnerability to anyone is so antithetical to what his life experiences have taught him it means to be a man. And while all of these things could probably also be said about one of the show’s protagonists, Lip Gallagher, I’m actually talking about Mickey Milkovich, who started off as one of the show’s tertiary characters.

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Box Office Democracy Review: “Veronica Mars”

In the interest of full disclosure, I should tell you that I backed the Veronica Mars movie on Kickstarter.  In addition to a myriad of cool perks this gave me, and thousands of other backers, access to regular updates on the process of making this movie, a level of access rather atypical today and totally unheard of a decade ago.  I watched this movie grow from a cool pipe dream to an actual thing that is actually playing in theaters.  This all adds up to a movie that I liked a great deal but am unable to assure myself that this affection is genuine, or is it more like the love a parent feels for their potentially mediocre child?

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Mindy Newell: Yiddishkeit

I miss bookstores.  Being able to walk up and down the aisles, pulling out a title that sounds intriguing, perusing the dust jacket flap, sometimes sitting down on the floor and reading the first couple of pages…just killing a couple of hours lost in a bibliophile’s heaven.

Okay, bookstores aren’t entirely gone, but they are, as everyone knows, on the endangered list.  My own first hint of this came about 15 years ago when the Borders in the Short Hills Mall closed up.  It was astonishing—this was a bookstore that was always mobbed, no matter the time of day.  Many, many people objected to the closing, and many, many people let the mall’s management know it; the customer service desk clerk told me, as I filled out the complaint form, that there were over 3,000 signatures in the first week alone protesting the shutdown, and demanding, if not the return of Borders, the opening of another book proprietor.  I thought, and I’m sure many others thought, that the store closed because the management had raised its rent beyond what Borders was willing to pay.  But now I think that I witnessed the beginning of the end.  I knew for sure that bookstores were about to go the way of the dodo bird when I drove over to Hoboken one Sunday morning a few years ago to spend a few hours in the Barnes & Noble there to find that it was gone; I remember being shocked (“Holy shit!” I said out loud) because not only is that particular store is in a city with a university (Stevens Institute of Technology), but it is also home to the sort of population that publishers love and book stores crave—well-educated and upscale and readers.

I bring this up because I recently bought a book on Amazon that whetted my appetite, especially because it is the last work of the late, great Harvey Pekar, who was one of its editors.  That book is [[[Yiddishkeit: Jewish Vernacular & The New Land]]].  According to the blurb on Amazon, which is lifted from the front flap of the book’s dust jacket:

Yiddish is everywhere.  We hear words like nosh, schlep, and schmutz all the time, but how did they come to pepper American English, and how do we intuitively know their meaning?

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Mix March Madness 2014 Webcomics Tournament Round 1! Vote Now!

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  • March 16, 2014

UPDATE: Round 1 voting is over. Vote in Round 2 now!

The people have spoken, and the brackets are ready for the Mix March Madness 2014 Webcomics Tournament!

Thanks to the thousands of people who voted in the seeding process, as well as all of you who added your favorite webcomics to the list. We’re adding all of the webcomics you suggested to our directory.

But now, the challenges start!

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John Ostrander: Up Against the Waller

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  • March 16, 2014

It’s always interesting to see your children grow up. In my case I don’t have any flesh and blood children; I have the offspring of my imagination, of my heart and mind – the characters I’ve created in my stories, especially in my comics. By growing up, I mean seeing them in other media. And occasionally their sending money home.

In that regard, the most grown up of my offspring is, without a doubt, Amanda Waller, a.k.a. the Wall. She first appeared in the DC miniseries Legends but was created for my version of the Suicide Squad. For those of you who don’t know, the Suicide Squad was a covert team that Waller put together using jailed supervillains. They were sent on secret missions pursuing American governmental objectives and, if they succeeded and survived, they were set free or had their time significantly reduced. If they died – no loss. If they failed or were uncovered, they could be easily disavowed – hey, they were bad guys doing bad guy things.

Waller created this version of the Squad and was herself created to do that in the DCU. Len Wein and John Byrne are credited as co-creators since she first appeared in Legends but Amanda originated with me. (The same way that Tim Truman is, rightly, co-credited as GrimJack’s creator although the character also originated with me.) As conceived, Waller was middle-aged, black, heavy set, on the short side, and with no super-powers; just an iron will and a terminal bad attitude which is why her nickname is “the Wall”. I’ve always said that some aspect of the characters we write exist within us; it’s been pointed out to me that would mean that I have an angry middle aged black woman inside of me. Maybe I’m just channeling Tyler Perry.

She’s also one of my favorite characters to write; actually, I don’t so much write her as just take dictation and pay attention to where she wants to go. She gets the job done and doesn’t care what she has to do along the way; she is morally a gray character by design. Some think of her as an anti-hero; the site IGN listed as her 60th Greatest Comic Book Villain of all time. For my view, she’s not a villain but she is deeply flawed. Just the way I like my characters.

Waller has appeared all over the place – in video games, in animated series (Justice League Unlimited as one example), animated movies, television shows, and movies. I find seeing the different variations of her interesting and gratifying, especially financially. I have what is called “participation” with Amanda; DC licenses her out and I get a taste of the money that comes in because she was an original character. I don’t have the same deal with the Squad itself; there was an earlier version. Amanda, bless her, sends some money home every now and then.

Both Amanda’s appearance on Arrow and in the New 52 DC Universe is changed; rather than older, stouter, and shorter, she’s now model thin and young and, well, sexy. I’ve always thought of Amanda as many things but “sexy” was not one of them.

I don’t control what happens with Waller or where she goes or how she looks; she is owned by DC Entertainment and Warners. I knew that going in. She is their property. That said, I think the changes made in her appearance are misguided. There were and are reasons why she looked the way she did. I wanted her to seem formidable and visually unlike anyone else out there. Making her young and svelte and sexy loses that. She becomes more like everyone else. She lost part of what made her unique.

Still, I look forward to the Squad episode of Arrow and not only because of the eventual check that it will bring in. It’s interesting to see how your children turn out and to see how much of you is in them whether they are flesh and blood or just the children of your imagination.

Marc Alan Fishman: 2014—A Comic Odyssey

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  • March 15, 2014

Each year Unshaven Comics has been around, we’ve declared a goal to meet. At first, the goal was simple: make a comic, and sell it at “the con”. Done. The following year? “Sell more books than we did last year.” Checkity-Check. To be fair, this has remained a sub-goal every year thereafter. In 2013, our goal was to attend literally as many conventions as we could possibly get into, and sell as much merchandise so-as to afford a trip to the glorious Valhalla of conventions, San Diego Comic-Con. Suffice to say, had we emptied out all our coffers? We would have succeeded. But, spoiler alert: We didn’t get accepted as artists for the alley at SDCC. So, we’ve wiped the tears away, and looked towards 2014. As suggested to me by Joe Olmsted, who I’ll actually talk about here in a just a bit, I’d like to share with you the conventions Unshaven Comics will be attending this year… and why we chose them.

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